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So, my husband has been in Kenya since Sunday for his 6-week clerkship in medicine in developing nations.
I've talked to him a couple of times and he sounds okay. International travel is always full of surprises and so is medical school, so I guess we should have expected bumps in the road on this one! It was the usual piddly stuff--he didn't have daily e-mail access when he'd been told he would, the fees he paid before leaving do not cover all of his room and board and he has to pay an additional $15/day while he's there, etc.
The big thing, though, is that there was a big shakeup right before they got there. As he explained it to me, in Kenya if you're lucky enough to get a job, you then try to get one for all your friends and family, too. (I think that's pretty common in developing nations, I've heard of that before.)
Well the hospital was overstaffed to the financial breaking point and a lot of people had jobs through their connections, etc., and the day before my husband's group arrived, they had done a massive round of layoffs. That was, um, upsetting to the community and they ended up closing down the hospital and posting dozens of armed guards all around to quell rioting. (The hospital is not one big building but a series of small connected bungalows within a fenced in area.)
I said to him "Well, is there rioting?" And he said, "There's demonstrations." And I was like "Are they close? Can you see the demonstrators?" and he said they can hear them, but they decided not to go to the fence to gawk.
I was like "Yeah, try not to look so . . . western." He said "Yeah, I'll try to blend in." (My husband is tall and fair--he did blend in pretty well when we were in Switzerland, though.) But he said it's actually been hardest on the African-American woman in their group, but wasn't able to go into why.
I asked if it's starting to settle down now that it's been a few days, and he said no, it's gotten worse and the atmosphere is very tense. The hospital is running on a skeleton crew and they're not very happy. Also the doctors aren't getting the perks they normally get, like lunch. They're supposed to get lunch at the hopital part, but they've been going back to the hostel (which is located within the fenced-in compound) for their lunch. They're still rounding on the patients who are in there, but the place isn't up and running, and there's not as much medical work to do as they'd hoped. And there's guards everywhere.
Another thing is that laundry is done in the river. They have to wear conservative dress clothes (ties, skirts for the women) but it's all beaten with a stick in the river. So after he first got there I asked him "Do you really have to do your laundry in the river?" and he said "The system is that there's people we pay to do it, but yes, they really do do it by hand standing in the river." I wonder if they'll still have that service?
I asked if this happens a lot there (unrest is just sort of the normal state of affairs in some places, no?) and he said no, this is the first time it's happened at this place.
Yikes Yikes Yikes! I really believe he's going to be okay (because what other choice do I have?). But I hope things settle down! I was more tense about it earlier this week, but today I'm feeling a bit better. He's not dumb and he's not out there on his own--his school has been running this program in conjunction with that hospital for ten years.
This weekend they're going to Nairobi. They're going to see a giraffe preserve and eat at some restaurant called Carnivore that serves game meat like crocodile and zebra. He'd better be taking good photos!
Assuming he's not harmed in a riot :| I'm so excited for him that he gets this experience. Africa's so complicated, with all these issues of colonization and aid and tribalism and race and all the ways the've been both helped and trampled on by the western world and he's getting to see it all up close (hopefully not too close). I need him back in one piece and HIV-, though!
I've talked to him a couple of times and he sounds okay. International travel is always full of surprises and so is medical school, so I guess we should have expected bumps in the road on this one! It was the usual piddly stuff--he didn't have daily e-mail access when he'd been told he would, the fees he paid before leaving do not cover all of his room and board and he has to pay an additional $15/day while he's there, etc.
The big thing, though, is that there was a big shakeup right before they got there. As he explained it to me, in Kenya if you're lucky enough to get a job, you then try to get one for all your friends and family, too. (I think that's pretty common in developing nations, I've heard of that before.)
Well the hospital was overstaffed to the financial breaking point and a lot of people had jobs through their connections, etc., and the day before my husband's group arrived, they had done a massive round of layoffs. That was, um, upsetting to the community and they ended up closing down the hospital and posting dozens of armed guards all around to quell rioting. (The hospital is not one big building but a series of small connected bungalows within a fenced in area.)
I said to him "Well, is there rioting?" And he said, "There's demonstrations." And I was like "Are they close? Can you see the demonstrators?" and he said they can hear them, but they decided not to go to the fence to gawk.
I was like "Yeah, try not to look so . . . western." He said "Yeah, I'll try to blend in."
(My husband is tall and fair--he did blend in pretty well when we were in Switzerland, though.) But he said it's actually been hardest on the African-American woman in their group, but wasn't able to go into why. I asked if it's starting to settle down now that it's been a few days, and he said no, it's gotten worse and the atmosphere is very tense. The hospital is running on a skeleton crew and they're not very happy. Also the doctors aren't getting the perks they normally get, like lunch. They're supposed to get lunch at the hopital part, but they've been going back to the hostel (which is located within the fenced-in compound) for their lunch. They're still rounding on the patients who are in there, but the place isn't up and running, and there's not as much medical work to do as they'd hoped. And there's guards everywhere.
Another thing is that laundry is done in the river. They have to wear conservative dress clothes (ties, skirts for the women) but it's all beaten with a stick in the river. So after he first got there I asked him "Do you really have to do your laundry in the river?" and he said "The system is that there's people we pay to do it, but yes, they really do do it by hand standing in the river." I wonder if they'll still have that service?
I asked if this happens a lot there (unrest is just sort of the normal state of affairs in some places, no?) and he said no, this is the first time it's happened at this place.
Yikes Yikes Yikes! I really believe he's going to be okay (because what other choice do I have?). But I hope things settle down! I was more tense about it earlier this week, but today I'm feeling a bit better. He's not dumb and he's not out there on his own--his school has been running this program in conjunction with that hospital for ten years.
This weekend they're going to Nairobi. They're going to see a giraffe preserve and eat at some restaurant called Carnivore that serves game meat like crocodile and zebra. He'd better be taking good photos!
Assuming he's not harmed in a riot :| I'm so excited for him that he gets this experience. Africa's so complicated, with all these issues of colonization and aid and tribalism and race and all the ways the've been both helped and trampled on by the western world and he's getting to see it all up close (hopefully not too close). I need him back in one piece and HIV-, though!
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