Cd. de Belice, Belice, a 30 de septiembre del 2009. Saludos a todos. Ahi les mando algunas fotos del cruce de Puerto Barrios, Guatemala, hacia Punta Gorda en el sur de Belice. Llegue al pais por mar, en lo que segun yo iba a ser un ferry o, ya de malas, un transbordador. Al llegar al muelle de Puerto Barrios me indican que me vaya al "Pichilingo", y yo por inercia me voy al barco mas grande (un transbordador), luego corrigen mi error y me encuentro con la panga de 2 motores fuera de borda que ven en la foto, asi [View Full Entry]

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I arrived in Belize City and was immediately greeted by the filthy hot air sneaking its way onto the plane. I stood around for about 15 minutes hoping to bump into a similarly minded traveler (read: poor) who wanted to split the cab into town. Unfortunately the crowd was a bunch of whities on their little exotic vacas, so I had to part with the $25US and make my way into town alone. I was dropped off at a hostel that was run by two ex-pats: a gray haired lady and her significantly younger pony-tailed partner. I ended up chatting with [View Full Entry]

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Wilderness Medicine Course This was a course designed to teach you how to practice medicine in remote areas when you have no supplies, technology or support. It also taught survival and rescue methods. Unfortunately the course was a bit disorganized and it got cut short leaving out the medical portion. Dana and I did however receive the survival and rescue training and I will tell you the entertaining (for you)/traumatizing(for me) bits. Highlights: saving our broken legged “patient” who was trapped inside a cave and transporting her though an underground river, up a muddy slo [View Full Entry]

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My time in Belize is drawing to an end. Over the past couple of weeks I have realized how comfortable I have gotten living in this environment. I’m getting used to the heat, if that is possible. I still squirm when I see a giant spider crawling in my room but my first reaction is not to bludgeon it with my hiking boots (which in the wet season are little more than weapons against insect invaders in my thatch). I know my way around the farm kitchen and have even had the opportunity to show new interns how to light the [View Full Entry]

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Belize photos May 2009 [View Full Entry]

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Three weeks down, six to go. Time has been going by pretty quickly, although a day in the life of a kitchen intern resembles nothing like a routine yet. The wet season is getting underway in southern Belize. Heavy rains have swollen the rivers, turning the winding turquoise stream into a swift muddy river. It’s still beautiful but much harder to cross without an experienced person in the dory. Between experiments in trying to prepare meals from the food on the farm (and trying to come up with creative ways to use the excess number of bananas that keep showing up), [View Full Entry]

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I arrived in Belize on May 28th and have been at the farm where I will be working for the summer for over a week. I caught my domestic flight to Punta Gorda (PG) without a problem and enjoyed watching the green scenery below only broken occasionally by a river winding its way to the Caribbean or by a burning field. The flight stopped three times at single-runway airports that were mostly surrounded by water and bordering a small town before I got off in PG. Because I was not taking the bus to San Pedro Columbia until the next day, [View Full Entry]

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Last week was busy once again with clinics - we went to some very rural places - in a couple of them we all had to see patients in one room with no examination table or anything, so that was quite an experience. I also diagnosed someone with malaria on Friday - my first 'proper' tropical disease! Aside from clinics, we've also been managing to have a pretty good time, with plenty of trips into town for meals, drinks and swimming. On Tuesday we went to a little restaurant owned by a rastafarian guy who cooks all his own food in [View Full Entry]

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Some more photos from Belize - of clinic things, and cave tubing and the jungle lodge at the weekend! xxx [View Full Entry]

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Here are some photos of Belize so far. I'm still having a great time - work at the clinic is really interesting and I'm still learning lots. This weekend we are off to a jungle lodge to go cave tubing (floating down a river through some caves on a big rubber ring!). I will write more soon. xxx [View Full Entry]

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