Blogs from Soroti, Eastern Region, Uganda, Africa

Julius took the group to his village today. He has wanted to introduce us the entire time we have been here but seeing as everyone was so sick we haven't been able to all make it out. His village is fairly close to the hospital so we left from there and walked a couple of miles. We passed this old airstrip. Julius said that in the 70s and 80s there were a group of American doctors who came over and helped start the hospital Freda Carr. They use to land there and bring supplies. They would also work on and off in Uganda during the year. In the 80s however, there was some kind of civil unrest or civil war or something and so they stopped coming and the medical supplies stopped coming as well. Now ... read more

Our last full weekend in Africa. This morning we all woke up and relaxed. A group of us played cards this morning. We are a little addicted. I taught everyone how to play hearts and so the other night we had all nine of us playing with two decks. It was a ton of fun and hilarious. It's so funny to see how competitive some people get. Basically we have a ton of super competitive people playing the game. It's hilarious to watch people jest each other all game. We've all gotten really close so everyone seems to argue over cards like brother and sister.... Especially Kristi and Andrew. After a long game of hearts, I went into Kumi by myself. I went to explore, buy some things at the super market, use the internet and ... read more

Today I went to Kumi University in Nyero with Dr Stephen. He works at the University clinic on Mondays and Fridays because they are so busy those days and at Freda Carr Hospital the rest of the week. I met him at his house in Nyero in the morning and then we walked to the university. The university clinic sees all people from around the town not just people at the university. The clinic was very nicely set up and more updated than Freda Carr or the rest of the places we have been at. We were very busy. The clinic doesn't see much malaria so it was really interesting seeing the variety of patients. One man came in who was in congestive cardiac failure. He had multiple problems. He was in his 30s or 40s. ... read more

Mobile clinic today. Kevin, Amy and I went. We rode with around 16 other people in a tiny ambulance to a village called Kococwa which is North of Ngora by around 5km. It's a small rural village. We drove to a school and used the church that was on site as a set up for the clinic. The building was beautiful. Simple materials and really beautiful lighting just from it shifting and being somewhat dilapidated. This clinic itself was fun. Dr Julius introduced us and let us also introduce ourselves. He translated for us and we got to express to them how much we loved Africa, Uganda in particular. The clinic was full with people. We worked all day... Taking blood pressures, distributing medication, palpating patients, listening to and treating symptoms, etc. We worked all day ... read more

Our first Saturday in Ngora. Brittany, Britta and I had decided we might go for a run the night before and got up early before breakfast to try to beat the heat. During the run, as we would pass different houses, the Ugandans would just come running out at us and laugh and yell at the Muzungas passing by. They thought it was hilarious that we were running for fun. Even the adults would just sit and stare at us as we would pass their houses. Some of the comments we got were "Good job" "Well done" "I'm impressed" It was funny how impressed they were. On the way back, we passed by a school and had a ton of kids running after us. The group split up today. Kevin, Andrew, Cara and Amy decided to ... read more