Bobo Dioulasso, Banfora and the bite of the anopheles mosquito (Part 2)

The next day, we went by motorbikes to Saindou Pics. It was an hour of driving on a dirt road. The pics are mineral natural sculptures of grès. A long time ago (500 000 years), tribes wich were living there were benefiting from a high spot to see enemies, and to hide.

Saindou pics

One can walk all day in the area wich looks like some kind of  labyrinth. This place is amazing and I highly recommend it. Then we went back to the hotel.

The day after, I had malaria. When I woke up in the morning, I was really tired, and didn’t have any appetite. I also had a bit of a fever. When we went outside I felt really cold, but it was 30°celsius so I went to take a jumper. Then Pavel decided to bring me to a doctor. We went to the new hospital, and I  had the ,malaria blood test, for which I tested positive. The fever started to rise, and  the doctor put me a quinine drip and paracetamol. I was hoping to go back to the hotel in the afternoon, but very soon I began to vomit, and heard a constant and strong buzzing. The fever didn’t seem to stop rising. Finally, when I fainted in the corridor on the way to catch a nurse (and I remember this guy at the end of the corridor I called for help and didn’t move but told me to wait my turn as I was collapsing), I understood that I would have to stay a bit longer. Well, we spent 5 days there… We took a single room and slept both of us on the same small bed, with no sheets or anything. That room was totally utterly filled with mosquitoes. The anopheles mosquito is the species which transmits the parasite of malaria. There was one of them in this room : Pavel caught malaria too. In five days we saw two doctors : one on friday, the other on thursday (because of the week-end and the monday day-off), a lot of competent, kind and patient nurses took care of us both. I had a 40° fever for three days and then 38° for the next two days. On the third day, I decided to have a small walk at the entrance of the building. A young man was sitting outside on the ground breathing hardly, like a fish in the air. People around were quiet. There was an old woman wich were giving him water. We realized that this young man was agonizing. We understood he had yellow fever. Yellow fever is also transmitted by mosquito, but it’s not possible to heal it. It’s the only obligatory vaccination to go in Burkina. Malaria is the first cause of mortality in Burkina Faso, even higher than aids.