Two elderly ladies in their late 70’s cautiously ring the bell outside a sex shop in Southampton and creep inside. Their eyes open wide at the sight of gadgets they cannot quite conceptualise how or where might be used on a human body. They nudge each other on the arm and almost giggle like schoolgirls. But that’s beside the point. They have come to buy some Viagra – under the counter.
The sex shop owner is happy to help, and explains he has a special deal on: only £1 per pill this week. The ladies decide to buy 20 pills. The shop owner wants to give a bit of advice for how their husbands should use them, but the taller and more tanned lady, with a shock of white-blonde hair and more than a passing resemblance to Camilla Parker-Bowles, replies: “What husband? I am a medical missionary in Kenya, and I need these pills for a villager who had a voodoo spell put on his penis so he can no longer get an erection! The families are still waiting for his marriage to be consummated, and we have to help!”
The shop owner was so delighted with this story that he threw in an extra 10 free pills – making a whole month’s supply for the beleaguered Kenyan bridegroom.
And that, dear readers, is your introduction to the delightful Valerie, 78-year-old state-registered nurse from England, who started looking after the villagers in Shela 20 years ago. We met each other yesterday, and shared some fabulous stories of our attempts at helping and healing this village.
She worked from the mud hut, which used to stand where Wendy Mandy has now built a 3-story Dispensary, and had to contend with a whole other level of problems than I have faced in my short time here.
Valerie used to dress burn wounds from when the villagers cooked over fire pits, but she did not understand why the wounds would be infected already the next day. That was until she worked out that the Muslim villagers were taking off the dressings to wash themselves before prayer, got dirty water on the wounds and did not dress them again afterwards. She then walked round to each patient’s house with the Imam who gave them permission to keep the dressings on for prayer. Valerie also taught the villagers to take their medicines even when it is Ramadan, and the villagers love her through and through.
Fate would have it that within 24 hours of meeting, we have been able to help each other with no less than three patients. One of them was a local carpenter who amputated part of his finger on a circular saw yesterday. Valerie brought him, his blood-soaked towel and three friends of his who were helping keep him upright to my clinic. I wonder what it is about villagers and finger semi-amputations this week! I put him back together, while his pain was substantially diminished by the morphine that Valerie happened to have. It’s so nice to have a “team” – and a nurse with a love for Africa who just cannot seem to fully retire is a very welcome part of that team!
For anyone curious what became of the bridegroom, voodoo proved stronger than Viagra, so we will have to do some (even more) alternative thinking on that one…
