Tuesday, 17 August 2010
A trip to Mariental and starting to explore
Well we’re back in Okakarara now having spent last week in Mariental, a small town about 3 hours south of Windhoek. This was our second lot of In-Country Training, and the idea was that we go to somewhere different in Namibia to learn about the culture and issues in the region as well as having some time to catch up with the other volunteers and share our placement experiences so far.
We stayed in a lodge which had 2600 hectares of ‘farm’ land. It was a bit of a strange place – the owner seemed drunk and manic all the time and her dog (half wolf, half German Shepherd), had an unhealthy fettish for the cats and had seemingly been trained to attack only black people – not good for some members of our group! We didn’t really think the stuffed lion and caged Cheetah were all that great either, but it seemed to be a popular spot for people passing though to do some game hunting….and the Oryx steaks were very good.
Unexpectedly it was a very cold week so luckily the tents in which we were staying had proper beds and we could huddle up underneath 2 duvets plus several layers of clothes – it’s much warmer up north where we are and spring is definitely here – signalled by increased bug activity. We’re not looking forward to the full sized cockroaches and dung beetles, so we’re working out how to make our flat suitably sealed and protected, starting off with mosquito netting and a draft excluder for the door.
We’ve had a slightly more productive day at work today. I went out to one of the settlements, about 70km from Okakarara and met with the very motivated Community Based Rehabilitation Committee who told me all about their plans to build a vocational training centre for people with disabilities as well as a gardening project. It all sounded very positive and well planned out, but they’re still awaiting donors to get the first bricks laid so I’m not sure how long the whole thing will take to get up and running – it’s a start though. Ant went along to the local police station with the Social Worker to run a sort of Alcoholics Anonymous session. The cells (supposed to be short term ‘holding’ cells, but there were inmates who had been there for 5 years) were about 12 foot x 12 foot concrete pens with only a mesh roof and housed 10 prisoners each. Despite the horrendous conditions there was quite a lot of interest and engagement with the programme – literally a captive audience I suppose.
The region in which we are working is twice the size of the UK, and we still haven’t managed to meet Ant’s boss yet to see if we can negotiate getting some sort of transport. This is definitely going to be key to being able to even start being effective in our jobs. However, we’ve become friends with another volunteer, Mike, who works for the Ministry of Education in our region, has a car and has invited us to go on a trip to Tsumkwe (another town in the north east of our region) from Thursday and then to camp at a game reserve at the weekend – binoculars and the new camera are at the ready so hopefully we’ll get some good shots to share with you all!
Ant’s just posted some pictures on Facebook too so feel free to have a look.
Keep us posted with the news from home!
xxx
We stayed in a lodge which had 2600 hectares of ‘farm’ land. It was a bit of a strange place – the owner seemed drunk and manic all the time and her dog (half wolf, half German Shepherd), had an unhealthy fettish for the cats and had seemingly been trained to attack only black people – not good for some members of our group! We didn’t really think the stuffed lion and caged Cheetah were all that great either, but it seemed to be a popular spot for people passing though to do some game hunting….and the Oryx steaks were very good.
Unexpectedly it was a very cold week so luckily the tents in which we were staying had proper beds and we could huddle up underneath 2 duvets plus several layers of clothes – it’s much warmer up north where we are and spring is definitely here – signalled by increased bug activity. We’re not looking forward to the full sized cockroaches and dung beetles, so we’re working out how to make our flat suitably sealed and protected, starting off with mosquito netting and a draft excluder for the door.
We’ve had a slightly more productive day at work today. I went out to one of the settlements, about 70km from Okakarara and met with the very motivated Community Based Rehabilitation Committee who told me all about their plans to build a vocational training centre for people with disabilities as well as a gardening project. It all sounded very positive and well planned out, but they’re still awaiting donors to get the first bricks laid so I’m not sure how long the whole thing will take to get up and running – it’s a start though. Ant went along to the local police station with the Social Worker to run a sort of Alcoholics Anonymous session. The cells (supposed to be short term ‘holding’ cells, but there were inmates who had been there for 5 years) were about 12 foot x 12 foot concrete pens with only a mesh roof and housed 10 prisoners each. Despite the horrendous conditions there was quite a lot of interest and engagement with the programme – literally a captive audience I suppose.
The region in which we are working is twice the size of the UK, and we still haven’t managed to meet Ant’s boss yet to see if we can negotiate getting some sort of transport. This is definitely going to be key to being able to even start being effective in our jobs. However, we’ve become friends with another volunteer, Mike, who works for the Ministry of Education in our region, has a car and has invited us to go on a trip to Tsumkwe (another town in the north east of our region) from Thursday and then to camp at a game reserve at the weekend – binoculars and the new camera are at the ready so hopefully we’ll get some good shots to share with you all!
Ant’s just posted some pictures on Facebook too so feel free to have a look.
Keep us posted with the news from home!
xxx
Thursday, 5 August 2010
Week 3
We have spent this week with Josephine, the district Medical Rehabilitation Worker. Despite adopting the communication approach of only sharing information in response to direct questioning that we have become accustomed to she seems to have slowly warmed to us. Josephine is actually very friendly and obviously very competent in her role which further raised our question about what we are doing here. We then learnt that she will be leaving soon to take up a post in a coastal district near her family leaving us as the only trained rehabilitation workers in the district, raising another question regarding sustainability after we leave. Things are far from clear regarding our roles and we must wait a couple more weeks before we meet my line manager to ask some more direct questions!
In the meantime we have found a role in supporting health promotion. Yesterday we found ourselves appointed to a committee planning a two day programme raising breastfeeding awareness. The two days turned out to be today and tomorrow – nothing like forward planning! Not the best utilisation of our skills but it was good to be doing something useful. And I have learnt a lot about breastfeeding! It also gave us a chance to be introduced to the community. Today’s event was held in an outdoor cattle auction arena with the presentations interspersed with prayer, songs and drama – we are certainly in Africa.
At the weekend we took the hour drive to Otjiwarongo to do some shopping and meet up with a couple Canadian volunteers. Genevieve is a physiotherapist placed in another region and it was reassuring to hear that her experiences so far had been similar to ours. I felt for her partner Simon, who is a non-volunteering partner or NVP, who seemed to have had a very long week and was craving internet access! I have also noticed how much time we seem to have here – we have already got through a whole season of Lost. When not watching Jack, Hurley and our other friends going crazy on their island we have been passing the time playing Scrabble, at which I continue to get worse.
Ant x
In the meantime we have found a role in supporting health promotion. Yesterday we found ourselves appointed to a committee planning a two day programme raising breastfeeding awareness. The two days turned out to be today and tomorrow – nothing like forward planning! Not the best utilisation of our skills but it was good to be doing something useful. And I have learnt a lot about breastfeeding! It also gave us a chance to be introduced to the community. Today’s event was held in an outdoor cattle auction arena with the presentations interspersed with prayer, songs and drama – we are certainly in Africa.
At the weekend we took the hour drive to Otjiwarongo to do some shopping and meet up with a couple Canadian volunteers. Genevieve is a physiotherapist placed in another region and it was reassuring to hear that her experiences so far had been similar to ours. I felt for her partner Simon, who is a non-volunteering partner or NVP, who seemed to have had a very long week and was craving internet access! I have also noticed how much time we seem to have here – we have already got through a whole season of Lost. When not watching Jack, Hurley and our other friends going crazy on their island we have been passing the time playing Scrabble, at which I continue to get worse.
Ant x
Friday, 30 July 2010
First week at work
We’ve been at work for 3 days now and it’s been an enlightening experience to say the least. At 8am Monday morning we were met by the Social Worker, Clever, who gave us some brief information about the hospital – having fired lots of questions at him and receiving minimal useful information we hoped that there might be some sort of induction planned for us. However, we then found out that the Medical Rehab Worker, Josephine, who runs the rehab department and will be able to fill us in on the basics of what goes on is away on a workshop about 400km away all week…and there’s no phone coverage so we were unable to contact her…marvellous.
There’s a weekly Monday morning ward round where pretty much all the hospital staff trawl around the patients (we were introduced to 16 staff all together on the round), so patient confidentiality and bedside manner left a lot to be desired – it’s how we imagine it to have been 50 years ago in the UK, but with less of a grasp on basic hygiene. Some of the wards are pretty shabby – the ward marked ‘isolation’ has the door open and allows anyone in, and there’s a lack of water in the taps and no soap in sight! Despite all this the staff are really friendly and laid back - probably because they have a lot of time on their hands as the ratio of staff to patients is quite high. I think at the moment there are about 20 patients in the whole hospital so it gives you an idea of how small the town is.
For the rest of the day on Monday we had a number of frustrating conversations with various members of staff whereby people would give us information on a strictly need to know basis – i.e. unless we asked a very specific direct question we would get nothing, and even then it was hit and miss. We had several random patients just turn up in the department including a few children, a guy needing ferrell replacements on his ancient crutches, a woman with severe leg contractures due to being bed bound for 6 months in hospital….none of which we knew were coming, had any information on or spoke much English. As you can imagine, we went home that night feeling a bit deflated and wondering what on earth we are supposed to be doing here.
On Tuesday we took it upon ourselves to go on one of the outreach clinic visits to a settlement called Okondjatu, about 100km from Okakarara. It was an ideal opportunity to suss out the region properly. Initially the understanding of the Dr, HIV counsellor and pharmacist who we travelled with was that we would provide massage to people when we arrived. So we had to explain, in a diplomatic way, that 1 – we don’t really do a lot of massage, 2 – if we did then doing a one-off session once a month to people in the settlement would be a total waste of time, and 3 – it would take all day for the Herero ladies to remove their 10 layers of clothes anyway (we’ll post some photos soon – amazing outfits, they look like a cross between Victorian dress and a hammerhead shark!). We went along to observe (in the back of the pick up truck) and when we arrived all the patients were sat on the floor, spilling out of the clinic door. The Dr saw 87 patients in 6 hours – pretty impressive! – mostly heart problems, diabetes and OA, put down to the fact that they eat a diet of strictly no veg, meat, meat a bit more meat and soured milk. It really made us realise how little people have here, we saw donkeys pulling people along in carts, and again, lots of goats.
Wednesday was a better day. We were recognised by people at the hospital and our Otjiherero greetings are coming along well. We spoke on the telephone to another Physio volunteer working in the region who has given us some helpful information, putting us slightly more at ease, and we’re meeting up with her next week to find out more. We also met with the Principal Medical Officer who seems very down to earth and flexible which bodes well. It’s all a lot to adjust to, and as much as we keep telling ourselves that it’ll take a while to settle in, it’s strange not being busy and not knowing what to do….we’ll be learning a lot about patience!
There’s a weekly Monday morning ward round where pretty much all the hospital staff trawl around the patients (we were introduced to 16 staff all together on the round), so patient confidentiality and bedside manner left a lot to be desired – it’s how we imagine it to have been 50 years ago in the UK, but with less of a grasp on basic hygiene. Some of the wards are pretty shabby – the ward marked ‘isolation’ has the door open and allows anyone in, and there’s a lack of water in the taps and no soap in sight! Despite all this the staff are really friendly and laid back - probably because they have a lot of time on their hands as the ratio of staff to patients is quite high. I think at the moment there are about 20 patients in the whole hospital so it gives you an idea of how small the town is.
For the rest of the day on Monday we had a number of frustrating conversations with various members of staff whereby people would give us information on a strictly need to know basis – i.e. unless we asked a very specific direct question we would get nothing, and even then it was hit and miss. We had several random patients just turn up in the department including a few children, a guy needing ferrell replacements on his ancient crutches, a woman with severe leg contractures due to being bed bound for 6 months in hospital….none of which we knew were coming, had any information on or spoke much English. As you can imagine, we went home that night feeling a bit deflated and wondering what on earth we are supposed to be doing here.
On Tuesday we took it upon ourselves to go on one of the outreach clinic visits to a settlement called Okondjatu, about 100km from Okakarara. It was an ideal opportunity to suss out the region properly. Initially the understanding of the Dr, HIV counsellor and pharmacist who we travelled with was that we would provide massage to people when we arrived. So we had to explain, in a diplomatic way, that 1 – we don’t really do a lot of massage, 2 – if we did then doing a one-off session once a month to people in the settlement would be a total waste of time, and 3 – it would take all day for the Herero ladies to remove their 10 layers of clothes anyway (we’ll post some photos soon – amazing outfits, they look like a cross between Victorian dress and a hammerhead shark!). We went along to observe (in the back of the pick up truck) and when we arrived all the patients were sat on the floor, spilling out of the clinic door. The Dr saw 87 patients in 6 hours – pretty impressive! – mostly heart problems, diabetes and OA, put down to the fact that they eat a diet of strictly no veg, meat, meat a bit more meat and soured milk. It really made us realise how little people have here, we saw donkeys pulling people along in carts, and again, lots of goats.
Wednesday was a better day. We were recognised by people at the hospital and our Otjiherero greetings are coming along well. We spoke on the telephone to another Physio volunteer working in the region who has given us some helpful information, putting us slightly more at ease, and we’re meeting up with her next week to find out more. We also met with the Principal Medical Officer who seems very down to earth and flexible which bodes well. It’s all a lot to adjust to, and as much as we keep telling ourselves that it’ll take a while to settle in, it’s strange not being busy and not knowing what to do….we’ll be learning a lot about patience!
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