All is well with us y'all

I can’t believe it has been a little over a week already since Amy and I arrived in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. A lot has happened since we came to Ethiopia but, let me first start off this blog by saying that all is well with me and Amy, and that we are enjoying our stay in Ethiopia thus far. People welcomed us warmly and they have been wonderful to us!
 

Oh boy, Addis Ababa has changed significantly since the last time I was here. Life in Addis is unbelievably expensive, especially food and lodging. To give you an idea, one nice dinner plate costs 98 in Ethiopian Birr which is about 5 bucks in US dollars. If you think about it some people don’t even make $5 per day so, I can’t help but wonder how some ordinary people survive on a daily basis. Surprisingly, people are surviving and happy with life. On a brighter note, the city is thriving well and there are literally thousands of huge constructions taking place all over the city. A gentleman whom we had a lunch with yesterday put it this way, “It is like a revolution” and “Addis will be completely a different place in five years,” he added. Hopefully, in her upcoming blog, Amy will tell you more about her first impression of life in Addis and this construction phenomenon.   

 

One of the many construction projects in Addis 

We stayed in Addis nine days in order to take care of some paperwork regarding our Davis project. Dr. Mulu Muleta, Amy and I just arrived today in Asella, a small town located about 108 miles southeast of Addis Ababa. Asella has a small Fistula Center run by Women And Health Alliance International (WAHA), a non-profit organization that Dr. Muleta directs. Dr. Muleta is our Davis project advisor and we met with her for the first time last Thursday, July 18^th at her office in Addis. She is a very inspiring and wonderful woman. Her job is tough but oh boy does she make a difference! Just, today, witnessing and experiencing the way she interacted with her patients by hugging and kissing them and aggressively advocating for them while one of them was neglected, was truly inspiring. I have been around many medical professionals but she is nothing like I have ever seen. She operates three patients tomorrow morning in our Fistula Center in Asella and then, flies out to Gondar on Monday to operate on nine patients. 

Amy, Dr. Mulu, and Me arriving in Asella

Despite her busy schedule, she took me and Amy under her wings with pleasure, and she is helping us out with our project to hit the ground running. We made some modifications on our project because of the limited budget we have. As you might have noticed, we aren’t going to Dabola village anymore. Since road conditions are extremely poor in Ethiopia, especially in the mountain area during the raining season, going to Dabola which is about 72 hours away from Addis, will cost a lot of money and will force us to use most of our Davis grant for transportation. Therefore, we thought it would be more practical to implement our project in Asella village which is only about three hours drive from Addis. 

 Fistula Center in Asella

As far as our Davis project goals go, they still remain the same and we are able to accomplish them all except, the local midwife training stage. This training costs $15,000 and it is beyond our reach of what we can do with our little Davis grant. However, this is much needed help and we hope to do it sometime in the future. Over the course of our time in Asella, we plan to work with three different rural areas where we will be doing maternal educational heath and obstetric fistula prevention outreach. We purchased some blankets and brought them to our patients in the Fistula Center in Asella. They were in need of comforters and blankets since it is the raining season and it is cold in Asella.

 Struggling to bring down some blankets for our fistula patients

Finally, I am sorry that it took me this long to post my first blog. Internet connection was very poor in Addis and having wifi service was almost impossible. Though the connection is very poor in Asella too, we at least have free wifi connection in our hotel. We are rejoicing and feeling liberated now. I will try to write more blogs though I want my next one to be about my travel experience and how poorly I was treated both at Logan Airport and Washington Dulles Airport when I was leaving from the United States. Maybe I will write about that experience when I get back to Boston and compare it with my returning flight experience.

Take care y'all and please keep sending us your prayers!

p.s. Mom, you were so right. Life in Addis is so expensive. I better listen to your advice next time. Thank you so much for supporting me. You are the best!