tweaked nipples

Hello Hello our faithful followers…. This is a very exciting blog filled with many many events! We taught our first classes! It was very exciting, but felt very natural. The students seemed to enjoy the classes, but gave us a few pointers on the format they were used to receiving so we can adjust our next lectures. We were sitting in our office (yes it is true, we have an office!) and one of the students came in and said “we are very lucky to have you as tutors.” It was one of those moments where everything felt right in life, and it helped to alleviate some uncertainty about whether we were well received.

Now as usual you have to be ready for everything here in Africa. We came to Lewanika thinking that we would be delivering most of our lectures using Power Points (since that is what we are used to in Canada). So we both come prepared for the first lecture with our computers and LCD projector, only to have the power go out about 8 times during the lectures. But you know Lianne and me, we can improvise anything! So we did, and delivered our lectures in style, with a little laughter thrown in there. One of our lectures was on nursing management pertaining to disorders of the Nervous system. I was describing how to assess and unconscious patient, so I had pretended to be unconscious and asked one of the students to come up and practice their assessment skills. Now in Canada we would first try to rouse the patient by rubbing their sternum…but again here is a whole other story.. One I wasn’t quite expecting! So here I am lying down pretending to be unconscious (keep in mind this is in front of 50 students). And the student comes up and tweaks my nipple! Yes apparently that is how they do it here in Zambia. Needless to say we all laughed pretty loud when I reacted to this…

Yes, Jessica’s nipple pinch was one of my favourite moments. One of my least favourite moments so far was the 10 hour night ride in the back of a land cruiser with 11 people, fish, a baby, in the freezing cold! This is a whole other story we will get too… Now back to teaching. When we arrive into the class all the students stand up. Then they won’t leave the class until we do. We have told them many times that they do not need to stand when we arrive, but they insist. It is very humbling to be treated with so much respect. Jessica and I have decided to attend courses as well such as opthamology, tropical disease, and so on. It will be like free schooling!

I do need to attend a few other courses the students have to take. Subjects such as opthamology, tropical disease, and HIV are not really taught back home…because we often don’t see these diseases in Canada. But here in Africa they are seen so much and it nice to be able to broaden my knowlededge. So if any of you get malaria, tuberculosis or a worm at home, you know who to call. One of my favourite parts of teaching here happens before class even starts. The students always start out the morning with a song. It seems like every African man and woman was blessed with the gift of song, they all have such beautiful voices! And in the morning, the whole class sings. It is something I wish everyone could experience..it sends shivers down my spine just thinking about it. I will try to get a video and put it up on the blog…