Since Al and I were not able to meet with Alex, the head of the community health outreach at St. Gabs, on Wednesday, we scheduled to meet with him today. The meeting went really well. Alex was able to inform us about community health outreach volunteers that are in the Msundwe area. These volunteers are called HSAs (health surveillance assistants). With his help, we were able to talk to the president of the HSAs and get him and a few volunteers from the Msundwe area.

From the meeting with Alex, we also learned about how the CHO pack supplies are replenished. All of the medications are obtained from the pharmacy at the hospital and rest of the consumables from the hospital stock rooms. Every 3 to 6 months the supplies in the pack are replenished.

In addition, we also learned a few things about St. Gabriel’s. It is both funded by a private organization, CHAM, and the government. The hospital also gets donations from individuals who first started the hospital. There is on going funding, which plays a large part in what the hospital can offer to its patients.

Overall, meeting with Alex gave me a lot of background information about St. Gabriel’s and its community outreach program.

Today we visited St. Gabriel’s Hospital. This was the first time I visited a health care facility in Malawi. We met with Alexa and Danielle and they gave a tour of the hospital. It was much bigger than I imagined. One of the health care workers at the hospital said that they see more than 300 patients a day at this hospital. It was interesting that there was one head nurse that basically did everything. Most doctors/nurses here were not specialized in any specific field. Since there is a limitation of trained health care workers in Malawi, it is definitely more practical to have health care workers who are able to treat various conditions. Going to St. Gabriel’s was helpful in that it allowed us to see the different components of a health care facility here in Malawi. Also, it gave us some insight into what is still needed at the CLI clinic before it can open.

It was nice to see our friends from Rice and experience a different area of Malawi.

Today I visited a nearby school. The name of the school was Mkanga. CLI had previously put roofs on two of the classrooms in this school. The school had standard 1 to 7. They used to have a standard 8, but since there weren’t that many older students, they decided to remove it. Al and I met with the head master and he was super nice and gave us a tour. We went to the school to observe and find out whether the children used the hand washing stations that a previous organization put in place outside the restrooms. The station consisted of a cement container, which was filled up using the nearby well pump, and a small bucket that is used to scoop the water from the container. The bucket had a small hole on the bottom to allow water to fall through. The head master said that the hand washing stations were pretty effective and that the children do use them.

There were only 4 actual classrooms and the rest of the classes were conducted outside. Usually one meal is provided by the community through a program. Unfortunately, we didn’t stay long enough at the school to see the students eat their meal. The way school was conducted here was so different than anything I have ever seen in the states. There are about 900 students attending Mkanga, but less than 10 teachers. There was definitely a need for more teachers and classrooms.

The container finally arrived! For the past few days Jeff, Karen, and everyone else has been waiting for this shipment to arrive. It has the two new larger wind turbines and more solar panels.

Tomorrow, Al and I are going to the St. Gabriel’s Hospital. We are hoping to talk with the head of the community health outreach program there and see whether he is interested in sending any of his community outreach workers to CLI. CLI has a pump repair team that travels all throughout the nation of Malawi fixing wells and Jeff is hoping that we can get a community health outreach worker to go out with the well repair team and provide basic healthcare to individuals in the communities that need it. With this, the well repair team can take the community health outreach pack with them and Al and I can take note of the usage of the pack and whether there is anything that needs to be changed.

Lake Malawi was beautiful. The water was so clean and soft. It definitely is one of Malawi’s hidden beauties.

We ate lunch at a restaurant by the lake. I got a dish called chicken kawawa. It was spicy but really good. It also came with insima, a traditional Malawian food. All the workers at the CLI site eat insima for every lunch, so I am glad I finally got to see what it is and try it.

Even though we only were at the lake for a few hours, it was nice to get out of the rural part of the country and see more of what Malawi has to offer.

 

 

Today Al and I spent our day painting wood for the shelves in the clinic. Hopefully, since we are helping with the painting, the shelves get done sooner. We are planning to go to the St. Gabriel hospital in Malawi sometime next week, so we can talk to doctors or nurses there and get feedback on what is still needed in regards to inventory in the clinic. It will definitely be an adventure trying to find our way there with the little Chichewa we know.

 

After noon on Saturdays the workers usually stop working early and go home, so we spent the rest of the day walking around to different communities in the area. We took a soccer ball to a group of kids in one of the communities and played soccer with them. I really enjoyed playing with them because all the kids were super excited. Interestingly, the women in that community wanted to play too, so we played catch with them. They were having so much fun; the smiles on their faces were unforgettable.

Tomorrow we are going to Lake Malawi. I am super excited!

Yesterday I saw my first lunar eclipse. It was beautiful. We sat outside the staff housing and watched the sky. Living in Houston, I have never seen that many stars in the sky.

Al and I have gone through all the donation boxes that CLI received from Medical Bridges and we are almost done with the inventory. We moved hospital beds into the rooms and started stocking the rooms with general medical equipment. We thought it would be a good idea to add some shelves in each of the treatment and storage rooms of the clinic. So for the past few days, some of the workers have been working on getting the shelves built.

During that time, we have been helping around the site. We moved dirt, washed kitchen items, and helped with anything that we could. While we were filling the dirt in buckets and transferring it onto a tracker and some of the women workers taught us how to carry the buckets on our head. Surprisingly, it was much easier to carry the load that way. The women here are so strong! I don’t know how they do it. They carry such large loads on their heads and keep them balanced.

From the time I arrived to CLI till now, I have learned many more words in Chichewa. I learned how to say “how are you”, “I’m fine”, “good morning”, and much more. Now, whenever I pass by the workers from the community, I greet them in Chichewa and they love it.

Next week, we are expecting two new wind turbines to be installed. They are much bigger and better than the three ones that are already on the site. I am excited that I am getting to witness so much of the pioneering of this project.

Bye!

Sabha

This is my first time traveling to Africa and it is quite a different experience. It’s been 5 days since Al and I arrived at the Lilongwe airport. When we got off our plane, we saw a man holding a sign with our names. The man took us to the front of the long line and got our passports stamped. I am so glad we had no trouble bringing the global health technologies into the country. At the airport we met Jeff Roger’s son, Jeremy, and he drove us to their house, where we picked up food and supplies and left to the Child Legacy International (CLI) site. Our task for the past few days here at CLI has been to help stock the health clinic. Al and I have been opening donation boxes, counting items, making an inventory list, and placing the items where they belong to the best of our abilities. It a long and tedious job, but it will be worth it at the end when we get to see the clinic open.

While working and walking around at the site, I have gotten the chance to meet and talk to many of the Malawian workers. Everyone is so friendly! Every time you walk by any one of the worker, they smile and greet you. I haven’t been very good at remembering their names, but they sure do remember mine. Al and I are making an effort to try to learn as much Chichewa as we can during our time here.

Today, after working at the clinic in the morning, I went to go fill potholes on the community road. This was the first time I got to leave the CLI site since we arrived here from the airport. The children in the community were so much fun to play with. They loved seeing us Americans. They would wave at us and want to pose for pictures. Some of the children had such great personalities. Hopefully, I get a chance to further interact with the community in my time here.

 

I am excited for the rest of our time here. We are hoping the clinic is ready for opening in July, so we can be here for it. Also, Jeff Rogers said that we may be able to go with the CLI workers to fix wells around the community, which I also can’t wait for.

I will write back soon!

Sabha