Ellana's African Adventures: September 2011

"Here comes the sun" definitely explains my current mindset towards living in Eldoret and Kenya in general. For better or worse, my attitude is very much controlled by the type of weather I am experiencing (hence one of the big reasons we are moving to Florida, at least in my opinion). Although all of the normal frustrations still exist, we have had about five consecutive days of absolutely glorious weather with amazing "Carolina" blue skies, as my NC friends would say. This has certainly helped my outlook on life in general. Ellana and I, or her babysitter, have spent almost every day, all day outside with her friends either in the pool or in the swing, or just simply walking around enjoying the sun. I really think that we are experiencing a little bit of Heaven right now. The highs are in the mid-80s with zero humidity and the temps probably reach the low 60s at night.

One of my favorite memories of the past week was when Ellana and I were out by our main front gate just watching people walk by and talking to one of the friendliest people I have ever met, our guard, Michael. About 10 cows came strolling by, and as Ellana really loves cows and making the "moo" sound, we stood and watched them for several minutes. These were some of the largest and healthiest cows I have seen in Kenya, and Ellana went right up to pet them. Although I'm sure they didn't know what to think of her, they tolerated her very loud "mooing" until they decided that our grass wasn't adequate. I'm really enjoying seeing the world through the eyes of a toddler!

My attitude has also changed after visiting the Tumaini Children's Drop-In Center located about 5 minutes from the IU House. I had been wanting to visit, but just hadn't made the time. Our housemate, Matt, has been working there since May and encouraged me to see the organization to see if there was something I could do to help. Tumaini was founded by a former Indiana medical student (now a Duke resident) named Tim, and one of his research assistants, Kimani. After doing extensive research, Tim and Kimani decided that trying a drop-in center would be the most effective way to deal with the growing amount of street children in Eldoret. This problem was compounded after the post-election clashes in Kenya in 2008. The center officially opened in January 2010, and has successfully placed many children either back with their parents or with other families, and has gotten many back into school. As part of the Tumaini program, a "livelihoods" project was also developed. This is the part of the program that Kimani and Matt are hoping that I will be able to lend some assistance. When I visited last Friday a group of young women (Tumaini works with street children up to the age of 25), were working on beaded pins that are going to be sent for Purdue's Homecoming in October (one of Tumaini's board members is the head of Purdue's Pharmacy program in Eldoret). Many of the women have at least two children. I suggested that adding a brief story and picture of the girls, along with information about Tumaini would be helpful, so we set to work getting the backgrounds of the girls and designing an informational card. I was sorry to give Matt more work, but hopefully the pins will sell better and people will be able to learn more about the program!

Once again, by hearing the women's stories about what they hope to do once they finish the Tumaini program, I realized that I have gained so much more from the people here than I can ever give. Also, many of the women mentioned that they wanted to start businesses of their own someday. Not that I haven't realized this many times before, but I was brought back to the fact that I am so incredibly lucky to have been born in the US and to incredible parents that said I could do anything. Because of this support, I was able to have an amazing education and attend an incredible business school. I kept thinking one of my favorite phrases over and over "to whom much is given much is expected." I have tried to carry this attitude over to my work at Imani, and as a result, had a much better week working there.

Other than work and hanging out in the sun, Steve, Ellana, and I have enjoyed spending time with our friends at the IU house. I must say that it is so nice to be able to walk outside of our front door and always have something to do. For example, last Sunday a big group of us made homemade pizza, Steve helped a friend brew his first batch of beer, and unfortunately, we watched Chelsea lose. Tomorrow we are heading out to a working farm about 20 minutes outside of Eldoret, and Steve is making his famous shrimp etouffee and red beans and rice. The farm is run by a third generation South African family living in Kenya, and they have rescued several giraffes. We are excited for Ellana to see "twiga" very soon!

Ellana feeding a twiga at the Giraffe Sanctuary in Nairobi (with the Duke group)

Can't believe she wasn't scared of Daisy at all!

Ready for the Chelsea match

Go Chelsea!

We're very happy to say that the Duke Neurosurgery team made it safely to Eldoret...and has now made it safely back to North Carolina! I'm sorry that I haven't posted for a while now, but the last week and a half has been extremely hectic. We calculated that we spent about 2 hours on a plane, at least 10 hours on a bus, and about 20+ hours in a safari van. Steve has promised to talk more about the surgeries, so stay tuned for a guest blog!

We started the adventure last Friday, September 2nd when Steve, Ellana, and I flew to Nairobi to pick up the group. We had a fabulous day exploring the city as we had not spent much time there previously. We enjoyed our time at the Village Mall that had everything from a gourmet meat and cheese shop to one of the largest toy stores I have ever seen. Nairobi is definitely an interesting place as it harbors one of the largest slum areas in the world but also has completely modern, upscale areas. I often have a difficult time wrapping my head around the enormous disparity between the rich and the poor in East Africa, and Nairobi is one of the places where that disparity is most evident.

We were very pleased that the group had no problems with their flights and arrived on time in Nairobi. Once they arrived at the hotel, we had a late dinner and enjoyed seeing everyone for the first time in months. Most of the group had been to either Uganda or Rwanda with Dr. Haglund (the head Neurosurgeon) in the past, but this was the first time for the Duke Neurosurgery program to be in Kenya and to not be going to a capital city. At dinner that night, we were all pleased to be sharing the hotel with the actress Olivia Wilde as she was sitting just a few tables away from us!

On Saturday morning we attempted to cram all of the luggage into the Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital 25 seat bus. We had decided to drive back to Eldoret because we couldn't get enough plane tickets for the group, and we thought that it would be easier with all of the luggage. We had also been told that the trip would take around 4.5 to 6 hours at the most. In order to give the group a feel for the city, we took them to a giraffe sanctuary and had lunch at a beautiful restaurant in one of the suburbs outside of the city. Then we headed to Eldoret only to arrive about 7.5 hours later! An exhausted and hungry group sat down to dinner around 9 pm that night at one of our favorite spots, Mamma Mia.

On Sunday the group divided up so that one half could attend church and the other half started unpacking the 4 tons of supplies that had been shipped by DHL. Yes, everything made it to Eldoret! The total value of the supplies was about $400,000. The team set up the operating rooms and prepared for the first operations on Monday, and also saw patients that would be operated on through the course of the week. One of the more interesting cases was a young man who had been shot by a barbed arrow a day or two prior. The removal of the arrow was set for Monday morning.

On Sunday afternoon, we took the group to a restaurant at the top of the Rift Valley so that everyone could see some of the amazing views of Kenya. The restaurant is located in Iten, which is where many of Kenya's most talented long distance runners are trained because of the altitude and the incredible hills. We have learned that on important training days, the runners are driven down the bottom of one of the enormous hills twice a day, and they run up the marathon distance both times!

On Monday, the team held a teaching conference on neurological trauma for the doctors, residents, nurses, and medical students of MTRH, and as well as some visitors from Nairobi. Everything went well both at the conference and in the OR, as the team was able to remove the arrow successfully. After a long day, we ate dinner at an Indian restaurant and had a brief Kiswahili tutorial given by our teacher, Wycliff.

Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday pretty much followed in the same fashion with me taking many of the members on small excursions around Eldoret including numerous trips to Imani. I think that the Imani artisans enjoyed having many of the members tour their facility and do lots of shopping! The team ended the time in Eldoret with a wonderful celebratory dinner at the Eldoret country club on Thursday evening. We were treated to traditional Kenyan fare, lots of thank you speeches, some traditional Kenyan music and dancing, as well as amazing gifts. Duke Neurosurgery's contributions to MTRH will hopefully be treasured for many years to come, and I know the team members will always remember their time at the hospital .

At 6 am Friday morning, we set off for our safari to the Masai Mara. Although the trip took around 6 hours, the final two hours were on some of the worst roads I have ever traversed. I'm not sure how Ellana slept for about an hour, and we were extremely happy to finally arrive at our home for the next two nights. Steve and I weren't sure what to expect, but we were incredibly pleased with our accommodations at the Olasheiki Camp. Olasheiki is in the style of a tented camp that is very popular in the Masai Mara. The lodge was also entirely run by members of the Masai tribe who helped to guide us around the park. We were able to see cheetahs and lions on the brief 1.5 hour trip we took on Friday, and then saw numerous animals on our day-long drive on Saturday. Ellana's favorite were by far the giraffes or "twiga," which is the Kiswahili word that she uses for them.

Overall, I don't think we could have been any happier with what was accomplished by the Duke Neurosurgery group in Eldoret or by the fun times we were able to have with everyone in the Mara. And despite all of the hours in some sort of transportation, Ellana was absolutely amazing and has already become a seasoned traveler. Now we are just looking forward to my family members arriving in early October so we can see more "twiga" again soon!