December 3rd

This morning I cranked out three of my exams for my students, my
biology exams. The chemistry one’s will be a little harder but it’s
not like I have to worry, the chemistry and biology exams are not
until next week anyway. I ran a couple of other errands and stuff
this morning and that about finished it off. I had a class at 2:35,
they were running late so I didn’t get them until about 2:55. But I
kept them for the rest of the period and the next one since they
didn’t have another class. Then they left for the “lunch” break at
4:05. I was supposed to have the SS2 kids for science the last two
periods of the day but after waiting 15 minutes or so I went up and
there was almost no one there. They let them go after the lunch
break to start preparing for their exams. Letting my kids come to
the last two periods before exams started would have been far
better. I was going to review and make sure they understood stuff
before I turned them loose to study on their own. On the way back
I caught Tom and Rebecca on the way down to the hospital in the
truck with some boxes of stuff so I rode back down with them to
help unload it. After that we went back up to the house and grilled
some burgers. It was wonderful, it’s not very easy to get beef here
in Kamakwie. It’s only about two dollars a pound in Makeni, but
with the drive here exceeding three hours and having to keep it
frozen it’s a huge hassle to deal with. We also had fries made from
potatoes that are a cross between a regular potato and a sweet
potato, it was quite good. As a side note, the pineapple here is
absolutely wonderful, pineapple in the US just pales in
comparison. We had some with dinner. After dinner I went down
to the hospital with Tom and Rebecca. There was a lady who had a
c-section and was continuing to bleed from the wound three days
later and they thought they might have to do surgery and I asked if
I could observe. We got down there and Tom checked her out. Her
bleeding has been decreasing and her hemoglobin levels have
been pretty constant so Tom decided not to go through with it
since it appears to not be an emergency situation. Opening
someone up is not something one does likely especially under the
conditions that must be dealt with here. Tom apologized that they
weren’t going to do surgery but I told him that there will be plenty
of opportunities and I’m glad that they don’t have to open her
back up. I find the hospital and all contained within quite
fascinating and I like listening to the various doctors here as they
talk about cases at the hospital though often it’s quite over my
head. Anyway, after that I sat in the OB ward with Emma and
Rebecca while Tom returned to the house. Solomon came back
while we were there and spent a while sitting with us talking about
all manner of things. He had been gone for about two weeks in
Makeni, first taking an OB training course and then the next week
teaching at it. Emma had been in the ward from 8am till 10pm
when one of the nurse/midwives finally came to take over. This
conference thing going on has really depleted the nursing staff for
the last few days. Anyway, she finally got off and I headed up with
Solomon to pick his phone up which had been charging up at
Samuel’s and had intended to walk back with him to his house to
talk some more, because he’s been gone quite a while and I don’t
see him around a whole lot when he’s around. He’s pretty cool and
fun to talk to. Tomorrow some of us are supposed to go see a
gold/diamond mine tomorrow but only if the guy who owns it,
Richard, is feeling well. Someone said he has malaria which doesn’t
go away real fast so we’ll see. If not tomorrow there will be other
chances. Anyway, that’s about it for today. I hope all is well on the
home front.

Blessings from Kamakwie
Ryan Brooks