High speed chase in a "souped-up" Starlet

Quick note: I changed a setting on the blog for those who have had trouble commenting. It should work now. Comment away! I love hearing your feedback. Of course, kindly do leave your name so I know who you are!

It's funny, after over a month I still forget I'm here sometimes. I'll wake up to some noise in the middle of the night and be disoriented and trying to remember what strange bed I'm in. A lot of people come and go during the night, and my wall facing the hospital area is actually mostly window. I hear everything, so I gain semi-consciousness around once per night. And I usually know when a baby was born during the night. Honestly it doesn't bother me so much! The birds in the morning are the real nuisance. They start warming up their voices at around 4 am, and go until...    well pretty much sunset. On the weekdays it's fine. On the weekends when I want to sleep in, I usually end up going outside every 10 minutes to throw rocks at the sparrow that sits in the tree right by my window without fail. Not very restful! Eventually one of us is going to learn his lesson though.

A few more things I've noticed about living here in Cameroon: For one thing, everybody here greets people more habitually than in the states. People are always saying "Good morning" "Good Afternoon" and "Good Evening". Francophones have a hard time with the concept of morning and afternoon since for them Bon jour is a blanket statement for all day. So they usually say good morning any time before 5 pm. Even when people enter a taxi it is customary to greet everyone with a "Good morning/afternoon". That's one thing that struck me a little differently, and it's also something I'd like to make a habit of and bring back home with me.

Seeing other non-African people makes me feel like there's an automatic connection betwixt us. There was a Chinese guy who I doubt spoke a lick of English, but I saw him walking on the street and just felt like I was seeing an old friend or something.

I was worried about the whole "Only American, only student missionary" thing, but the solitude has been a much needed respite from the distraction of the world. I've learned so much about myself in the short time I've spent here so far. I feel far more connected to my subconscious, as well as to my spiritual life than probably ever. It's really shocking to me (almost frightening) how much my artistic side is attempting to break out of its shell here. Lots of time spent alone and sometimes bored has had my right brain trying to snap its chain. And the quotient of my artistic curiosity is a bigger dog than I realized (Like a Rottweiler on a poodle's chain). It's not that I don't get out, I'm just not finding myself challenged by my immediate environment so much anymore. Buea's a pretty big town, but there are few stimulating activities here that I've found besides grocery shopping. I'm trying to manufacture logical challenges for myself (sudoku, A&P a la Khan Academy, etc.). Anyway, I'm finding an increased interest in language, writing, and poetry, as well as finding an almost spiritual appreciation for that which I find beautiful. I saw a jar of JIF at the market and was nearly in tears (okay maybe that's a bit of an exaggeration. It was Skippy.)  I attribute this partly to my lack of a guitar - my right brain is trying to find ways to compensate for not having the creative outlet I've always relied on. Trying to learn French, while a genuine motivation, is probably to blame for my increased interest in language and travel. Journaling daily has likely heightened my appreciation for writing. Also, copious amounts of dancing like nobody's watching may have something to do with my feelings of "liberation". Art to me has always been represented by a murky pond of uncertainty. There are no right or wrong answers, and it's so subjective that I get woozy just thinking about it. But I'm letting it happen. That's maybe the most frightening part of all. Sudoku and Anatomy aren't enough. There are no more theorems, postulates, or formulas to suppress my right brain. I'm plunging in, willingly or not. I don't necessarily want it to stop, but I'm afraid that my logical sense will atrophy and all of the math/science courses in my major will somehow be comparable to, well, arts and humanities classes before I came. In short, I hope that instead of exchanging my enjoyment of sciences for symbolism, my appreciation of tactic for talent, I am becoming more well-rounded as a whole.

And finally, storytime:

Cabs are interesting here. 95% of them are Toyotas (the highest clock I've seen so far was pushing 600,000km), some have train horns, and most have this very discotheque-inspired neon interior lighting that the drivers turn on after dark. A lot of the drivers like to put these big, plush rugs over the upholstery. I'm still not sure if this is designed to conceal the condition of the original upholstery or to engulf anything that falls out of patron's pockets. Probably both. Anyway, after exiting cabs I'm usually pretty good at checking my pockets, but this one time I neglected to until after he began to pull away. Noticed my phone was missing so I began to run after trying to flag him down again. No luck. He stopped for an offer about 100 meters up the hill, but didn't pick the person up. The distance began to increase and I had just given up when a taxi (might have actually been a Toyota Starlet, plenty of the taxis here are) without any passengers pulled by and stopped 20 yards ahead of me. The odds of an empty taxi are slim to none, so seeing this as my golden opportunity, I ran up, jumped in, and shouted "Follow that car!" (If you've never done this before, do it once in your life! Talk about feeling like a BA, I mean this was the real deal). Unfortunately, the first taxi was lost in a mass of other taxis (like picking an individual out of a herd of zebras), but I remembered that the only other passenger when I exited had asked for Bakweri town. It wasn't far, took perhaps 3 minutes to get there. Taxi drivers here already drive like, well, taxi drivers, but I was still surfing the action-movie-like adrenaline rush of it all, so it felt like we were driving 100 miles an hour weaving in and out of cars. By the time we ended up there, I wasn't sure I could recognize the taxi OR the driver (I mostly saw the back of his head. And I think all Cameroonian barbers are trained at the same school, because the men's hairstyles are all remarkably similar). My current cabby offered to call my phone, and the first driver actually picked up! Great! He talked to the driver on my cell until his credits ran out (all of about 30 seconds). Not so great! I was afraid that maybe my first driver hadn't gotten the message, but we finally did catch up to the first cab a little below where I had initially been dropped off. To the best of my understanding the first cab driver wanted 1000 XFA as a finder's fee. I only had a 10,000 XFA note (largest denomination here, worth about 20 bucks) and some change, and so my second cab driver had to make change. I paid back the 1000, then offered my current cab driver 1000 for the fare, plus to reload credits on his phone, which left a pretty good sized tip. I was out of breath, and the bread in my backpack got squashed a little, but at least it was an exciting story. Thankful that I got my phone back, I guess I'm chalking it up to being a "God thing". I could have bought another one I guess, but it would have been a pain in the butt and wouldn't have involved jumping in a taxi and shouting "Follow that car!"

TL;DR Commenting enabled for all. I still wake up disoriented sometimes. Cameroonians feel obligated to greet each other. Not necessarily friendly but habitual. I suffer from MARIMBAS (Medically Ambiguous Ridiculously Immediate Minority Based Attachment Syndrome - invented that phrase myself). Solitude, my greatest trepidation about being here, has actually helped me learn a lot about myself, and I'm enjoying it thoroughly! There's more artist than I ever thought I had in me. I almost lost my $20 plastic cell phone forever, but got it back a James-Bond-like chase scene loosely involving taxis, zebras, and barbers. Worth reading the full version just above.

Salmonella and Soup #5

Author's note: My camera battery burned out, so I won't probably be posting pictures for a while.

On Friday I was unusually irritable, which was unfortunate. After attending vespers (albeit not wholeheartedly excited about it) my mood was quite a bit better. Sabbath was also a mediocre day, and I started developing a headache in the afternoon. Figured it was probably just dehydration or malnutrition, so I took two aspirin, drank a little water, and forgot about it. Sunday I woke up and had the runs, mild nausea, and the headache had returned by that afternoon. I began to suspect something was wrong by the early evening, and sure enough, around 1900 I spiked a fever. I figured I must have malaria, so I told the doctor I'd like to be tested the next morning. 2 aspirin. Bed. The next morning I had the blood test done (The lab tech drew my blood while he was talking on the phone! Like 2nd nature to him, where if I had done it to somebody it would have taken every ounce of my focus). The tests were run, and I tested negative for malaria. Great! I also tested positive for typhoid fever. Not great! I was a little disappointed that the vaccine I had right before coming didn't do me any good. Well, I was prescribed an IV injection of ceftriaxone, and 10 days of cefixime tabs. By this time I had developed a lower backache that persisted through Wednesday (almost felt like kidney pain vs. a muscle ache). The most frustrating part is not knowing where or when I picked the bug up. It could have been number of things: From shaking someone's hand and not washing mine before lunch, to the water filter needing to be replaced. It's hard to know what I need to do differently to NOT catch this bug again! Other than that frustration I actually didn't feel that terrible throughout the whole bout. I was uncomfortable, but I've definitely been sicker. The 6 finals weeks and countless midterms I've been through have caused me more distress. And on the bright side the prompt treatment and diagnosis is one blessing about working in a hospital. Vital medical attention is literally next door to my apartment. Anyway, that's what's gone on through the beginning of the week. I made it back to work by Wednesday, so only missed 2 days. I did miss out on Sunday's market, so it's been beans and rice quite a bit. During my downtime I completely disassembled my laptop and cleaned the fan, and it's running a lot better now!
Got at least one vote for Dr. Bellosillo's bull testicle joke (you've always been a winner, Dad), so here goes: A Filipino guy went to Spain and watched a bullfight while he was there. He saw that the bull's testicles were very big, and once the bull was killed he went to the hotel where they took it to prepare the meat. He went to the restaurant and asked for "soup number 5" which features the cooked bull's testicles. They told him that this particular pair were spoken for and he'd have to put his name on a waiting list. He was told to return in a few days. Well a couple of days went by and he was called in and served his soup number 5, but the dish wasn't nearly as lavish as he had remembered. He called the waiter over to the table and said "Hey, what's the deal here? The testicles I saw on the bull the other day were much bigger than this." To which the waiter replied "Well sir, sometimes the bull wins." We had a pretty good laugh over that one at Sabbath lunch.
Another difference I've noticed after spending quite some time out and about is that the last time I saw someone taller than me was when I said goodbye to Dylan Browning (fellow Walla Walla SM to Uganda) at the airport in Addis. The Cameroonians are all shorter than me as far as I can tell! There have been some that are only a couple centimeters away (the closest one I've seen is one of the female nurses here at the hospital. She's quite tall), but none are my height. For a while I thought Prosper (the accountant) or Joseph (the head nurse) were as tall as me, but I think their positions of importance gave them the illusion of being bigger than they were because they're both probably a good 5-7 cm shorter than me.
The last thing is not so much something I've noticed as it is something I've been meaning to  mention but have forgotten to this point. The plant life here is vibrant, as one would expect for a tropical region. The hospital compound has quite the assortment of trees and shrubs, but my personal favorite right now is this one particular guava tree behind the hospital. There are at least 4 guava trees on the property, but this one's distinction is that its fruit isn't awful. And right now the guavas are ripening and they taste so good! Of course, all the staff know this, so if the junior doctor disappears for a few minutes, you can often find him filling his pockets at the guava tree with the long, 3 pronged stick that naturally grew into the perfect tool to pluck the highest, juiciest guavas. The birds are also aware, so if you let a guava get too ripe they will start eating it right off the tree. The locals here eat the whole thing, skin and all. I prefer just the fruit. Before coming here, I don't think I had ever tasted a fresh guava (only had it in the Kern's nectar or POG). They're seedy, but you get used to it. I planted one in an old cut up water bottle filled with dirt on my 3rd or 4th day here. It started to sprout about a week ago! Once those go out of season, I think the bananas on the property will be starting to ripen, so there's more fresh fruit to look forward to!

TL;DR I got typhoid. They were human testicles. Dylan Browning is the last person I saw taller than me. The guavas here are awesome.

Chicken Whisperer

Well it's now starting the 4th week that I've been here, and so far I've learned quite a few things, some of which I'm going to try and list below. From learning medical techniques to exploring the town, I've been subjected to at least a few moments already that have gotten me out of my element a little. Here's a quick look at the week's lessons and discoveries:
Being a white guy in a very racially homogenous region, I've found a few things out: My pasty white skin makes me above average at flagging down taxis in the dark. That being said, however, if Boko Haram were to come in the night I'm likely the first one they'll see ("Hey guys, welcome to Buea, I'll be your tour guide..."). I might be liable to forget my whiteness, were it not for all the stares and people calling out "white man" at me as I walk by. Also, I think I'm probably the only vegetarian in Cameroon. People literally feel bad for me when they find out I'm vegetarian (As the saying goes: "'Vegetarian' is an old African tribal word for 'bad hunter'"). The chickens have also realized that I'm vegetarian (and a bad cook most of the time) because they've started showing up at my door around mealtime to pick off scraps of vegetables and/or food that I deemed uneatable and toss out the front door. A chicken was actually poking its head in my open door and looked like it was weighing coming in or not.
Chores here are a little harder. Last laundry day I scalded my hand in boiling water, and it took my bath towel 2 days to dry out. I had to keep moving it in and out of the sun/rain. Dish washing is pretty much never finished, and only God knows whether or not my dishes are actually getting clean.
I'm slowly learning a little bit of pidgin, but I've determined that nobody here knows the difference between "the door is closed/locked" and "the door is open/unlocked" For example:
"Make sure and lock the door to the bathroom"
"I did lock the door, I don't want anybody walking in on me!"
"No, see? The door isn't locked"
"Ohhhh you mean closed. Ok I'll close the door when I'm done in the bathroom"
Also:
"You left your door open when you went out"
"Oh shoot seriously?! Were there any chickens inside?"
"No, but we were going to let the plumber in but didn't want to without your permission"
"Ohhhh you mean the door was unlocked. Yeah, that's kinda different than opened..."
The lightning storms here are spectacular, like watching a movie. At night I feel like I'm in a discotech. The clouds will come and go at a moment's notice, as well as rain showers, so it pays to be prepared.
I spend quite a bit of time alone, and I've found that my thoughts have become louder and more creative. It's kind of a cool effect actually to be more in touch with what I'm thinking due to living simply and having less distractions. Not that I'm not busy, just less preoccupied. My overall stress level is the lowest it's been since I can remember, which I've found also helps get the creative juices flowing.
In my explorations I've found a tennis court with some pretty good tennis players, a sprawling view of the ocean (when it's not cloudy), an ice cream shop (went and tried some after having a rough Monday. It wasn't Haagen Dazs, but it'll get me by! Plus, including the taxi ride I spent probably $1.50 in total on that outing. I'll definitely be going back), and a store that carries Snickers bars. If carrying Snickers bars isn't a sign of being civilized, I don't know what is (maybe indoor plumbing is a good indicator too, kind of a tossup if you ask me)
Nobody here seems to know what dental floss is. Also, spaghetti sauce is an elusive commodity.
I spent  3 hours trying to coax my very sick computer into downloading and updating Windows 10, hoping it would fix a bunch of the bugs. It didn't. Long story short, Windows 10 is the antichrist I'm pretty sure.
I got to give an injection this week! That was a pretty awesome experience. I also got snookered into helping clean and dress a wound. It was the biggest, nastiest, infected-est sore that I have ever seen bar none. This guy will be lucky to keep his leg, no joke. A wound like that and a small, stuffy exam room are not a good combo. I was fortunate that the thing didn't smell bad or I probably would have passed out. Afterwards the nurses were razzing me about it quite a bit and we all had a good laugh.
Morning rounds with the Doctor are a highlight of the day. He's got some good conventional wisdom on practicing medicine. Some of my favorites from this past week are the "lipstick sign" (when a female patient starts putting on makeup, she'll be going home soon), "not using lab tests to form a diagnosis, but to confirm it", and his joke about bull testicles over Sabbath lunch (may or may not relate that one in a later post depending on popular demand). He's also really interested in politics and history. I think if he hadn't become a doctor he might have enjoyed being a history or political science teacher. He's always bringing up wars in relationship to the Philippines. The junior doctor is a little bit more of a tough nut, and I can't quite figure him out. Maybe he just doesn't get enough sleep, but he swings back and forth between joking with me, and getting on my case for not filling out the record book correctly (even if it's something I didn't know before it's a "big deal")
Finally, the highlight of my week was receiving my first care package from home! It came about a week and a half faster than expected, so that was a big surprise! My family loves me so much that they pretty much packed all of Costco in a box and sent it across the pond. My stoke factor for this package was extremely high, and words can't do justice to how great it is to have support back home like I do. Calls, Skype, and now this - I am definitely feeling loved!
I love hearing from everyone, continue keep me in your thoughts and prayers!

TL;DR Assorted highlights (and lowlights) of the week, along with some things I've noticed about Africa: White men can be seen coming from a mile away in the dark, and 3 miles away during the day. There are pros and cons to this. I've bought the allegiance of every chicken in the neighborhood, pretty sure they'd defend me to the death. Hot laundry water will burn you, aspirin will make it better. Disgruntled to find that "Door open" and "door unlocked" are used interchangeably here, which is extra confusing. Lightning storms here: 10/10. Stargazing: 0/10. Being alone and not stressed has been a catalyst for creativity and imagination. There's one place with ice cream here (now I'm really living), but floss is about as common as unicorns here. Windows 10 can kiss my "solid state processor". Gave an injection, saw a horrifyingly infected sore that will quite possibly result in an amputation, and have had some interesting conversations with the doctor. Got a package from home containing enough Cheez-Its to build a 1:1 to scale model of Mt. Cameroon.

Exploration photo. Ocean visible in the distance, most of Buea below me

Federer vs. Djokovic

See the rainbow?

One of the nicer houses I've seen with the mountain in the backdrop. I've noticed there's a little something odd about all the houses here, even the nice ones. I attribute this to no building codes!

Toyota Hilux I found wandering around town. Retro paint job + big knobby tires + headache rack = Walker Texas Ranger's truck?

Outside Lina's. I truly did enjoy my stay

With the first care package!

Sweet Thursday

Hey there everyone. For this week, I had planned to just do a quick week in review with some highlights (and lowlights) of this week, but today's journal entry turned out pretty nicely, so I thought I would just put that here instead. Less work for me!

Also, I just wanted to mention that I've been reading other blogs of friends that are abroad, and their stuff is really good! It's also pretty introspective, where my writing tends more towards...    gonzo journalism. Or at the very least, my writing is essentially just a narrative of my experience. I partly chalk this up to the fact that the majority of the blogs I've been reading are written by females. As a guy, I'm more into details and less into feelings and parallels. Not saying those are bad, I'm just pointing out that you're probably not going to feel a lot of emotion from my writing (unless I write emotional, which happens sometimes). Bottom line is, I hope you don't find the details a bore and wish I was writing little sermonettes, because I'm saving those for when I get home! ;) At any rate, here's Thursday's journal:

Yesterday I was able to find some things that I needed in Clark's quarter (as well as some things I didn't NEED but bought anyway). Shopping for groceries is quickly becoming a highlight of my day: It gets me out and about, seeing the town (though I usually go to the same 3 areas of town to buy things. Until I have explored more, at least), and when I have fresh groceries, the possibilities for eating options are almost too exciting to handle. Found these neat things called ca-TOH (spelled phonetically), which are basically deep fried balls of dough, but somewhat like croissants in flakiness, just a little more dense. They're good (and I had them fresh, still warm, borderline lifechanging). I also found those Laughing Cow cream cheese wheels and bought one, and ate one of these catoh's with a wedge of the cream cheese and it was frighteningly good! So that was my haul for yesterday, along with more of these things that I would compare to donut holes, except a little less sweet and not glazed. Those are good too. Cooked beans for dinner, and that was that. They were of middling taste. 

During the evening I listened to an episode of CarTalk that I found on my iPad. Helped keep my mind off of some bad news I received yesterday. Click and Clack never fail to get a laugh out of me! 

Today in the clinic was slow, and doesn't bring to mind anything exciting enough to warrant mention, aside from seeing our first syphillis case since I've arrived, BUT after work I had some interesting times that I'll write about forthwith. And yes, that involves more shopping. This time I went down to Sandpit junction, which is walking distance down the road (75 meters, even less maybe). I had seen okra there before and had been thinking of cooking some fried okra, and maybe the option of gumbo sometime in the future. First I went to the store that has some kitchen supplies and got reamed over a cerrated knife, a butterknife, and a pot (9,000 fcfa, or about $18!). That was a bit painful, but I kind of needed another pot so I can make rice and beans at the same time. Or rice and gumbo at the same time! Then after stopping for a pineapple (gosh I love pineapples SO much, eating like 2 a week) I went to the little stand where an older gentleman has fresh vegetables, bread, and some other foodstuffs (there were two goats tied to a telephone pole outside his store, also for sale!). I bought the okra I had been eyeing as well as an egg, but first he took my 1000 francs to go make change with a nearby store. He's a really nice guy, seems to have fair prices, and he's quite the talker, so I spent probably half an hour talking with him and a few other storeowners/shoppers nearby about American politics, differences between here and Cameroon, etc. He's pretty aware of what's going on in the world, and is just a pleasant fellow to talk with, so I enjoyed that quite a lot, and he seems to as well. Another shopper asked me if I thought Donald Trump could run America! That was a surprise. 

Came home chomping at the bit to do some cooking! I had gathered basically everything I needed, took a quick look at Google to remind myself how to prepare fried okra, and I set to the task. My only problem was a necessary substitution. I haven't been able to find cornmeal, so instead I used what's called gari and is ground cassava. I think. It's yellow like cornmeal, except the particles are a little bigger, so I figured what the heck? I'm a risk-taker, I'll give it a try. Well I soaked the okra in the egg, and dredged it in the gari, mixed with some salt and garlic powder. It looked good so far! Then I started frying. The gari seemed to not be as mealy and gritty as cornmeal would stay after the dredging, but I forged ahead, not knowing what to expect out of the gari flavor-wise. Finally, I got to try the stuff, and all I can say is OH MY GOODNESS IT'S DELICIOUS!!!! So that was a pleasant experience for sure. After that I fried some leftover potatoes and ate them with another wedge of Laughing Cow cream cheese (that stuff is like the Twinkies of the dairy world. No refrigeration necessary, so it's my primary source of lactose for now. I haven't had actual cheese or milk since I got here!). Anyway, after I wash dishes, I have a date with Rishi from Khan academy, and we're gonna learn more about the circulatory system. A bientôt!

Clinic experiences

(Author's note) All units and measurements are written (and will continue to be written) in the metric system. Personally, I know the conversions, but I'm not going to do them for a multiplicity of reasons including but not limited to: 

• You can do them yourself (it'll be good for you)
• The Imperial system is retarded anyways
• Quite frankly, the word "Celsius" just slides off the tongue so sweetly that I'd prefer never to say (or have to remember how to spell) "Fahrenheit" again.

29/9/2015 (Second day on the job)

I spent most of the day helping Samuel in the pharmacy. He's a nurse but they have no pharmacist. I arranged the drugs so they're easier to find, and he sent me home with the pharmacology reports on about 8 different drugs and wants me to remember what they're used to treat. He's probably a little older than me, maybe 24 or 25. He also sees patients for minor surgery, vaccinations, and wound dressing. Today, I watched him do a wound dressing and two vaccinations... [The junior] doctor dropped off an urgent prescription to be filled for an inpatient. Samuel was in a meeting with Dr. Bellosillo, so I had to do it myself. I had only briefly seen him do it once before,  and inpatient scrips are typically a lot larger than outpatient (for instance, drip kit, IV fluid, syringes, canulas, and sterile water are all things that you wouldn't give to an outpatient, but  the hospital needs pretty regularly. Also, when the scrip calls for certain medications, you're supposed to automatically know how many sterile waters and syringes etc. they'll need. I didn't!). Well, I knew where to find about 50% of the things on the list (it's hard to read the Doctors' handwriting in the first place), and was still working on filling the rest of the order when the semi-frantic nurse needing the supplies came in. I had spent 30 minutes working on finding what was ordered, one item of which we ended up not having, so I could have searched for an eternity and not found it. The poor nurse had to help me find the last few things, and helped herself to all the syringes she needed. I knew I needed to write down how much of everything was taken, but I had to dig deep to remember WHERE to write it. Still no sign of Samuel, but she took the needed supplies and my blood pressure started its journey back to normal. Later I think the junior doctor may have gotten mad at the nurse for not administering the medications soon enough (can't be sure because he was speaking in French and Samuel only gave me a rough partial translation). I felt really badly that she may have gotten in trouble, but it's only my second day! Even later, I found that I'd neglected to write down the supplies taken on the patient's billing record (I'd only written it in the pharmacy's stock record), so I had to go back and record the supplies while the nurse was administering them. Anyway, I was a bit stressed out for about an hour, but it pulled me out of my afternoon coma feeling (now I really know I'm getting used to the time). All told, I kind of like the pharmacy when things are interesting. Filling prescriptions is fun, but Samuel does all the recording, which is probably the boring part. Everything is recorded by hand, no computer in the pharm department, so it's ultra tedious!

30/9/2015

While eating my lunch, I scrubbed off an orange and took it outside onto my porch to eat so I didn't make a mess inside. I was sitting cross-legged with it and the knife, and when I returned from my lunch break the staff was laughing and saying I was a Muslim. I inquired as to why, and they said the way I sat on the ground cross-legged it looked like I was praying. I asked them how they sit on the ground, and they said they don't. That seemed funny to me, although I guess as dirty as it is here, you'd at the very least want to be thoughtful about where you sit! I showed Samuel a video that I took on my iPad this last summer of the demolition derby at the StanCo fair. The look on his face was priceless! I explained how it worked to him, and of course this concept had never even occurred to him.

1/10/2015

Today the only really exciting thing that happened in the clinic was that an ~7 year old boy had a seizure in the waiting room. His frantic father and he were escorted back to the minor surgery room where Samuel tried to calm him down. I quickly got a 5cc syringe and a dose of diazepam for the kid (and I knew just where to find it! Yessssss), all the while his father was yelling "Jesus! Jesus!". He wasn't just using it as an exclamation either. I don't know that this father is necessarily a believer, but from what I could tell, he thought his child was having some sort of Mephistophelian attack. He was calling upon Jesus, not just saying the name. The head nurse, doctor, and Samuel all assured him at different times that it was only a convulsion, but this dad wasn't taking any chances. Believers or not, the people here seem to know that there is power in the name of Jesus, which I found to be a cool lesson all in itself. On a grander scope, spiritualism is very real here, and people are acutely aware of it (some are even taken advantage of using fear tactics, but that's another story)

TL;DR

Metric notation propaganda. Starting in the pharmacy, I've had a few occasions where the expectations of me were high and my ability to perform under pressure was, well, not. Sitting cross-legged on the ground here will get you pegged as a Muslim, and they don't crash cars on purpose in Cameroon (although I've seen a couple of NASTY accidents here). People don't mess around here with spiritualism. It's very real to them, and they're aware of Jesus' power, whether or not they believe in His divinity. If you read anything, read the last excerpt

My "office". The book in the center is where I enter outpatient info, the pharmacy is in the door to the right.

Eventually I will run out of sweet rides to photograph, but that day is not today! Here we see a Toyota Land-Cruiser (yeah that's a snorkel) parked in the hospital parking area. The other day I saw a pretty new Jaguar E-type parked on the street as I was walking, but not in a safe place to stop and photograph (busy road Mom, not muggers or Boko Haram)

Me in the pharmacy, ready for action

Samuel in the pharmacy ready for...  modelling shoot? The perspective makes him look like an oompa-loompa compared to me, he's really only 6 or 7 inches shorter than me