TOBABS

Greetings from Gambia!

I haven't been able to post as much as I would like, but finally found an internet cafe that has fast enough connection. We arrived in Brikama early thursday morning and were warmly greeted by all of the lodge staff.  The accommodations are fantastic! We each share rooms with one other person and have our own bathroom and shower.  Its almost like a hotel which is definitely not what I was expecting! The staff have become some of our very best friends and we go everywhere with them!
We had an orientation at the hospital and got to meet everyone involved and tour the facility.  My initial thoughts were a concern for the cleanliness.  Not so much personal sanitation but more about the facility itself.  It really is amazing how much they can do with such little supplies and funding though.  The biggest part of the facility is the maternity ward.  They have about 15 deliveries a day! Yesterday we went there to assist in National Cleaning Day which the president announces every month on the last saturday.  We helped clean the ward which is way more disgusting than you want to hear! As we were putting the room back together, there was a woman about to go into labor so of course we couldn't pull ourselves away! I got to hold her hand as she delivered and got a front row seat to my first birth! The differences are incredible.  First of all, no one is allowed with the woman in the room, so the father is not present and they aren't allowed to visit until after the woman is moved to a more permanent room.  Secondly, the room is shared with nine beds and no dividers so at the time there were 4 women laboring in the same room at the same time.  They also use no pain meds and its incredible that they make almost no noise at all! It really makes me wonder how much culture affects how vocal women are.  The next birth we saw was a little more difficult to watch.  It was the woman's first birth and the baby was stuck in the birth canal so they were worried about the baby going into distress.  After using several extremely painful techniques (such as slamming down on her stomach!) they made a makeshift vacuum and pulled the baby out.  Needless to say it was hard to watch but interesting in a medical standpoint.
The people here are wonderful! I just can't get enough of the kids! They call us tobabs which means white person!  It seems offensive but its actually their way of admiring us? or so they tell us! When we walk a mile to work we probably hear it a hundred times- not exaggerating! They run to us wanting to rub our skin and hair and just keep saying it over and over! Its really adorable.  As I sit, there is a little girl sitting on the ground looking at us and saying it over and over. very cute! Yesterday these two kids got into a fist fight about who was going to hold my hand.  We got out the bubbles last night and it was like christmas to them.  I swear they could have been entertained for hours. There is one little boy named Pamusa that is the child of a lady that works at the lodge.  At first he cried every time he saw me because he had never seen a white person before. Its hard to get used to the idea that we are the special ones because of something we never even notice.
The food has actually been really great surprisingly.  My favorite dish is called benechin and its like a fried rice with barracuda dish. SO GOOD! We also like a dish called domodou which is cous cous (type of potato rice) with fish meatballs and a type of peanut. The way they eat with very different.  They all crowd around one huge bowl and eat with their fingers.  so gross i know! Thankfully we get our own plate.  I tried to send a picture of us eating with them out of the bowl today but couldn't get it to send. We have found some weird meat though.  Olivia, a girl in our group, decided to buy a kabob at the market that smelled so good.  Later we found out it was goat heart. so glad I didn't try it.  Today we had a mixture of beef and goat liver in our benechin.  Thankfully I didn't get any and didn't know.  Overall, I'm surviving on Gambian food better than I thought I would.  The absolute best thing are cous cous pancakes.  Mom would LOVE them! Its a fried baseball sized banana flavored pancake.  I can't get enough of them.
Everything has been going great for the most part! We are still trying to adjust to the heat but it seems to be getting better.  Every other night we don't have electricity so nights without fans are rough.  Yesterday marked the beginning of the rainy season and the weather cooled off tremendously! We couldn't have been happier! The one drawback to the rainy season is more bugs.  BIG ones.  Yesterday we had to eat on the ground because our table was covered with them, every square inch. They said they will go away after the second rain in a row so only one more night.

We each have our own Gambian name and I was given Isa, pronounced Ice-uh.  It is unbelievable how fast we seem to fit in and feel at home.  I love Gambia so far but miss you very much!

LOVE YOU!
Morgan, or Isa :)