Hospital and Synagogue

I am officially at the half way point for my time in Kenya.  I feel like I just got grounded!

This week has been pretty crazy.  I didn't work much because I got sick, but I do have some interesting stories to report.

We were working in Likoni, which is about 45 min-1 hour away from Mtopanga (where I stay).  We had to take a matatu to the ferry and then another matatu from the ferry.  It is impossible to catch a matatu to the ferry during rush hour, so we had to catch one going about 10 min in the opposite directions, back to the "terminal" (Bamburi Stage) and then stay on the same matatu to go back past our house and all the way to the ferry.  The ferry is free for walk ons, but you seize to feel like a person and start to feel like cattle being herded onto a boat.  There are so many people tryin to get onto to get on!  You stand wherever you can find space.  The ride takes about 15 min, but it's only 500 meters away. 

When we got off the ferry, we had to take another matatu.  This was by far the sketchiest matatu that I've been on!  They had to push start it.  Then they would stop, lean into the matatu, tighten a few scews and then go and push again.  This happened a few times before we were on our way.  I thought the matatu would snap in half and we would loose half the group (we were all in the same matatu) when we went over the speed bumps (in Likoni they have 3 small speed bumps in a row). 

We finally got there and started our gender workshops.  Everything was going great. I facilitated a group on self esteem.  Steve, a manager from YCI, was in town and happened to walk in during my facilitation.  Everything was going well, until about 1/2 way through my session when I started to feel aches and pains in my legs.  By the time I was finished my part, I sat down and decided that I needed to go home.  After that crazy jouney to get o Likoni, I was only there for about 2.5 hours before turning around to go home with 2 Kwach facilitators that was going back to Kwacha.  The good news is that regardless of feeling ill, I got a lot of positive feedback on my session!

I went home and lay down.  After about 2 hours, I knew I had fever.  Other than the aches and pains in my muscles, I had to turn the fan off because I was cold.  COLD IN AFRICA!  When Melissa came home, she said that she couldn't sit in the room cause it was too hot without the fan.  I called Emmy (my Canadian supervisor) and she arranged for Shiko (a local friend) to take me to the hospital.  

We went to Aga Khan hospital in town.  It's private hospital and it was a great experience!  It was super clean and pretty fast service, given that it was a hospital.  I don't think I would have been seen that quickly in Canada, but that might be because I was at the expensive hospital.  It cost me 700 ksh ($9) for the consultation alone and I think in all I spent about 5000 ksh (about $70) for my entire visit. 

When you arrive at the hospital you go into a small consultation room.  They take down some info, pass your name on to the registration desk (through a window).  They call you up to pay and pass your name on to the dr. You see the dr and then they tell you if you need to go for blood test or not.  I went to pay for my blood test and then they passed my name (through another window) over to the lab where they took my blood.  The lab then passed my results to the dr. (down the hall, not through a window) who then called me back in.  Then I went back towards the lab (30 sec walk) to the pharmacy and paid them.  I think it seemed like the service was fast cause I kept moving around.  It was all in the same vacinity, so it wasn't like I was running around the hospital.

I had a temperature of 37.5C.  The doctor (female) laughed when I told her that I actually felt a normal body temperature for the first time in hours.  I was wearing long pants, a tshirt, socks and shoes (it was the first time I had socks and shoes on since I got here).  The hospital was airconditined but still 25C.  I wasn't sweating!  Based on my symptoms, Shiko and the doctor were pretty convinced that I had malaria...but I DIDN'T!  (phiew!).  The blood test came back saying that I had a respiratory bacterial infection.  Basically, I breathed something in, so there was no way to prevent it.  She gave me some meds and told me to take ibprophen and I went home.

That night was pretty rought.  Little did I know at the time, the meds were super harsh on my stomach.  The next day, my fever broke but I couldn't eat.  I was on a steady diet of bananas and freezies.  The third day was even worse.  I couldn't get out of bed it was so painful...so back to the hospital I went.  (Meanwhile all my teammates are back in Likoni every morning! Kinda happy I didn't have to do that again!).  This time my temperature taken during the consultation was 36C...that just confused me.  The dr that I saw this time (also female) said it was ok to stop taking the antibiotics...so i did and bye bye abdominal stabbing :)  Now I'm all better!

I didn't want to go home after the dr because the cramping was still there and if I went home, I'd have nothing else to think about and wanted to pretend that they didn't exist.  So I went in search for the synagogue I saw in passing a few days earlier.  It was about a 6 min walk from Kwacha.  I met some people there and it was pretty awesome to meet Jews in Mombasa.

Yesterday, being Shabbat, I went for services.  Right away, I noticed services were more gospel like, but I was interested to see where things were going.  I was a little surprised when, the Minister (yes, not Rabbi) said something and everyone looked at me but I didn't understand!  Awkward!  They then started to translate the service for me.  Felt a little strange, but appreciated the hospitality.  After about 1.5 hours, I went out for some air.  There were about 100 people in this small chapel.  It didn't feel over crowded but still hot. The minister came out to greet me and explained that they were Mesianic Jews....ahhh...Jews for Jesus!  This started to make a lot more sense!  I couldn't understand while during the bible study (aka sermon) they were making reference to Luke!  He asked me to say a few words after the sermon, which little did I know was about 1 min after I came back into the chapel.  The Minister was really funny and when I said something in Swahili, he translated into English.  I told them some of our traditions around Purim and they all had a good laugh. 

The minister asked me to stay for lunch.  The congragation is asked to stay until 5pm because he knows that if they go home, they wont keep Shabbat.  I told him that I would stay as long as I could, but it was hard with the heat.  I made it until about 12:40 pm (lunch was not served yet). I started to feel uncomfortable when they started testifying about converting people and then about the devil.  That was my que to leave.

I went to Polyben's (a restaurant near Kwacha) for lunch.  It was really busy and the waiteress sat me at a table with a random man.  We started talking and he was a Pastor.  It's a religious day all around!  I told him where I had been in the morning and he was really amazed that I was Jewish.  He said that he felt so blessed to be in the presence of a Jew!  He prays for us all the time because of our lineage frem Abraham.  I said "thank you!" What do you say when someone tells you that they are blessed to be in your presence?!  We had a really interesting conversation and it was a pleasure talking to him.

I then went home and relaxed for the rest of the afternoon.  I feel like my weekend has been oober long, but it's been nice to have some down time.  This afternoon, I'm going to a family day at the rehab centre on the corner of my street.  I probably wont understand much, but they are 12 step based and going to be talking about codependency, so I think I'll be able to figuer it out.