Engineering in Mbingo

It has been an absolute whirlwind the last month and a half after leaving Banyo for Mbingo.  Our whole family was excited for months at the upcoming arrival of my brother Zack and friend Jessica.  They arrived safely although having to go through a ghost town in the largest city in our region due to the anglophone/francophone conflict.  My brother aka 'Dr. Zax' as he is called here was able to get involved right away with all the medical happenings around the hospital.  Everyone of course immediately fell in love with Zack and tried endlessly to figure out how to get him to stay forever.  He was able to perform many surgeries and has a sea of new crazy medical stories as you could imagine.  


Jessica and I jumped right in on a project to ultimately fix a challenge that was cursing the hospital for years now.  The challenge was that there is a linens cycle and if anything slows or stops the linens needed for a surgery, the operation cannot start, ultimately resulting in delayed patient care for critical surgeries.  As are many thing in Africa, there was a much more complex than anticipated set of variables that were causing the problem.  Our initial assumption was that the drying process was slowing things down and so we set out to build a more cost effective, higher throughput system to get things dry when it rains.  In the rainy season it is almost guaranteed to rain at least once every day.  Currently we have 2 large plots of land set aside to dry clothes on lines in the sun.

When things can't get dry we fall back to our 30,000 watt electric dryer similar to the one in your house only scaled up.

Electrical challenges in Africa are mainly caused by poor design/planning, maintenance and funding.  Adding the large electrical load of the dryer to our grid is expensive and will cause us to need to buy a new transformer sooner rather than later at best or blow out the current transfer at worst.  The new transformer is easily $60,000+.  Therefor reducing/eliminating the dryer would be cost effective and buy us time before needing to upgrade to a new transformer.


The next challenge is that the OR is hot and humid even with 12 AC units attached to it.

So now the fun begins.  We tried to think of every creative way of solving the problem.  From simple to completely insane, we tossed around every idea.  Jessica was able to put all the variables into her computer and kick out some terribly useful numbers.  Jessica is a friend of mine from college who specializes in mechanical engineering that relates to HVAC.  She has spent much of her professional life designing HVAC system in Colorado.  Her company was kind enough to let us use a laptop and specialized software which helps in solving challenges like this.

We spent nearly every day she was here working on different ideas.

We went ahead and prototyped what we felt was the best idea in our front yard.  Very simple really.  When it starts raining, release the lever and voila you have an instant tarp protecting your clothes from rain.

Obviously this was a scale model and the real system would need to be 50x larger but we wanted something to show the hospital administration to sell them on the idea.  I don't want to put you to sleep with too many technical details but needless to say the challenge is complex.  We presented several different ideas including this one to administration and a large collection of 'simple fixes' which should help make a big dent on the numerous challenges.  We also started another project to collect more data to help solve the procedural part of the linens challenge.  Their response was very positive and hopefully a tarp deploying system will be built before rainy season this year.

Zack and Jess both left and everyone was sad, especially Charlie.


A week later started IT Class.  I spent 6 days solid with the heads of IT from numerous CBC hospitals throughout Cameroon to train them to prepare their hospitals for the upcoming EMR (electronic medical records) installations.  This is class 1 or 3: upgrading their networks.  The class was pretty intense with 5 hours of lecture and labs per day.  I was very pleased with their performance and passion for the topic.  We even had our first female IT 'guy' who was one of our top students. 

I ran out of adrenaline after the 6th day and crashed hard today.  Sunday as a day of rest is a great idea.  Tomorrow starts another new project...

Lori has been busy teaching Charlie through Kindergarten, visiting with Fulbe patients at the hospital and keeping all of our taste buds very happy.
   

Happy Christmas!

Merry Christmas or as we say in Cameroon- Happy Christmas!

Christmases overseas are starting to become less, well, foreign to us. While we miss family and friends at this time, we now spend less time thinking about all of the Christmasy things we are missing out on in the States and have instead embraced our own unique mix of American and African traditions.

Here is a picture tour of our Christmas season:

• We had to start the season off by putting up our gigantic, professionally decorated Christmas tree!

• Every night of Advent we went through the Adventures in Odyssey Advent stories- many night with our friend Lisa. One night we made gingerbread houses!

• Charlie and Lori did lots of baking. We even attempted homemade marshmallows! They were a hit with this crew!

• We went Christmas caroling around our village.

• We brought a plate of cookies to the Lamiido (our local king) and his wives and had a great visit with them!

• We had a "ladies only Christmas party" with food, snowflake making, the telling of the Christmas story and of course henna!

• We also had a "kids only Christmas party" - a melted snowball fight aka water balloon fight followed by watching "How the Grinch Stole Christmas."

• Christmas morning we had a lovely breakfast with a lovely view.

• And of course there were presents- from near and far!

• We went to church and after the service we all ate makkala (fried dough), popcorn, and cake.
• After church, local kids went door to door wishing a "Happy Christmas" in hopes of getting candy. It is kind of like trick or treating.

• Charlie and Lori then took dolls, match box cars, and candy to kids at the hospital (thank you Paradise ladies!) and cookies to the staff. (no pics of this because I feel super uncomfortable taking pics of sick kids)
• Then dinner with other missionaries and ice cream for dessert. Ice cream is a VERY special treat around here!

• Carols around the Christmas tree.

• And then we ended Christmas day with a fun game where the first person to unwrap the impossible to unwrap package with their oven-mitt-donned-hands wins a prize and Lori won!
  

We had a very merry Christmas season celebrating the birth of Christ with family and friends. We pray that you also rejoiced over the greatest gift ever given- God with us- Emmanuel!

What's in a name?

I went to a naming ceremont today. Little Jainabou Abbu was born a week ago and was nameless until today.

This morning her father and the men of the family joined with male friends to take the baby to the Mosque where the Imam announced the child's name for the first time. Boys are usually named after famlily memembers but parents can get more creative with girls' names. The baby is a grandchild to a co-wife of my good friend Hawawou. Yesterday I went to visit my friend and met the baby for the first time. I suggested they name her “Loriatou,” but alas they went with Jainabou. My dear friend invited me to the “after party.”

Family and friends celebrate a naming ceremony by slaughtering a sheep and then feasting. It is also kind of like a baby shower (minus the ridiculous “how big is the mommy's belly” game). Everyone brings gifts for mom and baby and everytime someone new joins the party, they go and look at each gift. The mom and baby received several new outfits, diapers, baby supplies, and SOAP- oh my goodness did they get soap. So much soap! I told Charlie's nanny about how much soap the mother received and she said when she had her child, her soap supply lasted until her daughter was a year and 8 months old! I brought some gifts, and yes some soap! But the fun thing is the mom gets gifts too- and not “mom gifts” like nursing pads but fun gifts like fancy new shoes and pretty cloth to make new dresses! There was even “goodie bags.” We went home with a leg of lamb, cola nuts, and candy!

We had a great time. So much laughing and eating and taking pictures since everyone was dressed up and in a festive mood. You might notice that Jainabou also was quite festive with her eye brow makeup! She also had her head shaved for the event much to my dismay. I begged them not to shave it because she had a head full of soft, thick, beautiful black curls. They all laughed at me and did it anyway. Regardless, she is a sweet little baby and everyone enjoyed passing her around.

I am so greatful to have met Hawawu. She is so joyous and fun to be around. I am so glad to call her friend and love that she has invited me into her life!

Eid al-Adha

Last week was Eid al-Adha - a Muslim celebration remembering Abraham's willingness to sacrifice his son. Here, those that can afford it slaughter a ram and have a feast with friends and family.

There is also the horse “Fantasia.” This is my favorite big Banyo event. Everyone gathers around the Lamiido's (the king) palace in their finest clothes. Street vendors sell yummy treats. Charlie and I  went with some friends and we wanted “anything deep fried!” We ate fried black-eyed pea fritters! Yum! Dignitaries come from all over- we sat behind the Minister of Finance! Musicians play homemade guitars and drums and crazy high pitched horn things. There is usually some kind of clown or jester. Excitement is definitely in the air!

And of course the main event are the horses! The horses are dressed up in elaborate head dresses and ornate saddles. They get together in groups of 5 or 6 starting down the road from the palace then all together they charge the stands and stop thisclose in front of the spectators. Then the men raise their long spears and everyone cheers!

 More groups repeat the same and every once in a while there is a musical interlude or a specific group like the “Princes of Banyo” or the wives of the Lamiido that come up and salute the Lamiido

or the Prefect (government official).

And then there is the crowd favorite- the "court jester." He rode his own special "horse!"

One of my favorite parts is getting to interact with different people. Charlie made a friend in the stands and later his father asked Charlie if she wanted to marry his son! (She was smitten!)

Rainy Season SCA

See this girl? She has completed 2 weeks of Kindergarten!

We are now back in Banyo after 2 fun-filled weeks at the Sunlight Christian Academy in Bamenda, Cameroon. SCA is a missionary homeschool co-op. We meet together twice a year- rainy season and dry season. There were some challenges for Charlie during SCA- she was the youngest one which meant some things were over her head or too difficult- like tennis. She could hardly hold up the racket! This was also her first time having to sit still in a “classroom” for an extended period of time. But overall she did well and had a lot of fun!  She played a ton! The resource room has a lot of toys- Barbies were a big hit with all of the kids which was perfect for Charlie!

There was a twins day and a crazy hair day!

They did art projects and learned about photography!

 

She even did the Presidential Fitness Test and almost got the Presidential Award for six-year-olds (there is not a category for five-year-olds). She ran a ¼ mile!

She also had daily devotions, music class, language arts, math, and so much more! It was a full and fun 2 weeks and this week we had a break because one of the best things about homeschool is that you can take a break whenever you want (or need to because your mom has to clean and unpack)! Homeschool at home will start Monday!

1st Day of K

Charlie started Kindergarten yesterday!

Just yesterday she was a snugly little bundle of baby then a curly headed toddler and now she is a BIG girl! Her homeschool co-op (Sonlight Christian Academy) started on Sunday with games and dinner then yesterday was a FULL day. I was exhausted so I know Charlie was too! She had devotions, language arts, math, tennis, PE (she said she did 21 push-ups), read aloud time, and a photography lesson! Sprinkled in between the “school time” was lots of playing with her friends. She even had a very special tea party with her Aunt Elsie (director of SCA) to celebrate the first day of school. We will be in Bamenda for the next two weeks for SCA- how exciting!

Hold your breath!

A Josh Blog!

When's the last time you sent in your payment for your electricity bill to your local hospital?  In America no one would expect the local hospital to provide their power much less water, housing, lawn care, maintenance, bottled water...you name it.  In Africa, a lot of times a hospital will be given a large piece of land in a remote location, sometimes because they are leper colonies or simply because that's the next available plot.  Since the hospital is now the only thing in the area, it acts as both a hospital and an infrastructure for its employees and patients.  Over time, newcomers flock to the area to provide services to the hospital, and before you know it, the hospital is now under the burden to provide infrastructure for everyone.
    Such is the case in Mbingo.  The hospital provides power to about two thirds of the entire city, some 150+ buildings.  The hospital grid consumes as much as 160,000 Watts of power with over $10,000 a month in electricity bills.  As is true in most of the world the power demands continue to increase at an alarming rate.  Every month we use 1% more power than the month before.  The utility company can't keep up with the current load much less with growth.  What happens when the power goes out? People die.  It has been the case numerous times when a hospital loses power and patients are on a respirator or oxygen, the machine simply runs out of backup power and the patient passes.  Mbingo has a backup generator which runs about 10% of the time annually.  It will automatic power the load when the utility goes down in under 10 seconds in critical areas.
    In my last blog, I talked about my one month project to do an electrical load study with fellow electrical engineer Hannah Peterson.  During our investigation we discovered a handful of issues that could easy become catastrophic in short order.  While Hannah returned to the US, I stayed and attempted to do one project after another to help patch the situation until a more permanent solution could be put into place.  Without going into too much detail, there existed a chance that two events could coincide (maybe 1 in 10) that could do a large amount of damage to our generator and potentially to all the electrical devices plugged in.  Since we have hundreds of thousands of dollars in medical equipment, I figured that while practically unlikely, the risk was too large to ignore and thus it needed to be resolved.  I honestly was very nervous about the whole project.  I was told that the project must be done as quickly as possible otherwise patients would die. So how do you rewire an entire hospital distribution room with only having the power out for 15 minutes max?  I spent two solid weeks designing a solution in CAD, precutting and bending all the cables with my new favorite electrician Nelson, and acquiring all the materials including cable, breakers, meters, timers, relays, terminators, backup generator and lots of tools.  I ran as much by Hannah as possible and felt pretty confident by the time the cut over date rolled around.

    We decided to make the date of the install on a Sunday morning when there was the least amount of activity.  I didn't know how much support I was going to get from the electrical department on the cut over day but when I got there, I was blown away by the 17 electricians who were prepped and ready to go an hour before the deadline.  I went through the detailed procedure I had come up with and sent everyone to their positions throughout the hospital.  I told them, when you see the lights go out, you go as fast as you can to get your part done.  When your done, come back and report so we can be down as short a time as possible.

8:02am, I pushed the heavy 450 amp 3 phase breaker down.  It was go time.  For the next 15 minutes, it was like when you shake the ant farm, everyone running around yelling in a full-on panic to get the wires off the walls and into the backup generator.  19 minutes later, "SNAP" the breaker comes back on and electricity floods the critical areas of the hospital.  Sorry the rest of you all, you'll be down for the next 7 hours.  The pandemonium died down a bit and we could then work without knowing people were literally holding their breaths.  We worked methodically, installing everything according to the plan for the next 5 hours.  Everything went about as smooth as could be expected. 

But then, it was time to bring the critical ICU, OR and wards back over to the new system.  We ran around and let everyone know that we were cutting back over and to expect the power to be out.  "SNAP!"  It was go time again and the riot returned.  This time there was a real sense of urgency after 32 minutes passed and we still had 2 breakers left.  A nurse came running up to the generator house in tears.  "TURN THE POWER BACK ON!  MY PATIENT IS TURNING BLUE!"  Oh the thoughts that run through your head.  First of all this can't be.  We planned everything.  There is O2 canisters next to every bed, battery backups on everything, we told them it would be down for 3 hours and its only been 32 minutes...  The first question collectively was, "why aren't you using the O2 canisters next to the bed?"  She replied, "we don't have a mask".  WHAT!?  "Go get a mask!"  She runs off, gets a mask, and the patient was fine.  I still haven't figured out why that wasn't obvious in the first place when the masks are clearly right there.  Anyway, 8 minutes later we are finished, clicked the power over and everything ran perfectly. We put the system through a series of tests including failing over to the generator and back and it worked exactly like it was supposed to.  Relief.  The hospital administrator showed up (in his tuxedo by the way).  My first thought was oh no did someone die?  I asked him straight out and he laughed and said, "no, no one died".  He took the whole team out to lunch, took our orders and even served us food like a waiter.  We all apologized to each other for our snippiness during those tense moments.  There were high fives all around and everyone really felt like they accomplished something. 

Before:

After:

Onto the next project...