Saturday, November 14, 2015

A watermelon


A watermelon, pineapple, some oranges, and a small bag of clothes made up my luggage for the 2 hour flight on the small plane packed with our friends and neighbors solar cooking panel, a small table and a few bags of carrots back to Bere.

Preparing to go back to Bere I fiercely typed a bunch of emails. Looked things up on the internet and made sure to get to the market and buy some fruit… they had watermelon and pineapple!  We don’t get that in Bere, so my items of transport back were my small bag of clothes, and a watermelon. 

Landing on the small dirt runway Gary pulled into the hanger like most do pulling into the garage.  A few dozen mostly barefoot kids from the village came out to see the plane leave and stare at the white people with all their bags of stuff… “back to the land of awkwardness” I said to Athens.  Even if I were to wear what they wear I would stick out a mile away.

A Glimpse into how things are done.... or not done in Tchad

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I came to the city (N'djamena) Feb 26 thinking I would leave March 4th

Here is a summary of a collegue who was responsible for ensuring I would get a new visa so I could extend my stay to work with an NGO in Tchad.

Thursday
Me: Did you get my visa/passport today? 
Him: No, they closed early
Me: Oh, ok, thanks… (in my head thinking) it’s only 2pm
Him: This is how it is here, but don’t worry, your visa is ready
Me: (in my head)… since you are from here and seem to know that, why didn’t you go ealier?
(Outloud) smile and laugh and say, Maybe tomorrow?
Him: Yes, I will go tomorrow:

Friday
Me: Did you get my passport?
Him: I went but the guy who needs to stamp it was not there, I will go on Monday

Monday
Me: Did you get my visa/passport?
Him: I went, but they wanted money, so I’ll go back at 2pm
Me: (in my head) of course they want money for a visa!
-later that day-
Me: did you get my visa/passport?
Him: I will go tomorrow morning

Tuesday afternoon, Visa is in hand with the date stamped THAT day and good for over a year (They ‘only’ give 3 month or 6 month visas)

TIA:  This is Africa

Bere Hospital- day 1


First day… slept too long… there was more of a breeze than I remember

Walked from bandelay to hospital, about 2 miles with Cherish, 6 year old missionary kid, she wanted to wear scrubs like me so we walked to the hospital and talked the whole way.

At hospital it was so good and weird to be back, I wish I spoke French, I can say only a couple things… I feel so dumb, but then a lot of the patients don’t speak French either, so it is hard to communicate unless there is a translater, usually for Arabic, Gumbi, or Nangeri (the language mostly spoken in Bere)

I helped a women with a horrible nasty wound.  I also scrubbed in on a hernia repair, I love being in the OR!  Dr. Roland let me close which was such a great feeling to learn and be doing something helpful!

Athens, my new roommate and I rode ‘home’ on the motorbike.  It’s really sandy so it was kind of scary, plus she isn’t use to driving with someone on the back.  But we made it!  We dropped off an container to the peanut butter lady, so in a couple days we will have a container filled with yummy fresh roasted peanuts that has been ground into peanut butter!  A lady showed up at the door with a cart of food and we bought potatoes, (white, but taste kind of like a yam), apples, eggs, onion, and green peppers!!!  These are foods I NEVER saw in Bere last time I was here (except the onions), but these onions were large, I only ever saw small ones before.  I think there have been a lot of missionaries since last time I was here and the locals got wise to import foods they know the visitors will buy. I think they are getting them from Cameroon.

Athens and I cleaned everything in the dusty house, then cooked up a nice dinner… felt good to be able to cook even thought it was already so hot it made the house hotter.

Tomorrow I’m heading in to the hospital with her at 7am for a day at the hospital.

Thursday, February 28, 2013

Bush flight to Bere






Highest under 5 mortality/morbitity rate in the world, 1 in 6 kids die, 1 1,000 km 1 paved road in the country.  I am in Tchad!

I arrived in Bere today… finally, after 2 years of thinking about going back! It finally happened!
My N’djamena adopter James took me to the airport.  It was so nice to be taken care of!
I was so lucky to snag a flight with Gary, Wendy and Cherish… it was so great to see them!  For whatever reason flight felt really long, I got so tired I fell asleep
We stopped in a village to pick up a cat.  It was for Gary and Wendy so they had a cat to catch mice, but also for Cherish, she’s 6.
I think the whole village came out when the plane landed… we were surrounded by local kids talking loud and in a language I’ve never heard. Dusty, hot, and loud, we talked with a women who lives in the village, she handed over a cat in a basket and we were off to Bere.  Landing on the dirt strip I was able to walk over to my new house and meet my new roommate Athens… the house is complete with running water, a solar panel that gives some electricity, a stove and oven, my own room with a bed, and a toilet seat!

Back in Tchad!


Highest under 5 mortality/morbitity rate in the world, 1 in 6 kids die, 1 1,000 km 1 paved road in the country.  I am in Tchad!

I arrived in Bere today… finally, after 2 years of thinking about going back! It finally happened!
My N’djamena adopter James took me to the airport.  It was so nice to be taken care of!
I was so lucky to snag a flight with Gary, Wendy and Cherish… it was so great to see them!  For whatever reason flight felt really long, I got so tired I fell asleep
We stopped in a village to pick up a cat.  It was for Gary and Wendy so they had a cat to catch mice, but also for Cherish, she’s 6.
I think the whole village came out when the plane landed… we were surrounded by local kids talking loud and in a language I’ve never heard. Dusty, hot, and loud, we talked with a women who lives in the village, she handed over a cat in a basket and we were off to Bere.  Landing on the dirt strip I was able to walk over to my new house and meet my new roommate Athens… the house is complete with running water, a solar panel that gives some electricity, a stove and oven, my own room with a bed, and a toilet seat!

Flying for Days


When the pilot says  ‘as some of you may have noticed, we have flown over N’djamena’ which was suppose to be our final destination.  The end of a 6 hour flight, you think you are getting off the plane, then finding out there is another 1.5 hours before landing in Doula, the city we are being diverted to due to a sand storm in N’djamena.  I don’t have any in flight magazines in the seat pockets but the man next to me is looking at a map, I ask him what country is Doula in?  He doesn’t know, I guessed Cameroon?
            Pilot says ‘we will tell you more as we approach Douala’  As we got closer he said ‘We will tell you more once we land’  after we landed… ‘we are going to disembark the plane’
Walking out of the plane there was a wall of heat and humidity!                    
It was dark, there were no lights, there was a airport worker laying on the ground taking a nap.
 walking from the plane into the airport everyone is quiet and I feel like a lemming, just following the crowd… a typical feeling for me in the airport.

We piled into a small room where everyone seemed calm and relaxed. 
Remembering how different this scenario would be if this was a Chicago to San Fran flight, diverted to Los Angelas. People would be asking questions and  agitated, talking to one another.  But on this flight, there are no tourists.  It’s either locals, or people who are doing work in the country… and anyone who would do work in Chad, knows that things don’t always go as planned.
            People started getting up and got in line, so I followed, still no announcement.  A man came around with a giant bin and collected everyone’s passports.  Then they took 25 people and we walked through the very long dark hallways of the airport following a Cameroon women outside where we boarded a little bus, crammed in.  Bused to a hotel, we were handed a form to fill out, while standing in line and waiting for over an hour while the one hotel worker checked in the WHOLE ENTIRE flight as I was cut in front of repeatedly, I finally exchanged my paper for a room key… still no announcement, but someone in line mentioned we were scheduled to depart the hotel around 9am and catch our flight at 11am.  No mention of breakfast, or food.  I made friends with Melinda and Omer and attempted to order a water in the bar that after an hour and half of waiting, jet legged, and with the time change, I finally went to bed.
A large buffet and mingling with the plane folks, I saw with a Chadian man who scoffed at my ‘no’ response when asked if I had kids.  I asked how many he had…. 24!  My next questions was how many wives.  3, but one died.  He never went to school, but he had 4 of his oldest in college in a variety of countries and seemed to be a proud father!
            We all congregated in the lobby while a bus shuttled people to the airport, one group at a time.  It took 1.5 hours before we were all there, back in the small room we were in before.

It was 10 minutes passed our departure time and several of us were impressed that we were actually more on time than we expected.  We finally took off at noon.

This all made me think about refugees, or people displace from natural disasters.  Not that we were in a terrible place, or anything bad was happening. But just the thought of being shipped around with no word or explanation.  It’s a strange experience.


           

Tuesday, March 27, 2012

Living in the dump.......


Jan 17, 2012  Chureca
Heading out to the Chureca today... that's the dump.  Talking with Katie from the NGO Manna, I learned about the communities they work with... including the community that lives in the dump.  WHAT?!?!?!?!?!  I am shocked, confused, intrigued, then again... not surprised.
I don't really know what to expect exatly.  Are there houses actually on top of trash, do they have houses, or move around depending on where the newest garbage is being added.  Will it smell, will I be grossed out, repulsed, sad. Probably.
I hope to learn more, maybe this will be a place I can give some of my cameras to in hopes to get some photo stories...



"Bad words want to come out of my mouth" I say after a visit with one family.... surrounded by garbage, watching truck after truck, or should I saw dumpster pass by.  One of the little girls comes running out with a peice of paper (what was just given to her) that she had written 'Sara' on with her new bright and shiny crayon that was also given to her.  She wrote the name of one of the volunteers and was giving her the peice of paper.
One family had a women making tortillas.  Kids running around with knives, people with no shoes, a bag full of medical tubing, yep, some still had blood in it.  This guys 'job' is to collect it, then clean it, and resell it.  it sells by the pound.  One volunteer said she has seen needles in the area, the women of the house didn't have shoes on.
This family... as all of the ones living in the dump, didn't look like they had anything that wasn't recovered from the ever growing piles of other peoples crap.  This little girl was just given something for her very own, and she was thinking of someone else and giving it away.  I tell her she has a big heart, but I don't think she knows what I mean.  The next thing I know another little girl is running out holding a 2-foot tall barbie when the next thing I know it breaks into song singing "I'm a Barbie girl"  and we (the 6 volunteers from Manna and the three girls that had come out for one last visit) all broke into a dance party, right there, in the trash.