Postcards From Lumwana: 2012

Week 37

Another busy week. Clement turned up at the house on Monday to tell me that Benjamin (his son) and Readness (his niece, not sure how her name is spelt. Clement is her guardian as her mother, Clements sister died) were both sick and he needed to take them to the doctors. He had no phone charge and so could not call me. He wanted to go home so he could then walk them 4 km to the doctor’s in Meheba. Carol was also sick and so Laura and I went with Clement to pick the kids up and bring them back to site to get checked out. Readness was fine, just had a cold and cough. Benjamin had Malaria and was very sick. He was admitted to the clinic and put on IV quinine straight away. I took Readness home and informed Joyce, Clements wife what was going on. As the clinic is just that, I took Clement and Ben in some lunch and then dinner that night. Benjamin was not looking good.

I missed Lorraine’s farewell, but I was able to say good-bye later on.

The next morning, Benjamin had shown great improvement as his Malaria test revealed a big improvement. He was able to be released on oral anti-malarial’s. So I was able to take them both home. That afternoon was Carrie’s farewell lunch. It was a lovely afternoon and it will be sad to see her and Abby go. Abby has just started talking and it will a shame not to watch her grow.

On Wednesday, Carol turned up to work, but she was not well. So we went up to the clinic with her. Thankfully, she did not have Malaria, but she did need to go home and rest. By the time we got to school for Fabian’s birthday party it was pouring with rain and Laura and I got drenched. The rain did not let up and we all got soaked getting back to the car. So it was home, bath and Pj’s for all of us. I then made the cake for the Kindy’s final day of 2012 on Thursday.

Thursday morning I had to finish the cake for Tom’s class and then go up for the last day party. I can’t believe he has finished 1 year of school already. His report was wonderful to read and the praise he received from his teachers was wonderful. I am so proud of my little boy.

That night we had the School Assembly. Tom and his class sang ‘I’m a little Dinosaur” and “Jingle Bells’. The other classes put on plays and then certificates were handed out. Then Santa arrived to hand out presents to all the children. Laura had left by this point as it was getting late, so she missed Santa, but Tom gave him a hug.

Friday was a recovery day from the busy week.

On Saturday we went to Michelle’s house for her 29^th birthday party. I made the cake and it was the first time I had made fondant roses. I will get better with time, but again, so far so good with my experiments.

Sunday was a quiet day as we were all tired, but I spent a bit of time in the kitchen making wheat-bix balls, a jam swiss roll which turned out really well (Phil complained he only gets left over cake these days) and 140 ginger biscuits. We won’t run out of biscuits for at least 1 week now.LOL….

Week 38

I knew we would not make it to our holiday sickness free. I was up at the clinic first thing with Laura Monday morning. She had a high fever. Thankfully it turned out to be nothing. When we got home from the clinic I had an e-mail informing me that Laura would now not be going to Kindy next year. One of the mum’s had complained (her child had to wait a year and so she felt Laura could wait too) and so it went to the GM of the mine who over ruled the decision to let Laura go. I won’t comment further as it still makes me so mad. Some people have nothing better to do here. Why on earth you would prevent someone else's child from getting an Education is beyond me! This place is really starting to get to me. The politics and some people are enough to drive a sane person crazy.

On Tuesday, I had to take Tom to the clinic as he woke up with a fever, so we had to get him checked for Malaria. Thankfully he was clear. I was still so angry and so went for a walk to clear my head. I decided to resign from the LTG. This was a difficult decision for me and one I hated to make. But, it seems that the more you put into this community here, the more some fellow expats find things to complain about. I have had problems in the past with people criticising the work of the LTG and as I was a member, it has fallen on me. After the issue with my blog (the reason it went private), Laura's refusal into Kindy and now this after all the health issues we have had to deal with, I cannot deal with any more. So I have decided to rule out all the reasons for people to attack my good work, by giving it up. I will miss my work at LTG, but it looks as though I will need to home school Laura in Kindy next year (can you believe that? home schooling Kindy), so that will keep me busy. I feel as though I am letting the local community down. Phil and I came here to help. We wanted to give back to the local community, not just come here earn the big bucks and go. I am starting to get bitter.

Tom had to go back to the clinic on Wednesday as he had developed a cough. He was diagnosed with a chest infection and put on antibiotics. I then went for a drive to get away from site. I went to Masulwila to ask them to make some wooden products for me. The craft guys from Solwezi are making me 12 different animals to hang up and so I am getting the Masulwila craft guys to make me a wooden Xmas tree to hang them on. I have also asked them to make me one of their gorgeous women that they carve. They really are very talented and I love visiting this village.

Back to the clinic on Thursday as Tom was having trouble breathing with his coughing and was losing his voice. They put him on IV antibiotics as he was now vomiting as well. The sister up at the clinic thinks my kids don’t like Zambia, I feel Zambia doesn’t like my kids…Lol. I cannot believe how sick they have been and neither can anyone else. I have been told that 2 families before have had to leave due to sick children. I think we may be the third.

Friday we were again up to the clinic for Tom’s second lot of IV antibiotics. I then went for a walk to clear my head again, I really am struggling. There are a lot of mushrooms out at the moment and so the kids and I went out to take photos of all the different kinds. As a result of Tom being sick still, we just crashed at home for the rest of the day. I was so tired since I had been up every night with kids since Sunday.

Yesterday we all went to the clinic as Laura has now developed a cough, so I thought we should get her checked out as well. Thankfully, she just has a cough / cold and I am getting the same. We only have 4 more days before we leave for holidays and I can’t wait. One of the places we are going to does massages…………oh the bliss!!!!!

Today has been quiet. It is now raining. Laura has just woken up and the boys are still asleep. The kids will probably open their presents tonight that they have been sent, since we can’t take them all with us. That way they can work out what they want to take with us. My sister’s presents have still not turned up. Her parcels always take 3 months for some reason. The others have all arrived. So I am sure the kids will have fun. Santa no doubt will deliver here and so when we get back the kids will have more to open, not to mention the presents we will give them on Xmas day. It will be unusual having a Xmas in a hotel. I have never done that before. There has always been lots of cooking and lots of dishes!!!

We leave on Thursday for South Africa and will be spending 3 weeks a way. It should be a great break and what we all need.

I will not write again until after Xmas, so I wish all my readers:

Merry Christmas and a

Happy New Year!