Volunteer blog: Francien

I’ve been in South Africa for 2 months now, and I can’t believe I’m halfway trough my time here in St. Lucia. Only 4 weeks left! Time flies by when you’re having fun.


I started my volunteer work here at the medical projects and I will switch to the education project next week. Because there are more education volunteers right now, I probably will continue helping with some medical projects as well, which I definitely don’t mind because I love the medical projects. It can be hard sometimes, though. 

Before I went to St. Lucia I was at the project in Thanda with animals and I have to say that I feel more sad here sometimes because of all the things that I see. Like very sick patients, but I still see them smiling and thinking positive. 

It is starting to get winter here and I felt so sorry for the people in their non-insulated houses with holes everywhere because it was quite cold last week. 

Two weeks ago two patients in Ezwenelisha died and last week we saw a new Home Based Care patient with meningitis. He looked so sick... And it’s sad to see when people from 10 families are losing weight (what happened last week in Khula for a few patients). 

You want to do more sometimes, but you can’t. I have to remember myself that the patients appreciate every minute we’re there, even if we just talk to them and be supportive. And it feels so good to see when patients are doing better. 

For example, seeing the 10 families gaining weight or seeing children and adults pass for their HIV certificate. People tell us sometimes that they’ve got hope that their child or family member will survive after we visited them and that is one of the things we always try to accomplish: keep the families and patients positive. 

Last week we went to Rose, a woman with Kaposi's Sarcoma in her foot and leg and she wasn’t able to move for a very long time (she also had TB). Last week, after being given some crutches through the Happy Africa Foundation, she showed us she can walk again with her crutches! So she’s doing much, much better now. She said the nutrient drinks we gave to her give her strength to start walking again. 

On Monday I finished my part for the HIV primary school education and two other volunteers took it over. They all wanted to go on the picture with me and the next day they asked where I was. It’s always nice to hear when the children liked you. 

I surprised them on Thursday when I went to a new project at primary school called Girls' Club. And there were some girls from the HIV education that were glad to see me again. The 30 girls seemed a little bit shy in the beginning, but when we eventually started with pimping their journals with glitters, stickers and other stuff we brought they were getting crazy! I think this Girls' Club will be a very big success. 

I’ve been to the clinic three times this week and we finally were donated new thermometers to use for the children. They are forehead thermometers and are so quickly to use. So especially on immunisation day when a lot of babies and children are coming, our new thermometers will save a lot of time. 

It was a good week and our volunteer group consists of different people and that makes it a very nice group. I will enjoy my last four weeks here and I’ll never regret or forget the time I’ve been here.

Follow Francien on her own personal blog here.