Our Lilongwe Film Festival

This past weekend I was sick and recovering and with Oscar season, Ben and I had our own film festival. We already watched a few of the best pictures so this weekend we saw the remaining ones and a few other major categories. The only time we left the house was to go fabric shopping for my dress for Lisa's wedding. I ended up with 3 different fabrics and 3 different dress ideas. Plan to go to the tailor next weekend!

Zanzibar

Last weekend we went to visit our friends from Boston as they were on holiday in Zanzibar. They were visiting Africa for a couple of weeks and concluded their holiday with a beautiful beachfront rental. We had fun just seeing them hanging out and swimming in beautiful water and eating delicious seafood. The return to the lilongwe was brutal though. We left at 530 am and got to our hose at 4 pm. 3 flights and 1 long drive!

View from our terrace

swimming with the turtles

Evening Beach stroll

beach

yum

First 2 weeks of Study!

Been a hectic 2 weeks so haven't had as much time to blog. My study officially started on January 9 and it has been off to a great start. They already enrolled over 100 women in the study. There has been tremendous enthusiasm and most people wants to participate. There is even demand from staff including nurses to have a CBE by one of my ladies so we are actually arranging a special clinic where people who can't really be in the study but want an exam can come. The team is awesome and is even making a breast cancer song. Maggie's son is a musician so they are going to the studio to record. Yesterday, we met with the head of NCDs at the Ministry of Health. She is awesome and was very supportive of all the work. She is also helping me try to get the Breast Course into fruition.

the most amazing team!

the new Fogarty site director Dr. Ben Chi comes to visit. 

interesting new drink I decided to try. I used to love cream soda as a kid, but this was different. It was green and didn't taste quiet right. 

Return to Lilongwe

This weekend we saw a bunch of our friends who have been away for the holidays. On Friday night there was a potluck dinner at Yoel's. We made friends with a new couple who is Columbian and Portugese. Saturday we had friends over for dinner in our place. Sunday we went to check out the Lilongwe Golf Club and watch the Arsenal game.

Potluck at Yoel's

Watching the UNC Game at our house saturday

View of Golf course

Chris and Damien in the club house

First Day of Study

The day has finally come! Today was the first day of the study and overall everything went very well. I was a bit ambitious and wanted to start at both clinics at the same time. We all started out in the cervical cancer screening clinic and then once I thought they were in the flow I took the other team to the other clinic, but then by the time we got there it was a bit too late because many of the patients were gone. The talk in the first clinic went really well with lots of interesting questions and feedback. Most people thought that most things can cause cancer like chicken broiler, condoms that left out in the sun, too much acid in the body. One lady was taking her own herbal remedy for cervical cancer that she said was a miracle and better than the doctor treatment and was trying to sell it to the other patients for 200,000 MK. The ladies really enjoyed it, but of course the paperwork part wasn't perfect, but i know it will get better with time.

Ladies doing a prayer before they begin

Visiting Friends

We haven't seen our Lilongwe best friends Lauren and Chris in the New year so went over there 2 nights in a row. Although the second night was mainly for Chris to help with access. We still ate good food thanks to Chris and played games and of course saw the pups!

new hidden gem

I had heard about this cafe that has amazing milkshakes before and tonight after Indian dinner I had a sweet craving so we decided to go check it out since it was near by. Its called Gazebo and has lots of big photos of NYC and one of Dubai. Downstairs it serves gross greasy fast food, but upstairs it has this 1950s looking ice cream parlor with real classic sundae glass bowls. they make their own ice cream and have an extensive milkshake menu. I had the ferroro milk shake which was awesome and ben had twix. I also wore my new chitenje jacked and got lots of compliments. One of my team members brought me a chitenje that her son got in Nigeria. She said she got lots and i love them so she wanted to give me one!

"Sometimes in Malawi we burry people alive"

today one of my team members was a late because her grandmother who lives with her family died. I told her of course she should go home and she did. Then after lunch, the other ladies told me that she texted them that it turned out her grandmother didn't die and she'll explain today. Then there was a passionate conversation about how its not uncommon for people to be pronounced dead and even prepared for burial or even in the coffin and then they are actually alive and start banging on the coffin or talking. Apparently it's even happened in the hospital and of course was in the newspapers. Anyway, looking forward to hearing what happened tomorrow. I also wore my new chitenje skirt and beaded necklace today and got lots of compliments!

lazing around Lilongwe

This was the first weekend in a while that we just stayed in Lilongwe with no visitors and just hung out the two of us. We watched a danish/swedish series called the bridge which I love. We finally exercised. we went out to dinner at Mamma Mia and I played chef a few times with varying degrees of success. We also worked a bunch--Ben more then me. Also payed a visit to the Golden Peacock Hotel looking for dim sum which was quite an adventure. None of the Malawians or Chinese staff had any idea what i was talking and I ran around the hotel looking for the Chinese resautrant which of course turned out to be closed. I take it they don't have dim sum. The hotel was very fancy and reminded me of the empty nicer chinese hotels we stayed in while on the China trip last year at HSPH.

the entrance to the hotel

the Chinese walkway from front part to back part of building

Lilongwe by night during the holidays

view from my pedicure, rainy season is really here

one of my more successful meals

Happy New Year 2015

Almost all our friends were away the week of New years so we didn't have too much going on. We ended up going out to dinner to our favorite and nicest restaurant. There were only 3 other tables of people there. Then we went to this bar that had a lot of people and did meet up our one friend who just returned to Lilongwe. He had a Israeli visitor who is from Omer, the nice suburb of beer sheva (where I lived in Israel). Of course her dad was a doctor in my hospital and she knew my host family very well so that was exciting! I miss Israel a lot, I think we will go next year when i'm back in residency. Oy yeah and there were actually lots of real nice fireworks at night after midnight!

New patient

I got a call earlier this week from a friend of Blandina's (the former Ms. Malawi breast cancer survivor and advocate) about his little sister who maybe was diagnosed with breast cancer and they wanted advise. I agreed to meet them to review her case and help guide them. In short, she does have this rare form of breast cancer that I've always read about and its  a popular absite question, but never actually seen. She's only 21 years old and will now need a mastectomy. The good news is that hopefully that is all the treatment she needs and she will have a good prognosis. The sad and frustrating part was of course the mismanagement she's received to ultimately get to this diagnosis and the incorrect treatment plan going forward and of course the complete lack of explaining to the patient what she has and the plans. I met with the family for about an hour taking them through everything that happened until now and ways forward. I myself had to look up the optimal treatment plan since this cancer was so rare and showed them how little information there was about this in the textbook. they appreciated my honesty and support. I also had the patient talk to one my breast health promoters (the one who is the breast cancer survivor) right then so she can feel comforted. Apparently, the family lost 2 other sisters to meningitis this summer so they are very. After our meeting I was continuing to get thankful messages from the brother and he sent me a picture them smiling for the first time in a while.

Best Present: South Luanga

Last weekend Ben and I went on our first international road trip in South Lunaga, Zambia for an incredible Safari. Our cube thankfully made it with no problems. At the border crossing we met this Norwegian family who was also driving themselves to South Luanga. We then actually met them again in our lodge and it turns out it was the Norwegian ambassador and his family. We have a friend who works in their embassy who of course they knew and liked alot. We spent a lot of time talking to them throughout the stay. Our lodge was amazing. It was actually inside the park so you didn't even have to leave the lodge to feel like safari. When we arrived we were greeted by warthogs, baboons, hippos, and impalla. We had a beautiful 2 story chalet on the river bed, which sadly was dried out from sever droughts, the rain was late this year. We could just sit on our balcony and watch the animals. Zebra came by too one day. The drives were awesome too. We saw 5 leopards on 5 different occasions. We also saw a python and wild dogs and lions eating a baby hippo. on our last morning, it was a torrential down pour which was good for the animals. we still went out which was interesting becuase we saw some animals taking cover under trees, but we got absolutely drenched.

Our arrival amazing lunch

sundowners by the river

Couples massage at the bush spa overlooking the hippo pool

lion eating baby hippo

the other lion was full from hippo and taking nap

the beautiful thornicroft girrafe only seen in South Luanga

one of hte leoapards we saw

out in the pouring rain