Post-SL Trip: Things I'm Thankful for

Count your blessings! - I know, I know - it's such an overused phrase, but it's so true.  There are just so many comforts of the U.S. that people forget about, and I guess this is just a list to remind me of all the things that I missed.

• Electricity! - I can't imagine how many times we'd be working in the factory and the electricity would just go off and someone would have to go and turn on the generator.  At the house we only had the electricity for 3 hours from 7-10pm from a generator, so there were many times when I'd be doing something where having the lights go off was VERY inconvenient. Or just doing things by candlelight was difficult:
• showering
• brushing teeth
• reading a book
• watching a scary movie - not fun...but the computer ran out of battery too, so didn't get to see the ending --still need to do that...
• vomiting my guts out
• baking
• entering data
• ...
• Internet - especially fast internet! Occasionally there's be internet at a decent speed, but just having internet was a blessing!  But in general, internet was useful mainly to stay in contact with my boss.
• Safe drinking water.  Yes, there were times when I had to conserve drinking water because I forgot to buy enough for upcountry.
• Milk!  Oh my goodness, I can't believe how awesome cold milk is until I came back. mmmmm! There was only powdered milk, which I was okay with.
• Orderliness/organization.  It's amazing how organized America is.  You can just step out on to the road and expect cars to follow the rules, or how you can just go to a store and expect to see the price on the product, and that would be the reasonable price to pay and not have to barter for every single thing.  You can just plan your day and that's generally how it'll go.  There's no saying what the day will bring in SL.  
• Factories/industries: So nice to be able to know that if you want something, you can just find a store for it and buy it.  I just wanted to find spatulas one time and I couldn't find them.  
• Hot showers! Oh man, every time I got into the shower I would think about how nice a hot shower would be.  
• Running water.  Yes, there was mostly running water, but upcountry there wasn't - and I felt kind of guilty that people had to carry buckets of water for us to the guesthouse.
• Food: So many people who didn't have that luxury. :(  There was a girl I talked to who I befriended upcountry.  One night she visited me, I asked what she had to eat during the day and she said she hadn't eaten all day (same as her brother).  When I asked her why, she said her dad had went to the city and didn't leave them any money.  When I asked why he went, she said to visit his other wife. 
• Anesthetics: Watching mothers give birth with no anesthetics has almost made me reconsider having children.
• Having reliable doctors/medicine.
• Blood banks
• ...

But overall, I gotta say that I had it good.  I was in a really nice compound that was fenced, and I got to live with some expatriots who were really amazing people!

Geek Ego Booster

Haha...for all you geeks/nerds out there...
http://sfbayarea.craigslist.org/about/best/sfo/66795671.html

SL Tid bits

Interesting Sierra Leone Facts:
* Seattle gets 3 ft of rain each year.  Sierra Leone gets 16 ft/year - all during the rainy season (June - October)

Typical Rain Day (Note the massive amount of water overflowing everywhere)

* The record LOW temperature is 68 degrees F (19 C), which is the lowest record high of any other african country.
* The average number of children per woman is 6.3.
* Largest export is diamonds, but mostly unpolished, which are of significant less worth than polished diamonds.
* There are no peanut butter or peanut manufacturing companies in the country (sucks for our NGO, Project Peanut Butter)

What to do if you hit someone with your car:
1) Very few people around: take the person to the hospital.
2) Lots of people around, don't even bother getting out and drive away quickly or else you might get killed.
Sierra Leoneons are very nice and friendly, but people forget that they've been through a war.  So when something happens, they fuel each other on, and it can get ugly.  They're really tough because that's how they got through the war.  As someone said, "It's like a switch."  One moment they are the friendliest people, and the next, they're beating someone to death.  Someone I met talked about how they were heading to church when rocks started being hurled around.  Turned out something had caused the people to turned on the police, and the police were retreating.  It's kind of unnerving to know that the police have no control other than creating traffic.

Language fun:
* Bus means cat
* In Krio: e sounds like "a", i sounds like "e", ay sounds like "i"...
* I "flash" you means calling someone briefly to give them your number

First Poda Poda Experience!

Poda Podas are the equivalent to buses, but they are the size of a minivan, and generally hold 20 people excluding the driver.  It was very squished, and you can generally find one guy hanging out the door of the car, watching out for potential passengers.  Along with flowery, colorful designs, they also have interesting phrases on the back like "City Boy," "Madonna," and/or "Jesus is Great."  Yes, they can all be on the same poda poda.  Unfortunately, poda podas are the root of all traffic (well, okay, and police officers).  They just randomly stop in the middle of the road as people jump on and off.  On my poda poda experience, there was a rather large lady who tried to get on, but just as she sat down, she got up and left.  Turned out all the other passengers complained that she was taking too much room, and drove her off the poda poda.  Man, talk about democracy.    Anyhow, it wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be.  In fact, I think I might incorporate poda podas into my nonexistent repertoire of public transportation.

Practicing Chinese in Sierra Leone

Who would've thought knowing Chinese would've been useful in Sierra Leone.  Even more curious is who would've thought the only sugar factory in all of Sierra Leone is operated by a Chinese family.  Anyhow, after looking up some business jargon on Google Translate and mentally rehearsing some of the things I might say, I think I managed to undergo a small business conversation in Chinese.  And to top it off, I got a free sprite.  We'll see if he really understood what I said after I see the result next week.


Also, before I would get really annoyed when people said "Ni Hao" or "Ching Chung" to me in the streets, and I would pretend I didn't speak Chinese, but then I realized sometimes it's a lot better to pretend I didn't speak English so that people would stop bothering me.  So then when people kept on bother me, I would just break into Chinese.  It really works!

Ah Bunge Di Squirrel

We were driving along the highway from Moyamba to Bo when all of a sudden, my driver cried out, "Ah Bunge Di Squirrel!"  He quickly pulled the car to the side of the road.  We asked, "What?!!" but he kept on repeating the same phrase.  He ran out the car, and by this time, we figured out that he had hit a squirrel.  He must have ran at least a few hundred yards back to check out the squirrel.  As he left the car, I yelled that he didn't have to worry about it and he can just leave it there.  Little did I expect him to return to the car proudly holding the squirrel by its tail.  He laughed as he told us how everyone from the nearby village was begging to have his dead squirrel.  Before we could say anything, he threw it in the car on the floor of the driver's seat.  We yelled at him to get it out of the car, but he said he was taking it to his brother so he can eat it.  How kind of him.  We decided it'd be okay, so we drove with this squirrel corpse and made him take a picture with it.

Watching the Miracle of Life

First time seeing a childbirth and a caesarian section!  It was such a crazy experience watching a baby come out of a person.  A whole freakin baby!  When I got there, the midwives told me I was receiving the baby.  I said I didn't know how, but they still gave me gloves and an apron.  It was crazy watching the whole process.  The midwives kept on saying "Push!!" as the mother exerted as much effort as possible in agony while a little tuft of hair protruded from her.  Initially, I wasn't sure what was protruding from the mother's vagina because it looked like it was so soft and deformable.  After a couple of pushes and many painful screams, it was clear the baby's head was way too big for the mother's opening, so the midwife took a pair of scissors and snipped the opening at 7 o'clock.  The mother didn't even flinch.  I can only deduce that the pain of childbirth already exceeded the minor pain of being snipped by scissors. 

Anyhow, the scissor trick appeared to work, and a head popped out.  A whole head with a pale, bluish face and plenty of hair.  I couldn't believe the size of the head compared to the opening I had seen earlier.  The midwife reported that the baby had an umbilical cord wrapped around his neck, but thankfully it was loose, so they just had to wait for the child to rotate naturally to the right or left.  The midwife demanded one last push, and with some quick maneuver, the shoulders came out, and the rest of the body just slid out like a fish out of someone's hands.  The midwife quickly grabbed the baby's feet and hung him upside down as the cord was removed from his neck.  The mother was told to hyperventilate to deliver more oxygen to the baby.

The baby looked so fake.  He was bluish and slimy and looked like a doll that had some manufacturing difficulties.  Man, babies are so gross when they first come out.  The umbilical cord also looked unreal.  It was so organized and smooth that it looked like a man-made plastic tube with a twist to it.  Anyhow, the cord was clamped and cut, and the baby gave out one tiny but purposeful cry to tell the world that he's ready to do some damage (well, he's already done plenty of damage). 

The mother's ordeal continues.  We waited for the placenta to detach as we watched for elongation of the umbilical.  That did not happen, so the midwife had to manually push down on the uterus to contract it while pulling on the cord.  Each time the midwife pulled on the cord, the mother cringed with pain.  Soon, a bag of blood vessels and lobes came out - the placenta.  The midwife checked to make sure there were no clots and the whole thing was intact before putting it in a bag so the mother can take it home and bury it in a special ritual.

To finish up this whole process, the opening's cut had to be sutured.  The midwife haphazardly stabbed the mother in various places near the cut to put in local anesthetics.  Then she continued to suture the cut.  I don't know if it's because the anesthetic wasn't enough or failed to take effect, but each stitch caused the mother to writhe in massive pain.  It seemed like it was done so roughly.  The needle sometimes got stuck at the outer skin level and the midwife had to really jerk it to get it through the skin.  I don't know how the mother would ever want another kid after this ordeal. After 5 sutures, she was finally allowed to rest. 

This whole process took place in a tiny room the size of a small bathroom.  The mother laid completely exposed on top of a cushioned bed that was simply layered with a plastic wrap.  The sutures were the wrong kind, so it had to be doubled up.  The mother didn't bring a lapa (fabric), so the child was wrapped up in her t-shirt.  But a real kicker was that to soak up the endless flow of blood, they used pads.  Yup, the same ones women use for periods.  A box of them was sitting on the empty bed next to the patient.  I guess if you think about it, they're probably the best at sucking up blood.  But still... there was one patient who had post-partum hemorrhage, and the doctor gave her some oxytocin shots, rubbed her uterus and breasts, and stuffed several pads up her vagina to stop the bleeding.  It was quite disturbing. 

Caesarian:
That was a lot of fun to watch.  The doctor went through layers and layers of various bodily material.  Then all of a sudden, there was a massive flow of fluid all over the place as the doctor entered the uterus.  The baby was extracted and hung upside down as in natural childbirth (do they always hang babies upside-down?).  Then the WHOLE uterus was pulled out of the tiny slit they cut in the abdomen to be sewn together.  The doctor was so smooth with his suturing that he was done in a couple of minutes.  After that, he just left - with the whole uterus still outside the mother's body - and had the medical officer (I'm guessing it's the term they use for doctor in training) finish up the suturing.  Oh man, it was a pain watching him suture.  Not only was he slow, the suture got caught up in clamps, the suture came out of the needle, he left too little suture at the end so he wasn't able to tie a knot, and many other little things that I'll probably do when I start rotations.  Ultimately, he finished, squished the uterus back into the abdomen, and sutured the rest of the layers together.  Mission accomplished.  Baby delivered. 

17 Year Old Mother:
I knew the mother was young, but I didn't realize she was only 17 years old!  She was just starting high school, and she had not married yet.  As she labored, I harbored a slight prejudice against her and kept on wondering if she had regrets. 

Anyhow, the birth continued with no complications, rips, or necessary scissor snips.  A tiny girl came out, but to everyone's surprise, her stomach was still distended.  She had twins!  Many people in Sierra Leone still don't have any prenatal care, so it wasn't a surprise that she didn't know she had twins.  The midwives suspected twins because of the large distension, but other than that, I think they were just as surprised. 

After the birth, I got to talk to the girl, and her story is a sad one.  Her father had died during the civil war, and her mother died unexpectedly when she was in elementary school.  She has several aunts, one of whom is very wealthy and have children living in London and America; however, the aunt abandoned her because of some strife with the girl's mother.  The cousins in U.S. or America would send money or gifts to the 17 yr old girl, but the aunt confiscated everything and made sure they never met. 

The teachers saw she was a smart girl, so paid for her education.  Then this boy near where she lived started to like her.  The boy's family got to know her and like her as well, so eventually she was living with them and they provided for her education.  At first I suspected some foul play, but when I asked if the boy and family were kind to her, she said they were like a blessing.  I wish her the best in her aspirations to be a bank manager. 

She had quite a lot of postpartum bleeding.  Please let her be okay.

Grandpa Stroke and Coma

Grandpa had a stroke and has been in a coma for 11 days now.  Please pray for him that he'll come to and recover.  Also that my father and family will be at peace and that it won't happen to more of my family.

Intros in SL

First 4 Questions Upon Meeting Someone
1) How the body? (aka how are you)
2) What's your name?
3) Are you married?
4) Will you marry me? (Or for the less crass, "Can I have your number"?)

Well, in reality, part 1 goes on for quite a while, including how did you sleep, how is your day, how is your work, for which all the answers are "fine" with the occasional "Tell God Thank you."

After I tell them my name, people without fail repeat the question, "what is YOUR name" because "eee" in Krio means "him." After I convince them that my name is really pronounced "eee," they burst out laughing and comment on what a "fine" name I have. (The issue with having the word "fine" for beautiful, nice, good, alright, okay is that you never really know what they think of something.)

Finally, number 3 and 4 always come almost immediately upon meeting someone. However, I have always been clever to say "I am not married because I am still a student and I have to study hard," which keeps many potential suitors at bay and also keeps most of the population from being surprised why I am an old maid by their standards.

Scariest Experience in SL

Going to the kitchen at night to get a spoon, hands down. Although I've never been fond of the dark, I've actually gotten used to doing everything by candlelight. But going to the kitchen is different because of the creepy crawlers. Not just one or two - I'm certain there's a colony living in the kitchen cabinets and the walk-in closet. I remember the first time I had to venture into that land of critters. I had been coughing like mad because, what a surprise, I had forgotten to take my cough medicine. I was already dreading the trip because it was a hassle getting out of my mosquito net, finding some form of light, and then going out of the comfort of my room. Anyhow, I got to the kitchen and opened the cabinet to get a spoon. And as luck would have it, I found many little six-legged friends crawling around trying to help me find a spoon for my cough syrup. Yup, that's when I jumped and slammed the cabinet door closed.

I failed to learn my lesson, so there was a next time. But this time I learned to flash my flashlight in the crack of the door to drive most of them away, and then loudly tap on the door to finish the job. And what do you know, it worked. Of course, I frantically washed the spoon with a lot of detergent, and really quickly in case the cockroaches in the sink also planned to visit me. Man, so much trouble just for a freakin spoon.

Actually, bugs are not so bad anymore because we just got an exterminator to come say good bye to my little friends. But every once in a while, one will still pop out. Man, these bugs are so durable. I've even found dead lizards, so I have no idea how these bugs still thrive.

First Argument With Police

We were driving to Logos Ship (floating book store), when we got to a sign that said no through traffic. But since the place we had just came from was completely blocked with traffic and we were directed this way, I just moved the sign to the side and let my driver drive the car past, and then I replaced the sign. Then all of a sudden, I see this policeman yelling at me. He was saying something like "You can't move that sign!" I tried to explain that we were told to come this way, but he wouldn't listen and kept on yelling at me. But since he didn't speak very good English, I couldn't really understand him. Anyhow, my driver came out, and told me to sit in the car while he argued with the police. Eventually we were allowed to leave, but then my driver found he had been pickpocketed.

Later, I was told that the police in Sierra Leone will try to stop foreigners for any reason (and sometimes no reason) at all. They essentially just want you to bribe them with money. What they'll do is they'll take you to the police station, and the people at the station will say there's no reason for us to be stopped, and just let us go, but the whole process is just extremely time consuming, so when a police tries to stop you, you need to just ignore them and keep on driving (since they don't have vehicles). In fact, the police don't even have the legal right to stop NGO's for any reason. Pretty much, this whole country is corrupt. Sad, but true. There's corruption in the police system, corruption in the government, corruption in the healthcare system, and even corruption with distribution of plumpy nut. President Koroma's new Anti-corruption Committee is helping out a lot (firing Minister of Fishery, Land, etc...), but it's a looooooooong process.

I Can't Believe I Waited 4 Hours!!!

I can't believe I waited 4 hours to have someone type a few 0's and a few lines on a sheet of paper and sign it! I went this other day to a lab to get results for our plumpy nut to make sure there are no germs in it. I waited for probably an hour before someone finally came and said I can go take a observe the lab procedure (which I also went to do). That pretty much consisted of the lab guy saying "Look, it's all purple still, which means no microbes." And then I continued to wait. Got so bored I went downstairs to watch the World Cup. I finished A WHOLE FREAKIN SOCCER GAME, and then I went back to ask what's going on. Only then did she finally get on her computer to type up the results and print it out. Why couldn't she have just done that FIRST and then done whatever she needed to do? Why did she have to make me wait FOUR FREAKIN HOURS!!! Why did she tell me it was going to be ready at NOON when it wasn't ready till AFTER FIVE!!! Ah...I hate how Sierra Leone has no concept of time! I guess the plus is that I got to watch the US vs. Slovenia game, which was pretty intense.

(NOT) The best place to learn to Drive A Stick Shift

Yup, had my first experience driving a manual - oh boy.  So I was planning to go to the beach to learn, where there weren't supposed to be a lot of people, and the roads are nice, open and wide.  But, my driver (Lahai) decided it would be a good idea to go to a field to learn.  However, when we got there, people were playing cricket on it (Of course! Cricket! Why didn't I think of that?!!), so I ended up learning on the road circling the field.

The road was DEFINITELY not wide enough for two way traffic but for some reason, cars were adamant about driving on that street.  Maybe they knew I was learning, so they were purposely driving in the opposite direction as me to freak me out.  Anyhow, I ended up learning how to drive a stick shift squeezed between a wall (or sometimes a ditch) and a car a foot away from me half the time.  The worst was when an enormous construction truck would approach.  I'd look on in terror and Lahai would laugh.  Great.  Oh, I didn't mention that driving on the main road in Sierra Leone is horrendous.  Thank goodness this was a side street.

Typical Sierra Leone traffic.  Thank goodness I didn't have to drive in this.

To make matters worse, I was learning from my driver.  Not that he was a bad teacher, but his English was bad, and my Krio was even worse.  So half the time, he's talking about "mass"-ing the break or the accelerator and I'm wondering does that mean press or release?!! (It means press.)  And initially, I didn't even know if it was okay to press the break if I was going to crash into a wall.  Well, okay, maybe my common sense was not functioning a hundred percent then.

At one unfortunate junction, I slowed to first gear to turn, but instead, I stalled.  Frustrated, I banged my head on the steering wheel, and I fortuitously honked the horn just as a group of students were walking in front of the car.  Yes, they all stared, pointed, and laughed at the strange American who couldn't keep a car running.

Then after a few circles, Lahai all of a sudden jumped out of the car and said, "I'm going to let you drive by yourself, to test how you do mentally."  Great, I just hope I don't stall and forget how to start up the car.  Well, despite my clumsiness gene, I made it back, and I jokingly said "I only ran over three people."  But I don't think Lahai understood it as a joke - now he probably thinks I'm a strange girl who laughs about running over people.

Babies, Babies, Babies!

Njala, Kwarma, and Taiama:

Mothers lined up at the Taima "hospital" (aka run-down store) waiting to get their babies screened

Today we went to the clinics "upline" or "upcountry", aka, in the rural areas of Sierra Leone. It was so much fun being able to see the fruit of our labor (plumpy nut made at our factory) being put into use! Some would say it was heaven for me because when we got to the clinic, there were rows of mothers seated with their babies on their lap. The little ones were just absolutely adorable! Some of them cried, but others sat quietly and looked confused.

The Plan:
At the clinics we screen children for malnutrition by comparing their weight/height to a chart and looking for edema. We then give the malnourished babies (age range 6mo - 5 yrs) a certain # of bottles of plumpy nut (therapeutic food), and have them check up with us after 2 weeks.

Reality:

This kid didn't want his length measured.

Crying, screaming, and disposing all sorts of bodily fluids everywhere. Yup, it was a medley of tears, slobber, pee, and poo (no vomit luckily). Every little one would burst into tears whenever we straightened them down on the height tape, and every time it made me cry a little bit on the inside and distracted me from measuring/recording.

Getting weighed!

But kids had different reactions to sitting on the scale. Most would cry with their little hands reaching out to their mom desperately, yet a few just sat there staring off into space. There was one who wouldn't sit and kept on leaving backwards; so we had to lie him down. And finally there were those who were so shocked that they literally **** (2 options) their pants (well, they were butt naked).

This kid didn't put up a fight!...he was sleeping.

This poor little girl had severe marasmus and oral thrush

Every so often, I'd see one who had a bloated stomach, tiny arms and legs, and an emaciated chest and face. They looked like old people. Holding them was like lifting a sack of skin and bones. Poor little things!

Records show some kids reaching their target weight - which is awesome! We call them "graduates"!

This kid is happily eating his Plumpy Nut!  Look at him smack those lips! They might be crying a lot, but once they get a taste of that Plumpy Nut, they just shut up and happily eat it.  So cute!

Cho Chung

6/9/10 Bo:
Aside from the cat calls "Cho Chung", "Chinese woman", "white man", "Korean", "Ni hao", "I love you", and whatever gibberish people came up with to get my attention, my solo walk in Bo was quite pleasant. I met this lady in charge of a trade development school where people could learn skills to support themselves like making gara (women's wrap), metal work, etc. (The next day she called me to say hello, how I am, and promptly hang up.)

Walking alone may not have been the smartest idea, especially if it was just to stroll. I guess this is what it feels like to be an alien. With another companion to walk with, you can at least fake preoccupation when people try to get your attention. Walking by myself, I had to fake oblivion - which I'm pretty good at (I know some of you are thinking "Are you sure you're faking it?")

Anyhow, I took a back road and ended up with a swarm of children escorting me. The girls were so adorable! One of them hooked her arm around mine, and had a huge smile on her face. Of course some of the boys were getting a little rowdy and personal - asking questions like "Where do you live?", "Can I visit you", and "Are you married?" (I responded maybe to get them off my back). The male of all cultures seem to be the same.

Voltage instability: Light kept on changing its brightness and fan changed its speed every five minutes, literally.