Dont Drink the Water; Don't Eat the Rice

Every human being fancies him/herself a bit invincible at one point or another. It is the inability to face reality that ensures the human race progresses. But eventually we are all forced to confront our bodily limitations in various shades of humiliation. 

Rash overgeneralisations aside, this week's brought-to-you-by-Ghana-push-to-the-limit-moments have involved migraines, diarrhoea, explosive diarrhoea and an overnight trip to the local hospital. 

Fortunately, only one of the above situations involves me, and seeing as you're reading this you probably know that if I went to hospital the whole world would've known about it last week. So I'll leave my fragile condition to your imagination. 

I will say this. If you thought being sick at home was fun, you should try it whilst flirting with the idea that: 1. The school's toilet only flushes on a good day (and its  last good day appears to have been last July when you were here); 2. malaria tablets only work if you can keep them in.

Having learned a valuable life lesson when I accidentally food poisoned myself last May and still went to work, this time I green facedly bowed out of teaching for the day. Instead, I spent a morning rotating between my bed, the toilet and a bevy of bad films on Ghanaian television. Though I felt remarkably sorry for myself and annoyed that rice is one of the foods with the highest propensity to grow angry-faced bacteria and the only real 'vegetarian' option in a country of rice and meat eaters, it could've been worse.

And for Stacy, one of the student teachers, it was. Stomach bugs are relatively common to western stomachs in Africa with the change of scenery, change of climate, daily dose of anti-malarials, difference in hygiene standards. With me, it was a nuisance. For the student teachers who were sharing rooms, and therefore germs, it became a mini-epidemic. At one point last week, 5 of the 10 student teachers were so unwell they couldn't go to school. 

Unfortunately, Stacy had  pre-existing medical conditions of the autoimmune variety. She became dehydrated after not eating or drinking for nearly three days and thus the decision was made to take her to hospital. Initial reports of conditions there were grim: digging for veins with a needle for ten minutes, filthy ward conditions, the dying lying inches from the immunocompromised. Walking blood and stool samples on your own to be tested and picked up, referring to the price list and  paying before treatment.  Fortunately, the doctors were ace.

Too many things hit home for me though. We never had any serious brushes with sickness last summer and dealing with hospitals never occurred to me. I never considered the medical compromises a Ghanaian makes, not a choice but a reality. And because I love someone immunally challenged, it made me so eternally grateful of a National Health Service that's stretched to the limits but is head and shoulders cleaner, safer and more efficient than here. No judgment. No disrespect. This comes from a place of genuine fear. 

So there Ghana goes teaching me something else. 

As for Stacy, she's doing fine after her brush with bacterial gastroenteritis. She  won't be eating the rice any time soon. Me, I'm tucked up in bed with my new best friend, the anti-bacterial hand gel. We've become close these last few days; I reckon it's a relationship built to last.