Come on down, down to the river

Last week, my ward was abnormally empty of patients, so I was floated down to the plastics ward. Generally, I am not a huge fan of being floated. It's out of my comfort zone; I don't know the people, the patients, or the routine. Here, flexibility is one of the lessons I am learning.

In this place, you are not left to figure it out on your own. It was a chance to get to know more of the fantastic nurses in our hospital and get to take care of another group of patients. Most of the plastics patients are burn contracture releases, though there are a few others such as syndactyly releases and debulking of tumors. Cute kids were everywhere in B ward. Some are the patients, but there are also little brothers and sisters of patients always underfoot, arms up wanting to be held. It is lively, with a teenage boy who insists on being called Michael Jackson, moonwalking down the aisles, dancing to Thriller, and ending every sentence with a wink.

This little lady occupied my lap for
an entire hour of ward church on
Sunday- she can dance :)

Saturday a group of us went to ride down the Kouilou-Nairi River that is not far from us. Several groups had done this before, so we made our reservation (and by we, I mean someone who actually speaks French, I was just along for the ride. Again, literally), convinced our friend Andrew to drive a Land Rover full of girls, and headed out to the river. We arrived at 10:30 for our 11 am reservation. We met the 9 am group that had yet to leave. TIA (This is Africa). Soon after, a third group arrived.

Of course, a group of 30 people wanting to ride down the river was "No problem, no problem" for them. After several rounds of boat shuffling, we were seated and waiting to go.

Our ride. And our chairs

 



The other boats chairs...

 



This was taken just before this boat leaned too far
to the left and almost got a bit wet...
they changed boats after that

For the first 30 minutes or so, I felt that any wrong move would tip us. After a while, the rocking and swaying became less threatening and the scenery was beautiful. The banks were lined with lush greenery, spotted with small villages of huts, with children standing on the banks waving. We stopped in one of these villages to walk around and we all got a chance to try sugar cane! It's....interesting.

 

Don't let those cloudy skies fool you- though I applied sunscreen, I still have a really nice tan/burn line from the tank top I was wearing!

 

 

Sunday afternoon we went out with a couple of our day crew members to a beautiful beach, farther than we would have ventured on our own. We walked along the rocks, which were black from all the oil, down to where several ships were wrecked along the shore. After we walked back, we were treated to mango juice in a café on the beach.

 

 

 

There is beauty in this place. Not only in it's beaches and landscape, but in it's people. The ones who want to show this place to us, who patiently correct our French, who care for the people they didn't know yesterday on the wards. Cette vie est belle

 

"Down to the River to Pray" - Allison Krause