P minus 7 days

That's right, the lovely David and Dorothy will be arriving exactly a week from today, and I am very excited - trying desperately to stay focused on being excited about that rather than thinking about the fact that it means I am three weeks away from leaving my babies. So instead let's not think or talk about that at all, kay? The kids are mostly doing wonderfully - Z is standing on her own (albeit for only a few seconds before toppling!), the toddlers are all utterly fascinated by mirrors, and the good health kick seems to be continuing for now, although the toddlers have been wracked by a prodigious outbreak of ringworm - their hair is all falling out in little circular clumps, which I guess is ok since they shave every few months anyway. Not beautiful, and not fun to get the antifungal on squirming kidlets twice a day.

Movie star Neema practicing her pout

Sweetheart Maureen giving a kiss

Simoni thinks the whole thing is hysterical

And Zawadi being her cheeky self, as usual.

Standing alone for the first time! With the inexplicable but omnipresent shoes on the hands... don't ask me.

However, I'm NOT thrilled with the way the school kids looked upon returning to the orphanage a few days ago - they come here first and then Mama Pendo brings them individually to their homes and checks on all the conditions before leaving them. After only four months, some of these kids had lost significant amounts of weight, and all complained that there was never enough food and they were beaten all the time, and most said they disliked school because of it. These are five and six year old children, GOOD kids, not just the ones who are mischievous - all reported being beaten regularly. So that's absolutely not ok, and I'm getting in touch with several people to see whether this is something that's fixable at the school or whether we need to look for another school for at least Ericky and Steven, both of whom are being sponsored by family and friends of myself and other current volunteers (thanks Rita!).

Immanuel at Christmas

Immanuel now, all his clothes falling off

I also spent yesterday with the palliative care team, since my parents will be working primarily with them, which was... quite an eye opener. The team consists of three women with minimal medical training, overseeing another thirty volunteers in the villages, taking care of over 700 patients, with conditions ranging from cancer, to HIV, to diabetes (which is a terminal condition here) to children without caretakers in dire poverty. They are provided with medication, but it is drastically inadequate - tramadol, which is a medicine commonly used for back pain, is the most extreme painkiller they have available, even for women like the one pictured below. Her cancer is covered by her scarf, and out of respect I'm not going to post the uncovered picture, but it is about the size of a cantaloupe and visibly open and painful, distorting at least half of her face - and all they can offer is tramadol.

Using an antiquated BP machine - in most cases the only care they can provide with current equipment

Meanwhile, these patients clearly cannot work and often have been abandoned by their families (especially HIV patients), and so lack even a few thousand shillings, a dollar or less, to buy soap and disinfectant. Meanwhile, the women running the program, who are in no way, shape, or form wealthy themselves, scrape up a few shillings from their own pockets in almost every home to help them out. Even more heartbreaking, if that's possible, was the diabetic patient we saw - apparently maximum life expectancy for diabetics is about 30 years here, and the hospital owns a single glucometer, which they do not lend to the palliative care team - so the team goes out into the village and is unable to even test the sugar of the patients, and instead must try to evaluate their condition from their reports of pain, etc. Cancer and HIV are often killers even with the best care, but to see such an easily treatable condition taking lives is deeply upsetting. I am hoping that we can help formalize the structure of their program, donate some supplies, and then work on raising some money to help support their work, as they are currently almost completely unsupported, internally or externally, and run by local volunteers.

Just what I need, another big project I want to get involved with weeks before I leave...It's all worth it though, and I WILL be back.

Chickens, Geese, Birds of a feather, and Avian Flu

Bear with me while I try to tie this all together - I am currently in the throes of a gross cold/flu/something that has rendered me unconscious for at least 55 of the last 72 hours. This occurred shortly after I scoffed at my mother's concerns over Avian flu due to my extensive bird handling recently - and it has indeed been extensive. Thus, since a blood test ruled out Malaria, I am referring to this current bout of disgustingness as my own personal Avian flu. Pity me.

My birds of a feather are sadly flying away, Christian having left yesterday and my wonderful Guilia flying tomorrow. Peter comes back tomorrow from Sudan, which helps, but I'm going to miss them a lot.

You're going WHERE?!?

As for the chickens, I got a call this morning from Frankie, the Tanzanian teenager who has been helping us with the birds - apparently, the birds decided they like the container for the bonemeal better than they like the custom made nestboxes, and have been laying their eggs there instead! Stupid birds. At any rate, it will require some rethinking of the pen design. My theory is that the birds shy away from the nest boxes because they are within sight of the window, from which a plethora of adorable, tiny, loudly screaming faces are using looming. So maybe we just move the boxes and solve the problem. We shall see. We collected our first egg last week, and my buddy Stevie promptly took it upon himself to throw it down a hill in his excitement - I think we all need to work on our chicken husbandry skills. In case you couldn't guess from the video, kuku means chicken in Kiswahili.

Chicken's eye view

And geese - this is borrowed from a wonderful friend of mine, who discussed how much easier life would be if men were tagged - I quote, "you know, like the way bread loaves have that little plastic thingy that closes tha bag.  sometimes they are different colors.  and men should be tagged like bread loves or like geese" to let us know whether they are gay or married or just terrible human beings so that we don't waste our time. This was an entirely theoretical and humorous idea until the recent revelation that certain people in positions of power here... let me rephrase that, a shockingly large percentage of men I've met in any kind of position of power here - seem to have serious problems with lying and/or attempted or successful sexual coercion of the women, and especially girls, working under them. I am devastated and deeply disappointed with some of the information coming to light, and in the process of trying to figure out what, if anything, can be done. I would like to extend the goose idea to tag men who are immoral and irresponsible, so they can be kept out of positions of power. When I'm God-Empress of the Universe...

Ugh. We're still doing good work, but getting bogged down a lot with organizational problems, and I'm starting to feel discouraged and frustrated. For instance, we STILL haven't had our survey done, despite being told every day since last week that it would be happening. Meanwhile, the man who has offered to drill for us essentially for free is getting antsy about the timetable, as he has paid commitments in the new year. Even when people legitimately ARE good and want to do good, the endless little frustrations of Africa seem to get in the way. Nothing to be done but to keep on plugging, and keep working on my Hakuna Matata attitude... Deep breaths...

...and dancing. Deep breaths and babies and dancing. These are the keys.