frustration

Written March 7, 2013

Morning everyone, how has the week been? I hope that everyone is staying warm and safe from the massive snowstorms rolling through, or enjoying the snow out on the slopes!

So life has been pretty par for the course here, nothing too crazy exciting. I had a terrrrrrrriiiibblllleee day on Tuesday. Nothing seemed to go right, and I almost broke down in tears in the middle of the market. I am finding my work in the hospital to be very stressful, not sustainable, and overall generally very annoying. I don’t really enjoy spending time there, and I think it shows. I greet my Peer Educators with aplomb, because that is who I am there to work with, but then everyone splits off into their respective areas to work, and I head into reception to help try and organize the clusterfuck (pardon my french, but that’s what it is) of paperwork. Shaking my head on a daily basis the amount of disorganization and chaos that ensues searching for a specific persons file, while overhearing phrases like “where did that pile of papers from yesterday go” to find out that that “pile of papers” are people’s CD4 counts- something rather, um I dunno, IMPORTANT, to knowing if they should be given the ARV medication or not.

Ugh.

So my work there is frustrating, and I keep saying that I cant continue to do what it is I am doing – that’s not my role, nor my responsibility – that we should hire someone for me to train, and get another few people in the reception area to work with the ONE receptionist. This usually falls on deaf ears with under the breath mumbles “we don’t need to hire people if we have you to work for free” its infuriating.

So I left the hospital, and walked across the street to my CBO (community based organization) to find that they are planning an entirely new project. Which is great, it really is wonderful that they are making plans, moving forward and doing sustainable work, its just annoyed me that this was never even mentioned in our weekly meetings, or the many times I stop by there during the week. So I sat in the meeting with a dumbfounded expression on my face, not able to contribute anything to the process. Making me feel worthless for the second time that day.

With all that said and done, I said to myself “self, you deserve a nice cold coca-cola at Dona Julia’s shop”.  So I took my frustrated, sweaty self down into town – to find that her shop was just overrun with people, and that she was incredibly busy. FAIL.

The next brilliant idea that popped into my mind – “self, go buy some avocado’s and have one for lunch”. So I went over to one of the ladies selling avocados, and started selecting 4 that I liked. Now to get a good mental picture of what is about to happen, please imagine small pyramids of 4 avocado’s on top of a tarp, most of the time, the purchaser can select whatever avocado’s he/she wishes . . . . NOT THIS TIME. The woman started yelling at me that I was taking all the big avocado’s. I promised her that I wasn’t, I was just selecting the ones I wanted to eat (some had bumps/bruises). She continued to yell at me and told me that I was only to take the pile from which I selected my first avocado. I demanded my money back while other women in the market were yelling that I could go over to them to pick any avocado that I wanted. The woman refused to hand over my money – playing hide and seek with it, much like a 3 year old does when they don’t want to give something up (mind you this woman was probably in her mid 60’s). finally I snatched the money from her hand, assured her I would never buy avocado’s from her again, and marched out of the market.

It was possibly the most frustrating experience I have had in the marketplace since first getting to site when I didn’t speak any Portuguese and was still incredibly intimidated.

After all of this, I finally make it home (no neighbors in sight to help calm me down) thinking to myself “self, you deserve a nice glass of wine, and a movie in front of your fan”. . . to find that my fan is broken beyond repair. FAIL

It was not a good day for me.

I went to bed early, shaking my fist at this crazy place called Mozambique.

The week has since turned around a bit, but I am still generally frustrated with many things, and wishing I had a bit of an escape. I am looking forward to tomorrow night – I’m going up to Inharrime (the next town north) for the evening to hang out with Jasmin and Veronica. We are going to have dinner, watch a movie, and hopefully I’ll get my hair trimmed! I need a little escape from life here. I really hope this will help.

Its great to hear from those at home. Keep the emails coming

Xoxo

t