Bamako Days 9 (04/07/09)

Saturday morning we got up early expecting a meeting with Professors Ogobara and Thera at 10 to discuss what we were going to do next in our schedule. However, after we were up and ready to go Liz checked her email and saw one from Thera that said that the meeting would be moved till later and he would call us with the time (which was a bit of a bummer because we were hoping to go out during the day). We waited around and read to waste time. We also did come laundry. It was a bit funny the hot and cold water lines were mixed up, so if you wanted a cold was h you had to set it to hot. Also the dryer didn't work so we hung out clothes over some lines that were stung up outside. With the heat it didn't take very long for the clothes to dry.

After lunch we decided to walk up to Ogobara's office to ask his secretary if he knew what time. He suggested that Ogo would be in after 2pm so we headed back down to the house. On our way out we bumped into Izack and some other people from the drug resistance lab we had visited earlier that week. Izack (who is the one that called me clear before) asked what we were up to and Liz explained that we were waiting for a meeting with Ogo and were going out later with Agnes. Izack insisted that we should hang out with him sometime and he would take us into the city (to be honest Izack makes me a little nervous, we've been warned about guys trying to agressively befriend american girls). Liz said that we were free Sunday and that she had seen something about a horse race on the news. A little while later I got a call from Thera (actually I missed that call because I wasn't carrying my phone on me, so I called him back), who said we would meet in Ogo's office at 4pm. Shortly before 4 we headed up to the office and waited outside for Ogo and Thera. Apparently Thera had called us at 4 to tell us that he was running late, but silly me forgot my phone again and I guess he didn't try Liz's.

Anyways, we waited outside until about 5:20 when Thera came, Ogo still wasn't there so we just started talking with Thera. We decided that we would like to visit one of the local clinic sites before heading to Bandiagara and if possible visit the hospital that's right next to the medical school. Thera suggested that we see two of the local sites to see how the design evolved. Apparently bandiagara is the oldest site (these were all set up for vaccine trials) and two of the local ones are newer and are designed based on what they decided would be most effecient after working in Bandiagara. Ogo came in a little laterand decided that perhaps we should jsut spend more time at one site and see the process of care from start to finish (the physical exam, to examining the lab specimines, to diagnosis and treatment). We decided that would probably be a good idea (plus no one overrules Ogo) so we set up to visit the newest site, which is on the edge of Bamako. There is also an entimology group there so we could also see how they catch and examine the misquitos (there doing some studies right now on the effectiveness of indoor residual spraying) if we'd like. At the end of the meeting we asked if we could have a driver for that evening to go out with Agnes and also for Sunday so we could go to the museum. They suggested the Agnes also go with us to the museum (it seems they are reluctant to let us go anywhere without a female chaperone). I was a little concerned that were becoming a bit of a burden on Agnes and also she is Christian and attends church on Sunday. Agnes was there to meet with Ogo after us and it seems that either she agreed or was forced t o agree to go with us Sunday.

After we left Agnes showed Liz a trail that she could run on if she wanted (which she did for a short while later in the evening). At 8pm the driver came to take us out with Agnes; we picked up Agnes and her friend that we had also gone out with the night before and headed into the city. It seemed that no one was sure where to go or how to get to where we were going, but eventually Agnes insisted on going to a restaurant called "the Diplomat" and after passing it once, we got there. Now don't let the name fool you, the Diplomat was not really as ritzy as its name implied. We got a table near where it seemed the band would play and ordered. I got the fish that Liz had gotten at Bar Blabla with fried plantains. The waitress didn't seem super attentive and messed up a few things on our order, but it worked out ok. There were also to ratherly scantily clad girls sitting on a bench not far from us and Agnes and I laughed everytime "my friends" came into view (I could decide whether or not they were prostitutes, though later I saw them serving food).

Shortly after we got our drinks (and toasted to America's independence) another of Agnes friends came to eat with us, he just finished his medical internship. The food was ok (though I think not as good as Bar Blabla) though a little burned. Interestingly when Agnes other friends food arrived it seemed of much better quality than ours and Agnes joked that maybe he had said he was a doctor and thus got better service. The band started to play some jazz and raggae and funnily (yup not a word) enough they also played Abba's Fernando that we had heard the night before. Although they did play more than just american music, they didn't really play the elusive African music that we were hoping for. After eating and listening to the music for a while we asked for the check. Agnes friend also asked Liz to dance to a song that was sort of reminisent of salsa/cha cha. When the driver came we decided that we were tired and heading back to the guest house. When we arrived back at the guest house we arranged with the driver to pick us up the next morning at 10am to go to the museum.