Et voilà is the expression I have most often heard during these ten days of my mission in Ivory Coast at the end of something, giving what had just ended a touch of magic, as if everything had been done with great ease, almost naturally, although this was not always the case.
Et voilà at the end of a long and sometimes complex conversation, often in two different languages. That simple final expression was enough to forget the effort both parties had just made to understand each other.
Et voilà at the end of an often painful and demanding rehabilitation exercise for a child born with clubfeet and subjected to correction surgery.
Et voilà as they finished bringing to the table all the specialties that the nuns had so carefully prepared days before, in anticipation of our long-awaited arrival.
Et voilà at the end of the exploratory tour in each of the six health centers visited in the different rural and urban areas of the country.
We were warmly welcomed by the Sisters, from different Faith-Based organizations, who invited Doctors with Africa CUAMM to visit the health centers they run. They work humbly and constantly for people, at prices that are affordable even for the poorest. They try to work as a team to ensure access to health for even the most vulnerable.
We visited six health centers of different kinds, some more focused on maternity, others on malnutrition or the diagnosis and treatment of HIV, and some focused on the physiotherapy of children and adults with disabilities, however ready to treat malaria, the country’s most widespread and often deadliest disease. The centers are often very distant from each other and in 10 days we travelled nearly 1400 Kilometres, most of the time by car and sometimes, when unforeseen events occurred, also by bus.
These were intense days, full of work and full of challenges, but in the end that much-heard expression, which always brought a feeling of healthy lightness, also became ours. And it was with an et voilà accompanied by a sincere and grateful smile that we said goodbye at the airport on our way back, sweeping away the memory of the endless journeys and fatigue, the heat, dust and mosquitoes, taking with us instead a lot of good humor, energy and confidence.
