Tuesday 10 May 2011 - before noon

You never know what a day will bring.

Today I thought I would be hustling to get some purchase requests done, tidy up some financial issues, work through a few of the many problems we have come across lately…

Instead, I spent the morning in a hospital with a sick little girl and the afternoon sitting next to a dead lady.

I was on my way to the compound for some water, and a child of one of my guards was there, very very sick with fever. All of our medical team is on the field at the moment, everyone was looking to me for what to do. I was too afraid to give her any of my medicine, for fear of overdosing her little 4-year-old body. Plus, it was looking more and more like the fever was connected to something far worse than just a fever and even the flu can be deadly for a kid out here.

I took her, and her 9-year-old neighbour who brought her to me, in the Land Cruiser to the hospital. It was their second time in a car, ever. As I drove, I could feel the heat from the little one coming off of her, and she was not even touching me.

We arrived and I spent the majority of my morning with them, waiting for an adult from their household to come (their dad is one of our drivers and is on a field visit, their mama out working the fields). Normally I would not even see a sick kid like this, much less hold burning in my arms while she was being examined. However, as the vast majority of the staff here are currently stuck in Bunia because of flight issues, on the field for projects or here and down with malaria… it really left me.

You see, as the ‘Chef de Base’ I work on the support side of Medair's projects. Logistics, HR, finance, base management, fleet management, electricity… not super glamorous or sexy. I have spent the past six weeks in the same 5 km radius from the base and only ever interact with my staff. Also, for the most part, the only time I hear from anyone is when there are problems… and there have been a lot of problems with far fewer solutions to counter them.

In many ways it was what I needed. Don’t get me wrong, clearly not what she and her family needed. But holding her there gave me time for reflection after the culmination of yesterday’s issues left me so beside myself that I burst into tears when one of my staff told me we were out of onions.

Sitting in the hot, over crowded, under stocked, under staffed and only hospital in the area gave me room to sort through my thoughts and reflect on where I was and the people I was working with and for.

You may think it strange (unless you have found yourself in similar situations), but far too often I forget where I am and why I am here. About once a week I will stop, look around me and think ‘Oh my gosh, I am working in the flipping DRC with one of the most vulnerable and isolated populations on the planet’. 

Little Merveille, as it turns out, was treated for malaria three weeks ago but got more and more sick. This time around, it was discovered that she had typhoid fever. She was correctly treated and is now home talking about the white lady who took her in the car to the hospital and held her until she fell asleep (as reported to me from her dad).

Reflections on the hospital and dead lady afternoon later, as this post is already long enough as it is.