Beach Bum

Friday, October 31, 2008
Happy Halloween! I´m here in the awesome beachside town of Huanchaca. It´s kind of rainy here, which is unfortunate. We were going to try and surf today, but too cold. So we just walked along the beach instead, met some nice people, got our feet wet, all that good stuff. I bought a purse from a little market. It´s pretty cool. I also washed some clothes, cause I was running dangerously low on underwear. That could have been bad. Monica and I split an Inca Kola, a soda that kind of tastes like yellow bubble gum and is only made in Peru. I wasn´t such a big fan. What else...Oh, we played with the turtle in our hostal´s courtyard. Fed him a banana. Our hostal is really nice, $5 a night, internet, really cute. And it´s right on the beach, like open the door and there it is. It´s really nice, it´s fun to sit and just be on the beach. Kind of a relaxing few days and it´s so nice to not be on a bus! Tomorrow we´re gonna try the surfing thing again, hope for better weather.

New Word of the Day: disfraz (Halloween costume)

Thursday, October 31, 2008
We´ve now left Chiclayo, Peru. Stayed in Hotel Residential, which was an okay place to stay. Nice and clean and friendly. There was a barking dog and a bell going off at a ridiculously early hour of the morning. But it was nice. We split the room with our Ausie friend, so it was pretty cheap. There wasn´t anything to do in Chiclayo, it was kind of a disappointment. The beach was a lot further away than I thought. Bummer.

Tuesday Monica and I bummed around Cuenca some more. We looked for a hat museum, but got too lost and couldn´t find it. It was a little embarassing. It was fun to just walk around, though. Left Cuenca in the afternoon for Loja. They played all four Rambo movies on the bus. In Spanish. Luckily it´s not exactly a complicated plot line, so it wasn´t too hard to follow. There was a guy who introduced himself to us by saying he was from Columbia but not to worry, he wasn´t a terrorist. Ohhhkayyy. Stayed in the Loja bus stop for a few hours until 11 pm when our bus headed to Piura. While we were in the bus station we were interviewed by a bunch of Ecuadorians taking English classes, which was interesting. Also met a nice guy from Israel. The bus ride wasn´t too bad from Piura, I slept so it can´t have been too bad. The border crossing took forever, but went off without a hitch. Had to show my passport at three differnt stations, a little annoying but good spanish practice. We crossed at about 3 am, I wondered what it would have been like during the day. Got into Piura at around 7 am then hopped another bus to Chiclayo with an Australian friend Johno. Slept on that bus too, but I did manage to see that most of the land we were passing was desert. I didn´t know that northern Peru was a desert, there´s really nothing there. There were people who wandered on and off selling their wonder drugs. We finally got to Chiclayo Wednesday morning and went to a hotel our taxi recommended. Walked to the Plaza de las Armas and found a place for lunch. Not great. And that pretty much sums up my travels over the last few days!

New Word of the Day: peregrino (pilgrim)

On the Road

Hello all from Cuenca! Here´s my journal entries for the last few days:

Saturday, October 25th
Took the bus from Quito to Riobamba, about 4 hours. Beautiful scenery, very farmlandy. Saw some of Cotopaxi and Chimborazo, two big mountains. It was a little foggy, so we didn´t get a clear view though. Chimborazo is apparently the highest point from the center of the earth, thanks to the earth´s equitorial bulge. Went through some town where seriously every building was a heladeria, ice cream store. Thought of you, mom. Made some PB&J sandwhiches on the bus, delicious. When we got to Riobamba we wandered around, got a snack and bought our train tickets for the Nariz del Diablo train ride. Also reserved some seat cushions from a guy. That´s just the way it goes. There were lots and lots of clothing stores in Riobamba, but no restaurants! Took us forever to find a place to have supper. The cafe we went to was pretty good, if a little pricey. We stayed at the Hostal Oasis, which was gorgeous. And they had a dog. There was a stained glass door to our room, and the walls were stone. Coolness. And even hot water in the shower. We had to get up at 5 am to catch our train, so it was an early night. Fell asleep watching some movie with Reese Witherspoon.

Monday, October 27th

We´re now in Cuenca at El Hostal Cafecito (little coffee). $6 a night, pretty nice. THere´s a pretty nice restaurant and cafe inside, had a wonderful omlette for breakfast. Yesterday on teh train we met up with a big group of people all going to Cuenca, so we have some new Dutch and German friends. No Americans heading this way, don´t know why that is. Anyway, the trainride was very cool, if a little longer than we expected. Saw lots of farmland and indigenous people. There were sheep on the tops of busses! Totally made my day to see that. We rode on top of the train, which was a little chilly at times but very cool. The worst part was when it started raining, but that was only the last hour or so. The train derailed twice, the first time took them 2 hours to fix. Nice little naptime, on the top of a train in the gorgeous mountains. As we were going along in the train kids would run out to wave, we all threw candy for them, it was fun. They were kind of weird about it though, didn´t eat it or hold it, but shoved it right into a pocket. Some of them took it pretty seriously. We stopped in two towns for potty and food breaks. I ate a banana empanada, which was good but a little squishy. Our final stop was a station in literally the middle of nowhere, where the indigenous people were having a little party for us. Apparently it was the start of their plans to improve the station, and make it more appealing to tourists; restaurants, shops, museums, all that good stuff. Right now it is literally just a place for a train to stop. They fed us for free, which was nice. Got to the town with the buses to Cuenca at around 5 pm. True to Ecuadorian time, it was about 4 hours late. We rode in the back of some guys truck to the main road, then walked to where we needed to wait for the bus, then waited for about an hour. There was a big group of us at that point, so I felt pretty safe about standing on teh side of the highway at night. Slept on the busride, so it must not have been too bad. Today Monica and I wandered around Cuenca, seeing all the beautiful buildings. It really is very pretty here, very old and colonial looking. There was a flower market and a big produce market that were fun to walk through, and then we shopped for some spanish books. I got a sherlock holmes one, so now I get to try and read it! In Spanish! We had a womnderful $1 lunch, with really good lentil soup. Yummy. Seriously, huge awesome meal for 1 buck. Doesn´t get better than that. Tomorrow we´re headed to Loja and from there to Piura, Peru. So last day in Ecuador for awhile.

Leaving Quito

This will probably be my last entry from Quito. I leave on Saturday for a whirlwind three week tour of Peru, Chili and Argentina. Here´s our tentative itinerary:
Saturday: Head to Riobamba.
Sunday: Devil´s Nose train ride, then bus to Cuenca
Monday: Day in Cuenca
Tuesay: Bus to Loja, then from Loja across the border to Piura, Peru
Wednesday: Bus to Mankora
Thursday: Day in Mankora
Friday-Monday: Slowly making our way south to Lima
Tuesday: Flight from Lima to Cusco
And after that who knows!
We´re hoping to do a 3 or 4 day trek of Machu Picchu, then Lake Titicaca, then Chili. No idea what to do in Chili, but I´m sure we´ll find something. Our last stop will be Mendoza, Argentina, for some time in the vineyards. Then I fly back to Quito from Santiago on the 17th, and back to the States on the 19th. Woo, lots of things to do in not very much time!

Last night I went to a futbol game. La Liga vs. El Nacional. Both Ecuaodor teams, and I´m not really sure what league or if they were professional or what. It was really fun, people are pretty crazy at those games! People were climbing the fences, throwing toilet paper on the field, lighting fireworks in the stands...it was pretty cool to watch the crowd, not even the game! And the game got a little out of hand at times too, one goalie was thrown out for sucker punching a player. Good stuff. After the game one drunken man asked to have his picture taken with me. I think cause I was blond.

My time in the clinic this week has been really good. I´ve been following Dra. Alvear, and she´s just wonderful. Very helpful and explains things really well. Saw a woman with really crazy sores all over her body (doctors had no idea what it was), a man with bad heart stuff going on who she sent to the emergency room, a really cute little old man who wanted to be checked out before travelling to Israel, and some middle aged women who needed breast and uterine ultrasounds. I got to be a translater for one woman from Canada, which was fun. And I got to see all the ultrasounds done, which I´d never seen before. I think I may have insulted the radiologist doing the tests, because I didn´t know that she was a doctor and at one point the translation patient asked me what the woman´s job title was, and when I said I wasn´t really sure, the doctor stuttered in English "I am Doctor", and didn´t look too happy. Whoops. Today is my last day of clinic. Ever. Well, hopefully not ever ever, but ever for awhile.

Overall my clinic experience has been great in Ecuador. I´ve gotten to see a lot of things that I don´t think I would have been allowed to see in the States, and I even got to give that shot once, which I sure wouldn´t have been allowed to do. Most of the doctors have been really helpful and wanted me to learn something. I´ve been pretty amazed at how easy it has been to do my interviews. A lot of the doctors didn´t even care about my questions, just said yeah, yeah, sure.

Thanks everyone who´s been reading this for the last two months, I really appreciate it. I´ll definitely keep you all up on what I´m up to for the next few weeks, hopefully I´ll be able to stop into internet cafes periodically. Chao amigos, hasta luego!

New Word of the Day: muestra (sample, as in urine)

Just chillin in Quito

Sunday, October 19, 2008

Well hello there all. Sorry it’s been awhile since the last entry, it just seems like there hasn’t been time to sit down and write. Don’t know why, cause now that I think about it I haven’t really done that much this last week, but that’s the way it goes I guess. This last week I was at a public health center called Carcelen Bajo (not to be confused with Carcelen Alto which I visited a while back). It’s a tiny little center; 2 doctors, a dentist, and obstetriz and a nurse. The doc I was with was very nice, gave me a stethoscope to use and taught me how to listen to heart and lung sounds. She was a family practitioner, so we mainly saw coughing little kids. There were a few exceptions, including a few people who needed health certificates signed for school and work, and an older woman with really awful looking varicose veins. The doctor was pretty efficient, and washed her hands between sick babies, which was something I’d yet to see. One morning while I was there I got to see a TB lecture that one of the staff was putting on in the waiting room. Pretty cool. The clinic is really crowded around 8 and 11, because those are the sign up times for morning and afternoon appointments. It’s definitely first come first serve, and there were always a lot of people, especially for the morning appointments. Then the center would gradually clear until about 11, when they’d start lining up again. It was really interesting to see.

One day after clinic I stopped at a big mall that my bus passed. It was pretty schnazzy inside, and things were about the same price as in the US. I was a little disappointed. It was nice to just relax and do something not medical or Spanish though. Although I think I must have just screamed “American with money” because the clerks were annoyingly attentive, following me around the entire store asking if they could help me find what I was looking for.

Tuesday was our medical meeting with Dra. Alvear. We had presentations from two of the students on Leichomiasis (honestly, I don’t know if that’s spelled right, and I have no dictionary) and hospital caused infections. They were really interesting presentations. Leichomiasis is a mosquito born parasitic infection that causes these big gaping sores, especially on extremities and faces (places that mosquitoes can bite you). The pics of it are really pretty gruesome, sometimes it can eat away a person’s whole ear or nose. It’s another one of those lovely things to worry about when you live in a tropical climate, although here in Quito (and elsewhere in the mountains) the altitude is too high for mosquitoes.

On Wednesday our group went to Crepes and Waffles and then to a movie. I love Crepes and Waffles. The movie we saw was “Control Total” (Eagle Eye in English, don’t know why they didn’t translate it directly. Maybe Eagle Eye doesn’t mean anything in Spanish). It was funny to watch the subtitles. Things like, “see you later bonehead” were simply translated to “adios”. Good stuff. Oh, before the movie we had some extra time, so we chilled at a sports bar in the same mall. There was a world cup game going on, though I don’t remember who Ecuador was playing. I had a blackberry screwdriver, which was wonderful. And so pretty. That’s definitely a drink idea to bring home.

What else…Thursday we had a cultural meeting at the language school, and planned out a lot of activities for the coming week. We’re going to a town near here called Papallacta on Friday, it’s supposed to have amazing hot springs. And massages. I think it’ll be a good time. And then there are all the activities I’ve already done here, like the mitad del mundo and the basilica. I’m going to skip out on a bunch of those, no need to do all the touristy cheesy things twice.

Friday I went back to Cochapamba to finish up my interviews there. Since I was only there for a day that week, I only got 5 interviews in. It was quite the adventure finding the place. None of the information from the program had an address for the center. The doctor normally picks students up at a corner near where we all live. So I had to just ask a taxi driver if he knew where it was. He said he did, which was a bold faced lie. We got to the general neighborhood, then he had to pull up and ask random people on the street if they knew where it was. The meter running the whole time. After about 30 minutes we finally found it, and luckily I had just enough money to pay the man and have a quarter left over for the bus home. (I know how to get home on the buses from just about anywhere, just not the other way around!) It ended up all right, and I got all the interviews done. Some of the women were very uninterested though and didn’t want to do more than give a “yes” or “no”, more than I’ve encountered before. Don’t know why that was.

This weekend I’ve been chilling here in Quito. It was a great decision on my part, because on Friday night I got sick. Seriously, I think I’ve been sick for most of this trip with one thing or the other. This time (luckily?) it wasn’t gastrointestinal issues, but a pretty good cold. I think all the little kids with “el gripe” I’ve been seeing over the last few weeks are to blame. So I’ve been relaxing here in bed all weekend. Read some books, watched some movies, drank some tea…it was a pretty good weekend considering. This morning I braved the outside world to go to an artisan market in a nearby park. Bought some fun stuff for presents, but then had to come back and take a nap. How pathetic is that? The prices there definitely weren’t as good as in Otavalo, I think I got swindled a few times. But then I always feel bad arguing with some kid over a dollar. Being here has definitely given me more appreciation for my life.

Well, that’s all I have to report for now. For not having done much I sure had a lot to say. I would post this blog today, but the internet is down at the café near my house. And I didn’t feel like braving the rain (we’re definitely moving into the rainy season here; every afternoon and evening without fail) to seek out another place. It is now exactly one month until I return to the States, time really has flown. Hope everyone is having an awesome time up north!

New Word of the Day: rondador (Ecuadorian version of the pan pipe)

I Ate a Larva. In the Juggle. Booyah.

Monday, October 13, 2008

I have returned from the jungle. It was really an adventure. There were piranhas and alligators involved. Seriously. Now that I’ve drawn you in…I suppose I’ll start at the beginning.

We left Thursday afternoon from the big bus stop in Quito. It was about a 6 hour bus ride to Tena, our first destination. Tena is kind of on the edge of the jungle. It’s definitely hot and steamy and bug filled, but not really in the wild. No monkeys, what kind of jungle is that? Stayed in a nice hostal run by some guy from Germany. There were definitely cockroaches, I’m hoping that I didn’t bring back any friends in my bag. Rode in the back of a big yellow taxi truck to get across town to the hostal. By the time we got there it was time for bed. On Friday we were picked up by our tour company and changed into swimsuits and big rubber boots (barn boots!) for our waterfall trek. Let me tell you, the combination of a swimsuit and big rubber boots is pretty darn cool. And so comfortable for hiking… Before heading out, one of our guides, a shaman, painted all of our faces with some kind of fruit that warded off mosquitos. The hike was beautiful, everything was so green! We were quite literally hiking through the waterfalls, and had to climb up some pretty intense wet slippery slopes. There were ropes at some points, otherwise it would have been impossible. Oh, and the best part! At one waterefall climb, we had to climb into a waist high pool to get to a rope. Our guide goes in, then tells us all to be careful, cause there’s an anaconda in the pool. A freakin anaconda! But it was okay; apparently it was a little one. We all QUICKLY made it through, no incidents. The walk back down the mountain we had climbed up was a little bit rough, not because it was a hard walk, but because we were all really wet and wearing floppy barn boots. Ate some fish at a house along the road, then went to a natural pool to swim in. It was amazing. The pool was underneath a waterfall, and really deep. We jumped off rocks into the water and slid down a cascade-ish part. We had to be careful, cause a little further down river were some rapids and then a BIG river, which wouldn’t have been fun. But it was really nice to just swim and relax on big rocks after our 5 hour hike. Later that night we showered, went to a local bar for cokes/beers, and got on an overnight bus for Limoncocha. It was a 8 hour ride, but we all slept.

Got to Limoncocha to start our real jungle adventure around 7 am. We took a 30 minute canoe ride across a big lake to get to our camp. There are a few families that live outside of the main town, preferring the savage beauty of the jungle, and our cabins were at one of those family’s clearings. There were five buildings; 2 houses for the family (I think about 10 people all together, though some of the kids were in the town going to school), a big cabin for the tourists, a bathroom (with real toilets and a shower, quite a surprise), and a smokehouse. We had breakfast (eggs and white bread with jam) to gain strength for our jungle trek, then headed out. We had to do the barn boot things again, because there really are bugs that can kill you (or at least hurt a lot). Big ants, tarantulas, and apparently many others. The hike was interesting; the shaman showed us lots of medicinal plants. The best one was “Pene del Diablo”, literally “The Devil’s Penis”. It is a tree that moves every season by putting out new roots. The part that shows above the ground really does look like lots of red penises. Apparently the juice from the roots is good for cuts. There were lots of pretty flowers. And one HUGE tree that is sacred. I could definitely see why it was sacred, it was so amazing. What else...well, after the hike we had a little bit of a break, then went piranha fishing. We split up into two groups, cause the canoes weren’t big enough for all of us to be in one, and paddled out into the lake. It was a little scary- the guide warned us to be careful not to fall in, cause the piranhas were quick. Not to mention the alligators and anacondas. (I asked when we first got in the canoe whether there were anacondas in the water, and he looked at me like I was an idiot. Yes, yes there are, apparently.) The canoes when full only sat about 4 inches above the water, and my job while the others rowed was to scoop water out of the bottom with a plastic cup. The fishing strategy was pretty cool: put a piece of raw meat on a hook, then beat the water for a few seconds with your pole (to simulate some thrashing animal), then jerk your pole back out of the water. Apparently the piranhas are really quick and just take little bites, so you have to be fast. I caught two. It was a proud moment for me. The guide caught 7. Showoff. He was sitting behind me though, and every time he caught one he jerked his pole forward and I got hit in the head by a slimy pissed off flesh eating fish. Good times. Monica got bitten by one flashing around in the bottom of the canoe, so she has a good story. On the canoe ride back we saw monkeys! Real monkeys! I have no idea what kind they were, weren’t close enough to really see them well. Small and black. I think it was the same kind that the little boy at the camp had for a pet. For supper we ate our catch, it was actually pretty good.

Our last outdoorsy activity of the day was an alligator hunt. Got into a big canoe (thank goodness, we would have refused to go in the dinky things we used to piranha hunt in) and headed into the dark. We were very, very successful. The guides were pretty fearless, reckless might be a better word, and got way too close to the first alligator. He was very upset. We were informed that they’re a little testy this time of year because they have babies. When we finally started to move away, the back of the boat swung closer to the gator and he charged. It was so fast, I didn’t even realize that he’d jumped. He didn’t get onto the boat or anything, but it gave all of us in the back a scare. The guys in the front didn’t notice though, and so they repeated it with the second gator. We were very vocal that it was so not okay to be that close to the gators (we could have reached out and touched him), but we still got close the second time, and again he charged. This time he did get onto the very back of the boat, and the guide hit him with a paddle to get him off. It damaged the motor a little, we kind of limped around the lake for the rest of the ride back. Soooo….it was quite an adventure! We had a camp fire, and the guides started telling stories, but we were all so exhausted that we didn’t last long before just falling asleep around the fire. I felt really bad, cause I wanted to hear the stories, but I literally couldn’t keep my eyes open. They gave us some of that cinnamon alcohol drink, which didn’t help the sleepy thing either! We had mosquito nets around our beds, which was a wonderful thing.

Next morning we got up early to search for monkeys. Didn’t find any. But it was a really pretty ride, lots of cool birds. After breakfast (more eggs and white bread), I got the shaman to tell us some stories. I learned the creation legend of the Quichua living there along the lake: a long time ago all the elements of nature combined to form a man that was half fish and half man. Eventually that creature came out of the lake onto shore and became the first man. Cool! He also told me about a tribe that lives deep in the jungle, 5-6 hours away, that is cannibalistic. Apparently they killed some missionaries not too long ago. What else…oh, there are apparently some racial issues between the mestizos (the majority of the population in Ecuador, part Spanish part Indigenous) and the indigenous people. The mestizo run travel agencies won’t hire the natives because they “aren’t educated and don’t have experience”, and so the indigenous people won’t let those agencies onto their land. We chose our agency because it is run by the indigenous people, and the money goes to their community. Interesting side note. The family where we were staying was getting ready for a wedding in the community, apparently every cooks huge amounts off food weeks ahead of time to take to the party, which lasts for days. The only meats served are fish, alligator, and anaconda. The bride doesn’t sleep for days before the wedding because she is working to prepare all the food. That’s definitely a custom that I will not be bringing home with me! We got to sample a drink they were preparing from yucca. The women chew up the plant and spit it into a big bucket, to get it to ferment faster. Yummy.

I ate a larva. Several actually. There was a gigantic larva called “chundakuro” which is apparently good for whatever ails you. They fried some up, and then steamed some others in a leaf. I liked the fried ones, crispy and juicy like a piece of fat from a steak. The steamed one was a little too chewy for my liking.

Well, that was basically my trip. Spent all afternoon and night on Sunday traveling back to Quito. Sorry that this entry was so long, there was a lot of activity crammed into those 3 days! It was an amazing experience, totally worth the bugs and the humidity! I don’t have time right now, but check back soon for some pictures!

New Word of the Day: chicha (the alcoholic yucca drink)

Wednesday, October 08, 2008

I stood on a corner for an hour this morning. Just chillin. The doctor from Cochapamba was going to pick up me and another student, Monica, at this street corner close to our homes. But she never showed. It was pretty cute, Monica’s host mom, this cute little old lady, walked with her to the corner and waited with us for almost the whole time. We ended up calling the medical director of the program, and she just told us to come to her clinic for the morning instead. It turned out to be a pretty productive morning; we saw lots of patients at Centro de Medicina Familiar Vozandes La Y. (Super long name!) There was a woman with some tumors in her uterus. She and the doctor discussed where to go for the operation that would be the least expensive but still close. Apparently uterine and cervical cancer are very common here. Then a little girl with a cold. Super cute. And the last two patients were a mother and daughter, 90 and 52 years old. The older lady was there for a general checkup, and the doctor gave her some pills to improve her memory. The younger woman was also there for a checkup, and the doctor ordered a lot of tests for her because of a family history of medical problems. It was sad, the younger woman was having a really hard time caring for her mother on her own. The doctor told her she needed to hire a nurse for one day a week, because she needed a break. I wonder if people have more problems caring for their parents here, since there aren’t nursing home type places or social security payments or medicare (or is it Medicaid for the elderly, I can’t remember), or anything to help out the elderly. The clinic itself was pretty posh. The doc said it was the premiere family care clinic in Quito. There were computers in every office, nice looking equipment, everything was very clean…quite the difference from the public clinics I’ve been in thus far. If I were sick, I would definitely go there. The doc told us that in Ecuador they have to practice very “human” medicine, because a lot of time people can’t afford to have laboratory tests done. So a diagnosis has to be made solely from what the patients tells the doctor about their life, symptoms, history, etc., meaning that doctors and patients have to have a more personal, open relationship. Interesting. And I finally found out what the word they use for the yellow antispectic I’ve been pouring is; it’s not sabon as I thought, but savlon. That’s been bugging me for weeks.

So my day at clinic was a lot shorter than I expected. I’m a little worried, because now I only get one day at the Cochapamba clinic. I need to do my interviews! Hopefully I can work it out with that doc to come back another day if tomorrow isn’t enough time. I have Spanish class in a few hours, only a few days left of my pre-paid lessons. Oh, and the exciting news of the day is that I found a travel buddy! Monica is also staying in South America for almost a month after the program and was looking for someone to bum around with. Yay! I feel so much better knowing that I don’t have to travel by myself. We’re going to make our plans tomorrow on the 8 hour bus ride to the jungle. There is talk of hitting up Peru and maybe Argentina. How cool is that?

P.S. I was in the DN (the Daily Nebraskan, our school newsletter) on Oct. 8th! There was a whole little paragraph about me being here. I’m waiting for the fan mail to start.

New Word of the Day: pomas (butt cheeks)

I Went Swimming in a Waterfall

Well, I’m back from Banos. I really like that town, it’s very quiet and pretty. Beautiful mountains. I posted some pictures from my bike ride to the waterfall, it was so gorgeous. And the ride was so much easier this time. Either I’ve gotten into better shape (doubtful) or the last time I just had difficulty because of the altitude. This time around we went a little further, to a waterfall where we could swim. It was so pretty, and we all just jumped into this pool at the base of a little waterfall and had a good time. There were some random guys taking pictures of us, which was kind of funny. I’d never swam in a waterfall before, and I’d definitely recommend it. We went to the hot springs after our day of physical activity, and they were so HOT this time! Almost too much to bear. The nice thing was that it was pretty deserted, so there was plenty of space. Apparently everyone else was smarter than we were and didn’t want to scald themselves. It did feel really nice to just relax in hot water though. On Sunday a few of us went rafting. It was a pretty easy river, not too challenging. It was mostly floating down the river and getting pushed in occasionally by our fun loving guide. There was a convoy of four rafts, and we played games with each other. At one point we kidnapped a girl from another raft. Pretty silly. We jumped off some big rocks into the river too, crazy! It was beautiful on the river, definitely a great day. Our raft’s team name was Giardia, cause we were pretty sure that’s what we were going to get from taking in some of the river water. We didn’t get back to the hostal until late afternoon, then grabbed some food and headed home. Did have time to check out a really cool little market right behind the hostal, the food looked so good, but there was no time to do anything but buy a few bananas. Sad day.

I was supposed to be going to a public clinic near here called Cochabamba today for rotations, but the doc is sick or on vacation or something, so I’m headed back to La Maternidad today and tomorrow. Third times the charm! It’s kind of a bummer, cause I was only going to get four days at Cochabamba (since we’re leaving for the jungle Thursday night), and now I’ll only get 2. Grr. But hopefully there’ll still be time to do my interviewing.

Well, that’s all I’ve got for today. It was a great weekend, a good group bonding experience, and now I suppose it’s back to work. Only 3 weeks left of rotations, time has flown by!

New Word of the Day: casco (helmet)

Taxi Drivers and Cookies

Friday, October 3, 2008

Hi everyone! I´m heading to Baños in an hour, should be a good time. Think I´m going to get a massage there this time around, they´re supposed to be pretty good. Today was my last day at CEMOPLAF. Sad day, it was such a good experience. Today there was this adorable little boy that I played with for a while, totally made my day. And I even got all of my interviews done there, which was quite the endeavor. The clinic director didn´t initially give me permission to talk to the patients because she didn´t like that my questions implicated the quality of care CEMOPLAF provided. Olguita was really really nice and convinced the director to let me do the questions, which was amazing. The women at CEMOPLAF were younger on average than I´ve seen at the other clinics, and a lot of them were there solely to get contraceptives for the first time. As part of my survey I ask women if they´re using any kind of family planning, and today quite a few said no. I asked them afterwards why they weren´t using it, and all of them said it was because their husbands didn´t want them to. There were a few women getting birth control and just not telling their partners. How sad.

What else...Well, the quest for a reasonably priced trip to the Galapagos continues. Thought I had one lined up but it fell through. Drat. I think I´m just going to keep checking and hope that some good last minute deals pop up.

Last night our group had our welcome supper. Went to a Canadian themed buffet that was really really good. I ate so much. They even had calamari, which was probably some of the best I´ve ever had. And flan, so my happiness was pretty much complete. The day was genereally pretty crazy beforehand though. It´s a good story...(imagine that there is faraway music starting and the picture is fading out). I got a notice on Wednesday that I had a package to pick up at the post office. So after clinic on Thursday I decided to take a taxi to the office, cause I didn´t know where it was and I was in a rush (only 1.5 hours till my class, but you´d think that would be enough time to run to the post office...). My taxi driver was a very inappropriate 60 something man, who at one point told me that nights here are really cold, and he should probably come over and warm up my bed for me. Wow. Seriously. Wow. It was one of the most interesting taxi rides I´ve ever had, and I spent most of it trying to decide if he really was saying what I thought he was, or if my Spanish was just way worse than I thought. Sadly, I think I understood everything correctly. So anyway, get to the post office finally and escape the lude comments. I head on in, and wait in line. Then I pay $1. Why? I have no idea. Then I wait in another line, for a man who then takes me into the package room, finds my package and cuts it open to inspect the contents. Then I wait in another line. Why? I have no idea. A woman tells me I need to pay $9. Why? I tell her that I don´t have that much on me, I didn´t expect to have to pay that much. Okay, Okay, she says, $5.77, but that´s as low as she can go. Seriously, I was haggling over prices in a national post office. I still didn´t have it, so I had to run home and get more money. Grr. Returned 30 minutes later to wait again in line to pay the 5.77. The woman gave me a form, which I took to another line. The man there tells me I have to go make a copy of the form. So I run down the street to a copy place. Then I wait in another line with a stack of forms, sign a book, and FINALLY get my package. Only 2 hours later. It was so ridiculous! I did meet a nice guy from the states while I was waiting, peace corp volunteer in a nearby town. Anyway, the suspense definitely was getting to me, I really wanted to open my package!, but I had to go to class and then dinner, and only got to open it at 9 pm yesterday. Thanks so much Laura, you´re the best! The kids really loved the crayons and paper you sent, it thoroughly distracted them from their homework. I´m taking the oreos to Baños, good bus snack.

Alright, that´s about all I´ve got. I´ll post some pics when I get back from Baños, I have lots now of cute little kids. Thanks for reading!

New Word of the Day: wawa (kid, in Quichua)

Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Not really too much to report since my last update. I have a little bit of a cold, I suppose that’s something new. All that time with coughing children has finally caught up with me apparently. Speaking of coughing children, I am loving working at my clinic this week. It’s a CEMOPLAF clinic, which is a private clinic that mainly focuses on reproductive health and family planning, but also offers other services to subsidize costs. I’m following a pediatrician there. Her name is Olga, and true to Ecuadorian style (everything gets ita/ito added to the end here…) people call her “Olgita”. Classic. The kids there are so adorable. There have been lots with “el gripe” (colds), a little boy with pneumonia, a few kids with chicken pox, and one unexplained case of vomiting. Oh, and my personal favorite, a 2 month old boy with uneven legs who the doctor thought might have hip dysplasia. I got to see what the exam they do for that looks like, which was pretty cool. It was so weird to be on the other side of a hip dysplasia discussion. Tomorrow Olga is going to let me do the height and weight measurements for all the kiddies. I’m pretty pumped. It’s so hard to think in metric, though!

Other than the awesome time at the clinic, not much is new. I’ve been looking into trips to the Galapagos. Pretty pricey, but it’s one of those once in a lifetime opportunity things I suppose, and while I’m here I figure I can’t pass it up. The other travel option is Machu Picchu in Peru. Such a tough call! But I figured that the natural wonder wins out. Machu Picchu probably has a better chance of lasting in the long haul. This weekend I’m heading back to Banos with the new group. I think this time I’m going to do white water rafting and a massage, just to mix it up a little. And the next weekend is a jungle trip! I’m so excited! We’re actually going into hard core jungle, where you have to use a machete to cut through the forest and everything. Apparently there will be piranha fishing. How cool!

New Word of the Day: recoger (to pick up)