SAFARI! We had a blast on our safari this weekend. We left at 7am on Saturday morning, but were very surprised to see our travel guide outside our house at 6:40. Ugandans are NEVER early, and rarely on time. Half of us were still in the shower and eating, so we had to tell him to wait for us. All 8 of us students then got into a sweet safari van, equipped with bucket seats and a roof that extended upwards so that you can stand in the van while on your safari and look at the surroundings. I got the back of the van, which ended up being a moderately poor decision because it was a VERY bumpy ride! We were told that the ride would last only 6 hours, but it ended up taking us 10 hours! Many roads were unfinished and consisted of dirt that had been eroded by rainwater. When there were cement roads, there were extremely inconveniently placed speed bumps spaced out at an awkward distance from each other. (Ugandans here apparently like having 5 speed bumps 1 foot away from each other). Needless to say, I had a pretty gurgly stomach by the time we ate lunch!
Right before we entered the park, we ended up crossing over the EQUATOR! First time in the southern hemisphere for me so we definitely made sure to stop at the road marker and get pictures! On our way into the park we passed by a big elephant and got super excited and stopped to take pictures. Little did we know we'd get much closer to more elephants later on in the trip! We ended up staying in a hostel in the middle of the park, which had pretty nice accommodations, an outdoor restaurant/bar nearby, and lots of mongooses (mongeese??) roaming the area. In the morning we began our road safari at 6:30 am. We saw warthogs, water buffalo, antelope and elephants. Around 1 we went on a boat safari and saw tons of HIPPOS! (Also an alligator). Right as we were about to turn around we saw a family of elephants standing on the shore drinking/bathing so we rode up right next to them and watched them for a while. I got some beautiful pictures that I will have to post on here when I get back home! At night we went on another safari drive because we wanted to see some lions and leopards, but unfortauntely we did not see any. However we did see 2 crested cranes (a really pretty bird that is the national bird), lots of antelope, elephants, and a really pretty rainbow. Part of the time I got to sit up on the top of the safari van (sorry dad, but i figured i could tell you now that you know im safe :-p)
the next morning we went on a walking tour of the land, led by an armed tour guide. we saw a massive cloud of bugs over the water, a hippo, and lots of birds that got boring to look at after a while. on our way out of the park in the morning, we had 3 elephants standing in the road blocking us. again, more sweet pictures.
i'm getting tired of typing for now, so more later!
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
Friday, May 27, 2011
woke up late...no time to blog about the past week before we leave for the safari, so i will just have to leave ya'll waiting in suspense! we are leaving in 15 minutes and the drive to queen elizabeth park is about 6 or 7 hours. i have a feeling it is going to be a very scenic drive though so i bet it will go fast!
if i don't get eaten by a hungry-hungry hippo, i'll blog once i am back in Kampala on Monday.
fun fact we learned from our roomate: hippos, elephants etc that are in parks around here each have several individuals whose job it is to simply walk around by the animal with AK47 guns to protect the each animal from poachers. when tourists (like us) come around, the guards keep a distance.
if i don't get eaten by a hungry-hungry hippo, i'll blog once i am back in Kampala on Monday.
fun fact we learned from our roomate: hippos, elephants etc that are in parks around here each have several individuals whose job it is to simply walk around by the animal with AK47 guns to protect the each animal from poachers. when tourists (like us) come around, the guards keep a distance.
We're back...for a night!
Hey everybody! We just got back from an AMAZING week in Nkokunjaru at the Providence Home. The sisters there made us 3 meals a day, we got to work with dozens of awesome children at the orphanage there, and even got to do some home health PT! (Home health PT in Africa involves being on a bamboo mat, surrounded by 3 roosters, a stray dog, a big pig, a piglet, banana trees, and 4 naked children running around...though I will have to explain more later!) I will update more when I get a chance, but for right now we are all waiting to get on the internet, so I will keep it brief for now just to say that we made it back to Kampala.
If I don't get a chance to get back on the internet, we are leaving tomorrow morning for a SAFARI!!! We are going to Queen Elizabeth park until Monday, so once again, I won't have internet access until then.
Miss you all a lot! (Even more than I miss Chipotle, which I have been craving nonstop this week)
If I don't get a chance to get back on the internet, we are leaving tomorrow morning for a SAFARI!!! We are going to Queen Elizabeth park until Monday, so once again, I won't have internet access until then.
Miss you all a lot! (Even more than I miss Chipotle, which I have been craving nonstop this week)
Friday, May 20, 2011
last day in Kampala for a week!
Anyways I can't be long on here because we are all waiting to get online, and we need to get to bed so we can pack in the morning for Nkokunjaru. This is the village about 1 to 3 hours away (depending on the condition of the road that day haha) where we will be staying at a convent with nuns and help children in the orphanage. I am super excited about this and have been looking forward to it all week!
As an FYI, don't worry about me when I don't update this for the next week because we will not have any internet access at the convent.
Miss you all a lot! (But I'm not ready to come home yet) :)
Thursday, May 19, 2011
Emu, bbarri, ssatu...1, 2, 3!
Learned a bit more Lugandan today at clinic! We wrote down the words for "bend" and "straighten", both very important words to know in the physio dept.
Me and Kristi started in the ICU which was pretty awesome. We first saw a patient who was seriously injured in a traffic accident (surprise surprise) and was in a coma. Unfortunately, his identity was unknown so he had been in the ICU for several weeks. He was stable enough to be moved to another ward of the hospital, but since he had no family there to take care of him, he needed to remain there. In this hospital, families are taught how to do certain medical procedures such as suctioning out their mouths. With no family there to help him with this or with feeding, he would not survive, so they are keeping him in the ICU. We did some range of motion exercises, and some chest PT (!). By placing our hands on his ribcage and initiating a breathing-like pattern, we are encouraging proper airflow throughout all the lung in order to prevent things such as pneumonia and to help get out the gook.
Another patient we saw was interesting because he had suffered a brain trauma from a fall, and had also gotten tetanus. A side effect of tetanus is muscle spasms so I got to feel some cool muscle tone that I had never felt before. He was intubated, which actually surprised me because throughout the rest of the hospital I never saw any eletronic equipment. However, the ICU was actually relatively clean (no visitors allowed) and very quiet. They had vitals monitors on the patients which actually surprised me given the fact that we had gone on a tour of the entire hospital and I never once even saw a blood pressure cuff anywhere!
The last spot we went to was the post-ICU ICU. Basically the place where you go when you become stable, but still need fairly close attention (however "close" attention means maybe one nurse for 15 or 20 patients.) We saw a man with a craniotomy (a removal of part of the skull) after he was in a traffic accident (something should REALLY be done about the traffic here!). What I found interesting was that this man, with basically a chunk of his head missing, was sitting next to an open window (no screens) in a dirty corner. I can't imagine how many infections occur in this hospital...
Right now we are getting ready for a party because it is one of our professors birthday today. We are going to order pizza and have her over and play volleyball with the other med students from Madison who are visiting here.
Me and Kristi started in the ICU which was pretty awesome. We first saw a patient who was seriously injured in a traffic accident (surprise surprise) and was in a coma. Unfortunately, his identity was unknown so he had been in the ICU for several weeks. He was stable enough to be moved to another ward of the hospital, but since he had no family there to take care of him, he needed to remain there. In this hospital, families are taught how to do certain medical procedures such as suctioning out their mouths. With no family there to help him with this or with feeding, he would not survive, so they are keeping him in the ICU. We did some range of motion exercises, and some chest PT (!). By placing our hands on his ribcage and initiating a breathing-like pattern, we are encouraging proper airflow throughout all the lung in order to prevent things such as pneumonia and to help get out the gook.
Another patient we saw was interesting because he had suffered a brain trauma from a fall, and had also gotten tetanus. A side effect of tetanus is muscle spasms so I got to feel some cool muscle tone that I had never felt before. He was intubated, which actually surprised me because throughout the rest of the hospital I never saw any eletronic equipment. However, the ICU was actually relatively clean (no visitors allowed) and very quiet. They had vitals monitors on the patients which actually surprised me given the fact that we had gone on a tour of the entire hospital and I never once even saw a blood pressure cuff anywhere!
The last spot we went to was the post-ICU ICU. Basically the place where you go when you become stable, but still need fairly close attention (however "close" attention means maybe one nurse for 15 or 20 patients.) We saw a man with a craniotomy (a removal of part of the skull) after he was in a traffic accident (something should REALLY be done about the traffic here!). What I found interesting was that this man, with basically a chunk of his head missing, was sitting next to an open window (no screens) in a dirty corner. I can't imagine how many infections occur in this hospital...
Right now we are getting ready for a party because it is one of our professors birthday today. We are going to order pizza and have her over and play volleyball with the other med students from Madison who are visiting here.
Wednesday, May 18, 2011
19/5/11
Oliyoteya! (that's "how are you doing"/"hello" in Lugandan)
We are learning a few new words now that we have spent a few days here, but I'm really bad at remembering them!Today me and Kristi were in the outpatient clinic gym again. Some of the patients we saw today had injuries several months ago from "boda boda" accidents (what they call motorcycles).
After we got back from the clinic we got lunch at a nice restaurant. As is normal in Kampala, there were armed guards at the door who looked into womens purses and scanned the men with metal detectors. The food was traditional Ugandan food, which included goat, a banana/mashed potato type dish, and something that vaguely looked and tasted like potato salad. I can't complain about a free lunch, but I don't think I will be ordering Ugandan food once I'm back in America!
We came back to the university and headed down to the rugby field to place some soccer, but a lot of the students here were already gearing up for a rugby match so we watched that for a while. The 8 of us glaringly-white individuals stuck out like sore thumbs, but by this point in the week we are getting used to it! (The name for a white person here is "muzungu". Kids will say it to you and wave as you walk by. It isn't meant to be derogatory)
The 8of us PTers made a homemade dinner tonight consisting of spaghetti and sauce. It was going perfectly until Dallas sprinkled some oregano he found in the kitchen on his spaghetti. He gave some to Jenelle to put on her plate and as soon as we looked at it we realized that what used to be oregano was now tiny bugs. yummmm
I'm getting less and less afriad of the gecko/lizard things that seem to like hanging out in the curtains of our house. Didn't even jump when I saw one this time :)
Need to get to bed soon because we are getting up in the morning to do some laundry. Clothes get really stinky and dirty here from all the pollution and red dirt roads. There is a few clothing lines in the back that we'll use to dry them out while we are at work. Tomorrow me and Kristi will be beginning our morning in the ICU of the hospital. It is going to be very interesting and different from what we have seen so far.
ps. mark and brian i meant to say this before but there are just a couple of super random CDs lying around this place (probably from other students who have stayed in this house) and thefirst one i saw and the only one i recognize is a King's of Leon CD.
We are learning a few new words now that we have spent a few days here, but I'm really bad at remembering them!Today me and Kristi were in the outpatient clinic gym again. Some of the patients we saw today had injuries several months ago from "boda boda" accidents (what they call motorcycles).
After we got back from the clinic we got lunch at a nice restaurant. As is normal in Kampala, there were armed guards at the door who looked into womens purses and scanned the men with metal detectors. The food was traditional Ugandan food, which included goat, a banana/mashed potato type dish, and something that vaguely looked and tasted like potato salad. I can't complain about a free lunch, but I don't think I will be ordering Ugandan food once I'm back in America!
We came back to the university and headed down to the rugby field to place some soccer, but a lot of the students here were already gearing up for a rugby match so we watched that for a while. The 8 of us glaringly-white individuals stuck out like sore thumbs, but by this point in the week we are getting used to it! (The name for a white person here is "muzungu". Kids will say it to you and wave as you walk by. It isn't meant to be derogatory)
The 8of us PTers made a homemade dinner tonight consisting of spaghetti and sauce. It was going perfectly until Dallas sprinkled some oregano he found in the kitchen on his spaghetti. He gave some to Jenelle to put on her plate and as soon as we looked at it we realized that what used to be oregano was now tiny bugs. yummmm
I'm getting less and less afriad of the gecko/lizard things that seem to like hanging out in the curtains of our house. Didn't even jump when I saw one this time :)
Need to get to bed soon because we are getting up in the morning to do some laundry. Clothes get really stinky and dirty here from all the pollution and red dirt roads. There is a few clothing lines in the back that we'll use to dry them out while we are at work. Tomorrow me and Kristi will be beginning our morning in the ICU of the hospital. It is going to be very interesting and different from what we have seen so far.
ps. mark and brian i meant to say this before but there are just a couple of super random CDs lying around this place (probably from other students who have stayed in this house) and thefirst one i saw and the only one i recognize is a King's of Leon CD.
Yesterday was awesome! We are currently waiting for day 3 in the clinic but our van isn't here yet...we have quickly come to realize that Ugandan's operate on their own time. Everything is very slow, laid back, and relaxed. Everything from conversation to walking to service at a restaurant is much slower than the US. Yesterday we were supposed to have a inservice at one, but it didn't begin until 1:45 or so.
Here's a brief description of yesterday...
Here's a brief description of yesterday...
- I got placed into the outpatient clinic, one of the easiest parts of the hospital at least in terms of how emotionally charged things were. Most people were coming in with conditions like post injection palsy (a paresis that is very common after nurses inject the trreatment for malaria into the sciatic nerve in the butt), and stroke. Conditions were just overall better than the wards, so I was kind of glad to begin there. It sounds like in the afternoons I will be headed to the wards, which I am actually looking forward to.
- I felt clonus! There was a little baby who had it. It might have been the highlight of my day haha
- I got to work with several little kids, and they were absolutely adorable.
- I met a third year PT student from Uganda who helped me out in the clinic. I was amazed at how much he knew, and how much experience they are allowed to have from the very beginning of their schooling. He was impressed with how much we knew for only being first years.
- We went to an inservice that could have been a Dr. Bill lecture straight from home. Talked about management of conditions like rheumatoid arthritis, osteoarthritis, and gout. Mom- you would love it....we only dfrink soda out of bottles! ive had many cokes out of a bottle!
vans here...gotta go
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