One thing I have been learning that here there is no such thing as a typical day or week. On one Tuesday I can sit in the house reading all day without a care in the world and the following Tuesday it seems like I am in crisis control mode.
Over the last couple of weeks I have been thrown situations I never really anticipated finding myself in. First, on one Wednesday evening I heard a ruckus coming from the three grade 9 girls that live next to me. After investigating no one was really able to tell what started the fight. Then about 30 minutes after returning home the drama erupted all over again with a new development...this time a female teacher came and started beating one of the girls and calling another all sorts of names and accused her of "dating" her husband. Now that accusation is serious and one that would be illegal if it was true so dealing with the matter by going to the pupil (who is just 17 years old) was totally inappropriate. So after consulting the girls for their permission, I went the following morning and reported this teacher's behavior to the headmaster who was deeply embarrassed by her actions. And the really unfortunate part is that this was the teacher that I brought to my GLOW Camp in December and who was supposed to be a role model to the girls. I have since ceased having her work on the girls club and will begin with a new teacher next term.
So that was one atypical event. The next was that I became an unexpected caregiver. My other neighbor is a woman who has two boys aged 7 and 9. I love them all and we are very neighborly with one another where we lend each other things like salt or beans and she looks after my dog when I am away from site for awhile. On Tuesday her younger son was at my house in the morning and was feeling fine, but by around 1500 he started crying and complaining of stomach pains and a headache. Our clinic was closed so I just tried to comfort him as much as possible until his mom returned from farming that evening. The following morning around 0700 he returned to my house again crying of the same pains. When I asked where was his mom he said she left to go farming. And let me just say I had no way of contacting her. We have no network for phones and her farm is about an hour walk away. So I found myself with a sick child...again. I took him to the clinic (this has now been the third time in my service that I have been the one to take him there). After doing the test it turns out he had malaria again. This is his third round of malaria since I came to Misengo. His last one was just last month. So after he was given his medicine we went home to my house and I made us some potatoes while he laid and attempted sleeping in the insaka. Thankfully his mom returned about noon because it broke my heart to watch him cry and in so much pain without the one thing he wanted most-ba mommy.
The clinic worker told me that she talked to his mother later that day and told her to take more responsibility with her children and not to be depending on me to take care of them for her. I was glad she did because it was getting to be too much to suddenly become the caregiver for a sick 7 year old who you cant even really communicate with.
The following day my bicycle broke down as I was returning from teaching about HIV to a women's group about 14km from my house. And when I say broke I mean BROKE. The last km or so I pushed the bicycle through the mud and up a hill with the rear wheel not turning at all. I guess it may be the axle? We'll see I guess!
So like I said there is no such thing as typical. This is no 9-5 job, which sometimes is great, but then some days there is nothing more I want than a normal routine.
