What it's like to be a medic on TDA

What is it like to work on TDA??? I get the impression that a lot of people would think it would be some kind of awesome working holiday. And awesome it is - holiday it is not.

We work hard. There's always stuff that needs doing. As the medic I run a medical clinic between 4-5pm every second day (Mathias the other medic does every other day). In addition to this I'm technically on call every night. If there's an emergency - my tent is the yellow one with the orange flagging tape on it. I am yet to be woken.

Then there's the general tour support. We go through an 8 day cycle of duties. Mine looks something like this:
Day 1: Lunch
Day 2: breakfast and sanitation
Day 3: Morning sweep
Day 4: Web and Waste
Day 5: Lunch
Day 6: off
Day 7: morning sweep
Day 8: kitchen duty

Here's what's included with all these duties:

Lunch: The main duty involved is running the lunch stop. Usually I'm up and packed up half an hour before breakfast starts. Triple check that you have everything you need - most of this you should be on top of the night bef0re. The food for the day is chosen in consultation with Kim our cook. You also need to make sure you have the lunch satellite phone in case of emergency and there's no cell phone reception, the lunch attendance clipboard, enough bread and food.
Once this is done help out with breakfast as required (topping up the cereal, thermoses, make more powdered milk for the coffee etc etc).
The lunch truck leaves when breakfast ends (sometimes when it starts if the road is dodgy and the trucks go slower than the riders).
When you get to lunch you help set up - put up the tarp for shade, pull out the tables, start chopping tomatoes and cucumbers, whatever protein is included with lunch e.g. luncheon meat, tuna, cheese, hommus)
Then as the riders come through you check them off on the attendance list, and keep the food, the energy drink, the water jerry can all topped up.
It's a big job but you have the "lunch sweep" person and Pajero the lunch truck driver there to give you a hand.
When lunch is over you truck to camp. Usually I'm on clinic in the afternoon between 4-5.

Breakfast and Sanitation: So with this awesome duty you are the first to wake up. You need to have all your stuff packed up an hour before breakfast starts. Then you help with getting the coffee on, setting up for breakfast, getting the porridge going, getting the chopping boards out, the bread and spreads on the table. While breakfast is happening you help keep everything topped up (bread, spreads, hot water, milk). You help break camp in the morning, wash up stuff etc.
Then you ride the truck to camp. If you're somewhere civilised with toilets then this is a great thing. Otherwise you help Steve the truck driver dig some holes in the ground and put up the toilet tents. Then it's your job to make sure the holes don't start overflowing and if they do - you have to organise for some new holes to be dug, close in the old ones and move the tents. thankfully we've got the system downpacked now and we don't need to move the tents anymore. After this you generally go into the kitchen and help with all the chopping and preparing for the nights dinner.

Morning sweep: So morning sweep is one of my favourite duties. It's usually a more relaxed start to the day. Riding gear goes on, tent comes down, into the kitchen, help with breakfast as required. You're the last one to leave camp on your bike. And it's your job to arrive last to lunch. So depending on how you feel you can either ride fast and stop alot, or just ride slow. I usually just ride however fast I feel like riding until I can see the last riders then I'll stop at the next coke stop, take some photos do whatever I can to not catch them, depending on who it is. Most riders do not like being "swept" so I try to stay far back enough so they don't feel like I'm doing this. Some riders like having a chat though to and there are some cool clients out there who are awesome to talk to. Once you're at lunch you help pack up lunch with whoever's on lunch, and the lunch truck driver. sometimes whoever's on lunch sweep will also help out. Then it's usually on the truck to camp, but sometimes I keep riding, once again depending on how I feel, if I have clinic in the afternoon and if I think I can make it to clinic in the afternoon. Usually 80km is enough for one day. Once at camp help in the kitchen is always appreciated in between the arrival of the lunch truck and the beginning of clinic. Then it's time for dinner.

Web and Waste: Another one of my favourites. Main duties include taking down the toilet tents, riding your bike for at least half the day so you can get some photos of riders, and then writing the blog update in the evening. Once again when you're done doing all these essential things help in the kitchen never goes astray.

Off: Sounds like an awesome day but the reality is that there's no such thing as a day off on TDA! There'll always be someone asking you medical questions, chances are someone will be unwell or on holidays and need their duty for the day covered for them. Technically you're allowed to ride your bike all day. You don't really need to help out but no one will complain if you do!

Kitchen Duty: One thing about these cyclists is that they eat five times as much as a normal person. You try chopping 15kg of onions, carrots, tomatoes, capsicums.... the list doesn't end. Have i mentioned help is always appreciated in the kitchen??? You help break camp in the morning, wash up the breakfast stuff, pack up the trucks. Ride the truck to camp. Into the kitchen. there's some days you're lucky if you leave the kitchen for 10 minutes. other days when it's relatively well controlled and you might be able to escape for an hour.

Generally somewhere betweeen 4:30-5 is a good time to wake up you're lucky if you're in bed by 2030.

If anyone is unwell enough to need a clinic then it's my job to take them there and someone else will cover whatever else I'm supposed to be doing.

So why is this job so awesome you ask??? Well... what other job allows you to travel across africa on a bicycle??? when else do you get to see the sun rise and set every single day??? where else do your colleagues start to become more like your family??? But mostly it's the unexpected things that'll happen along the way. I reckon if TDA was to become a reality TV show there'd be enough dramas to keep the entire world entertained!!!

Holidays

My tent is left standing as everyone else packed there's up. People rode away on their bicycles, the trucks drove away from camp leaving me left behind, all alone. For a moment I thought I was going to start crying - which is a weird thing considering I usually don't cry, I love my personal space, I'm ready for a holiday and I'm pretty ok at being on my own. The boys (Mathias, Cristiano, Ferdi, Steve and Gabe) all gave me a big hug before they left. I realise suddenly that I love these guys - they are all like brothers to me. Us staff are like one big family. Part of the working for TDA deal is that for the reasons of better work dynamics and for your own personal sanity, all staff get to take a break from the group for a week - obviously not all at the same time. So my place is here in Kasane, Botswana - an awesome little spot. Lots of I'm not planning on doing too much for the next week. Might read for a bit, write some postcards, check out the elephants and baboons that wander around camp. I can't remember when the last time I just stopped and put my feet up was. More than a year ago I think.

Cholera.... or Malaria???

I am hiding in a little internet cafe in Lilongwe, Malawi.

Not so long ago we were camped at Chitimba beach which is right on the lake. Another awesome little spot. But we found out after we got there that there was a cholera outbreak in the village not far from the camp. There had been 2 deaths in the last 2 weeks. As long as people are good with their hand hygiene, and eat well cooked food we decide it shouldn't really be a big issue.

The next day 3 people are sick with diarrhea - usually I wouldn't be too concerned because people get diarrhea here in Africa all the time, it's part of Africa, it's part of the deal with excessively tiring out your body through excessive amounts of cycling. Because of the cholera outbreak though I decide that they probably should be taken to a medical facility to a doctor that hopefully knows a little more about cholera than I do. A cholera outbreak at camp would be enough to shut down the tour for a couple of weeks. Another 3 people come along aswell who have also not been feeling too well recently either.

The doctor is not concerned about cholera. Apparently a cholera bowel motion looks like a flakey rice water and it doesn't stop coming (if you were interested... sorry I'm aware that not everyone reading this works in the medical field so perhaps many of you are not that interested).

He's more concerned that we need to rule out malaria. So he does a full blood count and a blood film and... 3 cyclists get diagnosed with malaria.

Anyhow, I have only seen malaria once before. But the Indaba staff and some of the other guys I've met who make it a habit of doing lots of tour guiding through malarious areas have all never seen 3 such healthy cases of malaria, and question the diagnosis.

The two options would be
a) to treat it as malaria with some Coartem
b) to go and find another medical facility and repeat the test
We can't ignore a diagnosis like this, and I would like to think that the doctor knows more about Malaria than we do. Time is poor, it's too late for a repeat test tonight, the tour waits for no one. So I choose option a) and if they don't actually have malaria then it's not going to kill them if they have the treatment.

My impression is that because they were taking prophylactic tablets for malaria that they will not get anywhere near as sick as someone who doesn't take any prophylaxis so the doctors diagnosis is quite possible.

For all you families out there that read everyones blogs please do not be at all alarmed. All three of these people are perfectly fine, and have now recovered, and never even got off their bicycles because we got onto the diagnosis early and they were never really that sick in the first place.