I've had the time of my life (no I never felt this way before...)

22 Aug 2008 at 16:06

Well, it's now pretty much reached the end of my stay here, so I figure I should give a brief resume of the last week.
The weekend was brilliant, on Saturday I went to Durban with Oona, Ruth, Tiara, Willy and Irma to the Victoria Street Market and we all bought some souvenirs. Afterwards, we went to Ushaka which is a local tourist area with an aquarium (which we didn't go in). We did some more shopping there and then Willy and Irma had to get a taxi to the airport since they were going to Cape Town with the other 2. We stayed around in Ushaka and went to an African restaurant called Moya for dinner with a couple of volunteers from Uthombo which is one of the other projects that helps street children. It was a lovely dinner, they had some african dancing and they did some face painting on us, and we all had a great time.
Afterwards we went to the hostel we were staying at in Durban called Tekweni, which is where the other two volunteers were staying. There was a bit of a party...

Read more: I've had the time of my life (no I never felt this way before...)

1 reactions | post reaction

Week 3

15 Aug 2008 at 12:01

Sorry I haven't been updating much, I tend to be a bit rubbish at that sort of thing. Anyway, I suppose I should mention what's been going on since my last post.
Over the weekend we went to the Drakensbergs, which was incredible. We went up the Sani pass to Lesotho, and we went for a hike in the mountains to see some Bushman paintings and we also went for a horseback ride, which was really fun, despite the fact I've never ridden a horse before in my life!
When we got back on monday, we found out quite a few of the patients had died over the weekend which was a bit tough. The majority of patients' deaths seem to happen on the weekends which is a bit strange.
Most of the week was just the usual, feeding and cleaning patients, changing beds, chatting to them, laundry and helping to count pills in the pharmacy. We had bingo on Tuesday night, and Sbongile, who I always take down, was one of the first ones to win, so she got a box of biscuits and was very happy with that. A group of...

Read more: Week 3

2 reactions | post reaction

The end of week 2

08 Aug 2008 at 18:29

I actually can't believe I'm pretty much half-way through. I know everyone says that, but it really doesn't feel like it's been that long.
Anyway, it's been a few days since my last post, so I shall try to remember what's happened since then.
On wednesday there was the general strike in South Africa, so there weren't many people around. It wasn't nearly as bad as I thought it would be, we didn't really have to do that much more. We had to go round feeding the patients at each mealtime, but other than that, pretty much all non-essential activites had been cancelled, so it was ok. Ruth, Irma and I took the 4th floor for service and it was actually not too bad. There's a new lady there who is ridiculously demanding and keeps asking if I've got any sweets for her. There was also a lady in the same room who I kept trying to feed, but she wouldn't eat. She had yoghurt because she couldn't manage solid food, but it was all I could do to get her to eat a few mouthfuls, she was really...

Read more: The end of week 2

4 reactions | post reaction

2 posts in 2 days, too much?

05 Aug 2008 at 21:52

Since I have a spare moment this evening, I thought I'd give a quick update on life here at the dream centre. Today was a bit of a strange day. This morning, Ruth and I went to the fourth floor to help the nurses out. We both ended up helping the nurses wash some patients, but we were with different patients. The guy I ended up with was in a bit of a bad way, he was quite confused, he couldn't really do anything at all for himself and he had a huge lump on his arm which looked really raw. We tried to remove the bandages but they were stuck on. Then the nurse went to go and see if the patient bathroom was free, and while he was gone, the man grabbed my hand and held on to it. We then took him to the bathroom, but I had to stand outside, since there wasn't much room. The whole washing process was fairly brutal, they just use a hose on the patients and then use a flannel and soap to clean them and then hose them down again. The patient just looked scared and confused and kept reaching...

Read more: 2 posts in 2 days, too much?

1 reactions | post reaction

My first post

04 Aug 2008 at 10:34

Sorry it's taken so long to get round to writing, I've been a bit busy, and since there's 8 of us using the computer it's been a bit difficult. Anyway, I've been here pretty much exactly a week now, so here's a quick recap...
I arrived last Monday and we just spent the day orientating ourselves, finding out where the shops were and all the rest. I went up to see some of the patients with Tiara, a canadian volunteer who was here the previous month aswell, in the evening, and everyone was really friendly. Most of the week was spent in meetings, just discussing what we can do, and what sort of help would be best.
The other volunteers are all lovely, all girls, 4 from holland, 3 of us Brits and Tiara. The Dutch girls are Anne and Femke who are both medical students, Irma, who's a bookkeeper and Willy who works in tax. For the brits there's me, Ruth, who I brought along with me, and Oona, who's from Manchester and just finished a psychology degree up in Scotland.
On Wednesday, we...

Read more: My first post

1 reactions | post reaction

All messages

Name: Eleanor Curtis
Age: 22

Volunteered at The Dream Centre from 28 July 2008 to 23 August 2008.

About me:

I'm Elle and I'm going to be volunteering at the Dream Centre from the 28th July with my friend Ruth. I'm also technologically incompetent, so apologies in advance for my downfalls...

Track my weblog

Latest messages

All messages

Links

Be More

Would you like to know more about Be More, then check the website at www.be-more.org. You can find the latest news, more information about my project and you can become a donor!

No. of visitors: 6390

Log in

RSS RSS Feed