Day 17 (Tamale Team): Into the Ravine

Tuesday, August 24, 2021

The Tamale team (comprised of Josh, Rebecca, and myself) will remain in Tamale while the rest of the team travels to Walewale. Our morning started with a late sleep in (at least on my end) which was then quickly transformed into a hectic mess once we arose and realized that, despite our double-checking the previous day, the PMI team was expecting us. We quickly got dressed, sprayed with mosquito spray, and headed off to the office. There, we were greeted by the Walewale team that had not yet departed. Together, we worked with Louisa, the resident ELIZA expert and genuinely awesome human being, to learn about the ELIZA process. We practiced dissecting the mosquitos: first, remove the abdomen from the head and thorax, then remove the wings and legs. Each component gets placed into a separate tube and the ELIZA will be conducted on the head and thorax. We mixed the solutions and grinded up the mosquito heads in preparation for the tests.

During the grinding process, it was time for the Walewale team to depart. We said our farewells and continued to work with Louisa until lunch time.

For lunch, we headed to our new favorite spot in town, Luxury. Seriously, this is the only restaurant we ate at for the entire duration of our time in Tamale. They have an extremely vast menu that offers all of the local dishes, and some non traditional ones too. After feeling a bit queasy from all of the spicy food the past few days, I settled on fried chicken and was immediately comforted by the familiar taste. Ghanaian fried chicken is even better than the US version!

We had some great conversation with our lunch guests, Christian and Louisa. We talked about the project, but then turned towards other topics like life in the US. Louisa asked us about our personal goals for the future and we shared our insights about the American Dream.

Lunch was quite the event and took over 2 hours to finish, so by the time we finished up, it was time to head out to the field to see some mosquito collection! We suited up in our long sleeves and pants and hopped in to the car with Hardi for our drive to Gbullung, the village where the collections would take place. The drive to Gbullung took about an hour, and boy, was it a precarious one. At some points, the road was little more than rocks pieced together. The heavy rains from the afternoon had formed huge puddles that Hardi bravely drive right into. I held on for dear life, as I was certain that the car was going to fill with water and we would all be stuck.

Finally, we arrived in Gbullung and we were greeted by roads completely covered in goats! All of the goats owned by the families of the village come out to sleep on the warm road at night, and they refused to move for us! Hardi had to get out of the car multiple times to shoo the sleepy goats out of the way so that we could get through.

We met up with Christian and Jerry and walked through the dirt path to the village. They led us into the first home and we were welcomed by the father of the home, who is also referred to as the landlord. He guided us over to the two men conducting the human landing catches - the gold standard for mosquito collection. As part of this process, one man sits outside the home and the other sits inside the home. Starting at 6pm, they sit in their positions and, every time a mosquito lands on them, they catch it with a plastic tube and place it into a colored plastic cup with mosquito netting on top. There is a cup for each hour of time, for the entire 12 hours the collection occurs (6pm to 6am). This process was fascinating to see! Jerry and Christian explained how there has been a lot of pushback from the upper levels of government regarding the ethical concerns of this collection method, but they make sure the volunteers are protected with anti-malarial drugs. This collection method is the main source of mosquitos used for surveying and give the most important insight into the true biting behavior of the mosquitos.

We also had the chance to see CDC light traps set up for mosquito collection. These are placed inside of the home and run on a battery light source to draw in mosquitos.

After observing all of these methods of collection, we climbed back into the car for our drive back to the hotel. Hardi seemed to have forgotten about the massive ravine that we had driven over on the way to Gbullung. We were driving quite fast when all of a sudden, the ravine appeared in front of us. With no time to slow down or stop, our van went crashing into the ravine at full speed. Rebecca and I went flying in the air while our van was covered in water and mud. My life flashed before my eyes, as I was sure that we were done for. But somehow, our car went flying and we landed on the other side. Josh and Rebecca laughed as the only words I could muster were "Dang, that was like a real safari"

By some grace of the heavens above, we arrived back to our hotel in one piece. We quickly headed to bed, as the wake-up alarms were to be set for 4:30am the next morning for more mosquito collection.