Home In Two Weeks

The students have finished their clinical placements for the year. Next week is exam week and interviews for the intake next year. So it will be a different kind of working week. I think we all miss Sister, especially my tutor colleagues, but she is still very much in charge by phone from India and she has a very strong presence in the college. The college will close on Friday until 15 January. Tomas, Tins, one of the Indian tutors, and myself go on leave until January, and Viju and Shinto go on leave in February.  We are hoping to get some new tutors next year.  So it's just like the UK, everyone finishing up for Christmas except we do it a bit earlier here.  People have all their leave at once here because travelling home is so difficult and expensive. Some of the students can't afford to go home at all during their training.

I had a few days in Juba for the nursing conference. If I was here for longer I would love to join the nursing association and help with their conference organisation. I helped organise so many conferences and study days in the UK and have a lot of experience to share.  The first day started very late, there were 12 introductory speakers, and the brass band struck up at inopportune moments playing the same tune, out of tune, repeatedly. No one stuck to time, resulting in the conference running 2 hours over. I had a lucky break the next day, vomiting and diarrhoea so I couldn't go to the conference. Liz eventually left the conference at 7.30 when it was still running over. I would have loved to have taken some students with me but couldn't it get any funding; it may be better to give them time to improve the running of the conference before the students go.

I didn't have time to do anything else in Juba other than go to a supermarket and meet the new VSOs.  Liz and I got really excited going round the supermarket. We hadn't realised how sad we had become; we were google-eyed at the range of fresh foods.  I nearly bought mothballs thinking they were mints. We don't have access to a wide range of goods in Wau, and because of weight restrictions on the plane back to Wau we can't bring a lot back with us. It was good to meet the new volunteers who had just arrived in South Sudan.  One of them came to Wau, and all of them are going to work in health.

One of the hardest things when you are working in a place like this is when friends that you make move on. You make friends very quickly, you have to trust and rely on each other and relationships are built much faster than they are at home. Placements come to an end and people move on for different reasons, and its always sad to say goodbye to people that you have enjoyed being with. On the other hand it's an excuse for a party and if there is no excuse for a party the lovely people across the road from me have a practice party, although these guys don't need any practice. I'm helping to care for their kitten which they rescued. He is called "Handicat". He is definitely blind in one eye and probably the other, he has gut infestations, fleas and an infected face wound. I've been injecting him with antibiotics and he thanked me by shitting on me. Hopefully we will be able to treat him and they will give him a safe home. I'm saying him but I think it could be a her and if so we may have more kittens in a few months.  Maybe that's wishful thinking.

I'm getting excited about coming home. I leave Wau on 5 December then leave Juba on 7 December. I'm travelling via Addis Ababa and London. Looking forward to catching up with everyone soon.