Day 2: The Girls Have Failed.

7/16/2009

Wow, today felt like the longest day ever. . . It started bright and early with a trip to the hospital with the nurse, Gilda, and the sexually abused girl.  We had sort of been wondering what they wanted us there for. . . We guessed to observe, or maybe provide some Western medical input (it seemed far fetched given what all we don't know, but we couldn't come up with any better explanation), but after maybe an hour of waiting and an hour of consultation with the doctor without us in the exam room, and 20 minutes of price-talking, we figured out that we were just there to pay for the testing.
It makes sense, all the pieces sort of fell into place. . . but we had left our money at the compound because we were pretty oblivious as to what they had expected from us.  It was kind of embarassing, honestly.

On another frustrating note, the little girl didn't get told anything about what was being done to her-- a pelvic exam, a pregnancy test, and an HIV test-- all negative, thank God.  They had a counselor there, but the nurse didn't want the little girl to see her.  It was really frustrating, but we all felt like our hands were tied as the outsiders here for two weeks.  Obviously things were bigger than what we could see, and we didn't want to go in, get all angry and up in arms, and undo a lot of the progress that has been made by the mission board over the past few years.

But anyway I don't want to focus on the negative alone. . . We did get a legal document stating that the man forced himself on her, so action can (and probably will) be taken against him.  And we got perspective (limited, but still very eye-opening) on the Cameroonian health system and why
Gilda (the nurse) probably feels the way she does about our records.

So we hiked back to the orphanage and ate lunch and generally were almost too exhausted to move.

In the afternoon we unloaded all the supplies (pretty haphazardly and into very unclean spots).  We all sort of tacitcly agreed that once the nurse was gone we would inventory and clean it up a bit (she was not very concerned with either).  But when she left we were once again zonked-- I somehow managed to chill with the kids a little, and the other girls went to listen to Philip and Eric lecture.  I laid down for a bit and then we all spent a good few hours brainstorming/venting/processing/encouraging after our morning of what felt like failure.  We just have to focus on the positive-- the kids.

After dinner and prep for our devotion, I went to get some stuff we left in the clinic, but there were like 10 billion kids outside the door and they saw I had a boombox, so there was an AMAZING, explosively successful, possibly the most fun I've ever had in my life dance party. Then we did devotions.

One more hilight-- the girls and I braved what we thought would be the kid-parazzi (God gave us gracious cover) and stepped out to find a sky full of brilliant diamonds, way more stars than I've ever seen in one night before.  It was dazzling and breathtaking.  God is so good.

<3RH

Ps-- I may or may not have gotten poop on my jeans from lifting up and carrying a little girl wearing a dress without underwear.  It could be mud, but regardless I'm pretty sure I accidentally mooned by proxy.  Fail.

Meep!

Quick real-time update:

We got our first monthly report email from the Harvest Childrens' Home staff today!  This is really exciting because it means that the staff has been continuing to do physical exams since we left, has documented them, and is meeting regularly to keep the childrens' health needs under surveillance.  We didn't even have to follow up with them about getting the report in to us, they sent it without prompting.

I am so excited!!  All of our blood, sweat, and tears (or mud, shivers, and tears as the case actually was), creative thinking and tailoring of the records system has paid off, at least for this month.  Hooray!

<3RH

Beginnings

7/15/2009

Is it the end of Wednesday already?

We accidentally overslept breakfast (which was sort of flexible seeing as how it was coffee and bread.)  After breakfast we met with Emmanuel Ngala and his wife Comfort to cover the essentials (meals and water).  We girls trekked to twon (Three Corners) with Comfort and two of the older kids, Clovis and Jude.  Comfort mostly did the shopping and we chatted with the boys.  Unfortunately a storm hit and knocked out the internet so we couldn't email out to tell everyone at home we got here. 

We rode back to town on motorcycles-- awesome!!  we played for a few minutes with the kiddos and then got a tour from Emmanuel Ful.  After the tour I think it was lunchtime, and more planning with the team, Emmanuel Ngala (EN) and Emmanuel Ful (EF).  We unloaded our supplies and debuted the chart system which the administrators liked, but the nurse Gilda seemed a little skeptical of.   Hopefully we can convince her to keep using it after we're gone.  Gosh I sunk so much time into that project.  Gilda overall was pretty honset with us and a good resource on what actually works and how people respond to things.

While we were meeting with EF, he brought up the sad story of one of the girls who has been sexually assaulted multiple times by an older man from the town.  He asked us if we could do a "virginity test"-- we basically said we don't have the equipment-- we don't have anything to do a pelvic exam or collect biological samples, not that much we could do would be definitive anyway.  It's so sad, though, and really surprising to see how OK she seems.  Maybe she's just good at hiding it.

Another sad story-- Christina and Kelsey both got notes from one of the older girls, basically saying that she neede love and wanted them to be her mom.  They're still formulating a response. . . but what do you say to that?  We're here for two weeks.  It's heartbreaking.

Later, after dinner, Kelsey heard some singing coming from the older girls' room, so we ventured out to see what was going on.  It was amazing-- tons of kids singing praise songs and getting down with all their sould.  About 5 of the younger kids pretty much attached themselves to me.  Even if the rest of this trip is miserable and we get nothign else done, it was entirely worth it for that half hour or so of praise.   I about lost it, needless to say.  That is what heavien is going to be like, and I cannot wait.

I also came to a realization. . . I guess a realization I've sort of had before, but never quite this tangible, and anyway it's good to be reminded-- I'd like to have someone journey with me into the wild missions onder, but if young, beautiful orphan hands like these are all I ever get to hold, it is more than enough. 

Thank you God for an amazing day.

<3RH

Ps-- Lizette cornrowed (plaited) my hair.

The Journey

{I wrote little blurbs at the airports in Washington, Newark, and Brussels, but nothing really gets interesting until we actually get to Douala.  I left July 11, but this post picks up on July 14 when we finally made it to our final destination, Fundong, Cameroon.  See pictures here: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2240305&id=55700796&l=842401c6ab, or click here http://harvestchildrenshomes.org/abouthch_compound.html for a virtual tour.}

7/14/2009
Let's recap, and a little more detail to the equation.
--Brussels security check-- Christina's peanut butter was confiscated under the new liquid rules.  Drink that PB, girl!  Kelsey had her bag sent through like three times to figure out what the thing that looked like a metal spoon was.  My bags were stopped too, until we all figured out that our would-be spoonish weapon was actually a reflex hammer.
--Flight to Douala-- mostly uneventful, although we were not the only white people on the plan, contrary to rumor/expectation.
--Douala airport-- "the gauntlet" of the trip.  Tons and tons and tons of people tried to help us with our bags and with customs, and we tried to refuse.  I would say they won, because they definitely elbowed their way onto our carts, but I'm pretty sure we didn't pay them (or customs) anything, so maybe we won after all.  (This is pretty much entirely thanks to Emmanuel Ngala.)
--Douala guest house (Baptist Mission House)--excellent digs.  Run by a very trusting European (German?  Austrian?) lady who looks a lot like my Granny.  Kelsey, Christina, and I had a huge room with AC.  There was a pool, and even wireless!  We all called home.
--Dinner-- I almost got barracuda, and then I almost got ananas (pineapple) chicken, and then I ended up getting plain (but yummy chicken).  My exotic food fetish was not to be.
We were super pooped when we went to bed at 10 or 11, but little did we know what the night had in store for us. . .
At about 3 AM, Kelsey, Christina, and I woke up to a banging on our (locked) front (only) door.  We waited, the banging happened again, then Kelsey was about to go down from the loft where we were sleeping to see what they wanted when Christina stopped her for safety reasons.  The banging started again, going on for what seemed like forever.  The invader attempted to open the door, and then finally went away.  We all sat straight up in bed for about 20 minutes as Christina tried to get Eric on the walkie-talkie to figure out what had happened/calm us down/stay safe.  Eventually she got him, and he informed us that it was Philip who had mistakenly set his clock 10 hours forward instead of the 5 we actually needed. . . Good times.
So that was day 1 on the ground.  We got up the next morning to a delicious breakfast of french bread, coffee, pineapple, and an omlette provided by the mission.  After breakfast the ladies headed to Western Union to pick up money (and attempt unsuccessfully to change it) while the guys packed their bags.  Eventually we piled everything on top of the van and headed on the looong journey to Fundong.

Observations:  The roads here are either pretty decent or non-existent.  Our van traveled both.  Everywhere is a lot cleaner than the other developing countries I've been to.  It's gorgeous here. . . hills that spring up out of nowhere and keep going, surrounded by a mist that makes it all pretty mysterious.

{. . . I talked about a few events and the road trip to Fundong, but now I think I'll skip ahead to when we actually get to the orphanage}

After our driver, Henry, navigated an amazing mud puddle, we arrived at Harvest Children's Home to mobs of screaming (happy) kids.  Three girls (Vigiline, Mariana, and Shansline) latched onto me immediately.  I was reminded of what Michelle said in response to my fears about loving and leaving-- the ones who need you will come to you.  It was overwhelming, in a mostly sweet but a little sad way. 

More on our evolving plan soon!  Bon soir! <3RH

Reality Check

I've just started my second year of medical school (which I spent most of the summer dreading), and it has definitely hit like a ton of bricks, but in a different way than I was expecting. The class isn't that bad, and the work isn't that bad, and really if you want to do medical school I definitely don't mean to discourage-- it's just that it contrasts so wildly with my experiences this summer.

I mean, there's the obvious level of lazy-ish summer of absolute fun vs. daily routine of getting up, going to class, procrastinating, eventually studying, sleep, and repeat. That's the one I guess I was planning on, dreading.

But there's another level. I spent two weeks on a health-focused mission trip in Fundong, Cameroon at the Harvest Children's Home, and it was just absolutely eye-opening. I mean, I know it was only two weeks, but it was just vastly different from anything I've experienced before. And I've spent time (longer blocks than this, in fact) doing healthcare work in developing countries-- I worked at a leprosy hospital in Nepal for a month last summer, and last Spring Break I went with our school's medical brigade to Honduras. But I feel like none of that was really anything like the conditions at the HCH, or of the Cameroonian health care that I saw in general. Every health problem we encountered led us to other, bigger, related, and extraordinarily difficult systemic problems. It was like a Pandora's box of Russian dolls.

So it was surprising. But what's even more surprising is how I feel about it now that I'm back in school. We had our first Introduction to the Patient II lecture the other day (the class where you learn the sort of doctory skills, like interviewing and the physical exam and how to do a differential diagnosis), and I realized I had forgotten how different Western medicine really was from what I had experienced. There's just so much that we take for granted here-- of course in terms of supplies and money and standard of living, but even more than that.

The first thing you're supposed to do before you have begin your examination of a patient is wash your hands: what if there's no running water? And what if less than 1 of 100 people in the country washes their hands? (I'm not suggesting that you shouldn't wash them, but maybe you need to provide a detailed explanation about germs and disease and hygiene, just so they aren't offended, for example.)

One of your first interview tasks is to find out the patient's age. What do you do if they don't know how old they are? I think I'd get a good laugh if I asked this in class, and that would make sense because it's pretty much unimaginable here. But very few of the kids we talked to got their age right according to the records that we had for them, and to complicate matters some were missing birth certificates, and many were extraordinarily small because of nutritional issues.

So where do you begin?

I am really glad that I am in medical school, especially at EVMS. I think they will do a great job of preparing me to be a doctor in America. And that will be important to my career. But lately it's become very apparent to me that it will only be the very first step in preparing for a career in a developing country, and there will be a lot of practical health ground to make up.

Oh, and I have got to get me an MPH.


{By way of explanation, I'm stating this blog as a way of sort of reflecting on my experiences in Cameroon. I can't say that I'm going to have a lot of time this year, but the overall idea is when I do, to take my journal entries from while I was there and either directly repost them or distill them into a more expository format and put them here. Other subjects might wander in from time to time, too. I hope you enjoy!}