Melkam Fasika

This weekend Ethiopia celebrated Easter. It is the end of 55 days of fasting (ie vegan diet), and is the biggest annual holiday in the country. People spend it with their families, and eat a lot a meat (much of it raw) to celebrate. We were fortunate enough to be invited to one of the local teacher’s homes in Bati, the village at the university gates. We had a lovely meal, although it wasn’t the traditional Doro Wat and injera that we were expecting but an amazing spread of “ferengi food” prepared especially us.  I was only slightly put off by having previously met the goat they had slaughtered that morning. We also had some not quite so lovely Tela which is a local alcoholic drink brewed from Barley and that tastes like muddy ditch water –yuck!

The rains continue here. Intermittently, but still there never the less. On the whole it is very welcome, as everything is beginning to look green and lush again and it’s a good bit less dusty which is a relief. On Saturday, Susan and I went for a walk down to the eucalyptus woods at the bottom of campus. It had been raining earlier in the day and the smell from the trees was just amazing. I couldn’t decide if I was back in Australia or perhaps in a herbal essences shampoo ad!

I took ownership of the next consignment of baby hats today – this time courtesy of my cousin Sophie and the lovely ladies of Briston and Melton Constable WI. Thank you! They are really appreciated. I’ll take them in tomorrow and get a few more photos of them in use!

Work wise, things are slowly improving. We have managed to get our one non-functioning incubator working, which is great news, but the problem is none of the staff know how to use it. It’s not that high tech, but it requires close observation, and that is not part of the psyche here. Even the most critical patients are doing well if they get more than one set of vital signs recorded in a 24 hour period unless I’m there nagging. I can’t be there 24 hours a day though and I’m a little bit worried that if I put a baby in the incubator it might get cooked. Not literally, but it might overheat and I can’t be sure that any one will check its temperature or turn the incubator down, even if I leave explicit instructions.  I guess there is only one way to find out though..... hhhmmm might get that incubator out tomorrow.