A new year

12/31

This morning Junior and I went to visit Adelaide, his friend from school. She lives in Ash Town. Her house was one room with a curtain separating the bed from the TV/living room. Her mother, brother and herself live there. Adelaide gave me several strands of beads to wear around my waist. All the girls wear them-from babies to old women. They wear them all the time and it is supposed to be like lingerie or something, but even tiny babies wear them. Her mom tied them around my waist and there were extra strands so she gave me an anklet and then also gave me a pretty clay bead bracelet. We then went into town. On the way I bought palm wine for our New Years party. Palm wine is basically tapped directly from the palm tree and made by someone, so it comes in used water bottles. It smells terrible and as we found out at New Years…tastes just as bad as it smells! This night we all went to the Projects Abroad office and brought in the new year together. Most Ghanaians go to church on New Years Eve. They end and start the year with God. And then once church lets out they go to the club…I did not go to church because the service would have been in Twi and listening to a guy on a microphone yell with LOUD speakers all around does not sound like my idea of a religious experience. We ate Groundnut Soup and rice balls, salad, garlic bread, chicken and pineapple. At about 930 the power went out for our part of the street. We ran to the house behind at had them plug in our music so we could still have a good night. At New Years we toasted champagne then went to the club. Many people were out and we had a great time!

our food!

me and Katja

Pouring champagne at midnight

the group

1/1

Happy New Year!!! It seems so crazy that 2010 has already gone by! So many things have happened this year and 2011 started off great! This morning we went to the office to eat leftovers and clean up. We then went to the host family of Katja, Birgit, and Anne. They live with the infamous Mama Gifty. She is a very tall, large and in charge woman. She has a very deep voice and is maybe the scariest person I have met in Ghana! She will not allow her host people to return to the house after 9pm no matter what. When Jan, one of the volunteers, said hello to her and asked how she was doing, her response was a cold, “what is your name?” ANYWAYS 6 of us came over and watched a movie while Katja packed. She was leaving for Thailand the next morning to teach.

Anne, me, Louise, Jamie, Birgit, and Jan watching a movie

1/4

Today in the hospital I did my usual morning ward rounds alone. When I got back to my ward to break the matron came in and wanted me to come on rounds with her. After that I went on round with Dr. Boateng. I can tell you everything about these patients now! I ate lunch then came back to find they were going to do some surgeries this afternoon! I scrubbed in and waited for Dr. Gyasi, the surgeon to arrive. The first operation was a 20 year old girl with a bone growth on her knee. She was given a spinal, not general anesthesia. Her chart listed the bone growth and the need for surgery and then the last line said,

Things we need:

1.     hammer

2.     chisel

The hammer and other carpentry tools did not do so well in the autoclave. The handles melted. Dr. Gyasi brought his own tools and kept joking about how he was actually a carpenter. Once the tissue was separated, revelaing the bone, he took the chisel and pounded the end to knock off the bony growth. When he started hitting the chisel, me the two scrub nurses, the anesthesiologist and the OR assistant all scrunched our faces up and Dr. Gyasi just laughed and asked if we were all right. He then smoothed it over and sewed her up. The next patient was a middle aged man needing a hemorrhoidectomy. I will refrain from going into so many details about this procedure….You’re welcome!

1/5

Today I got to the hospital and immediately set my things down and went straight to the male ward where I changed the dressing for the man who had the hemorrhoidectomy. We removed the dressing and he took a “sit bath.” Basically they filled a small basin with hot water and he hovered over it for about 10 minutes. I then cleaned and covered him back up. After this I went through the charts of the other men in the ward. One man was admitted for nausea, general body weakness, cough, and many other symptoms. After a rapid spot test came back reactive he was diagnosed with HIV. His family was counseled. He looked very weak, had open sores on his lips and on his chest. His whole family was in the hospital and looked very upset. The wife was then tested for HIV and the test unfortunately came back positive as well. They drew blood for a CD4 test. This is a blood count that basically determines the destruction caused by the disease. His numbers came back below 500, which is the mark for the disease to be considered AIDS. Many patients come in and happen to have HIV along with whatever they are admitted for. This was the first case where the patient was suffering from AIDS and would probably not return home. He slept most of the day, but his breathing was so rapid and you could distinctly see his pulse in his neck beating quickly as well. I found myself afraid to go near his bed afraid he would cough on me or that there would be blood on the rail of his bed and I would brush against it or something terrible. Then after about 15 minutes of thinking this I came to my senses. This man was lucky to have a family that cared for him and was with him in the hospital after his diagnosis. The hospital is supposed to be a place of refuge and no judgment, only care. It is my job to care for him just as the little baby in the children’s ward needs care. Of course I doubled up with gloves when dealing with him and leaned away when he coughed, but other than that tried to treat him as just another patient. After lunch I cleaned and changed the dressing for the 24 year old man that has been in the hospital for a year with the terrible bed sores. The sore on his back has healed, but the one on his side is not getting better and the edges have inverted on themselves, so I do not know how it is going to heal if we keep treating it the way we are. From where the surgeon had attempted plastic reconstruction several months ago, there are stitch marks that refuse to heal. One is becoming infected and I had to squeeze the puss out to get a swab to have it tested. Dorcas, a nurse, and myself walked out of the male ward and passed a patient walking around the hospital. She told me that was a new patient admitted for TB. I was shocked she was not wearing a mask and suggested we give her one. They told me once they start treatment they are not infectious. I find that hard to believe, considering at home people with TB are in an air tight, isolated room, and you have to be fitted for a proper mask to have any contact with the person. Needless to say, I stayed out of the female ward for the rest of the day. Today was filled with disease!

1/6

This afternoon I came home and Ben said we were getting 3 new volunteers!! Two were coming tomorrow and one later in the weekend or Monday. Ben, Junior, and myself watched Home Alone 1 & 2 tonight! The family bought me fried plantains that were spiced with nutmeg, cinnamon, and pepper. They were SOO good!

1/7

Today was Birgit’s last day in Kumasi. We had lunch at the Kentish Kitchen in the culture center and I got my favorite Ghanaian dish, red-red with fried plantain. Today a boy from Denmark and his girlfriend came to our house, Casper and Louisa! They will be here for 1 month. I was getting used to being on my own, but it will be nice to share the price of drop taxis, have someone to eat with and come home to tell stories to!

1/8

This morning Birgit and I took at STC bus to Accra. She will fly out tomorrow from Accra. The bus arrived about 230 or 3 in the afternoon. We spent the time on the bus trying to sleep/ listen to our music and avoid the sounds from the terrible Nigerian film-Nollywood as they call them. When we arrived we got a taxi to take us to the hotel I had booked the day before. The man said the price would be 18GHC. We went in and the guy said ok you can pay now the room is 23GHC. I told him that I had called and confirmed earlier this day for the room that was 18GHC. He said that it was taken. He also would not let us have the room for the 18GHC price. It is not so much that the price is more, although this was supposed to be a very cheap trip, it was the principle. There was no Better Business Bureau to threat about or writing up something in the paper. People get away with things like this. Sometimes I get fed up with things not being fair. ANYWAYS…we took the room and left our things at the hotel while we went out shopping. The guy from the hotel told us how to get to the culture center...he said, “go straight.” So we went straight for a  very long time. We kept asking people when we got to deadends and they would point another direction and say, “go straight.” That became the joke for the afternoon…go straight. We finally got to the Accra Culture Center. A man was at the gate-we decided he must be paid by people at the different booths to bring people around and convince them to buy things. He took us to several places and told us how he could get us the good deals. We got what we needed though and got out! She was looking for some last minute gifts for friends and family and I was looking for some things they don’t have in Kumasi. We then got a taxi to take us to the mall. We walked inside the mall in our sandals and plain outfits. We both looked at each other and laughed because we did NOT fit in. I mean we really don’t fit in most places because we are white, but here they were plenty of white people. We needed our hair done, make up on, and trendier clothes. Haha! I felt like I was back at a mall at home. There was air conditioning, people pushing babies in strollers, Aldo shoes, an Apple store, and a movie theater. There were only a few things that happened that were just a reminder that we were in Africa. We shopped around until we got hungry. We ate dinner in the food court. Well…the food court was actually outside. We ordered Pizza!! I had real cheese-this is a big deal! I also ordered a salad, but got, “Please, we don’t have salad.” Grrr…After dinner we got ice cream. I ordered a banana split, but got, “Please we don’t have banana.” I wanted to yell, “What do you mean you don’t have banana? There are about 80 people selling bananas just outside the mall and another 80 acres of banana trees!” I settled for a mint chocolate ice cream sundae. After dinner we went to see a movie. The theater has the latest Hollywood films! We saw “Little Fockers.” –very funny. After the movie I felt like I should reach in my purse and get my keys and drive home, but then realized instead I would need to hail a taxi and plead for a good price and hope his headlights work as we drive dodging cars on the way back to the hotel. It was a fun night.

1/9

This morning I said goodbye to Birgit! It is so sad when my friends leave! I know that we will keep in touch with facebook and skype, and hopefully we will see each other again someday! I rode in a trotro backt o Kumasi alone.