Jana Gets The Plague

I wasn't feeling like the pick of the litter Friday, but just chalked it up to CTF (cumulative travel fatigue) until I began vomiting Saturday night. My stomach, inspired by South African's labor unions, had decided to go on its own strike in protest of Africa. By Sunday afternoon I didn't seem to be throwing up any more, but I wasn't eager to put anything else in there to find out until evening the next day. Though I didn't know it at the time, that Monday night dinner, the first meal I'd had in three days, would also be my last for about a week or so. At the time, thinking myself already well en route to chipper health from a simple flu, I assumed my recovery would follow the normal trajectory and by Wednesday I'd be chowin' it with the best of 'em.

Wednesday I was definitely feeling better, if troubled by a bit of a sore throat that had come out of nowhere; Wednesday was also our travel day from Sierra Leone to Guinea. As we crossed the border we had to do the normal formalities, and though I didn't notice it when I gave him my passport, the border official had sores all the way up and down both arms. I only noticed it when, as I was giving my profession, etc., I overheard him complaining to his coworker about the chicken pox. That got my attention, alright.

"Chicken pox can kill you if you get it as an adult," I whispered, wide-eyed, to David.

"I know!" he said with seriousness, adding that he basically was an adult when he got it at 16.

I paused. "I've never had it."

He gaped. "You haven't? Have you had the vaccine?"

"Er.. no." (Was that foolish of me?)

We let that information hang in the air for a moment, and then I got out my Purell and coated both my hands and forearms with it.

When I did begin feeling really awful again a couple hours later, it was, the doctor later confirmed, too fast after exposure to be related to the chicken pox. The fever that came on around the time we finally arrived in Conakry was not "the sickness of chicken" (what the heck is 'chicken pox' in French anyway?), but it was definitely something nasty. I have, in fact, never been this sick in my life. Whatever I got I strongly suspect doubled as population control in the good ol' days before the advent of modern medicine. (In other words, THE PLAGUE.)

I believe it started with some sort of lung infection, because aside from fever, body aches and fatigue the first thing I noticed was chest pain. My lungs felt like they were filled with lead, and deep breaths caused an exquisite pain to shoot throughout my chest. By Wednesday evening breathing had become extraordinarily difficult and painful, and the effort required just to keep doing it over and over exhausted all available energy resources. Every now and then I would have a coughing fit and nearly choke on my own disgusting and occasionally bloody phlegm. I didn't bother to eat. Fevers alternated with chills; David assured me that my room was a thousand degrees, but it felt like a refridgerator to me. The Guinean summer sun outside was even worse, and I protected myself against it on my frequent trips to the loo by wrapping my sheet and towel around myself. I noticed on these trips that the sky was a brilliantly sparkling pinky-purple. Most of the time, though, I lay in my bed like a useless slug for several days, hacking and retching, sweating and shivering, stomach cramped for lack of food but definitely still on digestive strike.

If I was in Japan right now, I thought to myself, they would have me on an IV before you could say ganbatte, and I would be up and about like lickety-split.

But I was not in Japan. I was in Guinea, I was damned lucky to be in the capital of Guinea where a licensed doctor was able to prescribe an antibiotic and some other badtasting pills and syrups. Not the rainbow armful I would have bagged in Japan, but nearly as cheap. An IV wasn't offered, but I wasn't about to get anywhere near anything intravenous here anyway. That left one alternative: I began forcing food into my stomach the pre-needle way.

Eating became, next to breathing, the worst part of my life. I felt like I did nothing but eat for three full days, yet the sum total of my efforts was never more than a couple hundred calories. After two exhausting hours of concerted eating, I would realize that I had eaten like five saltines, and feel like crying. Periods of eating were broken by periods in which I willed food so hard-won to stay put in my union-inspired stomach. As I stared hatefully at the saltines, I cast about for foods that, if not appetizing, were at least not wholly revolting, and found myself oddly attracted to foods I normally hate - gatorade.. cheeze-pretzel combos.. a hamburger. Subconscious American nostalgia? The hamburger ended up not working out so well - at least the ants enjoyed it - but in one epic six-hour session of determination I finished two full snack-packs of combos.

Saturday morning I woke up after a record five hours of continued sleeping with no improvement and a fierce determination to accomplish two goals that day - (a) to shower, cos I smelled like a nursing home, and (b) to eat at least 1500 calories' worth of food. That night found be having accomplished goals, and I was highly pleased with myself.

I was also highly pleased that I was not roughing it into the center of the country the 13 grim hours to Kankan with David the next day. Though it had been the original plan that we would go together and then continue overland to Guinea-Bissau, we decided that he would do it alone and then we would fly on to Dakar from Conakry. I felt bad pooping out on David in French territory... but not bad enough that I was prepared to go. I would instead be spending my Sunday very much as I had spent my Saturday - eating, and showering.

So many hours lying awake gave me ample time for reflection, and I kept coming back to reflecting on the foolishness that makes people want to shed fat. After eight days of not eating, whatever fat I carried over my bones was quite literally the only thing keeping me alive. More than ever, I realize why your body works so damned hard to store a bit away - 'cos if you get the plague and you look like one of the Hill girls, you ain't gonna make it.

Sierra Leone

Liberia and Sierra Leone have both had bloody diamond wars, but while Liberia nurses its emotional scars SL seems to have chosen a different route to recovery: wiping away the memory with a party! Freetown parties late into the night, and after 5 p.m. in some neighborhoods cars don't have a chance against the throngs of people for control of the streets. Not that the cars give up trying, though. In an interesting marriage of the two, David and I saw an apparently fascinating fender bender in the middle of one intersection. It was so delightful to have people gawking at something other than us for a change that we stood around for a while and gawked, too.

Food: About a day after crossing into the country, I showed my respect for the national cuisine by promptly throwing it up. Repeatedly. And then I showed my interest in its capital by spending most of three days lying on a hotel bed. So I'm not really sure I'm qualified to say anything about the food in Freetown.. except that you can find it, and you can also throw it up.
Best eaten: I guess I would have to go with the first meal I kept down, something very simple but delicious - steamed vegetables, couscous, and gently fried plantains. After little or no food in three days, it felt marvelous to eat such nutritious, hearty, and easily digestible food.
The memory is all the fonder now, after the lapse of another week of sickness; I didn't know it at the time, but that meal would be my last worthy of the word for over a week.
Street food is also easily available, and David said the barbeque'ed and fried chicken he found from curbside vendors was among the best he'd ever had.
Worst eaten: that which I had to see again, slightly modified by stomach glop


Jana gets her comeuppance: I've mentioned before my fondness for sheep, and the hilarity I find in their floppy-tailed African counterparts, so it shouldn't be too surprising that when David and I happened to be walking past a ram, I absentmindedly baa'ed at it.
I didn't expect a reply, so I nearly crapped my pants when the ram whirled around and unleashed a raucous BAAAAA! of his own, head swivelling in search of the other sheep. David just about laughed himself silly. Apparently I do a pretty good sheep impersonation, for since then I've tried it out on other sheep and its never failed to elicit an excited response.

Hygienic lows: It don't git much better than vomit

Strange musical trends: As I did nothing but lie in bed for a couple days, I had ample opportunity to observe the 24-hour playlist of the street party stereo outside my room. As I possess earplug and generally love music, this did not bother me in the slightest at first. Only when even my slow-on-the-uptake mind began to recognize a song I thought I'd just heard did I begin to get annoyed. No joke, the entire time we were there our neighborhood blasted three and exactly three songs (Eye Wadwin Na, Falling in Love, Yore.). They are songs to which I can now sing all of the words.

Worst Experience: definitely being sick.

Best Experience: Walking around the city, visiting the lighthouse and a quiet, lonely little beach in the residential section of town, and looking over the water towards home.

Could I live here? In all honesty, I don't really know. I was sick for most of our time in SL, and consequently can't describe the national character nearly so well as I can my hotel bed. Freetown is a fun and interesting city though, and I can at least say I would definitely come back.