What does it mean to work in Niger? (on a I'm-feeling-negative day)

I hear more and more often now as things are winding down, “so hey- how is that research going?” During the week I go to the hospital every morning for several hours and do interviews, and catch up with the women who are there waiting for fistula repair surgery. We sit and eat peanuts, hold children, bead necklaces and chat. We position ourselves to avoid the running pools of urine coming from the newcomers in the compound. We watch people from other wards in the hospital come through the courtyard to use the bathroom and the sinks- boys with missing arms, women who have wasted from an unknown disease. Every once in a while, someone will inhale quickly and mumble, “May Allah save us,” and we all turn to look at the misfortune that has fallen the person that just entered our little area.

Patients watch rats with fur wet from sewage be chased by cats who roam throughout the hospital. The wood piled up outside the hospital kitchen reminds me of the deforestation, dust, pollution and heat here. Women approach holding their sick children out at an arms length. My white skin leads them to believe that I can make miracles happen.

This is surely “Month 6” talking- six months on top of fine tuned cynicism from the previous years in West Africa. But lately, what does it mean to work here in Niger? It means you get frustrated- at the lack of resources, at incompetence, at the snails pace at which things move. You get mad at the government for its disregard for its citizens. You feel embarrassed and guilty about the ample resources we have in developed nations at the expense of places like this. And you get mad at yourself for your own shortcomings and your inability to affect change.

You also get lazy, because no matter how you try, your water intake cannot offset the water loss in the sweat rolling off you. You lounge for 3 hours a day because… what the heck- no one else is working and it has not cooled off any. It means that after hello, you ask people about how they are handling the heat and general fatigue.

It means that you get involved: You put a comforting hand on the shoulder of a friend with TB. You celebrate the results of an HIV test.

It means that your work is only a little tiny part of being here and life happens around you and to you, whether or not it was in your original grant application to come here.