This weekend made me realize how much my village has become “home.” What was meant to be just a weekend stay turned into a much longer than anticipated/wanted stay in Kigali.
I came into the city on Friday for the second official Project Muzabimenya meeting. It was good and productive. Me, Lucy, Mason and Scott compiled and reviewed all of the surveys people had filled out (a grand total of maybe 15…out of lots given out. Better than zero!) and were able to get a better idea of what the Rwandan Chem/Bio teachers think are problems with preparing for the national exams. And it seemed like all the surveys actually were telling the truth, no lies to tell us what they think we want to hear! After a grueling 2 hour meeting, we were able to crunch out a rough format for the resource with all of it’s “chapters” and components. Then, we were brain-dead. We meant to sit down and work some more, but dang were we wiped out. So instead we’re going to conference call sometime in the next couple weeks to finish up this month’s meeting.
But anyways, now for the unexpected surprise. Now, for some of you this is going to be too much information. But, I’m in Peace Corps which means a couple things: 1) Any filter I had before is gone and 2) Talking about gross medical stuff doesn’t even phase me in the slightest…not that it really did before.
Basically since Friday afternoon I had been having the amazing, awesome (can you feel the sarcasm??) sulfer (aka rotten eggs) burps. Normally this tells me I’ve eaten something not so good and they go away after a day after everything has digested. In worse cases, it means I’ve given myself (not gotten, because if I wasn’t so darn stubborn I could probably prevent it) food poisoning and that’s just a pleasure within itself. So I’m thinking, great, sulfur burps, take the food easy today and tomorrow and you’ll be fine for Sunday. Wrong. Come Sunday it’s all just gotten a little bit worse. Now, food just seems revolting, I want to stick my finger down my throat and puke…oh wait, I did that, still, it didn’t work and I feel like my abs are doing a workout all on their own. Time to call the doctors. Call the doctors. “Hmm, sounds like you ate something bad” “Yeah, this I know, can you give me something to help the cramping and urge to vom?” thus, I get a relaxant for the muscle cramping and some anti-nausea. Docs orders, stay Sunday night, hopefully things get better, you go home Monday. Wrong again. Sleep all day Sunday, Sunday night was a whole new adventure. 1) I did not know it was possible to have so much fluid in my body 2) I wasn’t even drinking anything because I couldn’t 3) this is a recipe for disaster. Yup, destruction. Starting roughly at 8pm, every 30min-1hr I was making the trip to the bathroom to somehow vacate more fluid from my body. How? I’m not quite sure, at this point I was only able to take like 2 sips of rehydration salts (they’re gross) at a time so that couldn’t have been it. Dehydrated? I think most definitely yes. Monday morning comes, doc says “Come on upstairs” I say, “I’ll try” 5 minutes later (it’s literally just up the stairs..like 30 seconds) I’m up there about to pass out on the couch. “I’m going to take your blood pressure” “mmmk, it’s going to be really low” …blood pressure taken “Yeah, you’re getting an IV you’re really dehydrated.” More information I already know. Multiple apologies from doc-man about putting in an IV, dude, you’re talking to a bio major/emt slash I’ve been stuck so many times I just don’t care, just do it. He does it. It feels soooooooo good. 2 hours later, problem with IV and now my arm is a nice big edema (think pillsbury doughboy style) full of saline. Don’t know how, don’t know why, it’s not life threatening so I’m really not to bothered by it but it would be nice if the doc-man could do the IV right the first time. Oh well, at least they’ve got IVs here, right? IV comes out, rehydration salts taken orally now Hang out in the infirmary all day. And by hang out, I mean sleep. Literally, all day. Again. at about 4:30pm (office closes at 5) I go back down to the Case (PCV hostel) all drugged with Cipro and rehydration salts and the enlightening advice “try to eat something.” Will do…I haven’t eaten for 48 hrs, I’m slightly hungry. Good news! I eat some soup. Don’t feel like vomiting and feel more like a person. Go to bed. Sleep through the night…mostly. Only 2-3 interruptions from my body. Woke up this morning feeling a lot better. Not 100%, probably more like 70% but when given the option to go back to site or stay another night I responded with “I just want to go home.” And by home, I mean my village.
Now here’s where some of my thoughts can possibly become meaningful. Usually when I leave site, my umukozi watches Milo. Granted, Donatira’s more than just an umukozi, she’s like my mom/sister/best friend basically she makes sure I don’t get myself into too much trouble. So she calls me on Sunday, I pick up the phone and go “Alo?” and her response is not “Alo” in return but instead, “Ufite ikibazo, urarwaye.” (You have a problem, you are sick). Yup, she’s awesome. She tells me to be strong and patient and don’t worry, Milo’s find she’ll cook him some sweet potato. Okay, cool. At this point I still think I’m coming home on Monday. She’s been calling every day to see how I’m doing, am I able to eat? Don’t worry Milo’s fine, etc etc. Which is awesome, because now I know when those unexpected surprises come up, it’ll all be okay. This was further confirmed by earlier happenings in the weekend, on Friday, when I got a call from her saying something along the lines of, “Your door won’t lock because of the rain, when are you coming back? Call Twaza, no wait, I’ll go down and talk to him.. Okay no more problem now” (This is the condensation and translation of about 5 phone calls). It makes you feel good to know that in a completely strange and unknown place (yup, still unknown after 1 year) you can feel safe and secure. It gives you those warm fuzzies.
When you start your training with Peace Corps, they drill into you “integration, integration, integration” and it’s great to finally experience that you have, somehow, become part of your community. Because it’s hard. And when I say hard, I mean HARD. You don’t speak the language, you don’t look like the residents, your mannerisms are different, everything you do is a spectacle. But it’s something you need to expect when you get yourself dropped into a totally and completely different culture. After tears, frustration and days where you just lock yourself inside the house, you learn to appreciate the little things that show you are “somehow Rwandan.” For example:
-Running and not having children run after you but instead saying “good morning” and going about their morning chores
-Having a pet, but showing everyone how COOL it is and them reacting like “BAHHHHH she has a cat. Okay, that’s pretty cool, can I get one?”
-And my personal favorite happened this weekend. My host sister now lives in Kigali and has been bugging me to come visit her. And I planned on it this weekend. But then I got sick. And so I call her to tell her, sorry, I had meetings and now I’m sick and I get the overdramatic response, literally, word for word “WHY DO YOU REFUSE TO VISIT ME?!?!?!?!?!?!?!” bahahahah. Now, for the few people that know Da’ada, this is totally her character, but still totally hilarious. And makes me feel like a failure but still laugh hysterically. I will visit her, but darn that was entertaining.
So there you have, a somewhat meaningful post that has nothing to do with Milo. Also, in other news, in less than 1 month I will have been in Rwanda for 1 whole year. Let that sink in. Well, friends, that means I’m almost halfway through. See ya’ll soon…ish.
