Necessary Changes Here and There

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So, I´ve kinda slacked off on the blogging. Sorry to go missing for a while.

Where to begin?! A lot has happened in the last 11 days or so. Mainly, these things center around three things: Work, Friends, and Homesickness. It has been a rough last few days, but I’m writing this with a little resolution to the discontents.

First: Work.
Well, as you all know, I have been working in a clinic here, sometimes doing vaccination campaign, sometimes working in the clinic. I guess as the days we did vaccinations because fewer and farther between, I began to realize the lack of importance of what I was doing in the clinic. I started to realize that I honestly didn’t feel I was making anything easier for anyone, or doing anything to save them time. I was simply doing the job of someone who was sitting behind me. I continually asked what I could do to help, eager to clean the bathroom if they so asked. But I, without fail, always received the response, "No, gringo. Sit down. We don’t want you doing that." They were treating me like I was a fragile object, something that couldn´t get dirty. It was a very restrictive feeling, and I began to become frustrated.

I approached my internship director, Marisol, a resident of Ayacucho for her entire life. I told her that I felt I was not doing anything useful in Ayacucho, that I was not helping her community in any of the ways I was told I may. She was very understanding, also disappointed at the lack of contribution I was able to give in my over-staffed clinic. And so, with a little manipulation of the system and some creative searching, I moved my job placement. I now work fifteen minutes outside of the town limits in a farming valley clinic. There are two nurses who work there, and that is it. We receive little patients because we do so many house visits and work in the fields.

The first day, we got in a van and hitched a ride to about 6 km away from the clinic. We spent the rest of the day hiking about 5 miles down into the valleys and fields and giving vaccinations to the farmers and kids working. It was so cool and a completely different experience from before. They certainly needed another set of hands and another voice also.

The second day, I stayed back in the clinic. I was nervous that I would just be sitting around, but they put me to work. I made about 150 cotton balls for them, and then about 20 women from the community showed up. After they made fun of me in Quechua and had a good laugh at my expense, I led a class on the importance of washing your hands and cleaning your fingernails after working in the fields (typhoid and hep B are endemic in this area). I then got to take off my white coat and pick up a pick axe. I helped clear medical waste, like glass bottles and stuff, from a field and into a huge hole where we burned it all. That´s the only way they have of disposing of it. So, to say the least, I´m very happy with my new placement, in spite of my unhappiness just a week earlier.

Onto the Second: Friends.
I´ve met some really cool people here, definitely some I would like to keep in touch with after this summer. But, in my living arrangements, there was only one other guy in the house. We roomed together, and he was cool. But he left last weekend, and so I´ve been the only guy in the house for the last week. While this may sound like a dream situation, when you have no other guy to hang out with, let alone no roommate, it is less than ideal. So, that´s been a struggle. It´s made me miss people in the states even more recently.

But one of the rough situations with friends involves my friend Nargess. Nargess is a cool girl and a good friend, and she had been pretty sick for like two weeks. Whereas I have a whole lot to say about the Peruvian health care system in the rural areas, I will not put that all out here on the blog for the sake of your time. But, whole story told, Nargess took a few series of antibiotics she didn´t need and had a seizure. After the seizure, they finally did a blood test to find out she had/has bronchitis and typhoid, the strand not protected by the vaccine. So it was pretty scary there for a few days when she was in the hospital, but all is well right now. She´s on the slow road to feeling better. Eating solid foods again.

Well, Nargess is also the girl who found a way to get an EKG machine donated down here to a clinic from Johns Hopkins. After getting donations to ship it here, CCS (my organization) said she could not donate it because it was against their policies of donation, which stipulate that a donation cannot be something that is not sustainable. Well this clinic has a technician and a repairman for the EKG. Sustainable, no? Well, they simply refused. This was a source of anger for a while for many of us here. It seemed like our volunteer organization wouldn´t let us do the one thing that would actually make a difference.

Well, long story short. Nargess has been crafty, and now an American tourist friend of hers is flying down to Ayacucho from Johns Hopkins with some clothes and the very common checked luggage of an EKG machine.

It may have required underhandedness, but that EKG machine will save more lives than any volunteers coming through here. Cool.

Thirdly: Homesickness.

I guess I´m starting to get a little tired of the culture. Cultural fatigue, if you will, you anthropology people. I´ve found myself craving things I can only get back home, like a big breakfast with eggs and bacon and pancakes. My breakfast here, everyday, has been a piece of bread and cheese. Not quite an omelette from Richmond D-hall´s Omelette John or my mom´s pancakes. But I guess it will be even better in August.

I´m not gonna get sappy on you. Just know that, more than food and comfort, I miss the people. I´ll be really excited to see everyone at home, and then be dying to get back to see the people I left in May. Six more weeks isn´t that much longer? haha, I´ll be alright. I´m having a great time down here. Don´t worry about me. I´m happy.

Well, sorry this blog wasn´t heart-warming or anything. But I felt a need to simply catch you guys up on my life and experiences. I´m praying for you, and would ask that you pray for me. It´s getting a little harder to be here. Losing the initial honeymoon stage feelings. Thanks for keeping up with me and my life. I´ll try to be a little more regular with my blogs.

Tell me what´s going on in your lives, please. I´m interested. I´ll do my best to reply in a timely manner.

John

ps. Pray for my sisters as they go on their Millenium Development Goals trip. If you´re interested in what´s going on with them, this is the link to their teams blog. They will occasionally be the writers.

http://cbfportal.wordpress.com/category/studentgo-mdg-team/

Here's some info about the MDGs if you'd like to learn more:
http://www.undp.org/mdg/

Here's a video about the MDGs (not made by their team and focused on Africa, but still a good overall picture):

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Comments

[Fran]

hey
hey brother--skimmed it /c there's a line for the comp but big big love from bucharesti :) miss and love you! praying for your friend. love you so much and can't wait to share our experiences!!