Since the last post I have started my minor job as a dental steriliser, this week was my third week in the job, and I love it! Thursdays has now become my favourite day of the week! We travel for about half an hour to a nearby village called Abertrou, The clinic is a very modern building for the area; we work off a generator and have some fans as well!
These are a few pictures of the dental clinic...
My job is a dental sterilizer, the work is not particularly hard or challenging however, I have decided that this is the case with quite a few things in life, it’s not about the exact work you do, it’s about the people you work with, the place you work and your attitude towards it... In these three areas I think I have come up trumps... I work with some amazing people from all over the world, New York, Norway, California, England, Germany, not to mention all the local day volunteers who are trying to teach me French, I work in a village in Benin, in Africa , if I go just outside the door, I can play with the local kids, buy the local food and ice cream (known as fan ice, which is delicious) and I am so excited to go to work every week that not much tends to get me down once I am there!
The amount of dentists varies as they tend to only stay for a few weeks at a time... But with 3 dentists they saw over 100 patients in the first day I was there... the next week two of them saw 78 and pulled out 137 teeth, 2 days ago there was only one dentist and he managed to see over 50 patients by himself in one day! So we are kept pretty busy sterilizing all the instruments, we have 3 machines called autoclaves which sterilise the instruments and two out of three of them have now broken, which makes life interesting!
I have spent the last few weekends exploring the local area somewhat... We went to the big market a few weeks ago, called Dantopa, it is so enormous you get totally lost, and it sells everything you can imagine! I bought some flip flops....and quite a bit of African material. Last week I made myself a skirt, and today a bag! I love just hanging around in the market area, it is such an intense atmosphere, full of so many people, and it is amazing.
Last weekend I visited a place called Bab’s dock... it is basically a lagoon area. Some Belgians one day decided that they should up and leave Belgium, and move to Benin. This they did and built a house and little resort area, with a bar, hammocks, sun loungers, canoes and even a sailing boat! You have to take a little speed boat to reach the lagoon. It was a fantastically relaxing day!
The amount of dentists varies as they tend to only stay for a few weeks at a time... But with 3 dentists they saw over 100 patients in the first day I was there... the next week two of them saw 78 and pulled out 137 teeth, 2 days ago there was only one dentist and he managed to see over 50 patients by himself in one day! So we are kept pretty busy sterilizing all the instruments, we have 3 machines called autoclaves which sterilise the instruments and two out of three of them have now broken, which makes life interesting!
I have spent the last few weekends exploring the local area somewhat... We went to the big market a few weeks ago, called Dantopa, it is so enormous you get totally lost, and it sells everything you can imagine! I bought some flip flops....and quite a bit of African material. Last week I made myself a skirt, and today a bag! I love just hanging around in the market area, it is such an intense atmosphere, full of so many people, and it is amazing.
Last weekend I visited a place called Bab’s dock... it is basically a lagoon area. Some Belgians one day decided that they should up and leave Belgium, and move to Benin. This they did and built a house and little resort area, with a bar, hammocks, sun loungers, canoes and even a sailing boat! You have to take a little speed boat to reach the lagoon. It was a fantastically relaxing day!
Some photo's of Bab's Dock
This weekend is of course Easter weekend... I am in fact on duty today (Saturday) and tomorrow, which means I can’t leave the ship... but I am still having a brilliant weekend so far. The celebrations started for us on Thursday evening.... we had our community meeting with the room decorated with an Easter feel and one of the other rooms on the ship was decorated as an upper room, where you could visit with your friends to pray or partake in foot washing... Yesterday morning we had an amazing service in the morning, the atmosphere was amazing and it was a very powerful meeting. We also watched the passion of the Christ last night. The atmosphere of the weekend has been truly amazing... I think it has been the best Easter I have had so far!
Yesterday I went on a little adventure with a friend... we took the zimmy’s (motorbikes) to the local airport where we knew there were some beaches nearby.... and basically went for a wander along the beach! We bought some amazing local food, and had such a fun day!
I hope everything is well in England! In case anyone didn’t know I have extended my time here and will in fact now be coming home on the 1st of June instead!
