Full of life again

Nestled in my lap between crossed legs, Lamaran focused on my finger and thumb, gripped them tight and drooled ferociously through a half-healed lip.  He is precious, this tiny little boy, with a constant beautiful grin below the steristrip whiskers soggy with drool and milk that leaks through the hole in his palate and out his nose.  He's not yet big enough for the surgery to close his palate, but in a day or two we'll send him home with a healing lip to work on getting fat.  For now he's content just to lay and drool down my leg and smile at me while his grandma sleeps.  I've taken opportunity of the quiet moment to sit down and chart on my few patients and work out nursing assignments for the next shift.  On the stool next to me, Hawi and Lama sit drawing circles and chattering to each other in languages the other cannot understand, fast friends despite the language barrier.  Already they've assisted me today in wiping down the laminated meal order form, cleaning random ward items with copious amounts of hand sanitizer, and stickering each other, the nurses, and everything else in sight.  In a few minutes, when I finish printing assignments, we'll take a waka-waka small (short walk) down the hall to retrieve things from the printer and sticker them too. 

We went up on deck later to enjoy the sunshine and boats going past amid rollicking worship music with the hospital chaplaincy team and a rather wild tricycle and wagon gang from B ward.  B ward is almost full now with a poda-poda load of kids from Sierra Leone here for follow up surgery.  They arrived at night early last week, 14 kids tumbling out of the poda-poda with parents and a few extra patients that hitched a ride along from Sierra Leone.  I snuck into B ward the morning after they arrived and was instantly mobbed.  Padi, padi, padi (Friend, friend, friend) Fatima hollered as she attempted to climb my leg.  Sheku and Osan were right behind here, and a crowd of faces I recognized behind them.  Over the next few days I contrived to spend as much time in B as I could - covering lunch breaks and helping organize the mob of "hotel patients" needing Xrays, charts, and labs.  The enthusiasm is incredible and a bit exhausting!  Every kid wants to interact, to sit on laps, to be involved in everything that is happening with every other kid.  I had to laugh when I returned Osan to the ward (screaming and upset after a blood draw) only to have Sheku climb up my leg and ask earnestly, "na me?  na me? (Me too, me too?)"My 6-year old fiance from the C ward chaos of early last year is still toothless, still grinning, but proposing much less often than last year.  In fact, almost all of my kids from those few days in C ward are back again, including the ones we visited at their homes upcountry in Bo.  It's good to see familiar faces, to welcome new ones, and to once more be a part of the miracles we are here for.

In short, the hospital is open again, busy and full of life, and I am excited for a new season of surgeries in Guinea!