Life at Mulago

I thought you all might like to see pictures of the places I'm living and working. I took a few today, and I'm sure there will be more to come, but at least you can get an idea.

I am living at a guest house paid for by the Infectious Diseases Institute, one of the many clinics at Mulago Hospital, where I am working. The guest house is pretty nice, we have hot water, and a maid during the week, she even cooks for us sometimes and does the laundry, makes the beds, etc. Above is a picture of my room. Not bad, eh? I am getting used to the mosquito nets.

The house has 4 bedrooms and is about a 15 minute walk from the hospital. Here are some views from our 2nd floor porch (difficult to capture, I did my best).

We also have a night watchman, see him above? Never thought I would be living in a gated community in Uganda, pretty much all the musungus (Ugandan for "those idiot white people") do. You can see the hills of Kampala in the background. Kind of reminds me of Honolulu. But not really.

We are right in the middle of town, which means no peace at night. There is a nightclub down the street that thumps all night long (Kampala is known for its bumpin' night life, no joke. Some of my friends have been to the clubs, they cater to the Musungus and are apparently nice even by US standards and play nothing but American HipHop and Rap). Contrast that with the Islamic guy across the street with the megaphone who chants to Mecca every hour on the hour from 4am to 11pm. And sometimes he indulges us with a little bonus track in between, which is always a treat. Not to mention the barking dogs and the feral cat that has staked out its territory underneath my window, and happens to run into a challenger of that territory every night at precisely 3am. I finally got a loud fan for my room, so now I sleep a little better...

Here is a photo of the IDI clinic where I work. It's a brand new building with an atrium, and it's actually not bad. It is always horribly crowded-- average of 400 patients a day, and they all sit there all day long waiting to be seen. Luckily there are lots of volunteers (most of whom are HIV+) that do art projects and sing in the lobby, this keeps the place from feeling like a morgue. A lot of the patients are surprisingly healthy, and some are definitely NOT.

Sorry, can't figure out how to flip that rightside up. You get the idea.

While our clinic is relatively nice, the actual hospital is the saddest part, by far. Keep in mind, this is a state-of-the-art African hospital, probably top 5 on the continent. The wards consist of big rooms with rusty beds packed side by side. You have TB patients with AIDS coughing all over the AIDS patients without TB (but not for long). No private negative pressure isolation rooms and yellow paper gowns and particulate filter masks here, my medically savvy friends. You just cross your fingers and pray to the Mantoux gods. The other crazy part is that there is very little nursing care at the hospital. The patients' family members or friends basically move in for the duration of the inpatient stay. This lucky caregiver gets to deliver the patients' lab tests and results to and from the lab, admister their meds, record their ins and outs (for those not fluent in medical-ese, that means measure their food/fluid intake and its resulting excretion from the body), do their laundry, clean their messes, you get the idea. And strangely they don't seem to mind. Never mind that this healthy caregiver is putting themselves at risk by being exposed to all this communicable disease as well as missing weeks to months of work (read as: their kids don't get to go to school the next year, IF you are one of the middle class folks who can afford to send your kids to school in the first place). Here is a picture of the front lawn at Mulago Hospital-- these are family members washing and drying sheets and blankets brought from home for patients, as well as a shot of one of the wards

Patients who stay here are also responsible for paying for all their own care-- medications, lab tests, xrays, everything. No Blue Cross Blue Shield PPOs here. Think of that the next time you gripe about your $20 copay.

I know it's depressing, but it's reality. I have counted my blessings so many times since being here that I've lost track... Sorry, this will be my first and hopefully last preachy post.

Miss you all

Erin