When the kids at school started greeting me “teacher” Mike or “doctor” Mike, I quickly spread word around to the more adept students that the proper label would be “health administrator” Mike. Not as pretty sounding, but far more accurate. So…. what exactly does a health administrator do in a village like Busongi in a district like Bududa in a country like Uganda? Well…
When the generator starts smoking after an otherwise infamously lazy employee suddenly got motivated to change the oil unsupervised: it’s the health administrator’s problem
When we run out of prescription envelopes but nobody mentions a damn thing until the absolute last envelope is used: it’s the health administrator’s problem
When the Babylon shows up to arrest the drug dispenser…
When the inverter blows through fuses like the diceman does buttskis…
It’s the health administrator’s problem.
When we run out of water from weeks without rain shower…
or stuck in Kampala traffic when volunteers land in an hour.
When the pit latrine has a leak…
or the path to the clinic turns into a creek.
When registering as an NGO turns into five months of frustrating bore…
especially when we haven’t paid taxes since we opened our door.
When visitors get harassed by the town crazy…
When employees are lazy…
When the staff drama mama finds new material…
When plain oats are the only cereal…
When bad carpenters pout…
When baby patients scream and shout…
When there’s no close place to get a CD4 count…
When some old lady gets the gout…
When the drugs run out…
In the face of constant doubt...
It pays shit, but I get to bring my dogs to work and I wear what I want.
1 comment:
Hey Garth, that was Haiku!
So are you out of water? Or bathing in the creek?
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