chhandabewtra's blog

....So the tiny plane landed in the dusty little town called Timbuctu...
Nope. that does not sound romantic at all. Timbuctu is a place where one
should make long and hard treks, over dangerous terrains, not a quick
airplane trip. Though, to be truthful, the plane ride was quite difficult to
arrange, expensive, on again off again, unpredictable and long and bumpy.
So, in a way, I did pay my dues...

Like most of you, I too have been watching the Olympic games on TV with my
Ghanaian friends. I noticed a tremendous solidarity amongst all african
nations and recognition of a pan-african, transcontinental identity- an 'us
vs them' mentality - almost like 'we brothers have to band together, the
non africans don't understand our problems and blame us for all things...'
In TV, they will talk about 'africa's' medal count, not individual

...the other day I was explaining to my resident that a lesion made up of
polymorphous population of cells (inflammatory, epithelial, stromal etc) is
usually benign, non neoplastic, whereas a monomorphous monoclonal population
of cells usually means a neoplasia. My resident brightly said, "I get it. A
village market filled with men, women, children, rich, poor, buyers,
sellers--that is safe, and good. But a troop of uniformed soldiers--that is

Disease wise, malaria is THE commonest, with TB being #2. Among parasites,
Oncocerca seems to be the commonest, next to GI worms. HIV-AIDS is
surprisingly low 7%, compared to rest of africa. Amongst cancers, breast
cancer has overtaken cervix in women. In men, aggressive prostate ca seems
the commonest, next being hepatomas due to hep B,C etc. Very surprisingly,
lung cancer is quite rare!. Smoking is not common, in fact I have not seen a

...flying in to accra from amsterdam, the airport lounge was absolutely
packed with returning ghanaians excitedly chattering in twi and lugging all
shapes and sizes of bags and bundles. I tried to edge into a seat and was
immediately assaulted with strong BO! A thing that I had almost forgotten to
prepare myself and something that no guidebook tells you about. Tired and
alone, and feeling a bit nauseated, I was almost feeling sorry for myself,

Another gorgeous chameleon.

A lemur in a tree.

Anti-AIDS (SIDA) campaign. Outpatient clinic in Tana.

Our first pathology residents Drs, Lalao, Rakouth and Marcel. Tana 6/99

The poinsetta is locally called 'madagascar', as the shape of the petal is like that of the island.