Baggas' Blog

I don’t know exactly how many hours it will be with all the timezones etc but it’s 4pm now and I’ll be home probably around 10:30 tomorrow night. I really can’t wait to be home. I’ve had a great trip away but missed my family so much. So.. a quick list of things I’m looking forwards to when I get home (in no particular order) :

•  sleeping in my comfortable bed
• playing with my boys “Kung Fu Fighting” (complete with appropriate music)
• playing my guitar
• seeing how big Jenni’s belly has gotten
• swimming in the pool
• eating some junk food – chicken and chips Mmmm
• signing up for the gym, or starting some form of exercise (hopefully)
• buying a new laptop (hey ob1 – how r u enjoying your MacBook? should I take the plunge??)
• catching up on the news back home (did someone say election?)
• watching reports from CHOGM on TV and seeing if Kampala actually got ready in time
• being back in my own church on Sundays and playing in the worship team again
• seeing how much a topic of conversation daylight savings is this summer
• playing Xbox with the kids
• uploading lots of Uganda photos and videos onto the net
• seeing the ultrasound pictures of our little girl, finally replacing the faded printout I’ve been carrying around this last 2 weeks
• Most of all, just getting to hang out with Owen, Luke and especially Jennifer again

And the one big thing I’m not looking forward to … going back to work on Thursday!

It’s been a long day thus far but finally I find myself in the lounge at Johannesburg airport. I woke up at 3:30, expecting to be picked up to be taken to the airport at 4am, but my ride didn’t arrive until 4:50. I was just about to try and get a taxi when they finally showed.

When I arrived at the airport I discovered that, since my paper ticket originally was for a different date, I was unable to check my bags right through to Sydney for my flight this afternoon. This meant that I had to go through South African customs and collect my bag, only then to be told that I had to wait another 3 hours before I could check in for my Sydney flight and get through to the good departure lounge.

When I finally did get through, feeling sore in the neck and mid back I saw a shop offering seated massage for 120 Rand (around $20). After being pummelled by a middle aged African woman for 20 minutes I can now say that instead of being sore in those spots, I am now sore all over (wish I had my sports therapist friend from our medical team here!). So some Voltaren gel from the chemist and an excellent glass of red from the Diners lounge are my next strategy.

OK, now thats today out of the way – let me go back to discuss something much more fun – last night. Five of our group decided to go to a concert by one of the singers from KPC church, called Enoch. Actually it was not just his concert. His band was the headline act but was well supported by a bunch of other performers – soloists, dancers, rappers, an a-capella group, and a Ugandan comedian! We were expecting it to be some dingy hall or club but in fact it was a beautiful modern theatre. And the concert was fantastic. All of the artists were good, especially Enoch and his band, who were great musicians – particularly the lead guitarist and bass player. I got a lot of video of it on my digital camera so I’ll endeavour to post some on here in the next few days.

Only a small group of us went which meant for me I was able to avoid the goodbyes with most of the other members of the team. I’m not one for goodbyes so that suited me. But it was nice because the four that I was with last night were the ones that I connected with the most during the trip – friendships born out of a similar outlook on life, interests, sense-of-humour, musical tastes, and a little bit of adversity thrown in (especially in the case of my two partners in criminology, Emma and Mairin). I’m not always strong at making friendships, so aside from all the mission and medical aspects of the trip, connecting with these guys was one of the highlights for me. There were plenty of other great people on the team too, but with these guys we just clicked, which was great. The other cool thing about our team this year was that it was more multidisciplinary in nature. In addition to two doctors and a bunch of nurses, we had a physio/sports therapist, speech pathologist, and a couple of lab scientists. I was doubtful going in to the trip how much they would have to do, but they really added a huge amount to what we were able to achieve.

Anyway time to go grab some more food, and drink – and then maybe a shower before I board the plane…

My last day in Uganda today, and I’ve decided to get some downtime in order to pack and get organised before leaving tomorrow. The rest of the team went out to have lunch in one of the Watoto villages after church whilst I elected to remain at the hotel. Good thing I did, it’s taken me over 2 hours to get sorted.

Yesterday we went rafting the Nile River at Jinja – one of the best white water rafting spots in the world I am told, with plenty of big grade 5 rapids and falls. And what a great day we had. I was with a fantastic group – four of the more adventurous members of our medical team plus two English guys and a Dutchman.We decided from the outset that we were going to go hard – for every rapid if there was an easy option (aka “chicken”) or a risky one, we would take the crazy route. Consequently I think we ended up being flipped or thrown out of our raft more than any other group and with plenty of cuts and bruises amongst us, but it was well worth it. I can’t wait to see the DVD of the day’s action. The only time we didn’t manage to go the hard core route we flipped before we even reached the rapid – we were paddling hard to the left, where the faster, bigger rapid was, but the current pushed us hard up against a big rock on the side of the river. Our boat flipped and got sucked under the rock. Two guys ended up going down the difficult part of the rapid on their own, minus the boat. I found myself in an air pocket underneath the boat, and then we managed to flip the boat and scramble back on, just in time for the current to take us down the right, easier option. Another time we put the lightest member of our crew (Dr Jess) at the front on the boat whilst the rest of us crowded at the back – as a result when we hit the falls our boat went vertical and high. We managed to remain afloat though thanks to the efforts of Jess who was hanging on for dear life even as she was flung sideways in the air out of the boat. If she had’ve let go our boat would have completely flipped, but hanging on she provided the counterweight allowing us to land right way up. Ours was only one of two boats to try this crazy manoevre, and the only one to come out intact. Once again, can’t wait to see how that looks on the DVD.

Tonight we’re off to a concert featuring a musician from the church here amongst other people. I’m looking forward but hope it doesn’t go too late, since my transportation for the airport leaves at 4am tomorrow Then my itinerary is a morning flight down to Johannesburg, then several hours in the airport lounge probably, then leaving at 5pm for a flight across to Sydney. This arrives at 2pm on Tuesday, and then I have a 5pm flight back across the continent to Perth, arriving at 8:45pm. I rang the airline to try and get an upgrade for the Jo’burg to Sydney leg but it just wasn’t possible. I expect my next update will be from Johannesburg tomorrow – hopefully if the net is fast enough I can post some pictures.

And so it ends. Finally today after two full weeks of clinic, we saw our last patient. Actually my last patient was a home visit to a mother with HIV/AIDS who was in pretty bad shape. Hopefully they will get her to a hospital for some more intensive testing and treatment and she will be okay. Her case illustrated another obstacle to adequate HIV treatment – superstition. She, like many other people, was in denial about her HIV status, rather believing that she had been cursed by a witch or something along those lines. Just last night I was reading in my book “The Shadow of the Sun” by Ryszard Kapuscinski, about how prevalent such beliefs are in Africa. Even amongst Christians, they still hold on to a lot of these traditional beliefs as well.

Now that I’ve mentioned this book, let me just say that this is one of the best books on Africa I’ve read thus far. Kapuscinski is a Polish journalist who spent over 40 years in Africa as a correspondent. The book contains a series of vignettes – portraits of everyday Africans and everyday African life from all over the continent – combined with brief historical lessons and philosophical musings.  It’s amazing how much of what he writes rings true, especially reading it whilst over here. And he really gets into the unseen life of the African populace like no other author I’ve read. Not just touching on the shakers and movers, he visits the homes of the millions upon millions of people eking out a meagre existence and ponders why? For anyone who has ever been to Africa or has any interest in the place, this is a must read book.

As I said, today was our last clinic. I think we probably saw over a thousand people in the last two weeks, and I believe we made a difference in the lives of many of those. If nothing else we showed them that somebody cares. Tonight the girls on our team are at a Women’s Conference at KPC church, whilst the two of us men caught a boda boda to the shops, did a little shopping, had a nice pizza, and then discovered that the “best” internet cafe in town was again not working. But not to be deterred we walked down the hill into Kampala central and found an ever better one – the most productive half hour I think I’ve ever spent on the net in Uganda. Tomorrow we are heading off to Jinja to raft the rapids of the Nile, Sunday it’s church and then a concert in the evening, and early morning on Monday I leave on my journey home. Can’t wait to see my family again. This trip has been great, but I have missed them so much.

This is my second attempt at using the internet today. The first was at the “best internet cafe” in town and I sat there for an hour with no connection – but at least I got my photos backed up and the last blog entry typed. This time I am at a cafe near our hotel that has failed me several times before, but actually seems reasonably quick tonight. Just shows how totally unpredictable the net is here in Kampala.

Anyway here’s a few photos from the past few days…

The view from the front of our clinic on Suubi mountain – breathtaking!

Some of the crowd outside our clinic – we saw over 160 patients today.

Two brothers we saw – no parents in sight. Very common for children of a young age to care for their siblings here like this, and very common to see boys wearing dresses – they can’t afford any other clothes.

This is the boy I discussed in my previous post, not long after he was brought in with a seizure on Tuesday.

And this is the same boy with his new shirt, given to him by our physio Mairin – looking much happier!

The view from our hotel the other night when we had a massive storm – you can see the Old Kampala Mosque in the foreground and the Kampala ’skyline’  in the background.

Kampala is a very religious city. You see plenty of posters like this advertising various “crusades” (I hate that term- conjures up images of some of Christianity’s darkest moments) – anyway many of the look shonky and we found this one for “Pastor Augustine” particularly amusing – can’t decide if he’s a pastor or a hip-hop artist

Some of the many shops we pass on the road outside Kampala, with big piles of green ‘matoke’ bananas out front.

Well that’s all for now – time for me to head to bed. We went for an appreciation dinner with Watoto tonight to Kampala’s best Chinese restaurant- the food there is always tremendous and it’s a beautiful setting. Tomorrow is the last day of the medical clinics and I can’t say I’m sorry to be seeing the end of it. It has been quite exhausting work, although still very worthwhile. I’ll update again on the weekend if I get time.

Another hectic day in the clinic today – much of the same stuff  – otherwise treatable chronic diseases compounded by poverty. Many of these would be eminently more manageable back home – diabetes, hypertension, arthritis, epilepsy – but the people here just cannot afford ongoing treatment. And the backbreaking hand to mouth, one day at a time lifestyle contributes to it – men, women, and children all do their share of the physical work required for these rural households to survive. And this is in a beautiful, fertile land where there is plenty of rain and plants and crops and animals can thrive. Imagine what the more desolate, inhospitable areas of northern Uganda and much of the rest of Africa must be like.

But as is well known, the current number one scourge of Africa is HIV/AIDS – a more serious disease, but nevertheless one which is quite treatable with modern medications. My first patient of the day was a lady I had seen late the day before and ordered an HIV test on. I had to break the news to her of the positive result, encourage her to travel to the city to seek treatment in a public hospital clinic, and to arrange for her husband and 5 children to be tested. The husband will hopefully be coming to see us tomorrow. As for the children, they apparently live far distant from here, with another relative, and she could not envisage being able to get them either to us or to the city HIV clinic. In fact it is doubtful whether she can make it there herself. Probably only about 50km away, but a vast distance for someone with no form of transportation and no money.

Another patient was a lady who previously had had a positive test, but had not accessed any treatment. It transpired that the reason for this was that she was newly married and was afraid to tell her husband the result. She was looking for a way to access the treatment without him finding out, an even more tricky proposition. We encouraged her to tell him so he and the children could be tested but didn’t have much hope of her actually doing so. Another person, maybe even a whole family, who may die unnecesarily from this disease.

HIV is not the killer here – it is poverty and ignorance. The treatments themselves are not that expensive – the UNAIDS program supplies large quantities of anti-HIV drugs and Uganda now even has their own factory to manufacture them. It is the lack of infrastructure and the difficulty in getting the drugs out to the people outside of the cities who need them that kills. Like all problems in Africa, it is one to which there is no easy solution….

Kampala last night was a crazy, choatic, wonderful combination of torrential rains, thunder and lightning, traffic jams, crashes and floods. The weather pattern I’ve generally noticed here is an early morning storm before dawn, usually dry days, and then sometimes a thunderstorm at night. The previous night we sat on the balcony for a long while watching a spectacular lightning show. But nothing has compared to the storm we had yesterday afternoon just after we arrived back at the hotel. Within minutes of the rain starting to pour and the lightning started to flash, the streets around us were flooded, drains overflowing – one of the most amazing storms I’ve seen.

The chaos from the storm continued long after the rains had eased. A few of us squeezed into a taxi and drove across town to a beautiful Belgian restaurant in Kabalagala, Le Chateau. Was great to get out and escape the hotel food again, and the dinner was a treat. I had a beautiful steak with mushroom sauce for the main course, yummy Belgian ice-cream for dessert, and for the entre we shared some frog-legs and escargot which were delicious. A great night out after a busy day working in the community clinic (I’ll update on that stuff later, when I get a chance.) But on the way home traffic was at a standstill, accidents everywhere – one of the worst traffic jams I’ve seen even here in Kampala. In the end as soon as our taxi was in sight of the hotel we decided to get out and walk through the traffic in the rain since it was moving so slowly.

Ten minutes remaining on my net time (if it works – things have been really unreliable here this week) so I’ll update on the mission stuff. This week we’ve been out at Suubi village, a beautiful spot on a big hill quite a way out of Kampala. We set up a clinic in one of the Watoto buildings for the people in the surrounding community. Over the past few days we’ve had hundreds of people through. Once again many common conditions, infections, rashes, ulcers etc – and a few more serious ones – a baby with HIV, a child with a tumour, malaria, and a poor epileptic boy aged 13 whose family had basically given up on him. He had been having seizures since the age of 6 months, poorly controlled on meds, when his family had been able to get them for him. He was brought into me having had a seizure whilst waiting outside. I got some history from his mum – he didn’t go to school, didn’t play, didn’t even do any work around the home – basically he was a big embarassment and burden to the family. Back home, such a child would usually be able to attend school and have a pretty normal life, but here a treatable condition has left him severely disabled and neglected. We got him a good supply of better meds, and when we saw him again today one of the girls on the team gave him a new soccer shirt that she had, which lit up his previously dulled face with a huge smile. She demonstrated to the mother that this child did have the capacity to interact and even quickly learn new skills. Hopefully even these simple measures may go some way towards improving this poor boy’s quality of life.

Anyway, time’s nearly up. I’m quite worn out from the clinics, especially after today when I saw over sixty patients. Two more days of this to go, then we’re rafting the Nile on Saturday, church on Sunday, and then I leave for my 2 day journey home early on Monday morning (and I can’t wait to see Jenni and the boys again – missing them heaps). I’ll try and get on and update more, including some photos, if I find the time and the bandwidth between now and then.

A welcome change of pace today. The two doctors on the team, myself and Jess, went over to the Watoto Babies Home – Bulrushes, to do some checks on a few of the babies, whilst the rest of the team went back out to the villages to do various things.

The Bulrushes babies are in pretty good shape, considering these are orphans who a few months back were abandoned, some in terrible conditions. Like all Watoto children, they are well taken care of. Nevertheless, put 40 to 50 babies in the same building, especially ones who may have pre-existing illnesses, and various health problems are bound to develop. We saw about 15 or so this morning, most of whom fortunately had fairly minor problems. After that we spent a while just hanging out and playing with the babies which was fun. One of the babies I saw today I remembered from when we were here briefly in July. His name was Junior and when he was first taken in as a premature baby he was very sick with HIV and PCP pneumonia. Well, three months later with a bit of feeding, some antiretroviral medication, and a lot of love and good care, and he is doing well – gaining weight, smiling and in good health, as you may see in the first picture below. I continue to be incredibly impressed with the standard of care provided in the Bulrushes.

After we were finished there we took a walk along to the Garden City shopping mall for lunch and shopping. A call to the rest of the team revealed they are hours away from meeting us here so we decided to take a walk down the hill into the Kampala CBD before coming back here to the internet. Here’s a few photos I snapped on the way around. They’ve really been working hard preparing for CHOGM, the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting, which is happening here in a couple of weeks – so much that asking a person if they are “ready for CHOGM” is a standing joke around here. From the state of most of the works though, I doubt if they will be ready on time. I’m not sure if our Prime Minister is still planning to attend CHOGM in the midst of the current election campaign, but I hope he does, if only for the chance to see a bit of Uganda on Australian TV back home.

The bottom picture is yet another local restaurant sign

Finally, I’m going to try and upload a few pictures from the clinics during the week, which I will add to that blog entry, so go back and take a look at that.

Quick update on the last few days. The internet here is horrendously slow at the moment so I shall have to be fast.

Tuesday I shall leave for another time as the story of Tuesday will be quite long and I’m not sure if it’s legally appropriate for me to discuss it yet but be warned you’re in for an interesting story…

So moving on to Wednesday, when I went out to a clinic at the Watoto village where we saw some of the village kids plus a lot of people from the surrounding communities. As a rule they didn’t seem quite as sick this year as last year – we have yet to encounter a bona fide case of malaria – but there was still plenty to do. Lots of ulcers and infections and STDs. A few people had known HIV and many others came for testing, as we have lab facilities available. Only one of the ones we tested came up positive though.

Thursday was a similar story, but this time we relocated our clinic to a building in the community up the road. Once again, very busy indeed and once again very few seriously ill people. Lots of chronic diseases and mild to moderate infections. The clinic worked very well. Our team is really doing a great job and from my perspective things went quite smoothly. Friday – the same story but an even smoother, faster clinic. Despite some organizational hiccups we managed to see more people in less time, including our first confirmed case of malaria, a little girl that I sent around for a blood test to the delight of our lab guy. Also the local ‘doctor’ working with us diagnosed a rare case of trypanosomiasis in an old lady who had the most massive spleen I have ever seen – the lab guy was pleased with that too. Sadly we have had two members sick who are out of action which is a real shame since they have travelled all this way and can’t participate much at present. But they seem to be turning the corner which is good.

Tonight a few of us have decided to break the shackles of our cooped up hotel and go out for the evening. First stop has been a bit of shopping at the main Garden city mall, where I’ve picked up a few Ugandan books (as always) and some T-shirts from the one shop I’ve found that sells decent quality Uganda souvenir shirts. I got a couple for the boys as well as a small pink one for our little baby who we are expecting in March. The highlight of my week has most definitely been hearing from Jen and seeing her pictures that she emailed me from the ultrasound

Right now it’s nice to be sitting drinking a decent cup of coffee at last whilst using a steadily improving speed net connection. After this we are going to head off and try and find somewhere good for dinner.

Overall the week has been good. We’ve achieved a lot, seen and helped a large number of people and had a few adventures along the way.

Finally, here’s  a picture of one of my favourite Ugandan advertising billboards, on the way out to the villages. I’ve been trying to catch a good pic of this ever since the first time I was here and now finally I have it…

Here’s a great quote from Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni relating to recent floods that have troubled this country. I think I get his point but his theology isn’t quite coming out right :

I advise the religious leaders not to pray early for the rain to stop. They will confuse God. I know God is all-knowing but don’t confuse him.  (Sunday Vision – Oct 14, 2007)

I mentioned the other day how the schedule for this medical mission looked exhausting. Well I sure feel exhuasted now, but for today at least I only have myself to blame…

But first to backtrack a little to Sunday. We spent the morning at a church service at KPC which was great. Their worship team and massive African choir is phenomenal. Most of the songs they did were western worship songs, but I don’t know many except for a couple of Hillsong tunes. Even so, they were all brilliant. The message was interesting too, taken from Nehemiah, but with a lot of local cultural and political references which made it all the more interesting. Generally there’s nothing too exotic or zany in a KPC service (speaking from an Australian Churches of Christ point of view) but one thing that was a little different was where the whole congregation (of about 2,000 or so – one of four such services at their central campus alone) gathered in groups of 3 or 4 to pray for the family of a prominent lawyer and church member who had died in childbirth just a couple of days earlier, leaving her husband to care for her other children and this brand new baby, who will never know his mother. For some reason I felt particularly touched by that situation, but it also shows that even being wealthy doesn’t necessarily guarantee your health in a country like this.

In the afternoon we visited the craft markets and then the main shops at Garden City. Me and the other doctor, Jess, took a short cut there on boda-boda motorcycle taxis, to the apparent disapproval of some of the older women on the team. But I’ve done it many times before and will continue to do so – it’s fast, cheap, and pretty safe.

When we arrived back at the hotel a few of the younger members of the group went out for a walk, up to the Sanyu craft shop, which is about 5 minutes walk from our hotel. Then we had a look in the beautiful Anglican cathedral, St Paul’s, a majestic building that has stood on the top of one of Kampala’s main hills since around 1915. Three previous cathedrals had been burned or blown down prior to that but this massive building is not going anywhere. We then continued to walk around for a while longer before dinner. It’s great this time to be with people who are more interested in getting out and exploring the city.

St Paul’s Cathedral – Namirembe

Residential area near Old Kampala

Sign for a Kampala “restrunt”

Today we bussed out to Bbira Watoto Village, where we had a good tour around, and started to get organised for our clinics this week. We also ended up seeing about 30 or so of the Watoto children in the clinic, but most of them are pretty healthy, coming in with viral illnesses, cuts and scrapes. It will be a different story when we begin to see some of the villagers from the surrounding communities tomorrow.

Since we arrived back at the hotel fairly early a few of us again decided to venture out into the city in the couple of hours before dinner. Some were going to walk, and a couple were going to run. For some crazy reason I joined the running group. One of these women runs marathons but they went at a nice slow pace and initially I kept up pretty well. Surprisingly quickly we found ourselves smack in the middle of Kampala city, trying to weave between cars, taxis, bikes and pedestrians. Being on a boda-boda is safe compared to jogging near the Kampala taxi parks. No-one seems to jog in Kamapala so we got a few odd looks, and had a couple of kids try and race us. Most of the way was downhill but the last section into the city was uphill, as was much of the way back. I stayed with them until I was sure they could find their way back to the hotel, and then I elected to send them on their way and walk the rest of the way myself. This has definitely firmed my resolve to think about maybe considering re-joining the gym this summer when I get back. On returning to the hotel I remembered a fact with which I can console myself a little – Kampala, and most of southern Uganda, is at an altitide of over 1000m above sea level – so running here is kinda like the altitude training elite atheletes do. Plus the pollution in the city doesn’t help either. Now that I have had a shower and recovered I feel pretty good. I will probably run again. I definitely feel more motivated to do some sort of exercise than I have in the last few years.

But we’ll see how much energy I have tomorrow afternoon, after the first of our clinics open to the community…

Yet again I find myself back in Uganda. I arrived last night after a pleasant flight from South Africa. The place we are staying seems quite good. I have a big room to myself, which is air conditioned. And it’s a quite central location so just a short drive or boda-boda ride into the CBD.

Today we went over the the main Watoto office at Kampala Pentecostal Church (KPC) for a meet and greet and to go over the general plan for the medical mission. I must say, I look at the schedule with some degree of trepidation, remembering how exhausting some of the clinic days were last year. This year they seem to have even more planned, with very little down time. It’s okay for the nurses who make up the vast majority of the team and hence can do other things like hospital teaching, or just exempt themselves for a day if they get tired. As one of two doctors, I don’t really have that luxury, as the clinics can’t run without us. But it’s all not about me anyway so I’ll do my best for the next two weeks to cope. I do think there is the potential for us to do a lot of good work here.

As for the team, everyone seems nice. It’s a fair bit bigger than last year – mostly comprised of Australians and Canadians with a couple of people from the USA and UK. After lunch today at Sam’s restaurant (I had an enjoyable Ostrich steak) we took a drive to the southwest for an hour or so through the beautiful Ugandan countryside and stopped at the equator. A guy there treated us to an interesting demonstration of how water spins in opposite directions either side of the equator, and just drains directly down when you are on the line itself. I got some video of it on my camera so may upload it onto YouTube after I get home.

Just about to go and have dinner, and tomorrow we are off to church at KPC in the morning. The medical mission begins in earnest on Monday so pray for safety, energy, but most of all effectiveness. Hopefully we can go some way to helping the physical and spiritual needs of some of the people here. Will update again soon.

One of the prime reasons to go to a cafe is to avoid having to drink something like Nescafe – Hence this cafe I saw yesterday in one of Johannesbrg’s fanciest shopping malls, Sandton City, seems to me to be a complete oxymoron – why on earth would anyone go to a place called Cafe Nescafe? I’m sure my mate Dean would agree. I never worked up the courage to give their coffee a try. Instead I settled for a reasonable latte in a place called Mugg & Bean.

Currently I’m settled in the Diners lounge in Jo’burg airport, drinking a nice South African Cab Sav, waiting for my flight which leaves for Uganda in a couple of hours. Aside from the Lion Park I had a fairly relaxing time doing not much yesterday. I managed to get a bit lost driving across Johannesburg on my way back to my hotel. There were a couple of areas which my guidebook had instructed me to avoid if at all possible – somehow I managed to end up driving through both of them, yet I emerged unscathed at the end of the day.

Next update will be from Uganda, at some point in the next couple of days hopefully…

PS : more lion park photos are up on my flickr page.

….well maybe that should be lion with a little “l”…

The highlight of an otherwise dreary day today in Johannesburg was a visit to the Lion Park. I got to cuddle a couple of 4 month old lion cubs. They gave me a good lick and enjoyed a pat and scratch, but then one of them started to get a bit carried away, chewing on my shoelaces, then my jeans, and then having a good munch on my arm and then my side. I still have the scratches to prove it. Jen seemed a bit worried when I texted her to say I’d been bitten by a lion

After “cub world” I got back in my rental car and took a long drive around the lion park. That was fantastic too. They had a big range of animals including zebra, antelope, ostrich and hyenas, but the highlight was once again the lions, of which there were probably about 30 or 40. I could just drive by and take pictures of them just a metre or so away. It was a bit nerve wracking at times when I had a bunch of lions either side of the car, trying to film one whilst keeping a a wary eye on the other. A couple of times they just got up and walked nonchalantly in front of the car. Very cool.

I’ve got a whole lot more photos. I’ll upload them to my flickr page later when I get time. But first I’m overdue for dinner. 

I read this last night – quite a philsophical take on the differences between European and African time. Should be required reading for any visitors to this continent :

The European and the African have an entirely different concept of time. In the European worldview, time exists outside man, exists objectively, and has measureable and linear characteristics. According to Newton, time is absolute: “Absolute, true, mathematical time of itself and from it’s own nature, it flows equably and without relation to anything external.” The European fdeels himself to be time’s slave, dependant on it, subject to it. To exist and function, he must observe it’s ironclad, inviolate laws, it’s inflexible principles and rules. He must heed deadlines, dates, days, and hours. He moves within the rigors of time and cannot exist outside them. They impose upon him their requirements and quotas. An unresolvable conflict exists between man and time, one that always ends with man’s defeat – time annihilates him.

Africans comprehend time differently. For them, it is a much looser concept, more open, elastic, subjective. It is man who influences time, it’s shape, course, and rhythm (man acting, of course, with the consent of gods and ancestors). Time is even something that man can create outright, for time is made manifest through events, and whether an event takes place or not depends, after all, on man alone. If two armies do not engage in a battle, then that battle will not occur (in other words, time will not have revealed it’s presence, will not have come into being).

Time appears as a result of our actions, and vanishes when we neglect or ignore it. It is something that springs to life under our influence, but falls into a state of hibernation, even nonexistence, if we do not direct our energy toward it. It is a subservient, passive essence, and, most importantly, one dependant on man.

The absolute opposite of time as it is understood in the European worldview.

In practical terms, this means that if you go to a village where a meeting is scheduled for the afternoon but find no one at the appointed spot, asking, “When will the meeting take place?” makes no sense. You know the answer: “It will take place when people come.”

                 (from The Shadow of the Sun by Ryszard Kapuscinski)

Good morning from not so sunny South Africa. Actually it’s pretty cold here in Johannesburg – 9 degrees. I had a fairly smooth, but long flight from Perth overnight. I got a bit of interrupted sleep but still feel pretty tired now. In the end I gave up and sleeping and watched the mildly entertaining in-flight movie The Wendall Baker Story, starring Luke Wilson, with the usual appearances from Will Ferrell and brother Owen Wilson. I always liked those Wilson boys Owen and Luke. Was sadden to hear about Owen’s recent suicide attempt. Hope we see him back on the big screen again soon.

Also, whilst waiting in the airport last night, I listened to Radiohead’s new album In Rainbows, which I downloaded yesterday afternoon. It’s actually a pretty good album, perhaps their most accessible since OK computer, thus making their exclusively online distribution experiment even more interesting.

Right now I’m in the Diners Club (or Premier Club) arrivals lounge at the airport. Free coffee, juice, soft drinks, free hot breakfast and a wonderful shower have gone some way to making me feel human again. Seriously this is the coolest shower I’ve ever seen. It has so many options and dials and different places for the water to come out. I even took a picture – check it out here. Once I’m done here I’ll try and dump my bags at my hotel, which is just around the corner, then rent a car and head off to explore Johannesburg. Hopefully the dodgy weather will keep the criminals away. First stop might have to be the Lion Park.

I’m heading off tonight for another trip to Uganda, for the second annual Watoto international medical team mission. This time we have at least one other doctor to share the load, as well as plenty of nurses and I believe some basic lab facilities. It will be interesting to see how it all goes and what we accomplish.

However I go with some degree of mixed feelings as I’m leaving Jenni and the boys for nearly three weeks, and will miss Jen’s major 19 week ultrasound of the baby next week. I had a listen to the heartbeat last night and it sounds great (like a choo choo train) but it’s not the same as being able to see the baby on a video screen.

Not sure yet as to the schedule for the medical stuff, but my basic itinerary for travel is as follows :

• 10 Oct – fly Perth to Johannesburg  – 2355 – 0525 (overnight)
• 12 Oct – Johannesburg to Entebbe, Uganda – 1400 – 1710
• 29 Oct – Entebbe to Johannesburg – 0725 – 1040
• 29 Oct – Johannesburg to Sydney – 1750 – 1435 (overnight)
• 30 Oct – Sydney to Perth – 1750 – 2045

As you can see the return trip is unneccesarily long, but flying via Sydney was the only way I could use my frequent flyer points to pay for the trip. And I have a solid day and a half to kill in Johannesburg when I arrive tomorrow morning. At this stage my plan is to try and dump my luggage at the hotel I have booked for the night, grab a rental car and do some exploring of this city. One of the places I’ve discovered on the net is a Lion park where you can play with cubs as well as see the bigger lions and other animals so that might be a good way to spend a few hours.

Anyway, wish me luck and any prayers would be appreciated. I will do my best to update this blog regularly, time and internet access permitting.

Sometimes you stumble across some weird things on the internet, and this is one of the most bizarre I’ve found yet. Whilst looking up the perecentages of the various blood types in the population I came across this link :

The Message of His Kingdom : Poisoning of Mankind: Blood Types, Copper Deficiency,
Evolution Theory, Shroud of Turin & Illuminati – it’s basically an incoherent mix of wrongly interpreted statistics, twisted health data, and DaVinci code style religious conspiracy theory – looks like the product of a seriously messed up mind. Weird.

The Other War: Iraq Vets Bear Witness

This is a very disturbing article with interviews from 50 US veterans of the war in Iraq about the treatment of Iraqi civilians. Very long, and uncomfortable to read, but equally impossible to stop. Eye-opening and scary

I normally try and avoid shows like Today Tonight and A Current Affair like the plague. I invariably find myself irritated and occaisionally yelling at the TV because of the low-brow one-sided tabloid journalism. And how many times can they rehash the same stories – the neighbours/tennants from hell, petrol prices, kids out of control, miracle weight loss cures, how to feed a family for $10 etc etc etc? But sometimes I just don’t get to the TV off button in time and find myself watching part of the show. The last 2 nights I have had the misfortune of catching Today Tonight and their story on how the sinister evil cult of Hillsong church is manipulating Australian Idol. Like all their stories this was incredibly one-sided and skewed – they didn’t give Hillsong or any of their 20,000 or so memebers a chance to respond. Rather they gave time last night to a bunch of commentators who didn’t really seem to know what they were talking about, and tonight to a disgruntled seemingly defacto couple of ex-Hillsong members of fairly limited IQ. Hillsong may not be perfect, and people may have some legitimate criticisms of some aspects of their theology, however the media portrayals of them as some kind of brainwashing cult and money machine are grossly unfair and are an insult to the thousands of people who attend that church and many thousands more who are associated with them one way or another.

Specifically, the allegations related to Australian Idol are that Hillsong have deliberately infiltrated people into the competition and then (shock, horror) advised their congregation that they might want to vote for them.

To tackle the first allegation, it does seem that a disproportionate number of successful contestants on ‘Idol’ are Christian and have some kind of connection/affinity with Hillsong, however they are inaccurate when they suggest that all of these people are Hillsong plants. Most are not members at all, but attend other churches. One blatant error in their story was their claim that the original Idol winner Guy Sebastian was a Hillsong member, when in fact he went to Paradise Church in Adelaide (the home of PlanetShakers). The reason why there are so many Christians on Idol is much more straightforward – contemporary churches are an excellent nursery for musical talent. Where else in our society are so many people given an opportunity to use and develop their musical talents but in Christian worship? Even of those who work hard to form a band and persue a musical career, few would play to audiences of several hundred or more every week but this is commonplace for church musicians. And the example per-excellence of this is Hillsong church, who are at the cutting edge of innovation and excellence in Christian music in Australia, if not the world. So don’t be surprised if, in a musical competition, a disproportionate number of contestants hail from the breeding ground of Christian churches, especially those in the style of Hillsong. Churches don’t need to plant or infiltrate a competition like Australian Idol – contestants will spring up naturally from such a nuturing musical environment. For millienia the church has been the soil and the inspiration for music – why should things be any different today?

Secondly, the charges that it is somehow wrong or insidious for churches to encourage their members to consider voting for Idol contestants who hail from their congregation, their denomination or their faith in general – what is wrong with that? Imagine a member of the West Coast Eagles also happened to be a brilliant singer and at a game an announcer encouraged the crowd to “don’t forget to vote for Ben Cousins in Australian Idol tonight” – would that be considered a form of brainwashing? In the first season there was a performer called Cosima who we were encouraged to vote for just because she was from Western Australia (I believe even the Premier at the time was guilty of this) – is that part of a sinister plot? If someone from our church at Warnbro was on the show I wouldn’t consider it to be at all wrong if our pastor or one of the worship leaders encouraged us to support them? So why is it such a sin for Hillsong to do the same? Apparently they’ve shied away from such public mention of Idol candidates now, but I wouldn’t have a problem with it if they did.

I’m sorry but such illogical, biased and erroneous reporting really gets my goat. I really must make a better effort to avoid these shows from now on.

Are you getting Radiohead’s music for nothing?

So there’s a new album coming out from Radiohead, and since they’ve divorced from their record label, it’s only available for order from their website in either a discbox format (with CD and Vinyl versions), or for download. The really interesting thing is that for the download you can choose how much you want to pay, from nothing upwards. I like the concept, and will definitely download it on Oct 10 when it becomes available, and will certainly pay them for it. But there’s a couple of concerns I have. Firstly, they should have made an intermediate choice between the digital download and the 40 pound discbox. I like Radiohead and own most of their CDs and would prefer to purchase the CD to add to my collection, but can’t justify spending 40 pounds, especially when I no longer own a record player. So I’ll just have to be content with the downloads alone. Secondly, by not selling their album through traditional outlets (such as music stores and even iTunes, if you can call that traditional), Radiohead will significantly limit the audience who may end up listening to this album.

But most importantly, I’ll be interested to see how good this album is. Will it be as listenable as their earlier stuff, or weird and atmospheric, like their recent albums? Guess we’ll find out next week…

Rudd vows to fix doctor shortage | The Australian

KEVIN Rudd is promising to pay to fill a shortfall of doctors across the nation after a comprehensive audit of how many are needed.

Once again Kevin Rudd is sticking to his two main vote winning techniques. One is promising inquires, commitees, investigations, audits. And the second is throwaway slogans saying that he’s going to fix whatever problem it is he’s addressing. But always the promises lack any real detail.

The problem in this case is that you can’t pay to fix a doctor shortage. No matter how much money you spend you can’t magically make doctors appear out of thin air to fill a void. There is only a finite number of doctors to go around. Sure he could spend money to pay the existing doctors more (and I’m certainly in favour of that – lol) but that would not solve workforce problems. Even if by paying GPs more it encouraged more doctors to enter GP training that’s only going to add to a shortfall in other specialties. The only quick fix for doctor numbers is to import more from overseas, which is already being done to a huge extent. But that approach has it’s problems in terms of insuring quality treatment, and the questionable ethics of poaching doctors from other countries which may be experiencing their own doctor shortages.

The long term solution is more medical school places, and a shorter term solution is to work on measures to redistribute doctors to better address needs across the community. The Howard government has already taken steps on both these issues, although I’m sure there is more tinkering that can be done. Basically no matter what they do, this doctor shortage is a long term issue that is not going to disappear overnight no matter how many audits they do or how much money they spend. Rudd is again being disingenuous by suggesting that he will be able to magically fix it.

Finally got our net connection working again at work after 2 weeks of being switched off due to some “virus.” It’s frustrating being owned by a company in Melbourne because everything takes so long to get fixed.

Only 3 more work days after today before I leave for Uganda. My flight is at midnight next Wednesday. I suppose I should start making sure I have everything ready. Haven’t really done any preparation as yet but then again it’s not that long since I was away last so it’ll probably just be a matter of grabbing everything I need on Wednesday and throwing it in a suitcase. This weekend I’m on-call for obstetrics so I may now have a whole lot of time then to do anything.