Award ceremony
















Sunday 11th July

Well what a weekend it turned out to be!

On Sunday, judging went well. Two areas decided to put flowers in jam jars in the ward area (trying to gain those extra points…..!!). Everyone was out cleaning leaves off roofs, mattresses out in the sun, using the water hose, washing down walls, mops flying. Felt sorry for the poor patients that were in theatre that day. Perhaps they did not get the attention they deserved!

Bumped into Pauline – panic!! The lady that said she could make the 160 mandazis can’t make them... help, no food!
In the meantime, I am doing dressings and scrubbing beds, wondering what we are going to do.
Don’t panic, another mandazi lady has been found in the market, will deliver at 2pm.

The hospital is certainly shining. The mops are worn out, the bristles have gone from the brooms, and the rags are now definitely rags. As Sister W---- says, the only people who are unhappy are the spiders as they have no web to go home to!

So the judges had a difficult task. After much discussion, the cleanest ward was thought to be the Children’s Ward. Runners up were Out-Patients Department and Surgical Ward.

Pauline has run around all day, helping cleaning, moving chairs arranging the washing of cups for tonight. Amazing - the mandazis arrive!! There was a suspicion that the bucket they were brought in belonged to the lady that cleaned the toilets, but it was a rumour, I am sure. Well, nearly sure…

P arranged for someone to put a teaspoon of jam in each donut; she thought everything was going well until she went off to check and found them pushing a blob of jam in with their fingers!!! They had washed their hands. P to the rescue again!

By 5-30 we are all set. The video chosen is ‘Ice Age’ a cartoon, safe. It’s a hard job finding something that is suitable for everyone.

At 6-30 the only people present were all the Drs, Sisters and the volunteers. Panic, the thought of all those donuts and buckets of juice. Unfortunately for us, the governor from Rumbek had arrived and was giving information to the locals about a new road that is to be put in and new buildings that may be built.

Also about the collection of information, like individuals’ age assessments. At the moment, no one knows when they were born or when someone died. This is not collected, so if next year South Sudan splits from the North, a government needs to know ‘their population’. So, there is a hard road ahead.

Because of these dignitaries arriving, a few cows had been killed, and, as I said, any free food and people will come. So, by 7pm, we were starting to get a few people arriving at our function.

The short PowerPoint presentation went down well, showing every one cleaning; they love that, seeing themselves on the big screen. They have no mirrors so don’t know what they look like. So, after a repeat performance of the slides, we moved on to the presentations.

All the cleaners and laundry staff received some jewellery; luckily, I had thought ahead and taken with me some of my ‘fun’ type earrings and bracelets and a few extra scales. The man who cleans the grounds of the hospital received a small digital radio, so now while he is pushing his cart around he has his earpiece in, listening to the news. Very happy!

The Children’s Ward were the winners, so received ‘the Cup’ full of sweets + some fantastic posters of African animals which were kindly donated by a great company called Kids Art in Queensland (www.kidsart.com.au).

The Children’s Ward has nothing to identify it from any other ward. There are two posters I put up last year, but no books, no bright paint on the walls, nothing. So, on Tuesday, I will help them put them up.

All the staff on the Children’s Ward received a fob watch (one has a flat battery already) - very sought after as not many people have watches. The second ward team to win was the Outpatients Department, who had really done well with cleaning their very old area. I think you saw the photo of one of the nurses sweeping the cobwebs down. They all received a very smart shoulder bag. This group of people are a little older and attending adult education classes, so that was perfect for them.

Third placing was the surgical ward and they all got nurses’ scissors and a pen. They probably would have preferred the watches, but realised they came 3rd, not first. It has made a difference already - I can keep my pen and scissors for a whole day without them being borrowed, great!!

More speeches were made about how hard every one had worked and we had achieved our objective by reducing the bacteria, and making our hospital a safer and healthier environment for our patients and staff.

We were just settling into Ice Age 1 when the Bishop arrived, which was a great honour for us all. He is a very loved and respected man in the community. He then said a few more kind words which they all lapped up, and then left, I hope to sleep, as he had had a very busy day.
It was all over by 9pm, just in time to close the door (we will clean up tomorrow) and head for the finals of the real World Cup.

As I have said before, it was up on a big screen in ‘the cathedral’. It was packed, hard to find a hard bench to sit on, but we did. The excitement was high, but I think most thought it was a poor game. The Sudanese are quite good at being impartial - they clap and shout equally for both sides. Unless, of course, it had been an African team! Going into the second lot of extra time, I thought I was going to fall asleep!!