Experiencing SA's Healthcare System From the Other Side...

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Wednesday, July 9, 2008, 11:00 AM

So the past week has not been overly exciting due to the fact that my old friend, Bronchitis, has been paying me a visit here in Cape Town. But I did manage a brief hiatus of him for a few days last week, so last Wednesday, I went back to work for Courtney’s first day. She’ll be working with me in the research part of the hospital, so I gave her a tour (I’m the “big sister” now, according to Lea, since Bill and Neha left…). Courtney will also be working with Dr. Albertyn, but on a different project, focusing on researching the demographics for burn victims and their families, then trying to organize pre-existing NGOs to provide support for them in their respective communities. It’s a great project, we’re thinking, because it doesn’t require outside funding—it’s building on an already-established network of non-profit organizations. We ate lunch in the cafeteria, and I’ve already gotten her hooked on the grilled cheese…and the prices ☺. At Sarah Fox that afternoon, I was blown away by how much the babies had changed in the five days I’d been away. Joseph and Quinton had classy new haircuts, Linda tolerated exerting energy to stand up for the first time (she’s usually quite lazy, haha), and I think Joseph will be walking on his own soon (I hope I’m not missing it now!).

To celebrate our friend Matt’s birthday (one of two guys who braved the Garden Route with us girls ☺), a bunch of us--almost 30 people in all, I think--went out to Café Mohito on Long Street for the sole reason that it served chicken wings and barbeque chicken sandwiches, the closest to Matt’s request of barbeque chicken wings that DeeDee could find in Cape Town (she’s great at making people’s birthdays special ☺). We walked back through Company’s Gardens so we didn’t have to pay for a cab--we really are getting good at saving money, haha.

Thursday: another new intern, Bobbijo, joined us. She is a psychology major, with a Child Life focus, and her job is to introduce a Child Life department into the Red Cross Children’s Hospital. Child Life (the same thing that Liana and I work with at Geisinger!) focuses on whole-body well-being of the child during his/her stay at the hospital, and often saves the establishment money by being able to calm children down through natural means instead of expensive medications. Bobbijo has lectures set up, and she’ll be talking to nurses and doctors about the Child Life philosophy. She’s very excited about it, and I think the hospital is very lucky to have her.

FOURTH OF JULY! And my first not in the U.S. As usual, it was POURING in the morning, but by the time we got out of work at noon, the clouds were starting to clear. So Deedee and I went to the gym, ate a quick lunch, and headed to the National Gallery, a great art museum right down the street from us. There were great exhibits featuring Pancho Guedes, a local, forward-thinking architect, and Ernest Cole, a South African photographer who published a pioneering collection of photographs documenting life under apartheid. That night a huge Connect group went out to celebrate like the rest of our friends and family back in the States. It was funny because Rick’s is really a Moroccan restaurant, but we provided Fourth of July decorations, sparklers, and red-white-and-blue-ness, so the American atmosphere of Rick’s Café Américain was almost authentic ☺. After, we went to see a local band, The Rudimentals, at Mercury, a club right up the street from our apartment. I saw Tatiana, one of Cat’s good friends, who I see every time I go down to Simon’s Town. What were the chances! I walked back home (in the rain), with a few of the new interns, including Courtney and her roommate Meghan.

Saturday morning started with a gym trip with DeeDee, but my head started complaining, so I came back for a nap. And that’s when Bronchitis decided to come back from his vacation to wreck havoc with mine.

Accordingly, I did as little as possible the rest of Saturday, Sunday, and stayed home from work Monday. Except, I did watch the Wimbledon final between Federer and Nadal almost in its entirety (what a FANTASTIC match, minus the fact that Federer ultimately lost ☹) and managed to go out to Arnold’s to celebrate Charleigh’s birthday. I shared a game platter with Karen and have now tried gemsbock (like a very tender steak), crocodile (a strange combination of chicken and fish), warthog (bacon-y ribs), and some more ostrich (lean, although I really don’t know what meat to compare it to). I also watched a couple movies with friends who were brave/nice enough to hang out with me and Bronchy, haha. So, all-in-all, I wasn’t completely comatose.

On Tuesday, after I decided that my cough-in-residence wasn’t getting any better, I opted to taxi myself up to the Cape Town Mediclinic, a private hospital recommended for us interns. Lea recommended I go to the Emergency department and ask to see a GP, so…I did. The “it’s really similar to a bronchitis I had this spring” combined with my descriptions of a terrible cough and the absolutlely joyous color of the phlegm that accompanied it, headaches, bodyaches, basically the whole shebang…convinced the doctor pretty quickly that a healthy dose of amoxicillin would set me right. Luckily for me, there was a pharmacy right down the hallway, and everything was going fine until it came time to pay. My debit card was denied. Crap, I thought, I’m stuck. All I had left in my wallet was R 150 and a credit card with $2.32 left because the stupid car rental company decided to charge me an extra $280.89 (which is hopefully being righted as I type this…I hope). Sweet.

After debating our options (such as calling Sovereign Bank and having them accept the denied payment because it was from a hospital and “The money MUST be paid right now!” or me mopping hospital floors for the next two hours…just kidding ☺), I decided the best course of action would be to find myself an ATM and withdraw the money to pay in cash. So the woman behind the desk (who was actually very nice throughout the whole ordeal) found me a security guard to drive me down to the closest petrol station, withdraw R 500, and bring me back, no additional charge ☺. From that point on, I was home free. I called a cab and managed to get back to my apartment in one piece. Quite the adventure just to get some antibiotics and pay a R 381.60 hospital bill.

In other (random) news, I finally finished Cry, the Beloved Country and have moved onto Barbara Kingsolver’s Pigs In Heaven (thanks M&D!). I have acquired new iTunes music via friends with flash drives ☺. I have gotten very good at inventing new meals from bits of random leftovers. The price of electricity went up (which explains why our meter has been going through credits at a much faster clip than normal), so we have resorted to unplugging our microwave, VCR, TV, etc. when we’re not using them, haha. I have made a must-see list of movies from the expert advice of Stephanie. And a bunch of us ordered a record number of pizzas from Diva’s the other night.

And I am definitely feeling better thanks to these little blue and purple, powder filled capsules ☺. So expect more activity filled blog entries from now on~~

Random Facts of the Days: Mugged Café makes the world’s BEST chocolate muffins. They’re the equivalent of my irreplaceable chocolate birthday cake, but in muffin form with melted chocolate chips inside. They’re quite effective at satisfying a week’s worth of chocolate cravings, haha.

A few of my friends are working with school children in an HIV/AIDS workshop, and the stories they bring back are scary. There’s a common myth that if an infected man has sex with a virgin, then they’ll be cured. And there’s a lot of confusion about pregnancy and STIs and HIV in general. It’s terrible that South Africa (a country with one of the highest HIV/AIDS infection rates in the world) has such little knowledge of it. Education is so important, yet not the easiest thing to implement.

Just as I’m sitting here in Mugged, a march against high oil prices is going by. In the rain. I admire South African persistence.

I miss the piano. A lot.

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Photos

Fun Statue Thing Outside the National Gallery
When you turn the wheel, the lion chases the tourist, complete with binoculars and golf club...I'm hoping the lion doesn't represent SA's attitude towards us *nervous laugh* :)

Black Market Sparklers on July 4th!
I think the bartenders were just as excited as we were

Comments

[T-ster]

O_o You were sick too?
Almost everyone in camp has caught a nasty bug, though by now almost everyone should be immune to it. The fun thing is that the 4 weekers are leaving Sunday, and being replaced by a bunch of 3 weekers, so we'll have new people to infect. In other news, it was skit night tonight. Jacob Fogel one by acting as Ed, and in the end he proposed to Becca. One a related topic, Ed has told Becca that he'll ask the question sometime before the Banquet at the end of camp, and Becca was at the Jewelery store when he was talking to the Jeweler about getting a ring, though I don't think she saw what he's picked out. I think the series of events is a little different from the norm, but Becca doesn't seem to mind. I had heard about the curing HIV by sleeping with virgins, I think from watching "ER", I really need to stop watching depressing TV shows during the year. I hope you're better by now.