Quarantine Catch-Up

A couple of months ago, I had a blog post started. I was going to talk about a trip I had made across jagged, muddy roads to Dourbali to report on a bunch of finished water projects. Naturally I went in a car that had no spare tire because I like to live life on the edge. As you know, having recently been in a car accident, I should have been more prudent, but I did make sure to drive slowly, and I had no tire incidents. I did get stuck in the mud twice, but Victor got me out. 

 I was planning to tell you about convincing nomad women to stop for photos, driving out to a new water project that we had worked so hard on and being surrounded by laughing happy people and new babies named after me and after the water, taking a sick old man to the hospital in the back of the truck and giving him my second to last Turkish airlines pillow (it’s the best airline pillow, if you travel Turkish Airlines, please get one for me to replace my devastating loss)…that trip was pretty fun, albeit exhausting.  

Then when I got back to Ndjamena, I found out that I had shingles. Claire was super psyched about this because she correctly diagnosed me, and it’s always nice for her to be reminded that she is a medical genius. I was relieved that it wasn’t one of those crazy African bugs that lays eggs in your skin. So anyway, I had to recover from that… 

I was very proud that I drove through this mess and didn't get stuck.

Pride goes before a fall. I got stuck here twice.

Just sitting and waiting for Victor to come in his truck to pull me out.

Preferable means of transportation in rainy season.

Kadidja shows me how she used to travel for hours to get water,
but now she has it right near her house.

She almost smiled! She and her friends
from another Chadian nomadic tribe, passed by a hand pump
that we upgraded into a solar pump. They all stopped to drink and fill up their jars.

With my friend Fatima and another girl whose name I didn't get.

 

This is the hospital in rural Chad.

More photos at the end! (I have several blog posts' worth of photos)

 Once I recovered from shingles, Joe and Flip suddenly got sick one morning. I called the vet, and tried to figure out what was wrong. The same day, the owners of my house were fixing the cement walls that were cracking and crumbling. They told me that the British vet was in town, and she came over to check on the dogs. If your camel needs medical attention, you definitely want the Chadian vet. If your dog needs medical attention, you want the British one. Katie (British vet) agreed. I don’t actually want to tell this story because it was really painful. Joe survived the sickness, but Flip died. It was really horrible, and I stayed up all night holding Flip while he screamed in misery, and I realized that I was also getting a fever. The next day I was miserable, the dogs were miserable, and I called the vet to come and I called Abiner, Antani’s youngest brother who loves my dogs. He really helped save Joe’s life. He helped give them water, injections, and all the care I couldn’t give because I couldn’t get up. We thought that Flip was going to pull through but he died later that night. I was pretty devastated by it. Flip was such a sweet little dog. I’d trained him to sit and shake hands. He followed me everywhere. Just a lovely sweet boy. I really miss him. But I’m so thankful that Joe is doing better. He’s back to normal now, and I’m down to two dogs. York went back to his owner. Joe and Pika are still with me. Though Moussa continues to call her “Kakilé”, Pika is now the official name of Tiny Puppy. Antani’s kids came over a lot with Abiner to play with the dogs while I was sick, and Pika is now the name that she answers to. 

The last photo I took of my pack of dogs.

I would always bring Flip and Joe to work with me.
Flip jumped in the car any time I opened the door--
was always disappointing for him when I opened it just because I forgot something in there.
I brought Flip and Joe to work and left York and Pika because Flip and Joe will sit quietly.
I think they somehow got rat poison or something while they were at the office,
as York and Pika were fine.

I pulled out the guest mattress for the sick puppies.
Abiner is helping take care of them.
Pika wanted to photo bomb the photo.
I was lying in bed when I took this photo.

Now it's just Pika and Joe and me, but Pika loves Joe
and Joe tolerates Pika and sometimes condescends to play with her.

 As for me, after Flip died, I accepted being miserably sick and just went to bed. Claire stopped by and went against her principles of requiring a malaria test before giving malaria meds. She saw that I was pretty feeble and just gave me the pills. The meds we use here are for 3 days—one tablet in the morning, one at night. It was Wednesday that she gave me the meds. They tend to work fairly quickly, but by Friday when I should have been improving as I was on the last day of pills, I was worse. Claire came back into town, driving through a huge rainstorm, to bring me into the hospital. The storm was so bad, my whole yard was like a swimming pool. I had to wade through water over my ankles to get out to Claire’s car. Once at the hospital (a 20-30 minute miserable bumpy ride for me despite Claire’s best efforts at smooth driving—the road always wins), she took me to the OR where the docs immediately tried to hook me up to an IV. I’ve got pretty pokey veins and it’s usually not hard to get in one, but I was pretty dehydrated, and it took many pokes in both hands before they got one in. They took some blood and did the malaria test and it was positive as soon as it hit the slide. Dr Tom told me that I have a serious case of severe malaria that is resistant to the tablets, so I had to have medicine in an IV. He said I was also very dehydrated and that is why I was suddenly freezing and not because it was a rainy day. I also had symptoms of typhoid, but Tom said there is no point in testing because almost all typhoid tests here always come out positive whether you have it or not. He gave me antibiotics anyway. It’s great that I have a friend like Claire who strongly believes in the efficacy of modern medicine. Left to my own devices, I probably would have tried to treat my illness with the power of my mind and/or some green tea and chocolate. It’s also great having a friend like Claire who lives on the hospital compound. She put me in her spare room, IV bag hooked up to the mosquito net pole. I was there all weekend, and everyone took care of me. A bunch of the MKs on the compound drew me pictures and made get well cards for me. Abiner took care of Joe and Pika. 

Positive malaria test, attempting to smile for the camera.
I was freezing here and Claire went and brought me a pillow and blankets 
from her house because I had to get 4 bags of fluid in me before they would let me leave.

When you're constantly sick or in recovery, you don't run as much.
It's spider season and they staked their claim on my shoes.

Once Joe was better, he desperately wanted to go for his walks.
Here he is getting closer and closer to me to demand I take him.
Unfortunately, I was too sick to stand up and the vet said to make him take it easy
for at least two weeks.

I’m very thankful to have wonderful friends who love me and help me when I’m alone and in need. While sometimes I feel like God doesn’t answer the deepest prayers of my heart, the ones that I bring to Him all day/everyday, I can’t say that He hasn’t consistently provided for my needs during difficult times. It’s a tricky thing because in this world I constantly see people in need around me, and I wonder sometimes—why hasn’t God provided for their needs? He has everything. But just like He used people to provide for my needs, I’m someone He can use to help others. If I’m not paying attention to the needs of others that He puts in front of me, or if I’m too selfish or lazy or caught up in my own comfort, I can miss the needs of others. I’m not saying that God relies on me to do His work-He doesn’t need me, but I think there are consequences to my actions, and that might mean someone doesn’t get the help that they need in particular moment when we were supposed to step in. We have a responsibility as the Church to be the hands and feet of Jesus around the world—if you remember, in the Bible, Jesus’s hands and feet were constantly serving the poor and needy right up until that moment when He gave up His life for all of us. If you say you love Jesus, you don’t get a pass on this. Going to church on Sunday, praying before you eat, reading a few verses of the Bible in the morning—all nice things. But if your life isn’t transformed to serve others in the name of the One who gave us everything, you’re missing it. We are not going to fix this world, not in our lifetime, not ever. This world is broken. But we are supposed to work to bring good, peace, life everywhere we can (i.e. the Gospel, the Good News-in word and deed). A little village in the middle of nowhere Chad got a desperately needed water source because people all over the world obeyed—giving money, moving to a new town and reaching out to the people around them, taking a pay cut to work with a new organization that wants to bring clean and living water to the poor through the local church. But there are many many more villages like this one that haven’t gotten access to water. More people are going to have to step up if we are going to help them too. God can do miracles, and sometimes He does. But miracles should be rare, otherwise they’re just normal, not miraculous. Usually He works through His people to do amazing things. Don’t you want to be a part of seeing amazing things happen? 

They're happy babies!

The village gave us a goat in appreciation of the new well.
Sadly, we ate it the next day for breakfast. It tasted good though.

My little pals.

Getting water from the new well!

Anyway, moving on from the sermon, I’m currently in quarantine in Ethiopia. Initially, there was no required quarantine for traveling to Ethiopia. I waited until the last minute to buy my ticket, and so I had time to add another week to my trip when they added a 7 day quarantine requirement. THIS IS WHY YOU NEVER CAVE TO PRESSURE FROM PLAN-AHEAD PEOPLE. Last minute ticket buying is the only way to go in this uncertain world. Lucky for me, it meant I was on the same flight as Claire from NDJ to ADD. We did covid tests together—Negative! And got to the airport together. We did not get checked in together. At the airport they discovered that I was not a man, in spite of the fact that l’Hôpital Centrale had put “M” instead of “F” on the form. Everyone was concerned. I was informed that Ethiopia would send me right back to Chad because of this grave error. Two MAF pilots were in the airport vouching for me, but no one was swayed until a tired Chadian official came over to check on the hold up. He glanced at the paper and said, “Technically we only need the full name as on the passport and a negative test. We don’t even need the passport number or any other information. Why are you complicating this unnecessarily? We don’t need this. Let her check in.” What an amazing guy. I don’t know his name, but he is a pragmatic genius who should probably be in charge of everything. 

Waiting to pick up our covid tests!

So excited that it was negative, I didn't notice that I had turned into a Male.

In the airport in our matching Chadian flag face masks!

Claire and I planned to watch the latest episode of the Great British Bake Off on the plane, but my computer is old and not working very well and we couldn’t get the sound to work. We had fun talking about everything and eating the less than impressive airline food. Landed in Addis and said our goodbyes…and I went through immigration where no one mentioned quarantining or the fact that I’m actually Female. Claire discovered that many airport shops are open and the internet was working due to the airport not being packed to the gills as it usually is. I’m now staying with Paul Murphy and his lovely wife Almaz, who is treating my cold (unless it’s covid) with ginger lemon tea, while Gladys Hayes who is also in quarantine in the Murphy house along with her husband and two children (it’s a big house), smiles indulgently. Gladys is an actual doctor. But Almaz will heal me with Eritrean/Ethiopian health secrets, lots of love and care, and sheer determination. 

I like to sit in the garden while I'm in quarantine here.
I have to be in the sun though, otherwise it's too cold.

 I may write more after my trip to the field when I am tasked with getting many many photos and videos for Neverthirst. But possibly I will be too busy. If you want to see photos and videos for Neverthirst, follow us on social media because hopefully I’ll get one or two images acceptable for the public. And hopefully our local partners will film me better than I filmed Claire for a 3 minute testimony video that she had to do—I cut off the top of her head in the last minute of the video. She was already stressed about the video, and I ruined her perfect first take. After multiple subsequent takes, we finally got an acceptable one with head fully in the screen, but the people chose the head chop one to put on social media, so I feel bad every time I look at it. I’m sure they did it just to spite me. But it was a great story Claire shared and people really appreciated it. If I get my voice back in the next couple of days, due to the power of ginger lemon tea, I’ll hope to do as well as she did, though her accent is way better than mine (Devon is class).

I drove out to see Nesie's land.

Riding a donkey

Cuddling a little boy named Almi (water).

Good friend with his new solar-powered pump.

Dog bunk beds

Moussa's daughter (red head scarf) is a nurse.
She's training young mothers in proper care of their babies.

Cows like to ride in trucks.

Moussa and friends.

My little namesake, Amina, came by with her mother to visit me.

Some of the men from the village

Two nomad men who were in town visiting. 
They heard about our project and invited Moussa to their village.

Nomad ladies passing by on their way to sell stuff in the market.
They stopped to get water at one of our pumps.

Face tattoos are common in this tribe.

Nesie on his land with the owner who sold it to him.
They're good friends now.

Moussa and Joe shared a seat in my single cabin truck
on the way home from the office. Pika doesn't like the office.

The village elders with Moussa.
The man in the middle started this village.
Many people are related to him.

Selfie time!

Happy Thanksgiving from a Chadian turkey.
Moussa is looking for a female now.
He's got flocks of chickens, ducks, and guinea fowl.
He wants to start with turkeys too.

Une Histoire Pour Les Romans (One for the Storybooks)

The thing about having a good adventure is that it involves a lot of discomfort. Of course, if it’s a really good adventure, you don’t usually remember the miserable moments very much, or if you do, it’s almost better for having had them because the story is so much more exciting.  I told my mom a version of this after she mentioned that she was praying for me while my electricity had been off for 4 days. I told her that once it got past the 4 day mark and then my water cut out too, I was ok. By that time, my refrigerator was gone and I’d eaten everything possible and thrown out the rest of the rotting food, but you know what? Gummy smurfs do not have to be refrigerated (one of their MANY virtues) and so I had plenty of food for survival. I explained to my concerned parent that once things get to a new level of bad, I’m ok and I kind of want to see how much worse it can get. It’s the intermediate level that I don’t really like because it’s not a good story, and it’s just annoying. She replied with the Eye Roll emoji because she is supportive like that.

Anyway, to get to the point, I’ve noticed recently that I can’t go to Koudalwa without SOMETHING happening. This should have given me pause before inviting a pastor working with the people group in the area to come with me. In my defense, I last-minute asked him, and I really thought he would say no.

Scenes from the road

 Our trip started in the usual way—an hour late. This didn’t bother me much. I didn’t expect it would bother our guest either—I mean, he lives in Chad too.  We sped down the road, Hervé driving, in the large Land Cruiser borrowed from a Neverthirst partner who had parked his car at our office while he is in the US for a vacation. (I did ask him first.) After un-installing the car seat from his car, I decided never to have children, or if I do, only to have ones I don’t mind roaming around cars in an unrestrained fashion. When I reinstalled the car seat after we got back (SPOILER ALERT: we made it back), I was affirmed in the wisdom of this decision.

He wasn't pointing out the cool cow cart,
he was greeting his friend.

 While on the road, we called ahead again to remind our friends that we were coming (they knew, but it’s always good to follow up) and to ask them to get the motorcycles ready for us (they also knew about this). Why motorcycles? Well, last time we got stuck in the mud for 16 hours in our 4-wheel drive Toyota Hilux, but with motorcycles you don’t get stuck, though you do have to carry your bike through mud holes some times.  Naturally, upon arrival we thought (naively of course) that our hosts would be prepared. They weren’t, and then the motorcycle guys saw that we had two white people and they tried to jack up the price to new and terrible levels. Hervé resented this and fought for our rights. An hour and a half later we were on the road. This was a problem because it was after 3pm and sunset is at 6pm. And we had 40km to go. And it was about to rain. And the roads were terrible. But we were committed.  Or I was anyway. Plus, I like adventures, and it is pretty fun to splash through rivers of mud, so I was in a great mood in spite of the delay and the anticipation of a long evening. I estimated our ETA back in Koudalwa at 20:00, well after dark, but early enough to get some dinner and sleep before the trip back to N’Djamena. I was wrong, very wrong, but not knowing the future can be relaxing. I have no idea what Mr. The Pastor was thinking at the time, but I imagine he was beginning to wish that his wife had put her foot down and said, “No, absolutely no spontaneous trips with that woman with the crazy eyes.” Well, too late now.

Before Hervé took over from Orange Shirt

 We splashed along, 4 motorcycles with Hervé bringing up the rear because he didn’t want me to be on the last motorcycle (he takes chivalry very seriously). We were following closely at the beginning, rushing along to try to make up for time lost to bargaining down the nasara price and lack of preparedness. Just at the last minute, my moto driver swerved around an up-ended tree. Hervé’s moto guy didn’t have the reflexes and I looked back to see his motorcycle stuck in the roots with Hervé standing behind looking dazed. Sadly, I don’t have a photo. I was laughing too hard (it seems I don’t reciprocate chivalry with a great deal of sympathy). Hervé told me later, that when he saw they were going into the tree, he just stood up and let the motorcycle continue on without its passenger. He is very tall, so he just put his feet down, voilà—he was on solid ground. He told me this later, while we were trudging through the mud together around 11pm. I was wet, cold, muddy, sore all over (I've never been saddle sore on a horse before because I don't like them enough to stay on long enough for soreness, but motorcycle saddle sores are real), exhausted and hungry and I STILL laughed for 10 minutes with this image in my mind. I noticed soon after the tree incident that Hervé had become the driver, with his little moto guy hanging on as the passenger. Hervé said, “The driver was too small, not strong enough to drive us.” That was probably true. It is also true that Hervé is a bit of a control freak.

Rainbow Snake Omen of Coming Evil

Initially, I tried to avoid getting splashed too much, but soon this was out of my control. Then it rained on us. There was a lovely rainbow that I kept trying to get videos of for Insta-stories for Neverthirst Instagram, but I never got to post them because I didn’t get into internet land soon enough. I meant to ask if Chadians also think rainbows are scary snake omens of death like the Moru in South Sudan do, but I never got a chance to do this. Maybe because I was distracted getting on and off motorcycles to wade through deep rivers. One of these times, I stepped in the wrong spot and got suctioned down in the mud. My driver had to pull me out, back onto not dry-but firmer, less-suction-y ground because I really couldn’t get out by myself.

After being pulled out of the suction

After my dress got longer because of rain and mud and began dragging on the ground.
Djibrine kept yelling at me to pull up my skirt so that it wouldn't get caught in the wheels.
My shiny white legs were scratched up by thorns and chewed on by insects.

The good part of the road.

Hervé is still smiling here.

He is plotting my assassination here, thinking about how much better it was
back in the day before I came on board. He told me this morning that he is sick
because of our trip and that we never should have planned it like this.
(Now he just told me he forgives me because I gave him half of my sandwich.)

Amazingly, we completed two reports, though one will have to be re-done, likely, as it was completed after dark, and it is not easy to get photos of Chadian people after dark in a place without electricity. I had all the motorcycles shine their lights on the pump so we can get some photos, but the main thing is that the pumps are there, completed and working. So when I take the American boss there in a few weeks, it should be something nice to show him. Though, I will have to make sure that the roads are passable first. The boss is not one for night-time rainy rides. He loves to say things to me like, “No unnecessary risks!” and “Amanda, if I TOLD you not to do that [presumably dangerous thing], would you actually not do it?” (Fortunately for my job, he has never pressed me to answer that last question because, sadly, I think we both know what my insubordinate answer would be).

Dress dragging through the mud, getting some work done.

Road conditions. This road is wider than most,
which is nice because you're less likely to get hit in the face by a tree branch,
but still impossible to drive down without pushing with your legs.

Bugs attacked me when I stood in the motorcycle beams.
My glowing skin is worrying these children.

This photo isn't too bad, right?
Hervé took it to help me with night photography.
Shortly after this last report, we lost a motorcycle to fatigue,
so we tripled up on two motorcycles.
Hervé wouldn't let me, he said that "ma reine" (as he was calling me
that night) should stay with him on the third moto. Also, I think he was tired and wanted
the smallest person on the bike with him. We had some fun conversations--
this blog post title is a quote from him, and he told me the details of the tree-crash story, and we
admired the stars and his helpfully-long legs, but time is not making this memory fonder for him.

This is what my face looks like riding in the rain
on the back of a motorcycle.

 In conclusion, we were on the motorcycles for 9 hours. We got back to Koudalwa at midnight, in time to crash on the floor of the chief’s house. I did not bring my own mosquito net tent like Mr. The Pastor, but I did bring organic bug spray that my sister gave me. I do now have mosquito bites on my scalp and all over my legs. Chadian mosquitos laugh in the face of your lavender and citronella oil. And then they bite you in YOUR face, the little bastards (sorry, Mom, it was warranted). We didn’t get dinner, but that was ok (for me-- Hervé was not happy and he ate the rest of my cinnamon peanut butter cookies that I’d made for the trip) because I didn’t feel like brushing my teeth or hair or doing anything besides getting out of my cold, wet, muddy dress and collapsing on the blanket-mat the chief gave me and using my bag as a pillow (Mr. The Pastor brought a pillow—some people are way more prepared than others who have already gotten into the habit of using the bag as a pillow to minimize the carrying of extraneous objects). I was awake just long enough for our guest to tell me that he is never traveling anywhere else with me again. So, I’m adding him to the list of people who have said this to me…he did graciously admit that there were one or two beneficial connections he made on the trip, which I found gratifying.

In penance for my bad planning (“Why didn’t you just stay there a little longer and take your time getting the work done?” people asked me. BECAUSE I DIDN’T WANT TO! Also, because we had a UNICEF meeting the next day.), I drove 5 of the 8 hours back to N’Djamena, letting everyone else sleep when they (ok, Hervé) weren’t pointing out ALL of the speed bumps and potholes and wandering goats after I was ALREADY BRAKING for them and lecturing me about how you can’t pass someone on a bridge (I KNOW THAT TOO! I WASN’T GOING TO PASS THAT GUY WHEN I SAW THAT THE BRIDGE THAT WAS COMING UP WAS A ONE AT TIME BRIDGE—THAT’S WHY I SLOWED DOWN AND WENT BACK BEHIND THE TRUCK!) and stopping to buy watermelons. I got home at 4pm and ate two bags of gummy smurfs and ordered food to my house and was in bed by 8:30. Adventures are exhausting.

I'll leave you with this drawing of me and Hervé driving back to NDJ.
The men in the back were sleeping or asking why I wasn't wearing my seat belt
(answer: because when I hit an unavoidable bump, I fly in the air and it chokes me).
Note Hervé yelling at me about speed bumps and me yelling back that I already saw it,
and also me trying not to swear-drive because Mr. The Pastor is anglophone, and he would understand,
unlike that time I was driving with Emelie and she asked, "Amanda, what does $*#@! mean?" and
I had to tell her NEVER EVER to say that again, especially not in front of the Church People.