Successful Clinic Day
Hi everyone! Today’s post will be a bit short because I’m overextending my time in the office, and everyone else has left for the day!
It’s been quite the busy 24 hours, starting with a dinner prepared by Mama Lillian for all of the North Park students and some of the Hope staff. It was amazing to see what a magnificent dinner she could create for almost 30 people, and with such ease and grace!
It was great that we all had a full meal yesterday evening because today was the beginning of a three-day marathon in which the North Park students run a clinic to see all of the students at Hope Community School. This was the first time I was able to observe one of these clinics, which are run twice a year, and it was great to see not only the Hope students get much-needed health care but also see the North Park students interact with the children in a whole new way. I’d say the best part of the clinic is watching the Hope students get their malaria tests, which requires a small prick on the finger to draw a couple drops of blood. I was surprised to see that even the older boys (who have been through previous clinics) were nervous about the finger prick, but I thought about how it’s such a common occurrence in the US for children to go to the doctor, get shots and get blood drawn. With little to no available health care other than these clinics that the Hope-Spark partnership provide, I suppose it’s really not that surprising that the students are nervous about a bunch of strangers making their fingers bleed. 🙂 It was a great first day of the clinic, and the North Park students were able to think through some changes that will allow tomorrow’s clinic to be even more efficient.
That brings me to now! I’m in the office, working through some ideas for accounting, the creation of a student database for Hope Community School and what the rest of my schedule while I’m in Zambia will look like. During the weeks here, there’s so much to observe at the school, orphanage and clinic, that it’s hard to put in enough hours in terms of prep work for trainings that I’ll be doing next week and templates that I’ll be working with Hope to implement for reporting and accounting processes. I’m excited for this weekend when I’ll be able to just sit and power through some of the work. We’ve got two more clinic days before then, though, and I’m hoping I’ll be able to observe and work simultaneously! I’ll let you all know how it goes!