Sunday again

hotel Azynzolo

lobby of the hotel

This morning I came to get breakfast and the kitchen was closed. I went to the reception to ask about it and the man said: sorry the lady is unwell. At that moment the boss came in, heard it and started real shouting: Bullshit. So he has phoned her and she is coming. This is the hotel I am staying at. It is near to the town centre, nice shady terrace and friendly people. Only this boss….. It is sometimes very strange to see how people communicate with each other.  A kind of staccato hard talking. Also to patients they talk like this. Someone enters: PAPER! Not please , not do you have a referral.  Have to get used to it. At the other hand very friendly, always laughing. Shaking hands a lot. What I also like very much is the music everywhere.  

bushmeat, dried wild rabbit

So on Tuesday I started with my second project, a small ultrasound office in Navrango, 25 km from here. They want to expand but it appeared they want me also to teach ultrasound. Albert is a real nice guy, he has studied business, but after some years working for a sugar company decided to start this. He trained himself and in some course to be an ultrasonographist, and he is rather good now. He has two trainees and a lady from another clinic, whom I have to train. We saw one lady who appeared to have a twin and she told us she has two twins already

guinea fowl eggs


Organisation is difficult. As there is no proper hotel in that village I still stay in Bolgatanga.

shea fruit

He borrowed the car from his brother and we drive every day up and down.It is a beautiful trip, nice landscape. on the road we buy guineafowl eggs and sheanut fruit and many other fresh vegetables In the evening I am invited in their house for dinner. His wife is nice, she is a police officer. And cooks very well!!!

The second they we went to Navrongo we suddenly stopped….. petrol finished.  We could see a petrol station  about 800 mt further down, we pushed the car, then the station had no petrol!!!! The big problem is this week the prices of the petrol .The government is going to higher the price of petrol next week , so all the tanks are closed ,waiting for the high price. There is a real crisis here. I saw on the news hundreds of cars, stuck in Accra. Anyway there were some boys who went in the village and bought two lt. of petrol for us. At that time for $1,5.  That evening he bought some more on the black market. Two days later we got stuck again, now on our way to Chiana, a small place where he goes every fortnight to make ultrasounds. This was really in the middle of nowhere , hot, middle of the day. We were lucky there was one tree. He went hitching on a motor cycle, bought 1 gallon in the next village- now $ 3 /lt .

black market

waiting for fuel

 It is a nice little town, a clinic with 2 midwifes, about daily one delivery. She gave us the bushmeat, a dried wild rabbit. Which i ate yesterday and it was delicious. We finished our program and came safely home. Someone told him that if he went at 04.00 in the morning to a certain tank there would be petrol. He waited 4 hours, then gave up. So yesterday we bought on the black market again $4/lt  Albert persisted to go to Paga, where the  sacred crocodiles are. I rather didn’t, afraid to get stuck again.  But we made it and had a nice day. His wife , daughter and a friend were with us. Paga is the border town to Burkina Fasso. A lake with lots of crocodiles is the attraction there. Of course they fed a chicken and we had to “sit” on itTwo more days and the trip comes to an end.

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