le 22 decembre

Two comments from yesterday evening bandaging session.
1) A sore throat is not going to kill me, but I sure take a lot of meds to alleviate the discomfort. I think it's very difficult for us to tell people in the developing world or people in lower socioeconomic groups that they do not NEED stuff and justify our unwillingness to give, when we have all sorts of those conveniences and wants and we take them for granted. Who are we, those in the priviledge, to say what is "needed" and what is not? It's a very difficult...issue to swallow that we get to play god as far as what resources we bring to these communities. And back to an old point, what things really need to be changed and what things are just cross cultural differences that should be best left alone.
2) A friend pointed out, recounting a conversation with a teacher and RPCV (Returned PCV) that doing something like I did, putting a band aid on a little wound, can encourage people to view you as a nurse or doctor, and then you can't be suprised when they come to you...with a broken arm, with a woman in labor, etc. etc. etc. This is the real danger in doing little things like giving out bandaids because you don't want to be in a situation when you will be given a situation that is, never mind beyond your job description, but waaay beyound your skill level. Then the people may blame you when you can't properly handle the situation. No clear answer.

Today

I have...
- been told by a doctor who works for Niger's Ministry of Health or WHO or something like that that Rotary does supply a lot of funding to polio vaccinations
- learned a lot of crucial info about diseases like polio (transmited through fecal matter from person to person, not animal to animal...e.g. jeardia (sp ). Maybe the best CHA session yet.
- from the above presentation, confirmed that I have indeed seen several people around Niger who had/have polio
- thought I found the perfect combination of all the possible tasks with some more definition of "disease surveillance". I hope to talk about this more in detail later, but for now, I would love to concentrate on disease surveillance work.
- again had a slight headache later in the day. Makes me feel like I have lots of stuff going on, which I do, but I don't need a headache to tell me that. Thinking maybe psychosomatic
- got a phone!...but will wait to get it all rolling until Christmas
- enjoyed some time alone (even the heat of the day) pulling weeds and watering my garden
- (one of those daily things that is easy to overlook even only two months in) eaten spagghetti with my hands...and had some trouble with it. I'm a pro at eating the cornmeal dinner with my hands, but pasta and rice and maybe even millet is tricky
- (another easy thing to skip over) held/ had in my lap a little naked boy (my kayne)

I have not...
- been able to keep a straight face when we did a little mock skit of facilitating a meeting and I was assigned the character of a rich, powerful dude who was a straight up douschebag. I played the part pretty well (too well?) but got a bunch of great ideas of how to be more douschebaggy after we finished. Jam. Could play the part, could not keep a straight face. Had the teacher cracking up, unable to talk for a few moments too.
- got to play a REAL game of soccer with my fam and friends (like a big game on the road), though we did shoot around before lunch
- studied. I think, unfortunately, the time for this may have passed. Hard to justify NOT spending time with fam before I leave, with friends before we all leave, or time to prepare for the holidays and our big move
- had a fantastic dinner conversation. was kinda quiet. But, did talk to my baba about whether he thinks the town we train in should get a volunteer (it never has), and he was very passionate that it should. He has mentioned twice his desire to learn Eng, and I wish I could connect him with some resources to help him learn. After all, all the host families in the town have helped us learn Hausa/Zarma.