Drakensberg Boys and Giraffes

What a great week :) On Tuesday our clinicals were cancelled because we had a guest speaker come to AE and he held a four hour seminar for us on Zulu culture. It was super interesting and I am so glad that I was able to go. On Wednesday it was the hottest day ever! We drove a little over 2 hours to the Drakensberg Mountains to see the Drakensberg Boy's Choir. They are one of the top boy's choirs in the world, ranking up there with the Vienna Boy's and I just totally loved them! They did a lot of African songs and old gospel songs. But they also did "Beautiful Girls" by Sean Kingston which was so great! They were so much fun to see and totally worth the long hot drive in the bus without air-conditioning. And it reminded me of the good times in high school when I would travel to go watch my friends' choir competitions and performances, so that brought a smile to my face :) Here is picture of the beautiful sky on our drive home near the Drakensberg Mountains:

Thursday I was back at Mason's clinic and was able to work with Sister McKay in the ARV unit. It was a lot of observation and helping her with documentation. She isn't to keen on letting student's draw blood or do assessments, which was unfortunate for me but I still feel like I learned a lot because I was so full of questions. Midway through my time with her, the waiting room outside broke out in songs of praise to God again and my heart just instantly felt happy. I asked to go sit in the waiting room so that I could hear the pastor's message and join in on the songs and Sister McKay was very kind to let me. It was a good message and I feel like I was meant to at Mason's just for me to be in the waiting room for that short bit.

On Saturday, a group of twelve of us asked to go to a local game reserve in the morning to see some giraffes. The rest of the group had already been to see them during one of their class field trips but the nursing class and one other class had not been. So "Baba" (Father) Philip kindly took us. And within 5 minutes of walking through the game reserve we spotted their tall heads poking through the trees!! :) We all were so excited and walked off the path and into the bush to get closer, and naturally the giraffe started walking away. But we followed him for a couple of minutes and he led us straight to all of his friends! :) It was amazing there were like 20 giraffes just chillin' in the bush with the zebras! There were even baby giraffes -so cute! It was seriously so fun to see them and get close to them, such an awesome experience! Here is a quick picture of me pointing to the big one behind me:

Here is a quick video that I took of them all surrounding us with the zebras. They were running together so gracefully but of course stopped right when I hit the record button. But it's still a cool video. Sorry it is kind of short and that I am moving it fast...but you can at least get the gist of what it was like :)

After spending the morning with the giraffes and the zebras, I went out to lunch with my chalet mates. We went to this place called Frankie's which is next a cute little lake. I had a very tasty burger which I haven't had since I was back at home. And then we topped it off with a $1 ice cream cone which was perfect because it was miserably hot again. Today, I skipped church for some much needed R&R. I feel like I have been on the go since day one, so it was nice to sleep in and spend some time to myself. I also spent some time today in the stream that leads to the big waterfall with some friends and we played games and watched monkeys jump from trees. Even though it wasn't a productive day, it was great :) This week I will be back at Ethembeni and then a new clinical site called Walk in The Light. I am excited to go to the new sight and I am really excited that we are getting closer and closer to the safari trip on April 1st because my new favorite animal is the giraffe! :)

Durban, Rugby, The WaySide, and Zip-Lining? Yebo!

Sorry again for the lack of updates, I have been a busy little bee. On Thursday the 17^th, I was at Caprisa for my clinical site. It is located in a rural area called Vulindlela and it is a HIV/AIDS center for research. I was assigned to Sister “Lucky” for the day. She was nice but not too keen on having a student with her for the day. She explained that she had not gotten a lot of sleep the past few nights because she is preparing to move to a new province in two weeks. Lucky for her, there were only like 8 patients that came in before first tea and then she was able to lay her head down on the desk. She actually fell completely asleep and I was twiddling my thumbs for a good while. I did not want to sneak out because it would’ve woken her up and I knew that she needed to sleep. But eventually I slipped out and was able to take a walk down the road and just get a breath of fresh air with Kristina. I know I have mentioned this before, but I find myself becoming more and more overwhelmed by the sheer number of HIV+ people that walk in. And the magnitude of it all just becomes draining. So a simple walk down a dirt road and under a beautiful blue sky, was just what I needed.

On Saturday the 20^th, we went to Durban for the day. In the morning we went to uShaka which is a waterpark and marine world. My mother instilled in me at a young age that waterparks are dirty, so I opted for just the marine world haha :) We were able to see some seals, penguins, and a fun dolphin show. The dolphin pictured below is the largest dolphin in the world that is in captivity. Afterwards we went outside the park and walked down to beach. We had our packed lunches and enjoyed the sea breeze.

In the evening, we went to a rugby game! It was the KwaZulu-Natal Sharks vs. the Free State Cheetahs. Even though I had no clue how the game was played, I still had a blast! It was just so great to be in a big stadium, cheer with a bunch of crazy fans, and to eat a good hot dog with “tomato sauce.” It started raining during the game and the stadium awning leaked a little on us, but it was still a great game and the Sharks came out winning 24-9, yebo! (yes)! Haha :) hopefully we can make one more rugby game before we leave because I really enjoyed it. Below is a picture of the beautiful stadium as well as a picture of Amanda, Jessie, and I before the game with our war paint on:

Sunday the 21^st, I went to church with Kelly and Sandy who has been working 33 years for AE and is just super sweet. Sandy's church, the Christian Fellowship, is maybe a 10 minute drive from AE. It is mainly an Indian congregation with a few black families. The service was long and sometimes difficult to understand because of the accent. But everyone was very welcoming and so happy to have us visit. After the service we went to Pastor Chris’ house in Blackridge with Sandy, her son Jared, and another couple from the congregation. Chris made us a great Indian meal with all kinds of yummy spices. It was so nice to be in a home and to sit around a real dining room table together and just chat about life. We were able to ask them what their experience was like during the apartheid and it was very interesting to hear their perspective since I have only heard accounts from whites or blacks. Below is a picture of Kelly and I with Sandy in the black shirt, Sandra (Pastor Chris’ wife) in the white and black, and two other ladies from the church.

After lunch, we drove to Jika Joe informal settlement, which is about five blocks from the church. It is an extremely poor area –close living quarters, mud houses, tin roofs… totally the slums with just a few government 10x10 houses up the street. There is one water pump that they all share which was actually installed just couple of years ago. The Christian Fellowship church comes to Jika Joe every Sunday to sing songs and provide lunch to approximately 150 children. They started this ministry, called the WaySide, for the children about 2 years ago and every Sunday a different family from the congregation volunteers and prepares food out of their own money for up to 150 children. Pastor Chris and his wife have been coming every Sunday since the start. We had only about 70 children show up for the day, but it was beautiful to see their smiling faces and to sing along with them. They call it the WaySide ministry because they meet the children on the road that is on the way to church and they meet them on the side of the road under the shade of a huge tree. It was a beautiful thing to be a part of even for a little bit and it certainly turned out to be my favorite Sunday thus far. We are planning on going back two more times before we leave for Cape Town in April and I am really looking forward to it.

Tuesday the 22^nd, I was back at EastBoom Community Health Clinic with Alex and Callee. All three of us were assigned to work the Sister in charge in the antenatal unit. We saw maybe 4 patients before we were interrupted by this doctor who comes in once or twice a month and acts as a consultant. He invited us to follow him as he made his rounds to each unit. He checked machines to make sure they were functioning properly and checked to see if certain medical supplies were short or missing. But he mainly quizzed each sister and on-site doctor about their policies and protocol on how they documented, assessed, diagnosed, and treated patients. He corrected them a lot more than I expected he would have to. He also saw a couple of patients himself and taught the sisters and I quite a bit. So it was quite a blessing to learn from him for a day.

On Wednesday the 23^rd, our evening class was cancelled so I was able to go out and explore a little bit with our RA Sarah Jane and five other friends. We went to Howick Falls, had lunch and did a little shopping. It was so nice to get off campus, see something new, and just to shop, I love shopping :) It was good to get to know Sarah Jane a little more as well. She was born in SA but grew up in Botswana and then went to boarding school in Zimbabwe. It is her first semester working with AE and she is just great. Below is a picture from the “query” or lookout point.

On Thursday the 24^th, I was back at EastBoom. This time I was assigned to the pediatric unit with Callee. Our sister was very nice and she let us do all of the assessments and all the documentation. It was great to learn how they documented everything and get some practice on their Road To Health Card (health documents specific for Sub-Saharan Africa which I wrote a paper on). She taught and walked us through the first couple of patients but then basically let us run the show. When the patients only spoke Zulu then our sister would translate and if they spoke English, then she would only add her two cents when needed. She showed us how to use their booklet with all the protocol for how to assess, classify, and treat certain cases properly. The flowchart showed what questions to ask to see if they had any danger signs and to define their classification. It was a little bit of a struggle at first but after we had multiple cases of the same thing it became easy to handle without the use of the flowchart. By the end of the day we were properly diagnosing and prescribing the medication without having to look at the chart or ask the sister. We saw two different children with ringworms which was interesting because I have never seen that before. It was a good day with lots of hands-on experience. I really appreciated that the nurse took the back seat today and let us run the show while she overlooked all that we were doing. You definitely learn more doing things rather than watching things.

Today we went zip-lining at the Karkloof Canopy Tours. I was excited but, I was a little nervous too because I am not the biggest fan of heights. But it was still super fun and we had a really beautiful view of the valley below us. There were eight slides total with the longest one being 135 meters long. Definitely fun, but nerve-wracking when you had to land. After we landed at the fourth platform, we stopped for a break and our guides provided us with a snack -apple juice and a "Chomp" or chocolate covered wafer. Below is a picture of part of our group enjoying our yummy snack.

This week I will be back at Mason’s clinic which I am looking forward to because I really enjoyed the sisters that worked there, Sister Thandi and Sister McKay. Hopefully I will be able to work with them both. We only have two weeks of clinical left which is crazy -time is really flying by quick! After clinicals are over we have a community project to work on, which I will probably be doing at Ethembeni with Kristina and Kelly. We will also be working on our big senior seminar paper for our ethics class. I am looking at writing about young international adoptees and psychiatric issues that typically evolve in adulthood. My professors liked the idea and I really think it will be interesting to research. Next Saturday there is nothing set in stone or planned. I am hoping that we will be able to go to a local game reserve and see some giraffes or go shopping at a big market in Durban...crossing my fingers that maybe we'll get to do both! :)

Teaching Projects

Today we went to Mpophomeni High School to teach three different classrooms. We picked partners and topics to teach back in the States. Mary Bette and I chose to teach on dental hygiene. As many of you know, this was right up my alley because my Ghana trip in 2009 was all about teaching 1500 children the importance of dental hygiene. The other topics covered were menstruation, exercise, alcohol abuse, drug abuse, and smoking. The exercise group had two of the boys from APU, John and Matt, join in, scrubs and all, for extra help.

Here is a picture of Mary Bette and I with our hand-made posters on cavities and dental diseases:

We taught somewhere near 120 kids total (about 40 kids per classroom), ages 13 to 15. About 5 out of the 120 had ever been to a dentist. Which I find very interesting because South Africa has universal healthcare -so why wouldn't they go to a dentist if it's free? In response to that question my professor said, "Lord only knows." It's sad. I want them all to have beautiful smiles!

The kids loved the little pink pill that showed all the plaque on your teeth, they just thought it was hilarious :) We had a post-test at the end of our presentation, so whoever could answer a question got a toothbrush. So I think that was good incentive to have them listen but I wish that we were able to provide all of them a toothbrush. Here is a picture of our super great instructors. Sister Glenda Tuckell is on the left and Dr. Glenda Hall is on the right. They are wonderful and it is such a blessing to have them as our instructors :)

This picture was all of the girls in one of the classrooms that we taught, they were very cute and each one of them hugged us as we left.


Overall it was a great day. It is such a joy to work with children. I definitely think when I graduate school I will be working with pediatrics. Children always make me happy :) Here is one last picture of the other group teaching all the boys about exercise and staying healthy.

Thursday I will be going to a new HIV clinic with Kristina called Capresa. I have heard good things about the sisters that work there so I am excited to learn and work with them. Then on Saturday we will be going to a water park/aquarium in Durban during the day and then we will be going to a Rugby game in the evening. We will be seeing the Sharks vs. the Cheetahs -I can't wait, it sounds like it will be a blast! :) Hopefully will update again on Sunday with some pictures from our fun day in Durban!

Long Post, But Trying to Catch You Up!

Happy Valentine's Day Friends and Family! Sorry for not posting anything for the last two weeks. My computer decided to poop out on me then and I have since been using a community computer on AE campus. Not the most convenient timing for my computer to decide to become undependable but I should be able to get along just fine using the community computer and borrowing my friends' computers until I go home. So we have been quite busy since the last post but I will try and catch you up on all that has been happening here. It’s going to be long but no pressure to read it, feel free to skim or just look at the pictures J

On February 3rd, I was back at Ethembeni. This time I was able to deliver food to four different families and interview one new patient that wanted to join the program in Mpophomeni. I learned that Ethembeni's food is all donated by a local farm and dairy who decided to tithe 15% of their food to Ethembeni. And the food is delivered to these patients once every two weeks and an Ethembeni volunteer visits them once a week to just catch up and pray with them. Ethembeni requires that each new patient that joins must sign a contract stating that they will attend classes on sewing, gardening, cooking, or something they call the “wonderbox” which is basically a box that they put together and will cook food without electricity. They are all about empowering them to provide food for themselves and to provide Ethembeni is an amazing non-profit organization and it truly is a place of hope.

One patient’s name was Thandi, which means “love” in Zulu. Thandi was 34 years old, HIV+ and had two children, one girl who was 12 years old and one boy who was 4 years old. Thandi showed us a picture of her daughter and then asked us to pray for her. She explained to us that she came home yesterday crying after school because her teacher called her up to the front of the whole class to say that she was ugly and stupid because she was “black.” Even though in 1994 the apartheid ended, the impact of it is still lasting. The teacher is “black” herself. It is heartbreaking and appalling that a teacher, someone that is supposed to be a role model, would ever do or say such a thing to a child. I wished so badly that her daughter was their so that I could look her in the eyes and tell her she was beautiful.

Another patient was a precious HIV+ grandmother. She had two daughters who both lost their lives to AIDS just a few years ago. The sweet grandmother is now caring for her four grandchildren, two who are in high school and two who are under age 5. She was so happy to show us her garden that was growing beautifully. She had been selling some of her vegetables and was able to buy new seeds to expand her garden. Ethembeni truly was her place of hope because before them she never knew how to garden. I was blessed to be able to return to Ethembeni’s community center and spend some time with my favorite little Ahkona:

On February the 5^th the twelve nursing girls went to the beach in Durban while the other students went on a field trip for class in PMB. The beach was absolutely gorgeous and the sun was very hot. Some of the girls forgot to put on sunscreen and got burnt really bad, thankfully I wasn’t one of them. I took a walk along the beach to a lighthouse with one of my friends and then on the way back I unfortunately got stung by a tiny tentacle from a blue bottle jellyfish or Portuguese man of war. He came out of nowhere and just got me. It stung pretty bad but thankfully it only got one toe. The lifeguard gave me some magic cream and the pain went away after a few hours. Afterwards we went shopping at the biggest mall in Durban and I picked out a new purse. It was a very relaxing day that I definitely needed.

On February 8^th I was assigned to Mason’s clinic in a township called Haniville. I was placed to work in the ARV unit (clinic for HIV+ patients) with Mary Bette. Together we were able to work with Dr. Masinga. He only works at Mason’s once a week for two hours, so we were really lucky to be able to work with him. He taught us how he does a generalized head to toe assessment which was great because we were able to see what types of things he looks for in an HIV positive patient: eyes for jaundice, mouth for oral thrush, hands for clubbing, black lines on nails for liver function, white spots for protein loss, skin for rashes or fungal infections, calves for muscle loss, and feet for fungal infections. He then had Mary Bette and I switch turns performing assessments on each patient that came in while he overlooked. It was such a great experience! I was able to see lots of cases with oral thrush, fungal infections, enlarged lymph nodes, and even anal warts.

After Dr. Masinga left, we were reassigned to work with Sister Thandi. She was explaining to us that people here value money more than life. Many people come in to the clinic complaining of a bad cough and night sweats, claiming that it is TB. But upon auscultation their lung sounds are clear and they cannot even produce a cough, so they are lying. They lie because the government will give them a grant if their CD4 count is below 350 and if they have concurrent TB. So they lie to get the nurse or doctor to send in papers to the government for their grant. And when the nurse denies them, they go and sleep around more to raise their viral load and decrease their immune system so that they do catch TB. It is a sad reality and extremely frustrating that they value money more than life and that they don’t turn to the Father in their time of need since He is Our Provider. But who knows what I would do if I were in their situation, I could only hope that I would value life and rely upon the Lord during that time of desperation.

Also, I was able to do two successful blood draws on my own while Sister Thandi overlooked which was great. Later in the day Sister McKay came in and told us to come see this patient that had just walked in. It was this young woman who had this horrendous infection on her right breast. The infection was basically eating away her skin and it was just so raw and had tons of pus –it looked so painful! The woman had a little baby about 4 weeks old and had been breastfeeding when all of the sudden the baby started refusing to nurse from that breast and would only take from left. She said the infection started to show up three days ago and her sister tried to help “squeeze it out” but it only got worse. It looked awful when she came in, I cannot imagine why she waited so long to come to the clinic for help because it was so gross and just so disturbing. Sister McKay ended up referring her to Northdale Hospital’s causality unit so that she could get immediate attention since the doctor had already left. So that was a super packed day, full of learning and lots of interesting things to see!

On February 10^th I was back at Mason’s ARV unit, this time with Kristina and Sister McKay. It was super crowded that day and we did a lot of observing. It seemed as if every patient that came in was either a child or a young adult. It really pulled on my heartstrings just because every single patient was so young. One mother came in who was 29 years old and had a little baby that was 1.5 years old. My beautiful sister Alison is that same age and so is my nephew Owen. I just could not imagine Alison and sweet little Owen walking into an HIV clinic for medical treatment, it just boggled my mind. It just made me start to really question God and ask Him where He was and if He was present. The immensity of HIV is just so crazy and it just really seemed to smack me in the face. So in that moment I just said a simple prayer asking for faith and asking that I would not lose sight of Him amidst all this sadness. And after I prayed, like a minute later, the whole entire waiting room outside broke out in song!! Sister McKay explained to me that a pastor comes in and usually has a little sermon for them and together they pray and sing in Zulu. She said they were singing praises about how He provides. How amazing that these people in such a desperate situation still praise God and call Him the ultimate Provider? I cannot imagine any clinic in America ever breaking out in song to praise God. It was just such a beautiful moment and I really felt God was there.

On Saturday the 12^th we all went on a little hike through the Drakensburg mountains to see some old Bushmen cave paintings. The scenery was gorgeous and the paintings were very neat. The nursing girls are scheduled to camp out in the Drakensburg mid-March with Professor Glenda’s pastor. I am really looking forward to spending some more time surrounded by God’s incredible beauty!

Yesterday after church we had a “talking drums” session –it was basically an hour jam session with djembes and other such instruments. It was so much fun! A little family of three came in with djembes for all of us and had us do a bunch of different rhythms, it was totally awesome and I am totally looking forward to practicing my djembe from Ghana when I get home J

Other than clinical and the fun Saturday outings, we have just been in class learning a lot. Here is a picture of our classroom before we began our HIV/AIDS in South Africa lecture with Professor Wendy and Professor Glenda:

Oh and we've been trying to fend off these devious little creatures who like to steal my candy:

A Place of Hope

Yesterday I was at Ethembeni, a care center for those who are HIV+. It is located in the township called Mpophomeni, about a 25 minute drive from PMB, which is quite overcrowded and very poor. Ethembeni has four hospice beds for those dying with AIDs and yesterday three out of the four beds were occupied. Ethembeni also has about 70 patients that live throughout Mpophomeni and the surrounding suburbs that they follow up with every two weeks. They have volunteers that do home visits and that drop off a bag of mealie meal (maize), a roll of toilet paper, and a full plastic bags worth of food. I am unsure if they drop off food every two weeks or if it is only once a month. But nonetheless, I cannot imagine the food would last a week when these patients have to feed their children and family as well. My professor told me that the majority of people that live in Mpophomeni do not have jobs. The live off the land and whatever pension they can get from the government each month. There is also this thing called "Ubuntu" among the Zulus -basically meaning "community" and that you care for those among you no matter what. If you have a job, you care for your mother, father, sisters, brothers, cousins, and in-laws, and whoever else that have no income. I think that our independent-driven America could learn a thing or two from these Zulus. Here I am in Mpophomeni:

Despite the overcrowding, the backdrop of Mpophomeni is breathtaking -blue skies, rolling green hills:

Mpophomeni reminded me of my time in Ghana a lot. Since my arrival in South Africa I have mainly seen the first world. But Mpophomeni is very third world and really made me feel as if I was in Africa. I guess it is just something about seeing how and where people really live. Mpophomeni had chickens, goats, and cows awanderin' about just like in Ghana. There were people walking without shoes, women carrying colorful umbrellas to shade them from the sun, and children cutting across dirt trails through fields to get to school. Houses were made out of mud and warped wood with tin or straw roofs. But God's beauty surrounded Mpophomeni -blue skies, white puffy clouds, wildflowers, and the most wonderful breeze.


At Ethembeni I was assigned to join some of the volunteers and help deliver food to patients who lived in a very rural area way past Mpophomeni, way up in the hills. So I helped hitch on the small trailer onto the back of a small pick up truck. I packed in the bags of food, mealie meal, and toilet paper and closed the lid shut with short metal wire. We then put in a thin dirty mattress on the bed of the truck which I assumed we would deliver to someone as well. But I soon realized, we were sitting in the bed of the truck and the mattress was our cushion! Haha, so I crawled into the bed... and eight others followed me! If only you could have seen it, we were seriously squished and on top of each other -totally nuts, but I loved it! Here is a picture of two of the volunteers that I worked with on our nice cushion:

We drove out of Mpophomeni and onto the dirt roads. We probably drove for about 30 minutes and it was seriously the bumpiest ride I've ever been on -our driver had no fear and we went over some giant potholes. Thank goodness for the cool breeze blowing through:


We delivered food to four different families. Most of what was said was in Zulu. I tried not to ask them to translate much because in the moment it never seemed okay to interrupt. It would take forever to tell you about each visit but one I would like to share. She was 26 years old and HIV+ since 2010. She said she was nine months pregnant but looked to be about seven, I am not sure if that is due to her small stature or her overall lack of nutrition. It was her first pregnancy. She called herself "lucky" because it is unheard of for a Zulu woman to have her firstborn at 26 years old, most have three or four by then. She thought it was "funny" that I did not have a child myself but then called me "lucky" too :) She lived in a four room mud and wood house -kitchen, living room, and two bedrooms. Eight others lived with her. We sat on maroon couches that sank to the floor and a floppity-bajillion flies joined us. She shared with us that she had just been to the doctor last week and was diagnosed with preeclampsia. She was worried about her baby and the delivery. She was feeling the side effects of her ARV medications and it was causing her to worry as well. She was nervous about becoming a mother but excited as well. She did not talk about the father of the baby and I did not ask. I asked if I could pray for her. And so together we prayed with chickens walking through the living room and with the breeze flying in from the lace covered windows.

I so wish you all could be here with me. Words and pictures are nothing compared to experiencing it first hand. These moments, sitting and talking with these "untouchable" HIV+ people, are the most moving and surreal and sad and beautiful and humbling moments ever. I am so blessed to be here -still need to pinch myself.

After we visited the homes we drove to a shady spot and had our "tea and eats." South African take tea time seriously -it's no joke, the totally stop whatever they are doing to drink and eat and chit chat. It's so fun! After tea, they drove me back down to Mpophomeni because they needed to travel even further into the hills and I needed to be back in time for my pickup to go back to campus.

So they dropped me off at the Ethembeni "community" center which is basically a daycare center for orphaned and vulnerable children. So for about two hours I was able to hang out and play with some adorable children. I love that children are children all across the world -language barriers are no problem, you can still have fun and play together with them. Here is my favorite little girl Akhona who is 3 years old and only 11kg. She has a very bad home situation and is not properly cared for. She entered Ethembeni last year and was not even able to walk on her own. She is so precious and I hope that I can see her again at clinical tomorrow.

Today we had Michael Cassidy, the founder of African Enterprise (AE) come and speak to us in our History of South Africa class. He told the chilling story of his role behind the scenes with South Africa's first democratic elections in 1994. Those elections should have ended in a total bloodbath and a furious civil war. But Cassidy along with other Christian leaders were able to convince some of South Africa's biggest political leaders to come together at AE with their rivals for weekend dialogues. Understanding slowly took place between rivals over trips through game reserves. A twenty-four/seven hour chain of prayer was started. It's a long story that involves a plane with a faulty dial, a prayer meeting with 30,000 people, a Kenyan diplomat, and many Christian leaders coming together. In short, the newspapers got it right, the election that took place on April 26th, 1994 was a "miracle." The Almighty God intervened on that day and Michael Cassidy was an integral part of God's plan for South Africa. I seriously got goosebumps when he told us the story. After he shared I was able to meet him and buy his book which goes into further detail of all that happened with the 1994 miracle -I am so looking forward to reading it.

Zebras, Birds, and Ghandi :)

Sanibona! ("hello" to more than one)

Sawubona ("hello" to one) literally means "I see you." So in response to this people say, "Yebo, Sawubona" meaning "Yes, I see you." I find it very neat that the Zulus greet others by actually acknowledging their existence, that they are human. I had my first Zulu class last Wednesday night so that's where I got this little lesson from but oh man, what an fascinating language! They have three different clicks and trying to incorporate them into the middle of words is totally difficult. But when you hear the Zulu people speak, the clicks sound so natural and its just really awesome.

Thursday I was back at East Boom. This time I was in the PMTCT unit (Prevention of Mother to Child Transmission). PMTCT is a program that is set up for HIV+ pregnant women. Labs are drawn to check certain levels. If the expectant mother has a CD4 count that is below 350 then she is placed on ARV treatment. But before she can see the doctor to receive her ARV treatment, she must first attend three classes or counseling sessions about how to handle HIV as well as ARV treatments. The expectant mother is asked to bring someone who she can trust to come with her to listen in on and participate in these classes. Only after she has completed these classes with her support can she make an appointment with the doctor to start her ARV treatment. My nurse, Sister Hadebe told me about how it is a problem sometimes because once mothers find out their CD4 count is low then they never come back to the clinic because they are basically afraid or embarrassed. Sister Hadebe was a great nurse and I learned a lot. She was able to help me successfully draw my first vial of blood ever -so that was definitely exciting :)

Friday we had class all day but in the evening a group of 17 of us were finally able to get off campus. Our resident director, Janet, turned 23 so we went out to celebrate her birthday. We went to this little bar/restaurant called Keg & Hedgehog. So that was super nice to get out and have some fun. Janet is the second one from the right.

Saturday morning I woke up at 6 and went on a morning hike with two of my chalet mates. We were lucky enough to find two "zeb-bras!" They were having their morning breakfast on the side of the road on the way to the trail.


I love the zebras, can you tell?

I might be over-doing it with the zebra pictures but they are just so cute! Here's just one more, and I promise that will be it:

After our morning hike we left with the whole group to go to Birds of Prey Wildlife Sanctuary. It was pretty neat -they had all kinds of birds: owls, vultures, eagles, hawks, falcons, storks, etc. They train some of the birds too so that was neat. Below is one of the trained owls:

Here is the trainer with a falcon that they rescued and trained:


After our day with the birds, we drove around Pietermaritzburg (PMB) and saw some historical sites. We stopped at the PMB train station. This station is famous because Mahatma Ghandi states his experience there "changed the course of life." Ghandi was a lawyer and had just left England for South Africa to assist one of his clients. Ghandi recalls that on June 7, 1893, seven days after his arrival in South Afirca, he was traveling from Pretoria to Durban and was kicked off of the first class train at the PMB train station because of his race. He spent the night at the platfrom in PMB "shivering" and "afraid." He stated that his "active non-violence begain from that date." Below is a picture of the train station:

And here is a statue of Ghandi in PMB:

After our Ghandi experience we drove up to a beautiful lookout where we could see all of PMB and it was just gorgeous. Here is a picture with Kristina and the beautiful view behind us:


Sunday we went to a small church in the city. The church is located in the heart of a big Hindu community so the whole congregation is made up of Indians that were orginially Hindu. It was a good service and interesting to hear their message about how we can have a personal relationship with God because of Christ and that we do not need to worship idols. After church I spent the day laying on the grass in the sun next to the waterfall reading a book for fun. It was so nice to just relax and take a mental break from nursing studies.

Today we had classes and tomorrow I have clinical again. I will be going to Ethembeni ("Place of Hope") which cares for those who are really poor and really sick by going to their houses and providing them food and spiritual care. So I am excited to experience something new :) They are keeping us busy here but it is so good. I feel extremely blessed to be here. To learn from such amazing people and to be surrounded by such beauty and history. I am just so excited every day that I wake up and I haven't really felt that in a long time.

Sawubona!

Sawubona! (Hello in Zulu!)

We made it to African Enterprise! Beautiful place, beautiful staff. I am so so blessed to be living here for the next 10 weeks! God's beauty is everywhere -I feel like I have to pinch myself every five minutes so that I know that I'm not dreaming. AE has a ton of land -including some beautiful waterfalls. I'll have to post some pictures of those later when it stops raining -it's been cool and rainy since Sunday, which is quite enjoyable after the hot and humid Saturday we had. Here is a picture of Kelly and I at the entrance to AE after our hike in the rain:

This building is the main hang out. Our dining hall is in the middle. The windows on the far right are our classrooms and the last window on the very left is the library. It's on a little hill and our chalets are just down the hill.

When we arrived on Saturday, we were greeted with these tribal dancers on the lawn in front of the dining hall. It was a great welcome and it was so fun to hear them all sing together in Zulu.

You can see the brick-like buildings in the back, those are the chalets like the ones that we live in. They are fun and remindful of my days in the SPU dorms. There are four rooms within the chalet, each with bunk beds, so that means we have 8 girls per chalet (except my chalet has 7 because we have one girl who is rooming solo). The eight of us share a bathroom that has 2 showers, 2 toilets, and 3 sinks. It works out nicely. Here is a picture of my bedroom on the first day trying to get it all organized with my roommate Mary Bette, so excuse the mess.

AE is surrounded by a game reserve so there are these beautiful hiking trails that go throughout the reserve and I'm just loving it! There are zebras, impalas, reedbuck, bushbuck, blue duiker, and monkeys. It's amazing having such animals for neighbors!

The zebras are my favorite -they are so cute and it's crazy how close they will let us come to them! I love love love it!

Yesterday (Monday) we had class from 8 until like 3. We like offically met our instructors. Dr. Wendy Hall and Sister (Professional Nurse) Glenda Tuckell. They are absolutely wonderful and so fun. They are both from Zimbabwe but have lived and worked in South Africa for 30+ years. Our classes we take with them are Ethics and Community Health in South Africa. We just had an introduction in both classes but I already feel like I'm learning a lot. We had "tea and eats" twice during the day -it was lovely, and I know I will miss those breaks when return to America. We got our clinical assignments from our instructors and I was placed in the EastBoom Community Health Center. It sees about 1000 patients per day. And it has different units for like everything -L&D, chronic illness, ARV (anti-retroviral -for HIV+ patients), mother and baby, pediatrics, etc. Here is a picture of Mary Bette and I this morning at 7:00am just before leaving for our clinical.

I ended up gettting placed in the mother baby unit with a wonderful professional nurse (SA has 3 levels of nurses, professional is the highest -they can diagnose & prescribe). She was Indian but from South Africa. She has been licensed for 16 years. We did head to toe assessments on the mother and baby. It was a challenge for me to remember all that I had learned when I was in my maternity rotation and working at St. Joseph's in Orange. My nurse was a fantastic teacher though and very patient with me. The room we had was tiny and dirty. Supplies were limited and things were reused often if they were not "visibly soiled by blood." We saw babies from 6 days old to 8 months old. A lot of teaching was done because mothers were not properly caring for their babies. Incorrect formula to water ratios, not cleaning the umbilical cords, putting too many clothes on the baby/overheating the baby, not sanitizing the baby bottles, etc. Teaching was also done about prevention of pregnancy.

And over half of the mothers that came in were HIV+. Babies with HIV+ mothers had to have DBS testing - 3 drops of dried blood sent to the laboratory. Results would not come back until 3 weeks later. Babies were then started on Bactrim (to help prevent infections such as bronchitis or pneumonia) and Multivitamins (to increase their immune system) prophylaxis until the results came back. If the results come back positive, they would be started on ARVs and if negative, they could stop the prophylaxis meds.

Many referrals were made for the mothers to go to the other units for baby immunizations or for ARV treatments. It was very interesting and I learned a ton. I felt like I was asking a question every other minute. I am excited to keep learning and I'm just feeling so blessed. I am just so grateful for this experience. Tomorrow I have my History of South Africa class as well as my Zulu class. And I am hoping to make a trip to the local mall -I've heard it's a lot like American malls so that should fun.