Who's Flu?

Did I get it from the baby at the AIDS clinic that sneak attacked me and stuck her lil hand in my mouth?
Did I get it from Tobias, the 4 year old that I play cards with at the hospital, and who I shared a cookie with the day I got sick?
Did I get it from the tomato that I ate from the garden without washing it?
Did I get it from Amber, who has been graciously hosting every illness since we got here?
Did I get it from the nurse that I shared a PB&J with at an off-site clinic? I was using hand sanitizer, but that is not a thing here.
Did I get it from the constant replay of nausea-inducing surgery images? The C-sections? The amputation of the 8 year old's infected arm? The same 8 y/o who was only brought in for medical treatment bc one of our nurses saw his rotting arm on the bus and threatened his mom with citizens arrest if she didn't go to the hospital with him. (Citizens arrest is not a real thing here, but Zimbabwe's laws are so ass-backwards, you can get away with anything). The amputation was more of a clean up bc the arm was so infected that it had self-amputated. Parents refusal to provide their children with FREE medical care gives a new meaning to child abuse. The image still makes my stomach turn.
All of these are likely suspects, but I have resolved that my stomach flu is a direct result of the communion cups at the hospital's church service. What I failed to notice (and what the hospital staff neglected to mention) is that the communion shot glasses are community shot glasses. 2-3 people sip out of the same itty bitty cup. Excuse me!?! We are at a hospital. In Africa. These people are very sick. I am not even close to being immune to anything he. Don't get me wrong- I love serving them, tending to them, talking to them, reading to them, playing with them, sharing stories with them- but I am in no way interested in sharing in their illnesses. Not cool guys, not cool.
My take aways- Purell more. Eat less. And sleeping in a tree fort is very conducive to the flu- all you have to do is lean over the edge.

Revision.

Shortly after Night-Crawlers went to press, I found a dead mouse in the hut. Count it!

Night-Crawlers.

Lot of critters here. Things that we found in our hut last night- First was a crazed bat. It circled the hut for 5 minutes while Lauren, Liz and I took turns hitting the deck. Liz screamed. Lauren laughed. And I spent most of the time half-dressed curled up in the fetal position on the ground. The only way out was the door. We blew out all the candles and opened the door, while Amber attempted to lure it outside by dancing around with flashlights. The bat caved and joined her at the disco. Next was the spider. Bigger than a deck of card, smaller than my foot. Amber and I were searching for water for a shower (at which we failed). Amber comes running out of the room screaming "huge spider, huuuuuuuge". She is jumpy with spiders so I went in to decide whether it was "huuuuuge" or not. It was. I grabbed the can of DOOM Insect poison (the same can which I mistook for insect repellent and liberally applied to my entire body 3 days earlier. My skin is starting to look normal-ish), I went and DOOMed the heck out of it. A heaping, 30 second stream of poison directly on the beast. I assumed that would do it. Wrong. After we finished high-fiving each other, Amber and I went to take a picture of our kill and it was gone.... it had made its way to the other side of Liz's room. I was shocked, but also just figured it was making its last run, so I DOOMed it again and went to find the camera for the "victory shot". Wrong again. The damn thing was across the room again. Plan B- I grabbed my shoe and gave it a mighty bop. 1 down, 50 billion to go. Adventure is not over yet. Immediately after, still searching for water (this time to brush our teeth, hopes of a shower were long gone), we went up to the main house and found an abnormally large cockroach on the counter, it quickly disappeared into the wall... I can only imagine whats happening in there....
Dear God, do me a solid and vanguish the african critters until December. Thanks, Kial.

Working for Peanuts.

One of my titles at Chidamoyo Hospital- bookkeeper. I am recording all of their written records (income and expenses) from the last 2 yrs on a computer. Excel workshops are coming in handy right about now. It is a bit of a challenge, seeing as they switched from Zim dollars and South African dollars last year, to US dollars or as they say "Obama dollars". Another hang up is that they accept a plethora of things as payment. They won't turn people away for not having money (which most people don't) so they accept whatever that person can pay in. Can you tell me how to convert 50kgs of beans to Obama dollars? How about 50,000 farm bricks? Peanuts are also a main source of payment, to which the hospital started saying "we work for peanuts". Last year they needed fertilizer for their gardens (the hospital grows a lot of their own food) so if someone was unable to pay they'd have them go pick up cow manure and bring it over. So as they like to say, they went from "working for peanuts" to "working for sh*t".....

Neighborly Love.

Major (the hospital administrator), took me and the 3 other girls I am living with on a short jaunt to visit his village. It is 40 minutes by car from the hospital. Small village, just a few huts and one house structure. The hut w a fire= kitchen. The hut with dishes and food= pantry. Lots of chickens. Lots of pigs. And he has a grinder for corn, so he's pretty much the valley baller!  His neighbor, well into the better part of her 90's, came over to greet us. She was so sweet. She showed us traditional Shona greetings. One of which looks very much like a rapper's handshake followed by a chest bump- i dig it. She apologized for not having anything to offer us besides corn... it amazes me that someone with so little, is apologizing for not being able to give more.... granted she did follow up with thinking we were boys because we were wearing shorts. To which Major responded- "no you have to look up" (motioning toward our chests). To which she responded "still boys".

Well Baby Clinic

Today was the first day of offsite clinic. We set up baby clinic at a shanty deserted village an hour away. The drive was nuts, picture off roading. Hundreds upon hundreds of moms with their bambinos. We weigh them, chart them, vaccinate them, then give the moms birth control. It's science. I was charting and giving polio vaccinations today. I finished first and so I got to hang out. Having their picture taken is the countries favorite pastime. Kids swarm you and want to be photographed, but they don't smile unless you tickle them and catch them off guard. Moms come up and ask me to take their pictures too. It's hilarious. I love it. Only problem is that all the babies that we work with have moms, which means I'll have to look for souvenirs elsewhere.....

After baby clinic we went back to the hospital to divy out AIDS medicine. The AIDS medication comes packaged like any medication you would buy in the states, but we have to modify it before we distribute it. We take the pill bottle out of the box. Set the English instructions aside. Open the bottle and remove the "Do Not Tamper" seal, take out the cotton and the preservative packets. We do this bc this "garbage" is used for many other things. The boxes become fuel for the kitchens fire. The medication instructions become toilet paper for when the hospital runs out. The cotton is sterilized and used in the hospital. The preservative packets are removed bc the patients may mistake them for a pill and accidentally swallow, and we also use them to preserve spices. Nothing goes to waste here! And in case you were wondering, we ran out of toilet paper today......

First Impressions

Made it to Chidamoyo Hospital safely!
First thoughts of Africa- it is hot. There is a lot of land with nothing on it, yet there are people everywhere. The drive from the Harare Airport to the mission is 4 hours, and once you get out of Harare there is nooooothing, but for the entire drive we never went more than 300 ft without passing someone on foot. Most people are travelling between villages, or gathering water at the well to take back to their village. Lots of babies on foot too. Most are cruising with babies just a little bigger than themselves.
Every picture that you have ever seen of africa- true. Lots of dirt, chickens, and straw huts.  I'm always surrounded by dry grass and bushes taller than me. Everyone wears obama stuff. Geckos always stare at me when i'm going to the bathroom. Roosters are my new alarm clock. No phones, but internet is great when we have electricity...riddle me that one??? The hospital is busy beyond belief, head nurse and missionary Kathy McCarty and her staff must be angels, bc a normal person would not be able to handle the work that they do. God is using them everyday.
Just getting started here, but I wanted to give everyone an idea of what Chidamoyo does and also provide a  glimpse into life here- spoiler alert- it is different.