A year ago...

Goodness me, a year ago I’d just arrived and was doing that hellish orientation….12 months later, some things I see in the hospital still shock me, bringing tears out of nowhere, but at least now I know why things are as they are. I think its fair to say that, despite having lived in Malawi as a child, I never really knew what really went on around me – awful. I had so much and got so much from being in this amazing place but never thought much more than that. I’m glad I’ve now been given the chance to see all that I didn’t before and help do something about it. I don’t think its guilt that drives me, I think its hope. Although everything here has seemed pretty hopeless at times because systems don’t work, people don’t appear interested or seem to care about the patients, things go missing and everyone is happy for you to do the work while they sit in another endless meeting elsewhere…there have been a few glimmers of improvement. We’ve come to see, as we were told we would, that you become grateful for achieving the small things. I’m also trying to look at it as us being the beginning of start of getting standards of care up where they should be. It going to take a long, long time, in some respects I think we came too soon – they’re not ready for the concepts in healthcare they want, but to aspire to them might just be enough if we can encourage them to keep taking the baby steps towards getting where they want to be. Pang’ono, pang’ono is something we say a lot…one pang’ono means small…two means slowly, slowly. It sums it up perfectly doesn’t it!!