Wildlife in Mutomo

In an attempt to answers some more of your questions, we have written a few short stories about the animals we've seen in Mutomo.

A Snake in the Medical Ward.

You may have noticed a picture of Anita with a dead snake. Here is it’s story: Yesterday morning we were at our usually scheduled tea break (if you come to Mutomo hospital around 10am you will find hardly anyone in the hospital as all the staff take a tea break and we can be found in the canteen instead). 

Tea Break

Northe was having his samosa, Laura was having her hardboiled eggs and Meg was enjoying her tea and donut when someone came in and said: “there is a snake in the medical ward". While you might have expected everyone to run away, it was the complete opposite as we all ran in one giant group to the ward. There was a man in the ward standing on the walkway over a drainage ditch in a battle with the snake who was hiding under the walkway. The man was poking the snake with a broom and it seemed to be getting more and more angry. Eventually it came out and stood up about 3 feet off the ground. The man continued to hit it with the broom until the broom broke and he continued to hit it with the broken stick. Eventually the man won and the snake was dead. Apparently in the local culture there is a custom that you can never let a snake leave alive. The most amazing thing about this whole story besides the fact that the was killed with a broom, is that the man who killed the snake was actually a patient.

The photo of the snake again

2 tales of unusual pets.

1. Laura was in her office the other day and a giant beetle-type bug came walking in. She thought the bug was scary looking and her office mates thought she was very funny. They decided to keep the bug as an office pet. We will call him Eddie.

Eddie the Bug

2. As some of you may know, Meg has an irrational fear of birds. So, it was quite fitting that when she came back to the nursery ward yesterday after lunch the nurse had a surprise for her. She had caught a Zungululu and was holding it in her hands. A zungululu is a small bird that looks kind of like a swallow, and when it is small it has some beautiful yellow feathers. The whole ward had a good laugh at Meg hiding from the bird because as they put it she was “fearing.” To Meg’s surprise instead of planning to release the bird, Bretta was planning to take it home to her daughter as a playmate. Meg did not like the idea of the nurse and the patients playing with a bird all afternoon so she had them keep it in a drawer until it was time to go home. We named her “Lulu.”

Nurse Bretta with her new pet

What if you marry a camel herder?

One of Meg’s patients lives in a tribe that sounds like they are nomadic and raise camels. The little boy drinks nothing except for camel’s milk. When Meg seemed surprised that they were drinking camel milk, the father had many questions for her. He was shocked to learn that Meg did not have camels, and in fact had never had camel milk. He was even more surprised that Meg had no interest in raising camels. His next logical question was: “what will you do if you marry a camel herder?” to which Meg replied: “Luckily I am already married and my husband does not have any camels… at least not yet.”

Aside from these close encounters with our animal friends there are several other animals we see every day including: goats, donkeys, cows, chickens, feral cats & dogs and various birds and bugs of all shapes an sizes. In fact some of the bugs look more like small dinosaurs. 

And finally...