Weather in Asella, our rural village visits, and more!

It is summer time in Ethiopia right now and you would expect summer to be sunny, warm and hot. Ironically, it has been gloomy, rainy, and very cold in Asella for the past three days. It feels like the temperature is around 20 degrees Fahrenheit, and even though I am wearing a sweater and jacket, I am still feeling cold. I found it fascinating how the world’s climate varies from region to region. If you are interested in learning more about seasons in Ethiopia, visit this website http://www.ethiopiantreasures.co.uk/pages/climate.htm. Anyway, Amy and I just got back from the Fistula Center in Asella Hospital, and this was our second trip to the hospital for today. We made a trip to the Fistula Center earlier this morning to conduct interviews with our patients. We were hoping to do at least three interviews but we ended up doing only one interview since our patient coordinator, Birke, was very busy this morning.

Before I get into details on our three day trip to nine different rural villages, I wanted to share with you that we like Asella more than Addis. And it is not about the wifi connection at Derartu’s that makes us like here more than Addis though that is a huge plus, but it is really about the people we met thus far that make all the difference. We made some wonderful friends and we connected with most of them through Dr. YuHsin Huang, a WAHA volunteer gynecologist from Taiwan, who is awesome and takes good care of us. Most of our friends are physicians from Asella Hospital and we have had the opportunity of getting to know them in person outside their work. I had iftar meals with them mostly with Adem, who gives us some great suggestions regarding our Davis project rural visits.

Speaking of iftar meals with friends some of you emailed and asked me about how Ramadan is treating me. Ramadan is going really well though it is always never easy to fast away from home. The good thing is, I fasted at Denison for the past four years and definitely, that experience taught me how to survive on campus during the month of Ramadan. However, this year, my Ramadan experience is different from my previous ones in the United States. Here in Asella, I wait to hear the Athan (prayer call) to break my fasting rather than looking at the clock. The last seven years I was in the U.S., I haven’t heard Athan from far away. So hearing Athan from a distance brings back memories of my childhood. When I was a kid, my siblings and I would go outside of our house so we could listen to when the Athan call was made. Once we heard it, we would sprint back to our house and would tell our mom and the rest of our family, it was time to break fasting. I really missed terribly fasting with my family and that is something I am looking forward to next year.

Me breaking my fasting in Addis. 

Enough about my Athan nostalgia, and now let’s get into our trips to rural villages around Asella. Amy and I had really great time visiting nine different villages in three days. As Amy discussed in her last blog, we drove on very muddy and bumpy roads and sometimes we came across huge stagnant water with tons of mud in it. I couldn't help but think about our car being stuck in mud and that we would be there forever since we were in the middle of nowhere. Little did I know that we were assigned to a wonderful and brilliant driver who skillfully got us out of these tricky roads. Whenever we came over these obstacles, I would shout out in Amharic “gobaz ante” which translates into “excellent job.” Our driver Hailemariam and Birke, our wonderful maternal health education and obstetric fistula prevent outreach coordinator, would hysterically laugh at my reactions.

One more thing that concerned me during our trip was these livestock, especially the dogs that walked indolently in the middle of the road and didn’t give a crap about cars and buses passing by. I would jump out of my seat and unconsciously would ask Hailemarian, who is a great driver, to be careful. Amy, on the other hand, would say to me, “Abdi, these dogs are smart and please don’t worry they know what they are doing.” Over the course of our three day long trip, we saw only two dogs that were killed by car, and of course, we all felt so sad.

Bunch of animals casually walking on the road. 

Hailemarian, Birke, Amy and I got along so well and we had tons of fun together. We stopped by little restaurants nearby the villages we visited so three of them could grab a bite to eat while I watched them eat (they would always remind me how wonderful the food tastes). In return, I would pick on Amy, who struggles eating with her hands, and would make fun of the way she eats. Here is another story of Amy’s initial struggle! My second day in Addis, I was breaking my fasting with Amy and we were traditionally sitting on the ground and having some Somali rice. Amy who was so afraid of offending me quietly says to me, “Abdi, I have a question.” “Oh sure, what is it?” I said. How do you eat rice with your hands? Amy asked.” I couldn’t help but laugh because by the look on Amy’s face it seemed that she was about to ask me a very important question regarding our Davis project. I grew up eating food with my hands so unconsciously I was expecting Amy to start eating with her hands too. But now that I think about it, her question was a very important one. How on earth would someone who grew up eating rice with chopsticks be able to figure out how to eat with her hands. It turned out that it was hard for me to explain to her how to eat with her hands as she said, it would be also difficult for her to explain to me how to eat with chopsticks since these are skills that come to us naturally. 

Amy learning how to eat rice with her hands.

Well, there are many little funny things that Amy does that I could write an entire blog. However, for the sake of time, I am better off saving these funny stories for some other time. One of the main stages of our project is to prevent obstetric fistula and other possible childbirth injuries that occur during childbirth. With this in mind, we literally went from one village to another seeking out pregnant mothers. Luckily, we were able to gather pregnant mothers and talk with them about the importance of delivering at the health centers. As Amy pointed out in her last blog, we pledged to support and provide transportation stipend to pregnant mothers who don’t have money to go to Asella Hospital in case of emergency. We also pledged to cover the childbirth delivery service fee cost when they come to Asella Hospital. You can see the relief and happiness on the faces of these mothers, and that really brought joy to our hearts knowing that money won’t be an issue for them to have their babies safe.

Amy meeting with pregnant mothers. 

During our time in the rural villages, we noticed that transportation is a huge issue for the local people, and even though almost every health center has one ambulance, not everyone can use it or can afford it. Usually, the priority is only given to pregnant mothers with very complicated childbirth emergency cases or someone who is in life and death situations. However, these individuals still have to pay the fuel cost (around $30) which most of these people can’t afford. Because of this, we saw family members transporting their loved ones with their own backs and shoulders, not to mention that these people walked miles just to get to the health centers. 

Family members transporting their loved one.

Though this is a touching and inspiring story, I believe that people shouldn’t go through this, especially in the 21^st century when some people from other parts of the world have more than they need. If we were willing to share some of our wealth, reduce our consumption, and most importantly be willing to support and invest in this great idea of providing a quality education to every child, I think we would be able to achieve some of sort of sustainable development at least to one region of the world. Obviously, these are very simple ideas but I think they are practical and something we can incorporate in our daily lives. 

Anyway, what made our visits fun was our interactions with the local people, especially the kids. They were so much fun to greet and converse with as they were all interested in meeting with Amy. As any kids would, they loved posing for pictures and asked for solo pictures of them to be taken. Amy brought some pencils, erasers, and sharpeners from China and the kids really enjoyed having them. What really is nice about here is that people are happy, welcoming, and generous in general. We love dropping by at their houses and talking with them.

One of the kids who asked for solo photo.

She opened the grate as we entered & in return, she got a pencil. Loved her! 

Kids receiving pencils, spreading the power of the pencil. 

Amy meeting with new friends. 

We loved meeting with her and her grandson. 

The other thing that brings joy to our hearts the most is this indescribable and enormous happiness that echoes across the Fistula Center when our patients are being discharged. These patients bond and develop great relationships since they all receive their fistula treatment at once. They support each other mentally, emotionally, and physically before and after treatment, and they literally become one another’s cheerleader. If one of them is weak and not able to feed herself, others would take good care of her. They would walk and sunbath together as groups after their surgical procedures. Now that you have a sense of what I am talking about, you can only imagine what the atmosphere of the Fistula Center is like. The entire room is filled with so much excitement and gratefulness, and these women literally burst out with joy and happiness as they depart and start a new life. On the other hand, Amy and I are caught in the middle of these thrilling and joyous moments, and we can’t help but feel incredibly happy for these women.

As a part of our Davis project and in honor of their new lives, we give each woman a new blanket and integration monetary support. One of the main challenges that fistula patients face after treatment is that they have no means to support themselves. Therefore, our patients use the integration monetary fund to buy at least four sheep and goats so they can have means and generate income of their own. We already supported four patients thus far and we’ve seen how much difference that this small amount of monetary support (around $100) makes on the lives of these women. Since these women have a strong relationship, Amy and I had this idea of taking a group picture and then, giving each woman a framed photo of the group so they can have a memory of each other and us. 

We're with one of our favorite and adoring patients. We love her!

Our remarkable patient with her new sheep, we're happy for her.

Amy handing out the framed pictures.

Patients & their families were so happy to receive these gifts.

Well, it’s way past my bed time and I need to get up early in the morning to start another great week of visiting more rural villages. Tomorrow, we will also visit some of our discharged patients as we are interested in learning more about how they are doing and what their new lives look like. Before I go I wanted to second Amy and thank Dr. Samson Tule very much for providing us with transportation. We couldn’t do it without him and we truly appreciate his tremendous support of our Davis project. 

Thank you so much Samson for your tremendous support!