East Africa Keeps Trying to Kill Me

East Africa keeps trying to kill me, it would seem. 

I am like a cat; I have 9-lives.

In September, I went through an earthquake, only to just a few weeks later, survive nearly drowning in the Nile River.

I flew overnight last night from Accra to Nairobi, and Karen, one of my midwife trainers and friends, along with a driver, picked me up from the airport bright and early, at about 6:00 AM this morning.

We all bleary eyed started our long journey up to Migori. It is approximately a 5-hour drive.

After a few hours, we stopped off at a store to pick-up some training supplies, snacks for the week, and our traditional stop at the pharmacy to pick up cheap drugs! My haul for the day included some Valium (I take it on the plane), and some muscle relaxers. Who knew how handy they would become in just a few short minutes.

We piled back into the van, loaded down with snacks, water, drugs, and assorted random shit. Karen and I were carrying away chatting, bitching about Donald Trump, when all of a sudden, there was an incredible crash, explosion, and blunt impact, and before I could process anything, there was debris of some kind assaulting my face.

I told myself to close my mouth and eyes, and could at this point make out that I was being pelted with glass, all over my body. I could also feel the car moving.

It was incredibly disorienting.

It felt like the world was exploding, and like it was happening in slow motion.

I, apparently, yelled to Karen, “we’ve been hit!!”

I, however, have no memory of this, she later told me this.

When the vehicle stopped, I opened one of my eyes up slightly, and could see the air was filled with dust and glass particles. I looked at Karen and asked if she was ok, to which she replied yes, and then I asked the driver, and he also said yes.

As I started becoming aware of our surroundings, I quickly realized we were covered in glass, with our van pushed to the side of the highway. Our driver explains to us at this point that a motorcyclist has hit us.

I turn around, instinctively, to see if he is ok.

Bad idea.

Very bad idea.

I literally say out loud, “Oh my god Karen, he is really fucked up!”

He was seizing and his body was flailing around.

At this point, our driver moves our van a bit out of the way of traffic, and tells us to not get out of the car until the police arrive, and he runs over to the motorcyclist.

Around this time, what seems like the entire town rushes to the scene, half surrounding the man on the motorcycle, and the other half surrounding us. We were almost immediately swarmed with people.

This is of course incredibly disorienting and frightening because our windows are gone, we are covered, and I mean, COVERED in glass, I have just seen a man a few feet from me likely dying or near death, we are both in incredible pain from the glass and the impact, and all we can do is just sit in a pile of glass.

Yes, that is right, we just sat in a pile of glass.

We were concerned about potentially getting arrested, or being taken into the police station for questioning, even though it appeared as if it wasn’t our fault, we didn’t want to move. We were also concerned about the mob gathering around us.

I immediately say, “I need to get a Kenyan on the phone I trust.”

I frantically attempt to start dialling, but realize I am just pushing random numbers into my phone. I say to Karen, “I don’t think I am processing anything, I don’t think I am actually dialling anyone’s number.”

I eventually am able to figure out how to, you know, use a phone, and begin calling many of the doctors I work with, and who I trust my life with, and to other project staff. I can’t get a hold of anyone. I keep calling over and over.

I just desperately want someone to tell me what to do, because I am pretty scared shitless at this point.

People are practically hanging in our window, trying to see if we are ok, but I am also concerned because I have all of my electronics on my lap, trying to figure out this epic cluster fuck we have just found ourselves in.

At some point, I tell Karen that maybe she should roll up the window, because of the people trying to see inside…. I realize as I am speaking the words that of course, she cannot roll up the window, because WE ARE COVERED IN THE PIECES OF THE WINDOW!

We immediately start laughing hysterically. Trauma response, obviously.

I send out an SOS email to every person I know in Kenya. The title of which was:

URGENT – EMERGENCY - KIMBERLY NEEDS HELP

Shortly after sending this email, our driver comes back and tells us the gist of what has happened:

The man on the motorcycle was being chased by the police, because he was taking charcoal from the forest (or something to that affect). Our driver saw him coming (we were traveling north on a highway, the motorcycle was coming from a side street onto the highway), and our driver tried to speed up to get out of the way, however, he didn’t have enough time. The motorcycle hit the side of our van, head on, traveling at about 100 KPH (around 60 MPH), which explains the incredible blunt force we were hit with. A perfect T-bone accident.

Eventually one of my American colleagues, who is also currently in Kenya, gets in contact with me, and we are trying to triage whether or not we need to get another van or what the hell to do. While we are talking, the police finally show up, so I quickly get off the phone.

Karen and I are both anxious and worried about whether the police will try and hold us responsible. Keep in mind; we are still sitting in a pile of glass, with glass literally all over us. To make matters worse, it wasn’t safety glass. It was some kind of mix between safety glass and regular glass; it broke like safety glass, but was incredibly sharp and definitely cut us up, you couldn't touch it without bleeding.

Thankfully, the police seem totally uninterested in pursuing charges against us, especially considering the circumstances of the chase. The officer tells us it is good we didn’t get out of the car because of the mob that surrounded us. She tries to clear the crowd and tells the driver to take the car (and us) across the street.

As we are pulling away, I realize we are just a few feet from the side of the road, which has a 20-25 foot steep drop off the side. Had we been pushed even a foot or two more, we likely would have rolled down the embankment.

As this reality settles in my mind, the magnitude of what has just happened is begins to sink in.

We drive across the street to a gas station. I realize I have glass in my eyes, Karen has it in her mouth, and it is everywhere. I mean EVERYWHERE.

We both had glass in our bras; I had glass in my underwear. I thankfully had leggings on under a skirt (I was still in my overnight plane clothes!), so just ripped them off in the parking lot.

We think that because the impact was so hard, the glass flew all around the car and settled everywhere, including in our clothing.

I realize I have a piece of glass shard in the back of my knee that I need to pull out, and when I go to do it, I realize it is lodged in my scar from the shistosomiasis that I got from the Nile River from when I nearly drowned a few months ago.

I can’t decide if this is hilarious, horrifying, or just so fucking incredibly ironic, that I am picking out a shard of glass from a pre-existing scar from the last time East Africa tried to kill me.

I throw the bloody piece of glass onto the ground and crush it with my flip-flop.

It feels oddly satisfying and cathartic to feel and hear it disintegrate into powder beneath my heel.

I get my hands clean so that I can try and remove the glass from my eyes. I fish out a few small black pieces.

That was real fun.

I should mention, that the entire government medical system in the country of Kenya is on strike. Day 75 tomorrow. There is nowhere for us to even go to get looked over.

My mind never wanders far from the man on the motorcycle.

We never do find out what happened to him. However, given that he wasn’t wearing a helmet, and hit a car head on going 60 MPH, nothing good can come of it.

I can’t stop thinking about his family. He was stealing charcoal from the forest probably because they couldn’t afford to buy any and needed it to cook food, probably for their children.

Tragic.

If the man on the motorcycle happens to survive, it will be because he was taken to a private hospital, a hospital that he almost certainly won’t have been able to afford.

Absolutely heart breaking.

I am constantly reminded of my privilege that I have, not only as an American, but also as a human on this planet. 

Within an hour, I had multiple doctors on the phone, tons of staff trying to find us transportation, and had I been really badly injured, I could have afforded to be taken to the country’s most expensive private hospital.

I wouldn't have even had to think about it.

The man on the motorcycle, however, likely lost his life trying to get charcoal to cook food.

I thought of this all day as I sipped on my sparkling water, eating cashews. Luxuries, by any standard.

I am lucky.

And not just because things could have ended so, so, so much worse in this car accident this afternoon; but because I have options and recourses in front of me, everyday, but especially, and maybe most importantly, when shit hits the fan.

Within a matter of hours we had a new driver, and transferred ourselves, and all of our stuff, to another car.

As the adrenaline starts to wear off, we both realize we have some major whiplash, and both of our necks and heads hurt, a lot. We also have glass embedded everywhere and scratches to match.

Then I remember: VALIUM AND MUSCLE RELAXERS!

We treat ourselves to a few, washed down by sparkling water.

I was incredibly grateful for those pills, to help take the edge off of my physical and emotional misery. In that moment, I thought that the expression, a bitter pill to swallow, never felt so fitting in my entire life. 

That poor man on the motorcycle.

My job does not come without risks. Far from it. While abroad, I am constantly trying to mitigate risk and danger at every turn.

Is it worth it?

Of course.

This is who I am, and this is what I was made to do.

Years ago, while in graduate school, I went to a public health conference at Yale, and Nicolas Kristoff spoke. He talked about his global travels, the things he has seen, the people he has talked to, how it has shaped him as a person, as a journalist, and as a citizen of the world.

I was enamoured with his every word.

He spoke of the dangers inherent in global health, in journalism.

He closed his speech by saying, “I believe that by being virtue of being born American and winning the lottery of birth, I owe a little bit of myself back to the world.”

If I were a religious person, this is the moment where I would say, “Amen!”

Is the work hard sometimes? Hell yes.

Do I enjoy profuse vomiting, exposure to Malaria, dengue, shistosomiasis, and more on a regular basis? Hell no.

Do I enjoy having two near-death experiences in the span of four months? Hell no.

Is it worth it?  Hell yes.

Will it always be worth it? Will I always be willing to take these risks? I don’t have the answer to those questions right now. Maybe, maybe not. I can’t see myself doing anything else.

Why?

Because if I have learned anything in life, it is that nothing is guaranteed.

Malaria might get you, or a terrorist, or your plane might fall out of the sky.

Or maybe you will get a super rare and shitty terminal disease like ALS, like my Mom has.

Or maybe you will fall down and break your hip and die, never having really lived at all.

The point is, none of us have control over any of it.

If we think that by not leaving our country, our city, our neighbourhood, or even house, is protecting us, we are mistaken.

Nothing is guaranteed to us.

I will continue living life, out loud, to the outermost edges, until my last breath.

My New Years Resolution this year was more of a mind-set, than a resolution. It was, “Do hard things.”

Whether that is going to a 90-minute hot yoga class when I want to sit on my couch and watch Teen Mom, or sacrificing temporary creature comforts to help make this world a better place, or confronting uncomfortable truths about our world, I vow to get up, everyday, and do them. Do hard things.

To hard things.