Although it seems that time is flying by, I've only spent three days in the HIV Clinic of Chogoria Hospital so far. There are too many moments that I have been reminded how little time some of us have here. I'm meeting children who know no life without HIV, whether they are seropositive or have a parent that is. One of our patients was admitted over the weekend because of blindness and limb weakness that has developed over the past 2 weeks. She is in her 30's and most likely this is an opportunistic infection that she will succumb to. She is no longer able to coherently answer our questions and her muscles are flaccid. At the end of each day, the other four medical students on this trip convene with our preceptor, Dr. MacIntosh, for discussion of interesting cases. Each student is stationed in a different ward and luckily some stories are more enlightening than mine. It's hard to shake it off at 5:30. More detailed medical cases to come, it's 11pm and I have a run scheduled for 6am up the main road- literally up- the Chogoria route to Mount Kenya.
A view from our foot path of a tea plantation.
During a morning hike, a little boy spotted us from a cliff above and on the way back he was in the same place with the yellow flower in outstretched arms, I motioned for him to come down and we made an exchange, of giggles first, then I accepted his flower and opened my other hand- there was a perfectly intact yellow and blue butterfly for him I had happened to find on the road. His face opened up like the flower he had given me and he ran up the crumbly red dirt hill to his playmates.
Medical students house- still waiting on a shower and refrigerator but hey, we have a veggie/fruit garden in the back yard, an electric stove (2/4 burners work), and a normal toilet.
Chogoria's main road
Kids on their way home from school and slew of cattle and goats.
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