June 28, 2007.

My time at the HIV clinic has been very interesting so far. This week I have been spending the mornings (9-1) with the doctors during their patient appointments. There are two doctors Eric and Brenda- both are very nice and willing to take the time to explain things to me. Most of the patients are in to get their CD4 counts, to refill prescriptions (needs to be done monthly) or because of some sort of drug side effect or illness that has surfaced. The doctors see about 80 patients each day. I have heard a huge range of stories from the patients so far- from a 14 year old boy who came in on his own from school to get his medications, to an HIV+ couple wanting to plan for a family, a woman with late stage HIV who is unprepared to start antiretroviral therapy, a 6 month old infant just found to be HIV+- it has really become clear to me that anyone can be affected by this virus- regardless of wealth, age, sex etc. I have also spent some time in the pharmacy and the lab, following up on some patient visits to see what the next step in their care is.

I have been spending most of my afternoons in Dr. Mwachari’s office doing reading on HIV to familiarize myself with the drugs, opportunistic infections and other things related of the disease. Some patients show up with atypical presentations of opportunistic infections or response to treatment. In these cases, the files are put aside for me to investigate. The clinicians are very busy and don’t always have to research individual cases, so if any questions or confusing cases come up, I look into the cases in more detail to see if I can come up with any useful information. Everyone in the clinic has been very welcoming- although they are often speaking Swahili, so it is easy to feel a bit left out. I decided to walk back from the clinic today and had a school bus full of children pass by me yelling “mzungu” (white person) out the window. It’s either that or “how are you?”- the kids always yell that in unison to white people.

The hostel I am staying at is a very new scene to me. It is literally a nunnery. There is an entire building where nuns are trained and there is a church in the middle of the property. Although it is very quiet and secluded- I feel very safe here. I have my own room with a bathroom, and the gates are guarded 24 hours per day. Most of the people staying here are on religious missions, or are somehow related to the church. Luckily I have met 3 other girls around my age from England, Holland and the States who have been good to have around for company since we can’t really leave past dark.
Last night, Kevina, another Canadian I know indirectly through Christina came and picked me up and we went for dinner with a bunch of her friends. Today I went to a market with 2 other girls from the hostel. We were the only white people there. The Market was massive. It started out on an open road, and then slowly narrowed into an enclosed used-item and food market surrounded by slum-housing. I wanted to take pictures, but the last thing I needed was to draw more attention to myself.