Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Dear All,

Merry Christmas and Have a Wonderful Safe New Year!  Hope everyone enjoyed a magnificent Thanksgiving with friends and family!  I am so grateful for all of you and what you have shared in my life!

I can not believe that I have already been in Zambia 7 months and certainly can not believe that it is already Christmas! 

I have been fortunate to go to Victoria Falls, Chobe Safari in Botswana, Devil’s Pool and I walked with the Lion’s in Livingston.  I am sure that you have seen the pictures on facebook.  It was great fun walking with the lion’s, there was one Lion named “Terry,” and I thought that was hilarious!

Since August when I posted last, I went back to the US for 10 days in October.  I just went to Virginia to visit with family and 2 of my PCV friends from Uganda, Linda and Shelley!  We had some Tiki Time at Terry's.  I really had a great time, but it went too fast.

The ZCAHRD/BU Office moved to Choma while I was in the US.  They moved because Choma has become the provincial capital for the Southern province and all the major offices are moving there.  So I commuted the month of November until they found me a place to live in Choma.  Since everyone was moving to Choma, housing is hard to find.  But I have a nice place with a small yard for Kristie and it has a fence around it.  Which is good, because when I was in the US Kristie became a woman and went into heat!  I am currently looking for a vet to get her spaded, but have not found one in Choma.  One was recommended in Mazabuka, however that is 2 hours away and I need to get her there.  So I am still looking.  I would like to do that in January when I will be here for her recovery.

I was just approved to go to Mozambique for Christmas.  I will leave on Dec. 23^rd and fly back Dec. 30^th.  Mozambique PCV’s were just on Standfast for the elections, so no other PCV from another country was allow to enter until the violence calmed down.  Standfast is part of the emergency disaster plan, which means a volunteer in that country can not leave their site to go anywhere except their village.  So we just got word that the volunteers are now off standfast and we can enter the country.  Since we are still PCV’s, the Country Director of whatever country we go to is responsible for us while we are in their county.  So another response volunteer and myself have a little chalet on the Indian Ocean, it will be a relaxing and a quite Christmas!

I really don’t get that much down time here except for my weekends.  Before I left Kalomo I was able to go 2 weekends to the Haven Orphanage, (children from 1 month old up to 7 years old).  Most of the children are 1 to 3 years of age.  I showed them the movie, “Finding Nemo.”  

It was great fun to see their faces during the movie.  I don’t think that they understood the words at all, but the different colors and fishes were fascinating to them. 

I hope in Choma I can also get involved with teaching HIV, STD and Reproductive Health to the primary school across from our office.

Otherwise, most of the time I am in the field (different villages) visiting rural health centers.

My Small Project Grant of $5,000 was approved by the US gov and I will be putting up fences and gates with a lock around the rubbish pits at the health center.  You may not realize it because we are so fortunate to have garbage collection once or twice a week and incinerator’s at the hospitals.  But Health Centers here have a horrible waste management problem.  The majority of rural health centers dig a pit next to the health center and throw all the waste and garbage into the pit.  They burn it every so often, but dogs, other animals and children go into the pits and pull things out.  Yes, this includes some needles and bloody gauze.  Some center will throw needles down the pit latrine’s, as well as placenta’s from mother’s after birth.  The Ministry of Health requires every center to have an incinerator and a gated fenced rubbish pit, but none have them.  So that $5000 will only fence 15 out of the 35 centers…but at least it is something.  I really wanted to build incinerators, however they are much too expensive for any of the small grants.

Alittle about language expression that the Zambian’s say verses how we say things are interesting.  Like, “I don’t know how you think about that,” instead of saying “what do you think?”  Or “is it not so” when you are asking, “really.”  They also say, “Are we together,” when they are asking you if you understand.  Or how about “isn’t it,” when they mean “Yes.”    Everyday there is another saying that is really different.    They say, “Me, I am really suffering,” whenever they are talking about anything that might be confusing to them, studying, writing a paper or any work.  I got stuck in the rain the other day and that was the first thing they said to me, “You are really suffering.”  I had to think to myself, wow that is not suffering at all!  But everything is suffering to them.  When I ride my bike to work they say, “You are suffering, riding your bike in the heat.”

Zambians are just like the Ugandans when it comes to manners.  The men will walk right in front of the line, or just but in front of you no matter who you are; you can be carrying on a conversation with a Zambian and if another Zambian comes up they start talking to them and you have not even finished.  It is not unusual to see a man and a women walking down the street and the man is not carrying anything; however, the women has a baby on her back, pots and groceries on her head and both hands are filled with heavy supplies.  Again, I am so thankful for the male courtesy in the US!  

You can ask them a question and they totally ignore you, especially when they clearly hear you.

Gender Based balance is suppose to be a government millennium goal, but it has a long way to go.  I was so upset the other day when we went to this one health center and they brought a 26 year old women to the center that was unconscious because she had been beaten by the husband.  She was one of 3 wife’s and she had 1 child.  What happened was that the husband had just taken wife number 3 and she wanted a blanket to put over her.  The husband gave her a blanket that was the other wife’s blanket.  The other wife said that the third wife could not have the blanket because she had bought it out of her own money and was going to use it.  The husband got mad and beat her unconscious.  All because she wanted her own blanket!  We ended up taking her to the hospital that was 45 kms away.  Gender based violence is still really bad here.   

It still amazes me how dilapidated the health center’s are, however the government always say’s that there is no money to improve them.  They really rely on donors to fund everything.  Remember the Mother’s shelters that I talked about in August.  They are small structures with dirt floors and open windows that the mother’s to be sleep in while waiting for delivery.  They are really not fit for mother’s to sleep in them.   

The health center staff is suppose to get the community to build the mother’s shelters for there facility, the Zambian Ministry of Health says that they do not have the money to build the shelters.  So again it falls back on donors.  Right now Merck for Mother’s is doing an assessment and estimates of all the mother shelters to see what they can build to get them decent.   Like Uganda, Zambia depends on donors to provide funding, buildings, drugs, research and a lot of other things for them.  Things will never be sustainable as long as the mind set here is to receive everything from the donors.  I guess it is just like us in the US with welfare.

We had a conversation in the truck the other day going to one of the health centers about free education, free health care and medication in Zambia.  The conversation started with the Obama health care.  The Zambian‘s could not believe that we have to pay for health care in the US, not only pay premiums for health insurance, but also pay when we are sick, have x-rays, scans or when we are hospitalized.  That we pay for college and University education.  We pay taxes.  Zambians do not pay for any of that.  They are getting aid and money, equipment, jobs, drugs and supplies from all the other countries i.e. Britain, US, Amsterdam, Netherlands, Australia, Italy etc.  What is amazing to me is that they expect it too!  It seems they run the county on everyone else’s aid and money.  With the dependence on other countries and the corruption in Zambia, no wonder they are still a third world country.  The people are victims of their environment, and all we can do is pray and help where we can.

There is still so much to do here as far as international development and I quess I have not grown tired of it yet.  I just hope I can do some small amount and make a little difference in someone’s life.

Kristie is doing well and filling out like a little women that she is!  I have started working on ways to get her back to the US.  Just don’t know if she is going to VA with me first or to CA.

I think that is all for now!  I want to wish each of you a Happy, Holy, Joyous Christmas!

Stay Safe and Be Happy!

Love & Light,

Mari

“Lushomo”

Life in Kalomo

Dear All,

Kalomo Market

Well, I have been here for 4 months now.  I talked with you about Kalomo, so I thought I would tell you alittle bit about Zambia.  It is a landlocked country in south-central Africa and is about one-tenth larger than Texas.  It is surrounded by Angola, Zaire, Tanzania, Malawi, Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Botswana, and Namibia.   When I went to Botswana, there is a place when crossing the river I was able to see all 4 countries, Zimbabwe, Namibia, Botswana and Zambia.  It was really change.   The government is republic and the President is Michael Chilufya Sata since 2011.  Next election is 2016.  They have about 15,000,000 people with a growth rate of 2.89%.  There birth rate is 43.1/1000 and the infant mortality rate is 70.6/1000.  There live expectancy is 53 years of age.  The capital is the largest city and is Lusaka with 1.75 million.  You can imagine the size of Texas and that large of a infant morality rate.
The money here is in monetary units of Kwacha.  Exchange rate is about 5.3 Kwacha to 1 USD.
The official language is English, however they have over 71 different languages here.  In the Southern Province where I am, they speak Tonga.  Today, the country is made up almost entirely of Bantu-speaking peoples.
In 1889 Cecil Rhodes, a Empire builder obtained mining concessions from King Lewanika of the Barotse and then sent settlers to the area.   He also established the British South Africa Company which the region was ruled.  Until 1924, when the British government took over the administration.
The african population ethnicity is 99.5% which includes tribes of Bemba, Tonga, Chewa, Lozi, Nsenga, Tumbuka, Ngoni, Lala, Kaonde, Lunda, and other African groups, other 0.5% includes Europeans, Asians, and Americans according to the 2000 census.
The religions are Christian 50%–75%, Islam and Hindu 24%–49%, indigenous beliefs 1%.  Very different from Uganda where 45% were Catholic. 
There literacy rate is 81%, but again like Uganda the expectations for passing grades is only 50%, which is low standards for schools.
They have a growth rate of 6.6%.  Inflation is 8.7% and in 2006 they had an unemployment rate of 14%.  There agriculture is corn, sorghum, rice, peanuts, sunflower seed, vegetables, flowers, tobacco, cotton, sugarcane, cassava, coffee; cattle, goats, pigs, poultry, milk, eggs, and hides.  They have natural resources of copper, which in the Northern Province is abundant and they call it the Copperbelt.  I hear the area is growing fast in the north.  They also have cobalt, zinc, lead, coal emeralds (have not fount any yet), gold, silver, uranium, and hydropower.  So you can see that they would do copper mining and processing, construction, foodstuff, beverages, textiles, and fertilizer for their industries.   However, in 1975 the world copper market collapsed and since Zambia had been the third largest miner of copper in the world after the US and the Soviet Union, Zambia was devastated. Again in 1999 there was another depression of economy from copper prices because copper provided 80% of Zambia’s export earnings.
There major trading partners are South Africa, China, Switzerland, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Kuwait, South Korea.
The Health system is still so far behind the US.  It is sad to see.  People walk for many Kms just to get to a health center that has no xray, labs, dressings, and medications etc.
Zambia has cell phones, where you buy airtime each time you use it, just like Uganda.  Same with the internet bundles.  You can buy 1 GB up to 3 GB each month. 
The rivers include Zambezi and Luapula rivers, and Lake Tanganyika.  When I was thinking about where to go in Zambia for Christmas, I thought about Lake Tanganyika.  It is suppose to be beautiful.  However, you are unable to get into the water due to contamination.  Which is ashame! 
The airport is in Lusaka, but they just opened another airport in Livingston.  President Bush and Clinton both came at different times to Zambia last month to donate money to the health centers and flew into the Livingston airport.  This is also where all the tourist for Victoria Falls come in. 
They are also having a big UN Convention in Livingston the end of August, so Zambia has put alot of money into improvements in Livingston and Victoria Falls.
Well, I think that is enough about Zambia.  I don’t know if you saw my facebook pictures, but I did make it down to Livingston one weekend and went to Victoria Falls and Chobe Safari in Botswana.  I had a great time!  It was good to get away for a weekend.

 

 I really have not gone anywhere else since then.  I do plan to travel to Virginia for about 10 days to see family and other PCV’s.  I am also planning a trip for Christmas to Mozambique for about 7 days.
Kristie is doing well and gaining weight!  I found dog food in Livingston, about 150 kms away.  So another PC Response Volunteer brings me an 8 lb bag every time she travels up this way.  Kristie got all her shots and I am planning to bring her back to the US with me.  Pray that I will be able to get her out of the country!

Kristie

As far as work goes, there is alot of travel on reallllllly bad roads!  Health Centers are very rural, without power, running water and alot of them have no phone access. 

It really makes it difficult for pregnant women. 

Kitchen for the Mother's Shelter

One thing that they have over here are what they call Mother’s Shelter’s.  That is a small building with a roof that mother’s who are close to delivering come so they will be near the health center for the birth.  Since they live so far away.  They come with everything they need for a couple of days or a month.  They also come with their families, mother’s, grandmother’s, aunts etc.  So you may have many people at a shelter that only sleeps about 8.  Some of the shelter’s do not even have doors, some no roof’s.  The MoH rely’s on donors to help build shelter’s, for that matter alot of other things as well.
I wrote a story of one mother’s complicated delivery for the ZCAHRD newsletter.   Makes you really thank God you are in America!
At one of the Rural Health Center (RHC) many mother’s come from a large catchment area to deliver.  The population is 5,868, and 1,314 of them are women of child bearing age.  They have 317 expected pregnancies, 305 expected delivers and 290 expected live births in 2013.  In June 2013 there were 36 deliveries, 28 with a skilled midwife.   Not all births are with someone skilled.  The center has only solar power in the labor room, no phone access available and no referral transport system; which makes it difficult during the time of delivery during an emergency.  During the cold months there is no heater, the health facility is very cold at night for delivering mothers.  One mother came to deliver twins.   She delivered her first twin and the baby was a normal delivery; the second twin was not coming.   She started to bleed heavily an hour after delivering her first twin.   Her blood pressure started to drop to 65/40 and the midwife was losing her.  The second babies heartbeat stopped and hour after the first delivery. 
It was during raining season so the streams were flooded and no vehicle could pass though.  Having no phone access, the watchman had to go 40 kms in order to make the call for the ambulance.  The ambulance could not get past the flooded stream.   The midwife put the mother, in labor and bleeding in an Ox cart in order to get her to the stream.

Can be either a Donkey or an Ox Cart

Imagine what it must have been like in labor, on an ox cart, with no fetal heart rate of your second twin, during the pouring rain in order to get to the stream.   Once she got over the flooded stream one of the community members took her in his vehicle to the hospital.  When she arrived, she was taken to theater immediately and the stillborn second twin was delivered via C-section.    The Surgeon at the hospital said, “This woman is not supposed to be alive.”   It really is a miracle how these people withstand all the trauma and complications that they have to go though, just for treatment, food, and water.
I am still working with Mari Kelley’s Foundation in Uganda!  So if you feel you want to donate...Please do.  If you know someone that would like to donate please pass on the information!  www.marikelleyscows.org  Remember it is Tax Deductible.

Well, for now, stay Safe and Be Happy!
Love & Light,
Mari
“Lushomo”

Made it to Kalomo! Happy Father's Day!

Dear Everyone,

Happy Father's Day to all the Father's out there....Especially to my Brothers who are very special Father's and Men!

I made it to Kalomo fine, PC actually drove me down which was great!  Kalomo is a small town, not as built up as Lusaka.  The closest town with a partial grocery store is in Choma about 65 km away.  But Kalomo has a market place so I will get veggies!  My house is large!  Very different from my one bedroom, no power and no water in Uganda.  I have running water, hot water heater and electricity!  The house is surrounded by a concrete wall with glass at the top and metal gates in the front.  PC will hire guards for me if I want them.  I have a large yard with alot of trees, and a large veranda.  The  house has a dining room, living room, kitchen, walk in panty, 3 bedrooms, 2 bathtubs, 3 toilets and 3 sinks.  So with no furniture in the house, it looks really large!  To settle in, Peace Corps Zambia gave me a refrigerator, stove, bed, mattress, pillow, sheets, a small sofa and a bike/helmet.  So I really am pretty set.  I don’t need anything more to live here.  The house needed alot of work, so the plumber, carpenter and electrcian have all been over many times to fix things.  But all in all, I am Blessed.

The second weekend that I was here, there was a white lab about 1 1/2 yrs old outside my gate.  She followed me all over town, everywhere I went she went.  When I got back to my house and opened the gate, she ran in.  I told her to get out and she was so cute.  She started crying and went down on her front paws and started moving very slowly to the gate.  Then she cried when I closed the gate.  So the next time I went out she was right there waiting for me.  I asked everyone that I came across, who’s dog was she.  No one knew.  My landlord said that she did not live in my house before, which is what I orginially thought.  My neighbor however said that she lived there before and the people just left her.  So that Sunday night I let her stay inside the gate and she followed me to work the next day.  My coworkers said to go to the Vet and the Police and see if they knew who she belonged to.  So when I went to the Vet they did not know the dog.  They told me that if the dog was bothering me, they would put her to sleep and she would not feel a thing.  I was surprised that they would just kill her that easy.  She was such a sweet, good puppy and told them that that was not an option.  So I told them that I would take her and for them to give her her vaccinations.  I named her Kristie.  Then I went to the police and filed a police report about Kristie, so if the owners came back and wanted her they would know where she was.  But, I don’t think that will ever happen, I am sure that they are long gone and left her abandon.

So then the next challenge was dog food!  There is no dog food, dog collar, dog leash or dog anything here in Kalomo.  You don’t find anything for dogs except in the capital and not in alot of stores.  I did make it to Choma (64 km away) one day and they had a 1.75 lbs bag which was very expensive,  But I picked up 2 bags, which will not last her very long.  One of the other Response Volunteers is coming down this way from Luska tomorrow and she is bring me an 8 lb bag.   So I will have some dog food.  In the meantime, I have taken a bucket to the resturant and they are putting scraps in it, so I have something to give her.   Hopefully, she will eat the dog food when I do get it.
As for work, I am still just learning what they want me to do.  I have met the BU Intern that works at ZCAHRD, but she will leave the end of June and  we will get another.  The rest of the ZCAHRD staff is Zambian.  We work from 8 to 5 Monday to Friday.  This group of workers actually work.  Most of the time we are out in the field going to one of the health centers.  At the centers we do mentoring, data collection on delieveries, complications, concerns, issues, check for Infection Control issues, look at referral of Mothers to the hospital and go over feedback forms.    Some of these centers take 3 hours to get to because they are far away and they have bad roads.  One center told me a story of a mother that went into labor during the raining season, she was a high risk pregancy and needed to get to the hospital.  She had no phone network access to call the ambulance (the ambulance would have taken 3 hours to get there from the hospital).  Also, it was raining season, so the ambulance could only go so far.  Bewildered, I said..then how did you get her to the hospital?  She said in a matter of fact tone...well we walked a ways and then got on an Ox cart and went down to the river about 40 kms.  Then I could call the ambulance, and we waited in the rain until they got there.  Now can you imagine being in Labor and having to go though that!  It really is amazing what the mothers endure here. 

Anyway, a couple of the things I am suppose to do along with the above is to help establish roles/scope and smooth fuctioning of the 24/7 District triage nurse for the emergency text component of the mUbumi project.  As well as, assist with synchronizing SMGL Emergency Referral System data collection with mHealth/mUbumi SMS data collection and activities in the District.  So I am not quite sure how I am going to do that when the centers don’t have network access to even activate the emergency referral system.  So I am open to ideas!

CDC has purchased a computer and a printer for me to do my work and ZCAHRD provides the transportation.  That is a good thing, because most of the places we go....no taxi or buses go there.  But that is good for me!

The people here are really friendly, and have alot of the same cultural mannerisms as Ugandans.  For example, one of the educational sessions that a Zambian was giving to another Zambian took 2 hours...but it would have been done in 15 minutes in the US.

I am still working with Mari Kelley’s Cow’s in Uganda!  So if you feel you want to donate...Please do.  If you know someone that would like to donate please pass on the information!  www.marikelleyscows.org  Remember it is Tax Deductible.

I will go down to Livingstone to visit one of the PCRV working with John Snow Institute the last weekend of June and stay until July 2.  July 1 and 2 are Zambian holidays.  We are planning to go to Victoria Falls and a 1 day Safari!  Should be fun and I will have pictures for you in my next blog.

For now, stay Safe and Be Happy!
Love & Light,
Mari “Lushomo”

Arrival in Zambia

Dear Everyone,

Wow!  I can not believe it has been 6 months since my last entry!  I really feel blessed that I got to see so many of my friends in VA and CA when I went back to the states!
I wanted to fill you in on what I have done, where I am and what I am about to do!
In December I flew home from the Ayurveda Yoga Retreat Center in India to Virginia Beach, VA and arrived on December 16th.  So Christmas was fantastic with family.  Angel flew in from LA.  My family had an incredible 60th Birthday Party for me and so I got to see alot of friends!  My brother Kevin and Sister-in-Law flew up from Flordia to be with us for the birthday party right after Christmas.  Many people traveled along way to come and for this I am truely grateful.  My 78 year old cousin, Rosa even drove up from North Carolina!  I really was so happy and appreciative of what everyone did for me for the party and for my return from 2 years in Uganda!  It was a phenomenal homecoming!  My family really did an outstanding job with the party.  I had 60 intuition red roses, food, drink and friends!s  Steve put together this power point from when I was a baby all though the years up until now!  It was really alot of fun!

It snowed in Virginia Beach the first a January...so I was able to experience the beauty of snow again.  I went up to Washington in January to visit Shelley and Linda and the Peace Corps Office.  They both came back from Uganda before me, so it was great seeing them again.  I then flew back to LA in February.
As soon as I finally unpacked from Uganda, I started looking for Peace Corps Response positions, I also applied to Doctors without Borders.  On March 7th I was notified that I was accepted into Peace Corps Response as a Maternal and Child Health Specialist (Zambia) with Zambia Center for Applied Health Research and Development (ZCAHRD) and Boston University for a 12 month assignment.  I will be working on the “Saving Mothers Giving Life” project. 

“There are an estimated 600,000 births and 2,600 maternal and 20,400 newborn deaths every year in Zambia. The probability that a 15-year old girl will eventually die from a materna cause is 100 times     greater than that of a heigh income country such as the US or Norway.”  Source WHO, UNICEF, UNFPA ansd the World Bank, 2012. Trends in Maternal Mortality 1990 to 2010.  

Peace Corps said that our departure date would be the first of May.  I deployed on May 10th.  So that was great news for me, because I had scheduled a vacation with my friends Cheryl Birch, Mary Roach and Dana How to go to Kauai!  In April I left for Kauai and hooked up with one of my dear friends from Healing Touch International, Savitri Kumaran who lives on the island. 

It was so good to see Savitri again and she was great!  She took us all over the island and showed us some sacred sites and sacred places.  We also went to Polihale National Park, which is sacred to the Hawaiians, they feel that the souls depart the earth their between the mountains.  Cheryl and I hiked over lava rocks in the misty rain just to get a look at the two mountains.  That was a hike we will not forget!  But it was good to experience and a great challenge.  We also went snokling, kayaking, beaching/pooling, hot tub, and shopping.  Karen, Cheryl and I did a Helicopter ride!  We really had a great time!  So much fun and pictures are on my dropbox, if you want to see them just send me your email and I will share the link.

Then right before I left for Zambia, Angel took me to Palm Springs Desert and we stay at a place that had hot springs and mineral water baths.  That really makes your skin feel so nice!  She also took me on a

Aerotrain up the mountain that was great!  Then we stayed one night at the Morongo Casino...yes I played and lost then won.  So I basically broke even and had a great time doing it!

Then on May 10th, I left for Zambia.  My flight was really good, but long.  I flew from LA to Atlanta, then from Atlanta to JoBurg, South Africa, then from SA to Lusaka, Zambia.  We arrive at around 8:30 pm Zambian time.  Yes, Peace Corps was at the airport to meet me and took me though immigration.  It was not like Uganda, if you remember I was left at the airport by Peace Corps and they had to come back for me.
My stay here so far has been fantastic!  We are in the guest house that has hot showers, AC and heat, refrigerators, flat screen TV’s in the rooms and a beautiful bathroom.  The room also comes with breakfast.  Peace Corps Zambia has been great.  We were sworn in on May 13th, 2013. 

We have had a good administrative week.  I will be living in Kalomo and the language there is Tonga.  So that is what I studied this week.  We also went shopping for all our settling in stuff.  During language my instructor for Tonga language gave me a Zambia name.  It is Lushomo, which means Faith/Hope. 

Next week on Monday, I will meet the Boston University people that I will be working with, I can not wait!  Then we will have Sexual Harassment  training and that will end our, which is orientation Tuesday afternoon.  I leave for my site to Kalomo, Zambia on Wednesday morning. I heard that it was about 4 or 5 hours from Lusaka (the capital).  So we will see!  I will keep you posted when I find out more information about my job/position with ZCHARD/BU!  I will also let you know when I have an address!
Until then, Stay Safe and Be Happy!

Love & Light,
Mari “Lushomo”