With my dear Heather and MB's visit and a health summit soon after, I didn't have time to help too much with net distribution this year. This is unfortunate because we've never tried to cover such a large section (the entire arrondissement of Saraya). It was quite the cluster----- and we are still 7,500 nets short! This is because population estimates were way off, and there are loads of villages not recognized in any way by the government. But we want to stop malaria there too! Please help us raise enough money to finish reaching our goal for the year by donating at this site: http://www.againstmalaria.com/Fundraiser.aspx?FundRaiserID=5444 . Remember, the other PCVs and I are literally going to recieve and distribute these nets with our own hands. We have a thorough system of checking the population numbers and visiting homes if we think the numbers are wrong. As legitimate as I think anti-free-net arguments are, I can see for myself that it works here. We live in these villages ourselves and we see the nets being used correctly. Every villager knows malaria is the number-one killer, so they're not all that tempted to sell their nets off (I'm sure it happens, but not at a large rate). When more people sleep under nets, the spread of malaria decreases-- less humans catch it from mosquitoes, and less mosquitoes catch it from humans. This includes long lost PCVs living over here too...
OK, moving on to distribution highlights:
-took a carved-out canoe to Mali
-a 1-armed man did a 1-2 minute song and dance of thanks
-saw at least 2 children playing with skinned dead parakeets as if they were barbie dolls
-taught "Frere Jacques" and "We Will Rock You" to a classroom of kids to distract them from the cluster---- of distribution in the next room. Actually we WERE giving them causeries on everything health, but then the rain pounded the tin roof so that you couldn't hear anything that wasn't a loud song.
-a dr. licked my ear. Uninvited (need I say?)
-a bat entered Sheila's mosquito net. She casually brushed it away softly saying, "Huh.. bat..." That would NOT have been my reaction. This bat was special though and kept dive-bombing and making me duck for cover.
-Not so much biking this year. Can I get an Alhumdulilai? Instead we had a lot more rides from ambulences and such. One of the photos above is from when Sheila and I hitched a ride back to the Gou in an ambulence (yes, that's the bike on the stretcher.) I must say that these rides are most definitely not what you're thinking, even with the ambulences. More like a mechanical bull with walls. For many hours. At several points getting stuck in mud/rivers/hills/giant craters, or smacking my head against the window, I had a bit of a morbid giggle to myself. "Is this how I'll die?"
On that note:
The NetLife blog site for this project: http://netlife2009.blogspot.com/
PLEASE DONATE!
http://www.againstmalaria.com/Fundraiser.aspx?FundRaiserID=5444
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