Taste from Home

Got a nice taste from home today!

Sweet red grapes from SA bought at Freetown Supermarket - Lekker!
Was also quite surprised to see a Tru-Cape box @ the little vegetable stand near the clinic. (Apples and pears from Western Cape - my favourite ever since my brothers and I was dress in matching CAPE Apple T-shirts in the early 80's).





















Abdulai was quite happy to smile for this snap in front of his store.

So, how did you get here from the airport?

For anyone flying into Sierra Leone's Lungi Airport, that's usually the first questions asked. The international airport's actually not situated in Freetown, but "across the bay" from the city. Leaving you with 4 options to get into town- helicopter, hovercraft, ferry or road.

For most expats there's really only 2 options - helicopter (US$55, 8min) or hovercraft (US$55, 25 - 90+min). The road is REALLY bad and takes a few hours, the ferry that's slow and over crowded but cheap. Both heli- and hovercraft ports are situated very conveniently within a few hundred meters of our clinic in Aberdeen.

What do we see on the way to work yesterday "SURPRISE" -
hovercraft halfway submerged in the "The Man of War Bay", less than 50m from the shore and few hundred meters from the clinic.

As always in Africa rumours are plenty ...
A possible scenario:
around 6 am with
39 people on board (again, who knows for sure),
ran out of fuel,
another boat went to take fuel,
either ran into it or the fuel/engine caught fire -
back part of craft sank,
front part stayed floating,
luckily near the shore,
nobody hurt/drowned
craft now not hovering, but safely at the shore.









And that's not all....
latest rumour has it that the helicopter was also grounded, that on "the eve of the Presidential inauguration with several heads of state and the media expected".





But again, who will ever know....

Twins, twins, twins

Clinic days has been markedly busier since rainy season is ending, elections are over and someone made an announcement over the radio that our clinic exists (we didn't need any advertising, we're busy enough).

We usually limit the numbers of kids to the first 60 arriving before 8am and then usually have 10-20 booked for follow-up.

On a particularly hectic day 2 weeks ago I took a few minutes to "snap" these 3 sets of twin that was there at the same time.

In the middle of a long and busy day, just couldn't get them all to look at the camera and smile at the same time!

Lets hope it doesn't leave a scar

For most of us staying in Africa, insects (or goggas as we refer to them in Afrikaans) are just part of life. We generally don't get upset or interrupted by them. Of cause flies, ants and mosquitoes are a nuisance and we all wish they didn't exist, but they do.. and that's life.

I'm carefully remembering to take my anti-malarials every week and mostly remember to but on bug repellent when I'm outside at night, but this Wednesday a nasty gogga got me -without me even realising it. The little red beetles has been around the past few days and I must have squashed one in my neck without thinking about it. By Thursday morning I had a faint red spot on my neck, by the evening it had gotten bigger and started to burn and by Friday it was a proper red with fine blisters in the centre.

Google is great ...

The beetle's called Paederus Sabaeus (also called Nairobi fly or Champion fly)

not a blister beetle

the toxin of these guys is pederin

causes blistering, ezcema type lesions and pustules

often has Gram negative bacterial infection

takes 2-3 weeks to heal

often leaves scar (for moths or years).

And.. burns and itches and just generally does feel or look nice!

So that's it, lets hope for the best!