Heri ya mwaka mpya

Heri ya mwaka mpya, Happy New Year

The year 2014 ended well at Shirati’s Maternity Ward. I helped deliver two healthy baby boys (boy to girl ratio for all my deliveries is around 10:1 weirdly enough), and all the ward patients are doing fine. Even the young girl that delivered triplets, with one baby weighing only 900 grams, is in a happy mood, because all of her babies had gained weight. During rounds I heard this peculiar sound coming from her bed, and I was afraid one of the premature triplets was being smothered by the amount of blankets covering it. Turns out, the mother was keeping a chicken in a basket underneath the bed, that was laying an egg as I walked past. Premature babies in the Netherlands are luckily a rarity and are well cared for with incubators, special warmed mattresses and germfree environments. Here we put them all in a room with chickens, the incubator has 6 blown bulbs and is therefore not working, but at least the weather is working for us; the 30 degree Celsius heat keeps the babies warm. I cannot explain why most of the deliveries I have assisted were boys, but I am proud to announce that there is a little baby girl named after me.

In the afternoon Wasan, my housemate, and I were told to get dressed for a New Years Eve party. Fred was being very mysterious as to where this party would be. The only thing I new was that there would be 10 kilos of steak on the barbeque and free beer, and Dr. Shwaib kept telling me “we will get absolutely wrecked”. I’m glad I am not on call tonight and tomorrow is an official day off. In the evening we started driving towards Ubwere, where the only establishment I know is Owan Hotel, but to my surprise we turned into a driveway that led to a petrol pump. Are we to celebrate New Years at a gas station? Behind the gas station emerged a few lovely patios and a fully stocked bar. Frank, Freds brother was already nyema chomaing (barbequing) all the meat. It did not take long before all the girls were shaking their behinds to the tunes of “I’m looking for my Johnny” and “Shake body”. By now, having been to a send off, a wedding and a club in Musoma, I was familiar with the choreographed dances and could join the fun.

At the twelve o’ clock countdown, we popped the champagne bottles, hugged each other three times and started dancing again until the wee hours of the morning.

On January 2nd all was well in Shirati hospital, but not at Dr. Esthers clinic. I visited her clinic twice to learn about Burkitts Lymphoma and to see the young patients who were getting chemo there. Burkitts Lymphoma usually affects young kids between the age of 5 to 15. When treated early, the tumours just melt away like snow after a few doses of chemo. One girl had a tumour in her eye and had gotten her first dose. I was thinking of her, we did not confirm the diagnosis of Burkitts Lymphoma, could it be something else? The only way to be sure would be to biopsy the eye, which would surely lead to loss of vision. She had gotten her dose last week, if it was really Burkitts, the tumour must have shrunk considerably. Sadly Dr. Esther sent me a text: “No response to chemo. I sent her to Mwanza as soon as possible. Retinoblastoma”