Hallo again!
I’m getting more and more lazy writing. But I also have a lot to do here. Not many news to tell this time! We will move next week.
We are living in 2 houses at the moment and we have to leave the one I’m living in next Friday. The owner suddenly wanted 5 times more rent because of "inflation"! No way!
It was apparently not easy to find a new house at a reasonable price. There are just too many NGO’s in the city and this is pushing the prices very high on the market!
But finally we found a house. I did not see it yet though, so it will be a surprise fro me when we move in.
We had a few problems within the team in the last weeks. It’s not very easy, when you live and work with the same people 24/7. At the moment the situation calmed down again but we also had some differences with coordination team in Kampala. Some (me included) didn’t feel well supported. Hope we can solve this problem soon.
Meanwhile, my weekly routine is as follows:
Monday starts at 8 o’clock at the office where I mainly work on the computer: preparing workshops, data collection etc.
This is also the day where I do my drug orders and check on the pharmacy. The programs have small pharmacies themselves and then we have the main pharmacy in Gulu which is also my responsibility. The biggest problem we have there is that the delivery of the drugs takes a long time; 2 – 3 months. So we have to plan well ahead. It also gives us the problems that many drugs expire because we need to keep a big stock, just in case…
1 o’clock is always lunchtime, prepared by our housekeeper (yummy) und from 2 to 6 it’s the office again. At 6 we’re getting dinner and then we often stay there and talk before we go back to our house to sleep (Patrick, Kyoko, Taro and I). Monday is often also the day of holding job interviews because the staff is changing a lot.
Tuesday mornings is always very busy because everything has to be prepared for the field trip. Food, bed sheets, material and documents etc. Then at around 10, after the security check (endless phone calls to several organisations, authorities and army to check the current situation) we get started.
The trip takes around 1 hour 40 min with 2 stops at army barracks to check if the road is clear. It was a bit intimidating at the beginning to walk past these well armed soldiers and to discuss with commanders etc. but I got used to it now. We’re also in regular contact with our base in Gulu over the radio and inform them about our location.
In Awere (name of the camp) my day consists mainly of supervision. I observe the staff while they check on patients, do consultations (bit strange because these people often know a lot more than me), distribute drugs, collect data, check the blood for malaria, change dressings, give injections etc. I detect mistakes and try to improve their work. I also go into the camp with the community health workers, checking on their work and giving advises to the community as good as I can.
In Awere, we cook our own meals and sometimes the staff there gives us cooking lessons on local dishes. We are bringing the ingredients with us, from town. In the evenings we sit together, talk and admire the beautiful sky with its many stars. Sometimes you can see flashlights all around but the sky above us is clear! Fantastic!
What I sometimes miss in this country is silence. There is always some radio making noise at the loudest volume level, kids are screaming or people talking and laughing loudly. At night you hear dogs howling, rats running around and squeaking and termites eating. And when it’s raining, the drops are hammering loudly on the metal roof… Zuerich often seems to be more quiet than this camp at the "end of the world".
Cultures can be very different!
A lot of meetings are also part of my daily routine. Ugandans love to talk a lot!
Friday around noon we’re usually heading back and then it’s also running from one meeting to the next to share the experiences of the week with each other.
At 6 its time for dinner again and afterwards I’m usually completely exhausted and am going to bed early.
Saturdays I have to write a lot of reports and prepare some things for Awere again, so I usually spend this day in the office. In the evening we are usually doing something together; we cook or go out for dinner (the choice of good restaurants in town is very tiny though) and afterwards we often go to parties or to Havanna Pub, the only night club in town, who is acceptable but not really great. At least you can dance a bit to get rid of the stress of the week (once you managed to keep the male visitors at distance!)
Sundays is always "holy": strictly no work on Sunday! I read, go for walks, visit the internetcafe or treat myself to a nice massage at the local health club. In the evening we often eat together and sometimes we organise a movie night.
Well, this is basically my week.
Take care Anne