First impressions and First Aid

First week came to a wonderful close yesterday as I took a nice trip on a sketchy motorcycle to the distant lake/ lagoon (what's the difference actually?) Lagoa Quissico with my new friend Victor. Victor is my liaison at the hospital for the Jogo Saudável program. He's been a trooper teaching me Chope (local language) and answering my hundreds of questions.

(This is a video, which apparently only works for Android users, sorry!) 

But let's back up a bit to my arrival in Maputo (the capital). I was in the very last row so obviously I was one of the last off the plane... except the dude who had too much to wine on the flight and got carried off on a stretcher. The customs officer didn't even look at my papers so that's the good part about arriving at 22h.
All I really saw of Maputo was traffic, restaurants, and pot holes. My hotel was really, really nice and fairly close to the airport. Needless to say, I will be making a weekend trip back to Maputo to explore more.

Maputo hotel breakfast 

Inhambane. A hour and a half flight from Maputo including one stop over at a clearly tourist place as that's where a bunch of tourists joined the flight. Inhambane is the capital of the province, is a big town I would say, has a lovely pier, very calm and quiet. This town is also where my "headquarters"  and colleagues are. I had three days to orientate and sort out some logistics (buy stuff for my house, cell phone, internet etc). Other than my one colleague from Chile I was the only white person around 98% of the time which means I stick out like a red thumb ('cause I'm a ginger? Get it? )

Zavala! Which is really the town of Quissico, the capital of the district of Zavala. I will admit, as we were driving to my house we passed a lot of very "African" housing and I was starting to get nervous. But then we passed the high school, turned a corner or two and bam! I am a spoiled brat again with house that has electricity and running water. Here I am the only white person 99.5% of the time. I've seen one and a half other (the half was hitch hiking so they weren't really sticking around). AND out of all the white people so far, I have been the only ruiva (red head).

Main Market 

Okay now comes the First Aid part of the title...

It started in Lisbon before I left (ask Julie, I complained a lot), with extreme richness and some pain on the top of my foot near my small toe. Long story short a week and a bit later I have little bumps on my now swollen baby toe and a huge blister on the bottom side. Here comes a picture so if you're easily grossed out... sorry! 

From this

To this, in a day

Doesn't look as bad but gets crazy itchy! 

Back to Victor, He works at the hospital so he got me in at the end of the day (no wait, yay! ) saw the nurse who gave me (yes, she prescribed it) an anti-inflammatory, antihistamine and an antibiotic.  As shown below 

 Detailed pharmaceutical instructions 

Refer to manufactures instructions 

Or, take in the morning, lunch and evening, not before bed.

Most of that was for all my nursing friends. I will let you all know how it goes!  And if I am allergic to penicillin hahaha

Sorry for the long post!  Hope it was worth it!  More to come on my actual work (which I am doing, I promise!)

Thanks. Obrigada. Nabonga.