Clinic of Murara

A couple of miles down the road from Nyundo lies the town of Gisenyi. The road sweeps around the mountains and when taking the last turn, Lake Kivu makes a breathtaking entry. I knew from that instant I was going to fall in love with this place.With the faces of many of the children still in the back of my head, I checked in at the Presbyterian guesthouse. It’s a church-run centre that offers accommodation and room for seminars and gatherings. They even have a little restaurant and it’s set in a nice garden in the middle of Gisenyi town. Just around the corner and next to the hostel is the church, where people would meet up daily to sing. On the other side of town (read: at the end of the dirtroad) there’s a big mosque where they open up shop at 5am. Not great if you want to sleep in, but it does make it a vibrant town.

Murara
I joined volunteers Charlotte and Jane to a little village called Murara, where we met Erin, a young 'kiwi' who has been assisting for a couple of weeks at the clinic. It takes about 45 minutes on foot to reach the small clinic that’s mainly run by a couple of local nurses. Mr. P., the French-American ‘doc’, has an organisation that’s been helping out and supporting the clinic for the past two years. He told us the craziest stories that really put things back in perspective.

He had for instance people in who had terrible accidents with machetes: he’s seen them in heads, legs,…. and often wounds would lead to amputations as there are no supplies to treat them effectively. You see many people around in town who miss limbs and are severely handicapped.

The clinic has a very basic laboratory, a couple of consultation rooms, and a maternity section which consists out of three rooms. In the waiting room you’ve got about 6-8 beds, often with two women lying in one bed. Then there’s the delivery room, which made me feel all dizzy as soon as I came in. The smell of old blood was just too much and I remember Charlotte saying “oh, they must’ve cleaned it, because earlier this week there was blood all over the place.” I can’t describe the smell, but it got to me (I’m not so good with blood anymore) and I had to get out of there before I knocked down to the floor. In the last room, you’d have another 8 beds or so, where women were resting with their newborn. Not all of them deliver at the clinic. Some women have shown up on the doorstep, holding the baby in one hand and the placenta in the other, or with the placenta still inside them. Unbelievable! I didn’t see it myself, but I heard it from the other volunteers. There’s even a concrete wastebin outside, where they throw the placentas in. I wanted to go and have a look, but decided better not to, referring to my sensitive stomach.

Rape & HIV
I met two girls that day who were about fifteen-years old. Margerite is handicapped as she lost a leg due to an infection. Being all vulnerable, she got brutally raped and ended up pregnant. She’s got a beautiful four-month old boy named Eric, whom she loves very much, but at the same time will – without a doubt – always remind her about that violent incident.

Another girl got raped by one of her uncles, who infected her with HIV. A group of women at the clinic are all HIV positive and they set up a little business in making beads from recycled magazines. They’d cut the pages in small strips that have a wide base and a small top. On a toothpick they roll the paper up, glueing it together and then varnish the whole thing. With these beads they make necklaces, bracelets and earrings. I bought some as I found them very creative and the money goes directly to these women who try to make a living.

After wandering around the clinic for a bit, I visited the test lab where they were having blood samples tested on HIV. It’s a rapid test that works almost like a pregnancy test but instead of urine, blood’s used. Two lines would mean ‘HIV positive’. Out of roughly every ten, you’d have one that tests positive. Not sure how to interpret such results, but overall, not that bad I guess, it could be better, but it could be much worse around here.

Goodies
Doc suggested I’d give out the goodies to the children of the Murara village around the clinic. These kids walk barefooted on sharp rocks and dusty or muddy sandroads, many of them only get to eat once in a couple of days. Some of them go to school, but many others can’t pay the schoolfees and don’t go at all. People are extremely poor. There is no electricity and a waterpump is providing the village with water.

A local villager gathered some of the children and of course it was pure chaos, but they were extremely excited. Jane spent almost half an hour to get them lined up, which lasted for about 10 minutes maybe. I started giving out little sets of crayons and a pen, some of the older children got a booklet or a ruler. But the drums must have send out a message cause all of a sudden hundreds of children came running up the hill to the clinic to get their share.

We had to take our stuff to another building as the consultation area – where we set up initially – became too crowded and it disturbed the patients. Children were pulling and pushing and sqeezing in, just to get something. I didn’t have enough anymore for everyone and decided to give out one thing at a time. At one point, things got out of hand, Jane couldn’t control them anymore and they would’ve practically killed me in order to get to the box with pencils. I walked away saying ‘finished’, but they wouldn’t take no for an answer. It was funny in a way and cute, but I got a bit scared, cause I was surrounded by children and couldn’t move anymore. They’d pull arms and legs to get your attention – and a pencil.

I did the stupidest thing, but there was no other way: I grabbed some pencils and threw them behind the group of children (in order not to hit any of them with the sharp points) and some ended up in a cropfield. The owner was pretty upset as the children were running around like crazy to get to the goodies. I had no idea, just thinking about the safety of the children. Jane said it was not a good idea cause they would kill eachother, but there was no other way, I couldn’t get out of the crowd and all the other helpers left. Anyway, it did make me feel a bit guilty, cause of course they nearly killed eachother and kids got run over and cried and I helped them up, but it just got out of hand as the entire village showed up. Five minutes later, things got back to normal, some children left without anything, but I couldn’t cater for the entire village. Despite the last incident, I’m still happy I was able to donate my goodies to a good purpose and see many happy children going home.

Overwhelmed
The clinic left a very strong impression. Some people would wait a couple of days in front of the clinic just to see a doctor and others would walk almost two days to even get there. Whenever they do have to deal with severe cases, they send them off to Gisenyi hospital. Such as little Margarite, who’s remaining leg is now infected as well. Let’s hope she’ll get the right treatment and will still be able to live quite a normal life with little Eric. The only family she’s got is an aunt, who doesn’t really want her around and so she’s often out on the street, with her baby, without any food or place to go to. It does make you think twice about our lives, doesn’t it.

These are just a couple of examples of daily life around the clinic and without a doubt it gets to you and overwhelms you. We live in a sterile bubble back home, complaining about a million things, pumping our babies full with medicine for this and that, but sometimes I think the only ones putting themselves at risk is us. We tend to overdo everything and the slightest change in breathing or heartbeat would make us rush to the ER. I’m not saying it isn’t good we have access to all that, we’re very lucky to have such high standards, but we take all this for granted in our secure lives. In Africa, nothing is for sure.

Making a difference
Just by visiting this place for a day, where you see injured people walk in and out, where they have to operate, deliver, amputate without the right supplies, without proper anaesthetics, and staff that is only trained for the bandage removal, you do see that medical people are needed around the world and they do make a huge difference. I stood there in a silly way with my pencils, trying to do something for the children. Which is also okay I guess, but still, to really help out, you should be a team of doctors and nurses heading down to a place like this. Mr. P. has done a wonderful job at the clinic and he will continue doing so in the future. People like him put their own lives on hold or take financial risks to save lives of total strangers. I guess you can only do that and keep it up when you’re very much devoted to helping others. It is remarkable and admirable.

Sometimes I can’t help wondering whether or not efforts like these are a lost cause. As if it’s trying to dry up the floor with the watertap wide open. Providing supplies and medical help is not enough. People need to be trained and educated about sex, protection, hygiene, wound care, and safety. Not only time and money, but (foreign) expertise and the willingness to adapt a new mentality are needed. All this will take many years and we’ll probably won’t live long enough to see it, but meanwhile we can only have the deepest respect for people who do try to make a difference.

Thursday 31st March – Gisenyi 25 degrees