{I wrote little blurbs at the airports in Washington, Newark, and Brussels, but nothing really gets interesting until we actually get to Douala. I left July 11, but this post picks up on July 14 when we finally made it to our final destination, Fundong, Cameroon. See pictures here: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2240305&id=55700796&l=842401c6ab, or click here http://harvestchildrenshomes.org/abouthch_compound.html for a virtual tour.}
7/14/2009
Let's recap, and a little more detail to the equation.
--Brussels security check-- Christina's peanut butter was confiscated under the new liquid rules. Drink that PB, girl! Kelsey had her bag sent through like three times to figure out what the thing that looked like a metal spoon was. My bags were stopped too, until we all figured out that our would-be spoonish weapon was actually a reflex hammer.
--Flight to Douala-- mostly uneventful, although we were not the only white people on the plan, contrary to rumor/expectation.
--Douala airport-- "the gauntlet" of the trip. Tons and tons and tons of people tried to help us with our bags and with customs, and we tried to refuse. I would say they won, because they definitely elbowed their way onto our carts, but I'm pretty sure we didn't pay them (or customs) anything, so maybe we won after all. (This is pretty much entirely thanks to Emmanuel Ngala.)
--Douala guest house (Baptist Mission House)--excellent digs. Run by a very trusting European (German? Austrian?) lady who looks a lot like my Granny. Kelsey, Christina, and I had a huge room with AC. There was a pool, and even wireless! We all called home.
--Dinner-- I almost got barracuda, and then I almost got ananas (pineapple) chicken, and then I ended up getting plain (but yummy chicken). My exotic food fetish was not to be.
We were super pooped when we went to bed at 10 or 11, but little did we know what the night had in store for us. . .
At about 3 AM, Kelsey, Christina, and I woke up to a banging on our (locked) front (only) door. We waited, the banging happened again, then Kelsey was about to go down from the loft where we were sleeping to see what they wanted when Christina stopped her for safety reasons. The banging started again, going on for what seemed like forever. The invader attempted to open the door, and then finally went away. We all sat straight up in bed for about 20 minutes as Christina tried to get Eric on the walkie-talkie to figure out what had happened/calm us down/stay safe. Eventually she got him, and he informed us that it was Philip who had mistakenly set his clock 10 hours forward instead of the 5 we actually needed. . . Good times.
So that was day 1 on the ground. We got up the next morning to a delicious breakfast of french bread, coffee, pineapple, and an omlette provided by the mission. After breakfast the ladies headed to Western Union to pick up money (and attempt unsuccessfully to change it) while the guys packed their bags. Eventually we piled everything on top of the van and headed on the looong journey to Fundong.
Observations: The roads here are either pretty decent or non-existent. Our van traveled both. Everywhere is a lot cleaner than the other developing countries I've been to. It's gorgeous here. . . hills that spring up out of nowhere and keep going, surrounded by a mist that makes it all pretty mysterious.
{. . . I talked about a few events and the road trip to Fundong, but now I think I'll skip ahead to when we actually get to the orphanage}
After our driver, Henry, navigated an amazing mud puddle, we arrived at Harvest Children's Home to mobs of screaming (happy) kids. Three girls (Vigiline, Mariana, and Shansline) latched onto me immediately. I was reminded of what Michelle said in response to my fears about loving and leaving-- the ones who need you will come to you. It was overwhelming, in a mostly sweet but a little sad way.
More on our evolving plan soon! Bon soir! <3RH
Sunday, August 30, 2009
Friday, August 21, 2009
Reality Check
I've just started my second year of medical school (which I spent most of the summer dreading), and it has definitely hit like a ton of bricks, but in a different way than I was expecting. The class isn't that bad, and the work isn't that bad, and really if you want to do medical school I definitely don't mean to discourage-- it's just that it contrasts so wildly with my experiences this summer.
I mean, there's the obvious level of lazy-ish summer of absolute fun vs. daily routine of getting up, going to class, procrastinating, eventually studying, sleep, and repeat. That's the one I guess I was planning on, dreading.
But there's another level. I spent two weeks on a health-focused mission trip in Fundong, Cameroon at the Harvest Children's Home, and it was just absolutely eye-opening. I mean, I know it was only two weeks, but it was just vastly different from anything I've experienced before. And I've spent time (longer blocks than this, in fact) doing healthcare work in developing countries-- I worked at a leprosy hospital in Nepal for a month last summer, and last Spring Break I went with our school's medical brigade to Honduras. But I feel like none of that was really anything like the conditions at the HCH, or of the Cameroonian health care that I saw in general. Every health problem we encountered led us to other, bigger, related, and extraordinarily difficult systemic problems. It was like a Pandora's box of Russian dolls.
So it was surprising. But what's even more surprising is how I feel about it now that I'm back in school. We had our first Introduction to the Patient II lecture the other day (the class where you learn the sort of doctory skills, like interviewing and the physical exam and how to do a differential diagnosis), and I realized I had forgotten how different Western medicine really was from what I had experienced. There's just so much that we take for granted here-- of course in terms of supplies and money and standard of living, but even more than that.
The first thing you're supposed to do before you have begin your examination of a patient is wash your hands: what if there's no running water? And what if less than 1 of 100 people in the country washes their hands? (I'm not suggesting that you shouldn't wash them, but maybe you need to provide a detailed explanation about germs and disease and hygiene, just so they aren't offended, for example.)
One of your first interview tasks is to find out the patient's age. What do you do if they don't know how old they are? I think I'd get a good laugh if I asked this in class, and that would make sense because it's pretty much unimaginable here. But very few of the kids we talked to got their age right according to the records that we had for them, and to complicate matters some were missing birth certificates, and many were extraordinarily small because of nutritional issues.
So where do you begin?
I am really glad that I am in medical school, especially at EVMS. I think they will do a great job of preparing me to be a doctor in America. And that will be important to my career. But lately it's become very apparent to me that it will only be the very first step in preparing for a career in a developing country, and there will be a lot of practical health ground to make up.
Oh, and I have got to get me an MPH.
{By way of explanation, I'm stating this blog as a way of sort of reflecting on my experiences in Cameroon. I can't say that I'm going to have a lot of time this year, but the overall idea is when I do, to take my journal entries from while I was there and either directly repost them or distill them into a more expository format and put them here. Other subjects might wander in from time to time, too. I hope you enjoy!}
I mean, there's the obvious level of lazy-ish summer of absolute fun vs. daily routine of getting up, going to class, procrastinating, eventually studying, sleep, and repeat. That's the one I guess I was planning on, dreading.
But there's another level. I spent two weeks on a health-focused mission trip in Fundong, Cameroon at the Harvest Children's Home, and it was just absolutely eye-opening. I mean, I know it was only two weeks, but it was just vastly different from anything I've experienced before. And I've spent time (longer blocks than this, in fact) doing healthcare work in developing countries-- I worked at a leprosy hospital in Nepal for a month last summer, and last Spring Break I went with our school's medical brigade to Honduras. But I feel like none of that was really anything like the conditions at the HCH, or of the Cameroonian health care that I saw in general. Every health problem we encountered led us to other, bigger, related, and extraordinarily difficult systemic problems. It was like a Pandora's box of Russian dolls.
So it was surprising. But what's even more surprising is how I feel about it now that I'm back in school. We had our first Introduction to the Patient II lecture the other day (the class where you learn the sort of doctory skills, like interviewing and the physical exam and how to do a differential diagnosis), and I realized I had forgotten how different Western medicine really was from what I had experienced. There's just so much that we take for granted here-- of course in terms of supplies and money and standard of living, but even more than that.
The first thing you're supposed to do before you have begin your examination of a patient is wash your hands: what if there's no running water? And what if less than 1 of 100 people in the country washes their hands? (I'm not suggesting that you shouldn't wash them, but maybe you need to provide a detailed explanation about germs and disease and hygiene, just so they aren't offended, for example.)
One of your first interview tasks is to find out the patient's age. What do you do if they don't know how old they are? I think I'd get a good laugh if I asked this in class, and that would make sense because it's pretty much unimaginable here. But very few of the kids we talked to got their age right according to the records that we had for them, and to complicate matters some were missing birth certificates, and many were extraordinarily small because of nutritional issues.
So where do you begin?
I am really glad that I am in medical school, especially at EVMS. I think they will do a great job of preparing me to be a doctor in America. And that will be important to my career. But lately it's become very apparent to me that it will only be the very first step in preparing for a career in a developing country, and there will be a lot of practical health ground to make up.
Oh, and I have got to get me an MPH.
{By way of explanation, I'm stating this blog as a way of sort of reflecting on my experiences in Cameroon. I can't say that I'm going to have a lot of time this year, but the overall idea is when I do, to take my journal entries from while I was there and either directly repost them or distill them into a more expository format and put them here. Other subjects might wander in from time to time, too. I hope you enjoy!}
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