Cuyed by a Shaman

Tuesday, September 16, 2008

I can buy movies here for 1.50. They´re totally just burned DVD´s, but seriously, any movie for 1.50. Even ones that aren´t out in the states yet. I am so excited. Almost better than finding out that there are bakeries here on almost every corner. Last night my roomie and I had a movie night. This started with an adventure down our street to see if any movie stores were open. Found one. We wanted to watch ¨Becoming Jane¨, but we didn´t know what it was called in Spanish....or who was in it...or really what the plot was. But we triumphed, and eventually managed to explain enough to the poor confused clerk to get her to recognize it. We then decided that no movie night is complete without hot chocolate. Long story short, it is harder here to find cocoa than you would think, but it is so good! A lot less sweet and more cocoey. Yummy. Our movie worked perfectly for an hour, and just at the crucial, romanticly climatic part it started skipping and generally freaking out. It was pretty rough, not gonna lie. We think we finally saw enough to figure out what happened, in 20 second intervals.

Anyway, enough of my movie story. This week I was working at another public clinic in the north of Quito, called Carcelen Alto. Not to be confused with Carcelen Bajo, which ïs apparently much worse. The woman I worked with was a midwife, and explained to me that she had a 3 year degree in obstetrics. Sounds kind of like a nurse practitioner degree here, with the certified nurse midwife concentration. She was very nice, and explained the procedures she did to me. Mainly papsmears. I looked in a lot of vaginas this week. There were mostly women with STI´s and a few young pregnant women who needed routine exams and educational materials. It was interesting to listen to the explanations for things like why you shouldn´t smoke while you´re pregnant in spanish. I also got to hold some really cute babies while mom´s were being examined- at one point I was holding a baby (who I believe was trying to pull my ear off to examine it closer), shining a penlight for themidwife so she could perform the papsmear, all the while trying to observe what she was doing and comprehend her combined descriptions and instructions for where to shine the light. It was a big moment for me. I also completed 8 more interviews at the clinic (two more to go), one with an elderly indigenous woman. She was so much fun to talk to, but I had to really work to get her to answer my specific questions. She really liked talking to me, and would very easily get off topic.

Tomorrow is the shaman trip, salsa lessons, and ¨tapas y vinos¨. Gonna be another busy day!

New Word of the Day: papanicolau (pap smear)



Thursday, September 18, 2008

Hola amigos!
I want to start out by thanking everyone who takes the time out of their busy day to read my blog and see what I´m up to. I really appreciate it! And here´s a shout out to Grandma, happy birthday on Saturday! I hope you have a great day!

So, on to what everyone has been waiting for...my trip to the shaman! The clinic we went to is in Otavalo, and is very unique because it combines western and indigenous medicine. So there was a gynecologist, a pediatrician, a lab AND a herbal healer, a shaman, and a midwife. Very cool. We got to observe treatment of three patients. There were two small children who had contracted ¨bad aire¨- in spanish it is ¨mal aire", and is the cause for sickness in little children. When they are scared or startled, the bad aire can enter them and make them sick. A lot of babies here wear red bracelets that are supposed to ward off the bad aire. Also, fun trivia fact ¨mal aire¨is the origin for the word malaria. The other patient was an older woman with leg pain. For the little children, the healers rubbed lots of oil all over their heads and bodies (it was an interesting mix of treaditions, because the shaman made a cross on the forehead of the child and later prayed to a statue of Jesus with the child in her arms) then used an egg to remove the bad energy. She shook it all over the kid´s body, then cracked it open to see what was wrong. She also used rocks, rubbing them all over the child´s stomach. Also picked up the child and gently shook her, while saying ¨choom, choom¨. I think she was trying to literally force the bad energy out. Pretty cool. The older woman didn´t get the rocks or the egg, but she had what looked like a wonderful full body massage.

And then it was my turn...first, I had to take my shirt off. The shaman explained to me that it was because the cuy (guinea pig) was dirty. We watched her pick the cuy from the pen, which was a little sad. That little cuy was going to have a bad day. Then, with me in my bra and the rest of the group taking pictures, the shaman proceeded to shake the cuy all over me. She focused especially on my stomach and chest, apparently that´s where problems happen...? After about 5 minutes the cuy started squeaking, then peed. It was dead, we figured it was probably bleeding and swelling in its brain from all the shaking. The shaman then skinned it (Dad, it was a lot like when we used to watch you skin rabbits) and read the organs. She said that in the future I would have intestinal problems. Also, my chest had a lot of heat. The belief there is that all illnesses are due to either cold or hot sources, and are treated with something of the opposite origin. Apparently, many indigenous people always want to know whether to take their medication with hot or cold water, because that´s just as important as the medication itself. My prescription was to drink some juice from a local fruit called tomate de arbol. I did have some at lunch, so hopefully that´s all good now. Otherwise, she said I was in perfect health. I was a little disappointed that she didn´t catch onto my hip problem or the three kidney thing. But maybe the treatment will impart general healing and fix the hip anyway.

Did a little more shopping afterwards in the market and headed home. Actually had a seat this time on the bus, which was AWESOME. Got back just in time to make it to our salsa lesson, where I learned some new moves. Alex, I´ll try my best to remember so I can pass them along! It´s really easy to be the girl, you just go where the guy puts you while keeping up the same back and forth step. After salsa we went to a restaurant called ¨Tapas y Vino¨, where we (appropriately) had unlimited tapas and vino (wine). Tapas is a spanish tradition, it´s basically like appetizers you eat late at night for a meal. They were so delicious. I have new recipe ideas for our Christmas Eve appetizer tradition! And the wine was good too, though I can´t actually remember what it was...

Had my last day at Carcelen. More pap smears. Good times. Tomorrow morning I am headed for Chone, a town on the coast, to visit a girl in the program who is living there for a week to study rural medicine. Think we´re going to go to Isla de la Plata, the so called ¨Poor man´s Galapagos¨. I´m really excited, cause I definitely want to see all of the amazing island animals, and there may be whale watching opportunities! I wanted to post pictures today, but didn´t have them downloaded from my camera yet. So on Monday or Tuesday look for photos of the coast and the shaman experience!

New Word of the Day: ama de casa (house wife)