Dedication Personified

It is difficult for me to imagine the trauma and number of fatalities seen by Jim and other members of the hospital staff after an accident such as Saturday's horrific double bus crash. Yet, amid the frustrations of an ill-equipped hospital and the lack of efficient systems for handling this type of crisis, many lives were still saved.
The other night, we went to a nearby restaurant with a young American family (originally from Houston, Texas), who live about three hours north of us. They drove down to Tamale so their children, ages 10, 4 and 2, could attend a special week of group education which was set up for families in similar situations throughout the northern region of Ghana. For the most part, the children are home-schooled by their mom who also happens to be a certified teacher in Texas. The dad is an OB/GYN plus pediatrician doing full-time volunteer work in the Baptist hospital in Nalerigu since 2008.

No rest for the weary - for Jim

It's late Saturday afternoon when I thought Jim and I would be enjoying a bit of relaxation combined with stopping in at a "naming of the baby" celebration to which we were invited by one of Jim's colleagues from the hospital. The Muslim naming of a new baby is a joyous occasion which traditionally begins at dawn, consists of the local imam coming to give his blessing and continues throughout the day with food and socialization.
Instead, Jim phoned a while ago from the hospital where he has been since early this morning, primarily having gone in to check on a small child who had been admitted yesterday. However, an all too common scene of chaos took place there soon after his arrival, resulting from a head-on collision between two buses a short distance north of Tamale. Several persons were killed and many others injured. It is yet another example of the frequency of traffic accidents in Ghana. Contributing factors include fatigue of drivers on the long trips between cities, combined with poorly maintained vehicles and roads.

Thanksgiving in Tamale

My microwave-made cocoa cake is barely one-half inch high, but definitely edible with a scoop of chocolate ice cream on top. Presentation is improved by cutting it into more appealing brownie-size portions.
It's Thanksgiving Day at home in the US so the above dessert will have to substitute for my sister-in-law's signature pumpkin and pecan pies. Also decided to forego a replacement for the traditional turkey - Ghanaian guinea fowl - and enjoy a new eggplant casserole recipe instead.
It's of course work as usual here in Tamale and Jim has surgery scheduled to rebuild a teen-aged girl's nose which was tragically destroyed by an electrical burn. Today's procedure is but another step in the attempt to restore an acceptable facial appearance for this young patient.

More Creative Cuisine

My first attempt at making Ghanaian palava sauce turned out OK. Actually couldn't do much to mess it up as the recipe mainly involves adding parboiled "alifu" greens (similar to spinach) at the end-stage of a tomato based sauce. The palava is usually served on top of sliced yams but we happened to have regular potatoes handy instead.
Maintenance is a big problem here in Tamale so when something gets broken, it often takes a long time (and a lot of patience) before it gets fixed. Case in point is our oven which, unfortunately, I may not see operating again before we are due to leave for Accra in December. Therefore, I decided to take advantage of our computer and googled "how to bake cake in a microwave." Thought I better start with muffins and even though they were not able to brown, the consistency was not nearly as rubbery as I had feared. Armed with more confidence, will try my hand at a microwavable cake tomorrow.

Weekend of Work and Play

Bill & Patricia Turner came over for dinner which managed to turn out well considering I had no functioning oven (still broken) or microwave (inadequate voltage) to heat the two casserole dishes I had prepared earlier in the day. Scooping out the contents and cooking it all in two frying pans on our stove-top burners did the trick.
Finally broke down and had the house cleaned on Saturday. Three maintenance workers from the hospital helped us to attack everything in sight. The two men, Shani and Shaibu, tackled jobs like the floors, windows and bathrooms while 23 year-old Amina, with her ten month-old daughter either wrapped tight on her back or amusing herself on the floor, scrubbed in the kitchen and elsewhere.
Sunday morning, Jim surprised me with breakfast in bed! Picture-perfect fried egg surrounded by three strips of bacon with toast & jam. Andy Norman had brought over some vacuum-packed Hormel microwavable bacon strips, some of which were left over since Andy returned to the US.
In the afternoon, the gals from COLWOD visited and while they were here, we were able to connect via SKYPE with Sr. Jacky in Kenya. They were all so excited to be able to see one another on the computer screen and get caught up with their news as it has been over two years since Jacky was transferred from Tamale to Nairobi.
Fr. Martin stopped by to greet us as well, then later in the evening, Jim and I were invited to a nice dinner at Archbishop Gregory's home. Gregory's completed autobiography (which I helped edit) is now in the process of being printed so we are looking forward to its publication.
All in all, a full weekend.

A Typical Day for Me in Tamale

Along with Jim, I rise around 5:30 AM and make breakfast before he goes off to the hospital. This could be a choice of oatmeal (or Jim's preferred variation called "Tom Brown"), toast and an egg, French toast, pancakes, fruit, etc. Our oven is now "kaput" (temporarily, I hope), although the stove top burners and microwave are doing fine.
Activities of the day always include boiling a good supply of water and the somewhat lengthy preparation of other meals, often taking a taxi into town to do marketing, and sometimes washing a load or two of clothes in our little machine (which takes two hours and 15 minutes per cycle), then hanging it out to dry on the line in our backyard. There is also plenty of reading, trips to the bank, post office, library, and of course to COLWOD - mainly in order to say hi to the gals who work there and to check on the dress that Sylvia is making for me.
Fortunately, I like to cook and because the shopping and preparation involved take up a fair amount of time and effort, I decided not to volunteer teach in the schools during this particular stay.
Has anyone noticed that I haven't mentioned house cleaning? Except for the bare necessities - mainly keeping the kitchen and bathroom respectable - I do my best to get past what would bother me to no end in the US. Dust and dirt are ever-present (it will only get worse with the annual Harmattan wind approaching from the Sahara) and it's surprising how I manage to basically ignore it. For the time being, we do not have someone to clean regularly - which may and probably should change - but Jim has arranged for a small crew to come in periodically to get the job done.
Early to rise means early to bed as well. We choose not to have TV so no distractions there, but I do have my trusty iPad. Even without available wireless access, I'm able to re-charge it for my various books on Kindle and an occasional game of "Angry Birds."

Pizza and Eggplant On The Menu

As I sit here writing this entry, our little stove is in several pieces along with various tools left behind by Ishawu, a nice young man who works at the appliance store in town. Ishawu has now gone to see if he can locate something close to a duplicate of the broken mechanism wich evidently regulates the oven.
Last night, Andy and I actually managed to make our own pizza even though the temperature seemed to hover at a steady 300 degrees instead of the recipe's recommended 425. Our crust wasn't exactly on the crisp side, but the veggie toppings along with some pepperoni brought from home did the trick.
Abdulai, our loyal night watchman who is here daily from 6PM to 6AM, is a farmer by day. His first gift of produce soon after I arrived was a vegetable that resembles a cucumber or zucchini but with a softer outer skin texture and very large seeds. I have to admit that it didn't have much appeal to either fry up or even add to a stew. Yesterday, however, he handed me a real treat - about five or six hearty eggplants. Here, the eggplants are not very long - more rounded or pear shaped - and are referred to as "garden eggs." Yum!
Now if only the stove can get put back into one usable piece....

Satisfying the Palate Without Power

Unlike the occasional power outages in the US which typically result from a particularly strong storm, loss of electricity here in Tamale is a frequent occurrence. And, even when power is on, low voltage and/or inadequate electrical systems often do not allow for two or three appliances to run at the same time.
Cooking has been a special challenge for me, especially when preparing for a group of guests. Our small stove which runs on a butane gas tank works pretty well for stove-top cooking, but the malfunctioning oven is inconsistent to say the least. When I am lucky enough to manage lighting it (holding a lit match with pliers to maneuver the flame into the little dark hole), I hope that whatever I'm trying to bake has a chance to cook at somewhere near the correct temperature.
Heating food in our microwave is fine except of course when the power is out or the voltage is too low - this magically happening at supper time for the past few nights. When the meal is finally placed on the table, we often enjoy it sitting in the dark.
Then again, there is always fruit!!! Depending on what is in season, a variety of delicious items can certainly satisfy the palate. Unfortunately, mangoes are not in season at the moment, but pineapple and pawpaw are found in abundance.

Quiet Weekend

The three visiting GYN physicians traveled further north to the hospital in Nalerigu this past weekend in order to perform fistula repairs for women there.
Saturday morning, I met Jim in town after he finished seeing his patients and we did a few errands together - paid our broadband bill for the internet, picked up some items in the market, then stopped at the library. No dancing at any of the local night spots tonight, but we did speak with Jim, John, Beth and Stephen via Skype. Left-overs for supper and reading in bed under the mosquito net.
Like last Sunday, we again attended Mass at the small chapel on the hospital grounds since Jim wanted to check on his patients afterward. We also visited our friend, Dr. Bill Turner, in Intensive care as he is recovering from malaria; thankfully, he now seems to be doing much better. Ended the weekend going out for supper to a local place called "Mike's." By wearing long sleeves, long pants, socks, and spraying ourselves well, we were not bothered very much by mosquitos sitting at the outdoor tables.

Visiting MDs

Dr. Andy Norman, a GYN physician from Vanderbilt University in Tennessee, is back staying with us for a couple of weeks. Two female physicians who are staying at the Catholic Guest House in town accompanied him on this trip and all three are doing fistula repairs on Ghanaian women who have experienced difficult and long labor during childbirth.
While Jim is taking care of a serious snake bite and a deep facial cutlass laceration at Tamale Teaching Hospital and Andy, Karen and Candice are busy at the West Hospital in town, I try to put supper on the table for all of us at night. I like being chef of my own kitchen once again; our previous cook, left the area a few months ago. Shopping and food preparation take quite a bit longer than in the US, but it's all "do-able" and forces one to try and be creative. Daily boiling of lots of water is always on the agenda since we cannot drink that which comes out of the faucet. Found some nice eggplant yesterday so will attempt that for tomorrow. Tonight looks like it will be garlic and oil pasta with a side of beans.

Socializing

We were recently invited to a dinner held at a compound run by Baptist missionaries. A retired American couple from Indiana built a small group of buildings from which they minister to the local people and train visiting Baptist volunteers. The gathering was held in a large, round, screened gazebo in the center of the compound. Two of the visitors hailed from the French-speaking country of Burkina Faso, located about five hours north of Tamale, so I enjoyed a nice opportunity to use my French for the evening.

Market Madness

Tamale's huge open market consists of a labyrinth of multitudinous stalls containing various items of food, household products, clothing, cosmetics, toys, etc., etc. The narrow passageways have a partially enclosed wood covering above and a cement-like strip on the ground with a rut down the center to catch any water. People passing one another in opposite directions can pose quite a challenge. There seems to be no rhyme or reason to where particular goods are located; vegetables are next to handbags, meats are alongside hair accessories. Jim loves it! He thoroughly enjoys bargaining for a good price of a pineapple or hunting for a box of tinfoil. On a recent attempt to stock up on supplies, we could barely carry the shopping bags and maneuver the aisles at the same time. A young girl of about 12 or 13 came to the rescue with her large, round basin-like bowl, piled all the items inside and carried everything on her head until we were finished shopping.