A day off at last

Ruth and Rebecca are in the midst of their mid term break . Two weeks set aside so that those who want to can go skiing! Well perhaps some of the teachers have gone. We are still in Guinebor II with temperatures slowly creeping up past 40 degrees at mid day as the hot season approaches. It not only hot but also dusty with an almost continual wind blowing off the desert to the north

To say that Andrea and I are busy would be a definite understatement as we are now the only doctors for the hospital. Since we opened two and a half months ago, the clinical work is increasing each week, up to 60 new patients to be seen each day and about a dozen inpatients. There have been about 40 babies delivered and we have one planned operating list each week during which Andrea and I give anaesthetics to each others patients. It is great to see the hospital developing a good reputation so quickly and being able to witness to the love of God as we bring affordable health care to the local population.

With the medical cover being solely our responsibility the mobile phone network is a real advantage as we can leave the hospital in the hands of the nurses and midwives and still be able to give advice and if absolutely necessary return. This means that we get to church each Sunday and then……….

We have decided to set aside one day a month when we will go out as a family and do as little hospital work as possible. Today is the day off for February and so far it has been fantastic. By ten o clock the hospital work was finished and we set off for a pottery museum on the far side of Ndjamena. I wasn’t too excited at the thought but as you can see from the pictures it was much more than that. It was a real surprise to see the whole of the centre of the village with vividly painted walls and the museum was housed in the restored Sultans palace, a mud built building that is about 3 centuries old. It was full of artefacts, photographs and documents including some very large pottery urns, that were traditionally used as coffins. I forgot to ask whether they were buried or simply left outside the front door of the house with a lid on. I am pretty sure it was the former but then again some people keep ashes on the sideboard so I can’t be for sure.

Having visited the museum we toured the village which seemed to have been given over to the production of pottery. It was amazing to see the skill as the big pots were hand made from a mixture of clay from the ground and some cow dung. They are fired for four hours in a pit covered again with cow dung as a fuel. They are then used as water jars, every home has at least one and the central aisle at church has several. They are either set in the ground or on a metal stand and being only partly glazed they are permeable and as the water gently evaporates the remaining water is cooled.





We have just returned home to check on the hospital all is quiet and if it remains so we plan to go out for a pizza at a small restaurant. It is an overgrown bungalow in the middle of town with a wood fired oven with tables arranged under a veranda in the garden. All my patients are fine and there is only one woman progressing well in labour. We will only be 15 minutes away, let’s hope we are not needed.