Time is FLYING.

I only have 2 weeks and 2 days left in Ghana...where is the time going?

This past weekend the volunteers took a trip to Wli...the list is as follows:
Me
Kim...US, Texas
Deena...US, LA (I think)
Harry...England
Nicole...England
Kate...England
Kanya...Australia
Jo...Australia
Nick...Holland
Corina...Switzerland
Sabine...Denmark
Phillip...Denmark
We had a great time. We stayed in The Waterfall Lodge and it was gorgeous. It was a 5 hour tro ride...but it honestly wasn't so bad. If you had told me two weeks ago that I would be able to sleep on a tro, I wouldn't have believed you...but it is true.  The first day we hung out and played football (soccer) and volleyball...and just joked around. The next day we did the hikes to the waterfalls. I attempted to hike to the upper falls...which is about 4 miles...uphill about the steepness of bleachers...up a mountain. The whole hike lasted about 2 hours. 5 minutes in...feeling good. 10 minutes in...face red and struggling to catch a breath. 15 minutes in...literally can't catch a breath and borrow an inhaler. 20 minutes in...still having trouble breathing and soaked through my shirt with sweat. 25 minutes in...two girls turn back but I'm too stubborn and decide to lead the group to set the pace a bit slower. 30 minutes in...I give it up. I was pretty confident that if I continued, the others in the group would be forced to deal with my limp body when I passed out. We weren't even halfway there and I was struggling to see straight...so I went back down to the lower falls....the problem being that the other girls had already turned back, so I was forced to go back alone.
    Now I don't know if any of you have ever been alone in an African jungle, but if you have, you will probably agree with me that it is the single most terrifying thing to happen to me in my entire life. Especially since another group of volunteers a couple weeks ago had a Green Mamba snake fall into the middle of their group while hiking the same mountain. As if descending a bleacher-steep, rocky mountain wasn't hard enough to do alone...I was constantly thinking that I was being stalked by a leopard or was about to tread in deadly snake territory. So it took me about 40 minutes of mountain descending alone before I found the other girls. I've never seen my knees shake so badly...I was sure they were just going to fail me and leave me stranded forever. But they, and I, kept going somehow...Praying (literally) the entire time that I would not end up as a jungle cat's dinner, or somehow get myself pinned between rocks like that guy who had to cut off his arm.
    All of it was worth it, though. Kate, Corina and I spent some time in the lower falls and it was stunning. I got lots of pictures and had a nice, refreshing swim (which I found out later DOES contain parasites...more on that later) and cooled off.

   Monday I had my last day in ART and followed around a dietician . It was interesting but I didn't get much hands on action that day. I did, however, learn how to take blood pressures which I know will prove to be useful later in life.
   Tuesday was my first day in PMTCT (Prevention of mother to child transmission) where I actually performed HIV and Syphillis tests on pregnant women. I got to prick their fingers and put the blood on the testing strips and add the reagents to see the results. We tested about 40 women and only 2 out of the 40 were positive for HIV (nobody was positive for Syphillis). One lady didn't really say much when she was told her results. I got the impression she may have been expecting it. The other lady was heartbreaking, however. She didn't cry, but when I looked in her eyes I could see all of the fear that she was trying to hold in. Apparently she had just been granted a visa to the U.S. (which is really hard for Ghanaians to do) and was terrified they would take it away from her now that she tested positive. I hope that they don't. This was probably the hardest moment that I have had here so far.
   Wednesday was an African holiday...African Unity Day...so we were off of work. All of the girl volunteers went to the pool at the hotel Shangri La and spent the day there. It was extremely relaxing. Later that night, I fell down the stairs at home...really hurt and now I have quite a few deep bruises :-/
    Today was my last day in PMTCT and I spent the day watching 2 month old babies and 9 month old babies get vaccinated. These babies were not HIV babies, but normal, healthy babies. I got to hold a few of them...which really started to confirm my thoughts that I may want to work with babies for a living. I got some great pictures...I'm finally comfortable enough with the culture to know when it is appropriate to ask someone for a picture. A lot of women are hesitant, especially when their children are involved...but I am happy to say that the women I asked today were very happy to participate. Some even took pictures of me! After work I stopped by the pharmacy to get some parasite medicine from swimming at Wli... taking the medicine will also ensure my safety if I want to swim again this weekend in Ada-foah because the water there also contains the same parasite. But all is well, and the medicine was cheap so we'll see! :)

Side note...someone don't let me forget to tell Carmen about spider-hunting and bug bite shockers.

Hope everyone is well and I will blog again soon!
Erin