Wanale and Down Days

This past week has been one of the slower ones, but moving forward! I was down for a few days with a typical African bug that made food absolutely repulsive. I had no energy so I couldn’t really leave the house, which was frustrating. Before Josh and the other girls left on Wednesday, they went up to the village to say goodbye and see the progress on the clinic one last time. It was the first time that I wasn’t up at the village with everyone else and I really missed the people up there. I knew that after a couple rough nights of little sleep and not keeping any food down, I was better off staying at home. They were happy to report back that the walls were half way up! Josh left and I am completely on my own to head up our projects. Now, the hardest part will be having to rope other team members into going to my projects with me because I can’t go anywhere alone. I feel bad especially since everyone has their own projects to work on and I have to pull them away to travel with me to do all my health work. Although feeling under the weather, I was able to spend the week focusing on the health camps that we are hoping to begin as soon as the clinic is open. Such camps will include a day of HIV and malaria testing and possibly a dental camp later on in the summer. Most of the testing is free if we can get enough (about 100) people from the village to commit to being tested.

Unfortunately, due to terrible rain lately, the construction has been slowed up a bit, but clinic should be complete by the end of the weekend! The walls are complete and roof and floor are all that's left. I'll go up on Thursday to meet with the board of directors for the clinic that we've appointed to run everything once we leave. The rest of the team will meet me up there on Friday morning so that we can complete cementing the floors! I am really looking forward to finishing the clinic so that we can actually begin treating people. We are looking at opening in two weeks because we still need to invite government officials, local media sources and potential pharmaceutical partners. Sustainability is key for this clinic, so I'm taking every measure possible to work with the local people so that the functioning of the clinic remains smooth and long-lasting.

Two weekends ago, Josh, Kelsey, Kara and our guard David all went up to Wanale again for Josh's last weekend. I threw some pictures together of Wanale and the past 6 weeks--mostly of the scenery and the beautiful hikes that I've taken here. I'm still in shock that I live here!