October 16 - Moving on
I took Ben out of the other school last week on Thursday. Ben came
home crying because he was afraid to make a mistake on his homework.
The teacher had again verbally threatened him with getting hit if he
didn't do his homework, and a different teacher came in and actually
threatened him physically with a long piece of rubber that they use
for switching children here. So I told him he didn't have to go back.
Loren and I went to the school on the Friday and heard the teacher out
(I did tell Ben that if he was lying about it that he would learn what
a real switching was). The teacher basically said that he has a bunch
of bad kids who don't listen so what was he supposed to do. I just
shut my mouth and let Loren talk. I did learn that there are children
here who are very spoiled at home and the parents expect the teachers
to discipline their children for them (not completely unlike Canada as
far as I can tell). So fine, if the parent says to you, yes, please
beat my children for me, who am I? But Ben is a good kid and will do
exactly what you ask more or less immediately. The only reason he
wouldn't is if he hadn't understood. Anyway, that is done.

We started at a new school on Tuesday. There is a bus that takes him
back and forth. The new school is a little smaller – he is in a split
class, basically grades 2 and 3. There are only 7 grade 2 students and
10 grade 3s. There is a teacher and an aide for his class. Most of the
teachers are from Ghana so they all speak fluent English. I asked the
teacher to find something else for Ben to do during his 2 hours of
English a week as they are just learning their colours and numbers.
Ben could teach the class. Ben seems a lot happier here.

Thanks for all the concern about the malaria. Still haven't quite
figured out what went on but it's gone and I feel 100% again. It took
a long time for the last fevers, nausea and dizziness to go away. I
figure I was sick for easily 10 full days.

The latest entertainment is the new bug bites. I was bit by a black
ant on the leg, when I was sick and sleeping on the mattress on the
floor. It was like half my leg was burning and it felt like I was
getting bitten over again every hour or so for about a day. Weird. The
other bite is worse. I got 2 bites, one on my wrist and the other
under my arm. The one on my wrist I noticed, it looked like a blister.
I carefully broke it and wiped up the water, then put polysporin on
it. Where the water from the blister went on my skin, another blister
appeared. So I did the same thing and it eventually dried up. But it
looks like I have a burn on my wrist. The one under my arm looked like
a blood blister about 3 mm in diameter. I didn't pop it but I should
have. I put a bandaid on it and it broke during the night while I was
sleeping. All the liquid was contained by the bandaid thankfully but
when I took off the bandaid, I had a huge blister the size of the
gauze inside the bandaid. It being under my arm it was very hard to
contain even with bandaids so I now have about a dozen blisters in my
underarm, all of which were getting infected and kinda sore. Some of
them are from putting Polysporin on and it spreading around. They are
slowly healing but I will have a number of scars from it. Clark had
one on his back that broke and the liquid spread in such a way that he
looks like he was whipped across his side at his ribs.

I found a gym for $30/month. It's small but has a treadmill, fans,
mats and some resistance equipment. It's better than running outside
and I can do some weights as well as practice some karate. It's really
hard to do stuff at home since the floor is concrete with a textured
tile overlay which is really hard on the feet. There isn't much space
at the gym but enough to practice kicks and jumps and drills, if not
katas. I feel SO out of shape. I had to start back at a 1:1 learn to
run pace but am quickly improving. The 2 miles I had to run for my
black belt exam in 16 minutes is currently taking me closer to 30
minutes but at least I can run 2 miles now. It is still quite hot in
the gym (low 30s - cool compared to outside!) but at least it's not in
the blazing sun. My goal is to be back in at least brown belt form by
Christmas. Black belt form would probably be dreaming but I can
probably get there before hot season (March). However it will be hard
to do if I can't find someone to train with (come here a sec, Loren...
hahaha).

Ben's health has been okay. He was complaining of stomach aches so I
had my mom send a parasite cleanse. I think the parasites here are a
little bigger than those found at home so there was no apparent effect
from the cleanse. So unfortunately had to go back to plan B –
antibiotics. Started him on a course and within a couple days there
was marked improvement. I guess we'll use the cleanse to keep things
cleaned up afterwards!

Otherwise everything is same old, same old. Hope everyone is well.

October 5 - Palu or not palu that is the question.
Well it was bound to happen. I think it almost got spoken into
existence – you know when you forget to say: knock on wood? I was out
Saturday afternoon with Loren and some of his friends (or at least
with a bunch of people at the bar he goes to regularly) and one man
asked me if I hadn't gotten sick yet and I said no. I knew I was
having some kind of dehydration/heat exhaustion issue as my skin was
always hot and dry unless I was working out vigorously. However, I
left there to go home and almost immediately started to feel sick. My
bones ached and I had a headache, my temperature was over 38oC and I
didn't feel like eating or drinking. Classic signs of malaria
(paludisme or palu for short) – feels like the flu. But you just don't
know. I mean there are always so many things that have similar
symptoms. So I waited to see, I took Ibuprofen which broke my fever
and the pain so I could sleep. I slept fitfully until nearly noon on
Sunday. I had to move to the other room and sleep on a mattress on the
floor because it gets so hot in my room.

I took my curative dose of Malarone Sunday morning (4 pills a day for
3 consecutive days) – I don't ever take preventative because I believe
doing that is kind of like taking antibiotics just in case, just
creates resistance (I do make Ben take it however, it would be brutal
to watch your child go through that.). I drank 3 litres of water and
juice and finally ate. My fever went up to 39.5 deg so I took some
ibuprofen and it broke quickly, leaving me a big sweaty mess, I felt
like I had taken the 3 litres and dumped it over my body. My body
hurts from sleeping too much. So I've gone through 2 cycles of that,
and hopefully it will break tomorrow with the last dose of Malarone

When I was here before, I got sick about 6 weeks in, just before
Christmas. That was different symptoms, I think it was a stomach
parasite but I did take a curative does of Mefloquine just in case.
That in itself is probably worse than the symptoms of malaria as I was
hallucinating and kept passing out. So I took some antibiotics and I
was fine.
Benny is having tummy troubles, I think he is a little dehydrated but
I started him on a 15 day parasite cleanse that my mom sent me. If
that doesn't work, then we'll go to a round of antibiotics as it's
been going on for awhile. I trust Loren's judgement on this as he's
been living in the bush a long time where access to medical care has
been quite limited so he is pretty knowledgeable about symptoms and
treatments.

Loren invited Ben to go to work with him last Saturday. Loren is
building a tourist camp for some Belgian lady so Ben tagged along. I
don't think he was much help, Loren said he followed him around for a
bit, then found a trench with frogs in it and was more interested in
throwing rocks at the frogs. Boys.

Boring post and short. Not much further to report. Loren got a plumber
in to fix all the plumbing so we can shower now (instead of bucket
baths), can flush the toilets instead of having to fill a bucket of
water to run the water down and can brush our teeth in the bathroom
instead of the kitchen. Not a huge change, you get used to that sort
of thing pretty quickly. I'm sure I'll even forget a few times and
bucket bath out of habit. We'll get the place painted shortly and some
of the electrical stuff fixed up too. Again, pretty used to the
status quo so not exciting exactly.

I still haven't figured out what I want to do. I was reading Michael
Crighton's State of Fear (this came from an argument with Derek,
Loren's brother who I argue with all the time – Loren calls it arguing
with a rock – a fairly apt description). Derek thinks he knows
something about climate change from reading this novel, although he
did admit that none of his opinions were based on any facts or
knowledge. I believe climate change is happening and that it is at
least partially created anthropogenic ally however I think Crighton
makes a point that there is so much wrongheadedness in the way we go
about dealing with many issues. Certainly I got to see much of that
firsthand working for the Canadian government. Everyone has an agenda
and people live off fear mongering. Like Agent Smith said in the
Matrix, that they tried to make a life for people that was perfect but
we wouldn't accept it. Somehow we define life by hardship and
problems. It even says it in the Bible, trial by fire to refine and
mature. Odd since we spend much of our time trying to make life
easier. Anyway, this has me thinking that what I want is to do
something real, on the ground and iterative – i.e. evaluates and
learns from its successes and failures over time. My friends are
suggesting that all I have to do is write a proposal and someone would
fund it. Unfortunately, my thinking is no more evolved than what I
said above. I don't even know what area I might want to work in. I
just feel so ill-equipped, making me think I could take the time to do
my masters but really, I don't know that it's more knowledge I'm
looking for. I think I'm looking for a mentor. I just don't have such
an entrepreneurial spirit.

October 6 – definitely malaria
I thought I was going to die last night. My whole body hurt, I could
barely walk, I thought all my bones were going to snap. Loren is away
at a jobsite out of town so poor Benny was kinda left on his own
watching movies. I was alternating Ibuprofen with muscle relaxant that
had acetaminophen in it every 2-3 hours because the medication
wouldn't last any longer than that and it only worked well enough to
let me sleep not to get up and do anything. Loren called me to check
up and said if I didn't feel better in the morning, that he would send
a doctor to the house. My fever would swing up to over 40 and back
down to 37. This morning I took my final dose of Malarone and didn't
take any ibuprofen or relaxant because I was afraid I was going to
throw everything up. I could barely stand, I had use the wall, and
walk with my hands on my knees. I had to lie in my room because I was
afraid I wouldn't be able to get off the mattress on the floor because
I was so weak. Loren called and said his friend said to go to the
clinic and get examined, to call my friend Marie to drive me there
that with a fever that high I probably had an infection.

And then abruptly, it was over. At 9am I woke up feeling as weak as a
newborn and tired but I don't feel like lying down in bed anymore
(here's where a couch would be handy) and I don't hurt (other than
muscles that feel like I've slept too long). I'm still dizzy but again
it's like the dizzy of having been sleeping too long. Carol called
and said to take it easy because there could be a relapse in 24 hours.
I'll take her word on that. I'm sure she's familiar with it. She said
it was unusual to get malaria so quickly but because it was wet season
and I got so many bites at the beginning that it should be better here
on in. Just seeing all those bites Benny had, I'm grateful to have
bought him enough preventative medication for the whole year. Well I
think I'll shower and go back to bed. I'm tired already and I've been
up only an hour.