Extended Community

 

I really feel that I’m becoming a part of the community. Every morning from my window seat in the hospital car, people will smile and wave either shouting, “Porto!” or “Sally!” When I’m at the hospital, everyone knows who I am and greets me with a smile or a nice, crisp high-five or a solid fist-bump. I even feel like I’m coming into my own as a nurse here. On Monday, a coworker brought her baby to work. The baby wasn’t sick or anything, but she had me hold him while she went to take care of a few things. I held him, and talked to him, and sang him to sleep. It reminded me that I will always be a Pediatric nurse at heart. Working with children has always been what I’m good at. I’m starting to give more medications and help with more procedures as well. The weather is much cooler, so I have the energy to do way more things as well! Everyone tells me that the rainy season is coming and soon I will be sick of the rain. I’m excited! I am ready to be sick of the rain!

I’m also starting to learn about a new kind of community in Sierra Leone; my fellow foreigners residing here long-term. Most are here working at paying jobs or internships at NGOs. They come from all over the world: England, Brazil, Nigeria, Kenya, Japan, most are from Italy. Two Italian girls live close to me in Stocco Compound. They’ve lived here for about a year, but they’ll be leaving soon to go back home. They know Father Luigi and he asked them if they could invite me to one of their get togethers. They took me to a restaurant I had never been to before called “Fishermans” to meet up with some other people from around the world. We all swapped stories of living in Sierra Leone and how we’ve adapted over time. One lady from England used to live in the house I live in now. She says she doesn’t miss it. It would get too hot because it was always directly in the sun. When I told her that air conditioning had been put in, she said that would definitely help.

The next day, the two Italian girls invited me to go with some of their friends from Bo and Freetown to hang out by a river close by. I was absolutely down! The girls from Bo were also from Italy and the girl from Freetown was from Japan. We drove out of town and arrived at some large, metal gates guarded by men demanding twenty Leones from each of us. When we were allowed to drive through, we saw a lovely, winding river surrounded by palm trees and locals chilling in the sand. I suspect the river gets very high in the rainy season so we must have come during the busy season when it’s still safe. There were families and college kids and couples all either swimming or lounging by the river. Some kids even had a wooden canoe and were standing in it while paddling it around. There was a volleyball net set up on the beach. There was also a swing that little kids would play on and jump into the water with. We didn’t get in the water. We just found some picnic tables, bought some drinks, and hung out next to the water.

That night we went to Relim leisure center. It was the same place I had gone to have a pool day. It was much busier during the night. Someone was having one heck a birthday party that night with flashing lights and loud music. There were also a bunch of Arab men smoking hookahs in their bathing suits at the table next to ours while we ate. Right as we were about to leave, rain started pouring down on us. We drove back to the two Italian girls house at Stocco Compound where they had baked some banana bread for us to share. It was so nice to talk with other people having experiences like mine. They were all getting used to how different everything is here just like I am. Of course, most of them had been there longer. They were able to give some tips on living here too! I hope I can keep in touch with them and learn more from them.