January 08 update

Algol
Hamish Tait, Robin Hastie & Jim Hepburn
Sat 19 Jan 2008 12:27
Taking the chance of time in Maroua to post an update.

From Anne
Work. The development plans in two of the schools are coming along - they have chosen their five priorities for the next five years and are now making detailed plans for each year. The other two schools are slightly behind. One is at the stage of choosing its priorities and the last one is in the middle of a row! This morning's meeting should be interesting as the two villages fight it out to beome members of the development committee. At the last lively get together they ended up calling each other foreigners!

Home.  We are now on antique fridge number 5. The other four have all died of natural causes, either emitting vast quantities of CFCs or black smoke. We wonder how many more we'll have by September 2009.

Chrismas Day.  Hamish was working all day, but we still managed to have a good dinner (alcohol free, of course!). The other doctor gave us a gigot of pork and I managed to find apples, carrots, green beans (all firsts since or arrival here) and sweet potatoes. We finished off with some of Wendy & Martin's wedding cake. All by candlelight as the generator wasn't working! Very romantic.

Culture. Since the last blog we have been at a wedding, a baptism and an animist funeral. The wedding was described by the English father of the groom as being like a game-show. The other two deserve a blog all to themselves. We also discovered on Christmas Day that visitors just take away with them any food you've laid out which they haven't managed to eat during the visit!

Godam. Time keeping has improved to such an extent that one day he arrived at 6.50 am for a 7.30 appoint,ent. He was late another day, hoever, because he'd found a dead donkey outside his house! This week he has decided that he and I should dress in the same material for International Day of Youth on 11th February. Photo call????

All the best to all our faithful readers.

From Hamish.
The job is continuing to be an amazing experience, if challenging. As there are only two doctors, we take turns week about to be on call. Most of the actual work is done by the nurses and our role is to advise and make decisions with the odd bit of practical work thrown in. If a patient has to go to theatre I will assist whichever surgical nurse is operating. On Christmas Eve we were doing an emergency caesarian section when the generator failed. Theatre was plunged into pitch darkness and we just had to stay still until a torch was brought. Fortunately, the baby had been safely delivered so we only had to do the stitching up by torchlight. Those of you who know of my DIY skills (our girls say the letters stand for destroy it yourself) will be amused/horrified to hear I helped set up traction for a patient with a fractured thigh bone. This involved drilling through the upper end of the shin bone using a (sterilised) hand drill to insert the pin. Cords were attached to the ends of the pin and the other end led up & over the side of a cot before being tied to a poly bag filled with sand! Once I can download the photos from the camera I'll post them on the site.

We're stilll waiting for a replacement adaptor for the laptop, so regular updates are still beyond us.

We wish everyone at home all the best for 2008.

Anne & Hamish