October 23, 2008
Today I greeted my quarter-century mark with a small gathering of incredibly fabulous people. It was the first time I've had any kind of party with my Moroccan and American friends so far! I'd invited my host family over earlier in the week and was sort of nervous for them to see my house and eat food that I'd cooked. Also a few other PCVs from the region came over. I decided to make Ethiopian because it's similar to Moroccan food in a lot of ways and it's something I like a lot.
Well, it was served on a dish placed on top of the box that my tv came in, but I think everyone enjoyed it. Admittedly, the house still needs a little work but it's really shaping up.
Best part of dinner: My host mom asked for some birthday cake to take back for the kids! Success! We had to light a couple candles and sing just to do a little cross-cultural exchange, of course. Work as a PCV never ends! ; )
My big/real birthday celebration will be after our upcoming In-Service Training, in Fez. I think maybe I'm too old to make people celebrate my birthday, but then again I've been alive for a quarter-century and maybe that's kind of a big deal. I did regale my PC friends with the "WKRP in Cincinnati" story of my birth... You know the one. If you don't then maybe you'll hear it in a couple years. I don't think I'll be telling it again in Fez. When you don't know your Nick-at-Nite classics, then hearing a story about funny shows from the 80s isn't as hilarious as I think it should be...
October 24, 2008
A few days ago I was at my friend Hanneke's site and she'd taken in this really sick little puppy. He was so cute! Her neighbors said another dog had bitten him and he looked so friendly and helpless that she decided to take him in when he wandered over to her house.
(In Morocco, there are generally a lot of wild dogs in our sites in the bled. It can be a problem sometimes and recently a couple of PCVs have been bitten. It's more of an issue at night, though; during the day you can see to throw rocks at the dogs to make them go away. They're so accustomed to this practice that the motion of bending down and pretending to pick up a rock is usually enough to scare them away. All PCVs in-country receive a rabies series during training, and in case of dogbites we'll be sent to Rabat or the closest facility with the post-exposure prophylaxis. )
I came to visit the next day, and he was already in need of a great deal of care. He was playful and cute but had trouble eating anything and swallowing liquids. We just kind of figured his discomfort and health issues were due to the bite wound, which was on the side of his cute little puppy face. So she was trying to nurse him back to health and I helped out a bit. Some of the neighborhood kids were watching us and laughing as we taught him commands in Tash and English. We'd say "skus" and push his bum onto the ground so he'd sit, but then he'd pop back up and want to play some more.
We tried to feed him what we could, which proved difficult. So on our trip into Tiz, we shopped around for baby bottles and formula, anything that might prove manageable for the little guy. We went back to our sites and she kept me updated on his status.
Unfortunately, after a hard-fought battle with various afflictions and an emergency trip to the vet in Tiznit, the puppy, dubbed Samson in reference to a Regina Spektor song, succumbed to his myriad afflictions, including a severe case of roundworm, and died. From Hanneke's description, it sounded like a pretty tragic end. Well this morning, after a night of celebrating my entry into the world and whatnot, Hanneke gets a frantic call from her dad, who's just read an email she sent about the dog; he tells her that anyone who was in contact with Samson needs to get a rabies vaccination. Like at that very moment. We called the PCMO (Peace Corps Medical Officer-- in PC Morocco we have host country national medical staff) on duty, and she tells us she'll contact the hospital in Tiznit to see if they have the prophylaxis but that if we can't get vaccinated there then we'll have to travel up to Rabat for it as soon as we can.
So I'm sitting here in Tiznit writing this, after a hectic day of packing and prepping my house for an extended absence and running around getting ready for a potential trek across the country. I'm a little tired. I was ready to go to Rabat if necessary. Luckily they had the vaccination here, enough for all three PCVs who came into close contact with Samson.
In retrospect, maybe we shouldn't be playing with dogs here. This probably seems a bit obvious and maybe you're questioning our collective judgment right about now. But he was cute and didn't display any of the symptoms of rabies with which we were familiar. It's difficult to evaluate things like this because we're so out of our context that sometimes judging a situation like this can be next to impossible. Three different PCVs took it as a matter of course that you can take in a friendly but sick little dog, care for him, and raise him. It turns out that in wild animals, a symptom of rabies is fearlessness-- which we all definitely thought was playful puppy-ness. We've come to the conclusion that he most likely had rabies; although he didn't bite or scratch us, we were in very close contact with him and needed the shots. Live and learn.
(In Morocco, there are generally a lot of wild dogs in our sites in the bled. It can be a problem sometimes and recently a couple of PCVs have been bitten. It's more of an issue at night, though; during the day you can see to throw rocks at the dogs to make them go away. They're so accustomed to this practice that the motion of bending down and pretending to pick up a rock is usually enough to scare them away. All PCVs in-country receive a rabies series during training, and in case of dogbites we'll be sent to Rabat or the closest facility with the post-exposure prophylaxis. )
I came to visit the next day, and he was already in need of a great deal of care. He was playful and cute but had trouble eating anything and swallowing liquids. We just kind of figured his discomfort and health issues were due to the bite wound, which was on the side of his cute little puppy face. So she was trying to nurse him back to health and I helped out a bit. Some of the neighborhood kids were watching us and laughing as we taught him commands in Tash and English. We'd say "skus" and push his bum onto the ground so he'd sit, but then he'd pop back up and want to play some more.
We tried to feed him what we could, which proved difficult. So on our trip into Tiz, we shopped around for baby bottles and formula, anything that might prove manageable for the little guy. We went back to our sites and she kept me updated on his status.
Unfortunately, after a hard-fought battle with various afflictions and an emergency trip to the vet in Tiznit, the puppy, dubbed Samson in reference to a Regina Spektor song, succumbed to his myriad afflictions, including a severe case of roundworm, and died. From Hanneke's description, it sounded like a pretty tragic end. Well this morning, after a night of celebrating my entry into the world and whatnot, Hanneke gets a frantic call from her dad, who's just read an email she sent about the dog; he tells her that anyone who was in contact with Samson needs to get a rabies vaccination. Like at that very moment. We called the PCMO (Peace Corps Medical Officer-- in PC Morocco we have host country national medical staff) on duty, and she tells us she'll contact the hospital in Tiznit to see if they have the prophylaxis but that if we can't get vaccinated there then we'll have to travel up to Rabat for it as soon as we can.
So I'm sitting here in Tiznit writing this, after a hectic day of packing and prepping my house for an extended absence and running around getting ready for a potential trek across the country. I'm a little tired. I was ready to go to Rabat if necessary. Luckily they had the vaccination here, enough for all three PCVs who came into close contact with Samson.
In retrospect, maybe we shouldn't be playing with dogs here. This probably seems a bit obvious and maybe you're questioning our collective judgment right about now. But he was cute and didn't display any of the symptoms of rabies with which we were familiar. It's difficult to evaluate things like this because we're so out of our context that sometimes judging a situation like this can be next to impossible. Three different PCVs took it as a matter of course that you can take in a friendly but sick little dog, care for him, and raise him. It turns out that in wild animals, a symptom of rabies is fearlessness-- which we all definitely thought was playful puppy-ness. We've come to the conclusion that he most likely had rabies; although he didn't bite or scratch us, we were in very close contact with him and needed the shots. Live and learn.
