Planning and Executing!

Sixth night in this new and exciting country and I feel almost at home. This is definitely because of the people here. Everywhere I go I am greeted with friendliness and curiosity and kindness. In the streets, in stores, and around campus, once I say Dumela-mma or Dumela-rra (Setswana greeting for female and male), I get smiles and questions and generosity in return. Also, this country seems to be very slow-paced, slower than California. This is really refreshing for day-to-day interactions, but of course this could be frustrating sometimes like when we examine some glitches in the healthcare system.

Today was an exciting day for me. The past few days Jodi, our instructor, has been working hard to set up our clinical sites and get us started but, like I said earlier, things move slowly here. Today however, some of us went back to the Kamogelo Day Care Centre, which Derek described in the previous blogs (with the awesome pictures and video of kids dancing), and talked to Father Tony about how we can be most helpful to the community. He told us about a sewing project they have set up for the community where they provide sewing machines (with donated money) and teach the locals how to sew; this way they can then sell the clothes they make and feel ownership over a newfound talent… I wish I could sew! Some other projects include finding a way to get water to some remote villages (digging underground for wells), buying chickens for a few families to use for eggs and eventually to sell, and building rooms or roofs onto homes so that their aren’t 8 people in a small room – one can imagine how that cannot be healthy. It was an incredible experience just to witness how this type of work can be set up for students and volunteers. Conversations like the one we had today is vital around the world; as cheesy as it sounds, helping one another is the best thing we can do. Next week, we will teach the teachers at the Day Care about CPR, the Heimlich Maneuver, and basic first aide, like what to do when a child gets a cut or has ringworm. We will also do physical assessments on the children, and record their health info so that in the future, they have a baseline to compare to. In my experience, organization in many countries with needs secondary to poverty and inadequate healthcare is hard to come by, so we were all incredibly excited when Father Tony was so accommodating for us to come and help in any way we could. I can’t wait to get involved in these projects!