Community & Pork Pan

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Today, our breakfast was chicken and long squash soup, blue dyed rice with a meat that tasted like sausage, a fried egg, and beef bimi-pop (which was delicious!). Our community clinical took place at the Donkeau Community Center, except we drove to three of their community outreach homes. The first home, which I am presenting a case study on was a 62-year-old woman who got in a car accident 17 years ago that left her paralyzed. Her caretaker has been with her this whole time and takes excellent care of her. She has only received 2 UTIs in 17 years and 0 bed sores. The second case was a young man in his mid-thirties who got in a motorcycle accident. He was holding the helmet in his lap rather than wearing it from what I understand. He is only 4 months out from the accident and is still working through many complications with his health. His 13-year-old daughter and his mother both help take care of him. The third case was an 82-year-old gentleman who is bed bound as all the others are as well. He is suffering from “un-diagnosable pain” as far as he knows. However, the daughter has confirmation from the doctor that he has end-stage bladder cancer. What makes this case difficult is that the patient is unaware of his condition as his daughter does not want to tell him what the real diagnosis is. All she tells him is that he has multiple diseases. When talking to him, he seems to be aware that his daughter is hiding something, yet he feels hopeless. He wishes that he could take a magical pill that would allow him to be pain free and suddenly walk again. This case was difficult to listen to as he spoke English and you could see his raw emotion which provoked several of our students to weep. After we finished the home visits, we headed to lunch at a noodle café where they offered either Vietnamese or Thai soup. I tried the Thai style, which was very tasty. In the afternoon, I walked down to the sports complex where we found a pond in the back, this beautiful pond reminded me of a piece of home which brought me comfort. Pork Pan was later in the evening and this was a very memorable event. Frong told me it is similar to Korean BBQ where you have metal tins over a small fire and place meat on it to cook as the vegetables boil in a broth along the rim of the pan. This was a lot of fun as we sat with our friends and our buddies. After the meal on the fire, we introduced the Thai buddies to s’mores! This was of course, delicious, and also another sweet reminder of home. To end the evening, I played Uno with Libby and Emily and several Thai buddies. This game was hilarious as we established the rule that the loser has to get a bottle of water dumped on their head. Emily lost twice, and Ohm lost once. Meji thoroughly enjoyed helping pour water on the losers.

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