Monday was a busy day! It started in the chapel at 7:45am as Bob had mentioned. The chapel was on the ground floor of the hospital and was fairly big. It reminded me of a shorter Catholic mass with some singing, scripture reading, and the priest ‘teaching’. During the mass we were introduced (along with the Swedish nurses) as new intern doctors for the month. The chapel was filled with medical interns (white coat + khaki pants), medical students (all white), and nursing students (pink sweaters + pink skirts). Everyone welcomed us- ‘karibuni’ and then they clapped in unison as a gesture of acceptance. Near the end of the mass the choir had a performance. It was beautiful. I had tears in my eyes it was so beautiful. It was a great start to the day. In the future (I asked Bob if it was ok) I will videotape some of the songs during the masses.
After mass, we headed to the head directors office (who was on annual leave) to sit down with Mr. Mushi (the head nurse and medical school coordinator) and a few other people who ran the place. We don’t have a set schedule, and they know we might want to climb Kilimanjaro during this time too, so they are leaving things very flexible. It was mainly an informal meeting to start things off with some coffee and tea. ‘Pole pole’ is a term used hear that translates to ‘slowly, slowly’---which is exactly how everything is run here (it sometimes reminds me of Poland). Everything takes a great deal of time to do. When you sit down for an informal meeting it can last 2 hours and you get nothing accomplished. Or you are told to go to someone’s office and by the time they show up or give you their time an hour has passed. It is just something to get used to. We run on African time here…..pole pole….
Eventually we were given an orientation of the place. The hospital is considered the second largest in Tanzania but it doesn’t even have a CT scanner. It has the following departments: Orthopedics (with its own separate OR—there are a ridiculous amount of road accidents here!), General surgical ward + OR, Male and female medical wards, labor and delivery ward, HIV clinic, palliative and hospice care, dentist, radiology (x-rays and ultrasound) and general triage area that sorts everyone. There is also a make shift Emergency Room after hours, however, no ambulance exists. Doctors do call but it is very ‘pole, pole’ compared to western standards, which can be expected if there are no ambulances. There is no psychiatric department, but there is one in Moshi (about 30km away) and we will be allowed to check it out at some point. Otherwise, we will be seeing some of the hospice/palliative work this week as well as possibly the internal medicine/triage area…
We ended the orientation at the Labor and Delivery ward, where there was a 1 week old baby who’s mother had died during childbirth (she had uncontrolled diabetes and hypertension). The next step for the baby was to go to the orphanage down the street or for his grandmother to take care of him. We were told that usually in these situations they would put the baby in the orphanage for 2 years and then give it back to someone in the family when they were better able and prepared to take care of it. I hope to check out the orphanage soon too…..I heard very good things about it.
After orientation we went to the canteen area where they serve lunch and dinner. Both meals tend to be the same, and every day the meal tends to be the same: rice + beans + meat. Very bland, flavorless, boring. However, cheap and hardy, and gives you enough carbs for the day. We found a spicy local tomato sauce that we will just put on the plate to add some flavor to the meal. On Mondays and Thursdays, Machame village has a local market down the street from the hospital where you can get fresh produce and supplies. We headed down there (the Dutch girls were our tour guides all day because they had already been here about a month) and stocked up on some fresh produce: eggplant/tomatoes/onions/peppers/garlic/ginger/bananas/cucumbers/carrots. I also bought a “kanga”--- traditional African colorful fabric that you can make just about anything from. Tom helped me pick out a nice teal fabric with nice designs and then from the market we headed up the road to the tailor to make something out of my fabric. The fabric cost about $4 and the amount I had could make a skirt and a purse. The tailor charges about $10 to make this. One of the Swedish girls bought a different design and we decided we would share the 2 designs. By the time we got back we were exhausted, so we made some eggplant for dinner and went to bed about 10pm. The power did not go out that night so we were able to take a shower!! As is often here, power is intermittent, and it shuts off at least once a day but you can never predict when. When it turns off, you turn on the generator lights, but these only work in certain rooms and the bathroom is unfortunately not one of them. You really learn to appreciate the things we consider basic commodities back at home…
