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After my cervical cancer screening practicum, I went to find Dr. Etolu on Ward 4A. I had promised to help him with data entry for his research project. I called him, and he told me that he was on his way. About an hour later, he finally showed up on the ward. He told me that he had to go see a VIP patient on the 6^th floor (private floor with paying patients) with his consultant. So I followed him there. And for the first time, I saw Dr. Etolu being pimped, or as they call it here, being percussed/squeezed. Dr. Etolu handled it very well, with absolute calm and amazing precision. Man, if only I could become a doctor like him!

By the time we were done (seeing that one patient took close to 2 hours!!), it was dark, and I was ready to call it a day. Dr. Etolu told me that he had actually already finished the data entry for the cases that we had collected so far over the weekend, so there was no work to do. He brought me to the doctor’s mess, where we each got a soda, and split a meal of rice with chicken (nkoko!!!). It was delicious! We chatted about medicine, about his research project, about Mulago, about Soroti, about medical training here as compared to medical training in the US. And by the time we were done, I was half convinced to just move to Uganda and practice medicine here for the rest of my life!

Anyways, by the time we were done with dinner, it was quite late, so I hurried home. I got home just before 10pm. When I arrived, the household was in turmoil. Gerie greeted me with a mixture of joy and frustration. As it turned out, they had started worrying about me when I hadn’t reached home by 8pm. They tried calling me but my phone battery had died during the day, so they couldn’t get through to me. They called Cliff, Boni, Simon, posted on my facebook wall, was going to start contacting all my facebook friends to see if anyone knew where I was. Cliff had called a friend of his who was an intern at Mulago, and the intern was getting ready to scour the hospital for me. Olive and Gerie had formed a prayer circle, and they were all praying for my safe return home. What a frightful situation! I promised to always keep my phone charged, and gave them the phone numbers of all of my new acquaintances in Uganda. I also told them that if I am ever late coming home, and they knew I was in Mulago, then they should try calling Dr. Etolu first. Chances are, I’m hanging out with him on his ward or completing his research project.

I felt so terrible for causing these girls to worry. “I’m so sorry. Nsonyiwa.” “It’s ok. We’re just happy you came home safely,” Gerie replied. And for the first time, I realized that this had truly become my home, and these girls, their family and friends, they had all become my family.