Fraser's blog

I'm in Abidjan for both R&R and work - so online, with ADSL. I'll upload some piccies and entries in the next day, so watch this space!!!

The MSF medical and logistics catalogues are written in french and translated into english. The original french appears on the right hand side of each page, so it is possible to work out the occasional interesting literal translation. In the vehicles section, I can see that our landcruisers come with these wonderful features:

• Ring of front towing
• Put back front head
• 3 gates
• Filter with dry air & snorkel & witness of filling
• Handle passenger before 2 pts

and even an avoid breeze laminated clearly. Fortunately the medical catalogues appears to have benefited from a human proofreader!

Just cooked a birthday cake for my part-time admin assistant's seven year old son. Last year he missed his birthday because they were refugees in Guinea. This year Cyprienne has only planned pop-corn, as she can't afford to make him a cake. I don't even know his name. (Of course, as you all know, I actually enjoy making cakes, so maybe this is just an excuse!)

Actually I'm back in Abidjan... but I was in Ghana this week and very nice it was too. Almost no tourists, which surprised me a bit. Highlights included wandering around Cape Coast, reading the whole of "Long Walk to Freedom" in 4 days, staying with Daneet and Allan - friends of Grace in Accra - and seeing Harry Potter III with them. More, with pictures, later... Got to get off to the beach now.

Maybe we are in different game show. We get these great kits and have to put them together to achieve goals. Someone somewhere is probably keeping score. For example, we can order a kit to cut people up - KMEDMSUR11- (module, surgical, 300 op. SURGICAL INSTRUMENTS), we can order a kit for lighting KPROMLIG13- (MODULE LIGHTING, 1300 W. 4 spotlights 300 W + 12 tubes fluo) and a kit to power that kit KPROKGEN33D (KIT, GENERATOR, DIESEL, 3.3 KVA, 2700 W, 220V). These kits come with everything you need - for example the generator comes with a jerry can, extension leads, oil filters, spanners and even a plastic funnel. Some kits look quite fun, for example KTRAKZOD02- (KIT, ZODIAC, MARK 2 Grand Raid, 6/7 persons), although here I'd have to order KWATKTAN60- (KIT, WATER TANK, 60 m3, storage/sedimentation, conn.) just to float it! We can even order a zoo in kit form - KZOOLIVE36D- (KIT, MENAGERIE & CAGES, BASIC, 36 ANIMALS). It even includes an pangolin. (Only joking, the latter is a Local Purchase - and a bargain at 1500CFA)

In the UK there is an odd fashion amongst the huntin' shootin' fishing folk, where they put silly silver sculptures of animals on the bonnets of their jags and range rovers - a dog or a horse perhaps. Something to maim the pedestrians that get in their way as they drive along the King's Road. In C?d'Ivoire they go one step further:

I don't get all that much "cultural" news from the UK, but I understand from Amy that Big Brother has been happening again. We have often remarked that it feels like we are in a Big Brother set of our own out here: We started as ten and are down to six now; The cameras in our compound are very well hidden, but is know they must be there; Big Brother keeps in touch with us by HF radio and we all get interesting and varies tasks to do; We don't have a swimming pool or chickens, but we do have a 60-bed hospital, six Landcruisers and almost 180 staff. Current project include hiring a new admin assistant, sacking a cleaner, opening a surgical program, ordering four months supply of drugs for the end of October onwards, keeping mobile clinics operating despite rebel movements and a rapidly approaching rainy season. I'm sure it makes good television, but of course we only get media that has been carefully filtered by the producers, so we have no idea what the tabloids are saying about each of us!

On Sunday I finally got around to organising a bit of off-road training for the expats. The MSF-H policy in CI is that only the drivers drive, and seeing how other NGO's vehicles are treated by expats I'm glad that is the case. But if there were an emergency, it would be a good thing for us expats to at least know the basics, so four of us joined my head driver at 10am and we went through the basics of changing a wheel, using the various jacks, how to check the oil etc, and then drove around the hospital to try going in and out of four wheel drive, low range etc. We then set off on the road to Guinea - currently our worst road. We found some mud and played about in it for a few hours, trying different routes through it, forward and backwards and generally trying (and succeeding) to get stuck. Excellent fun - must do it more often!