Monday, September 24, 2007 

Adventures in Health Care For The Last Time (Hopefully)

So there I was, with a stomach full of burritos and an ear full of stitches. I had a giant bandage on my ear, and I was a little worried that half of my ear was cut off under the thing, but when I took the bandage off I was happy to see my ear still in one piece. Say what you will against the free clinic doctor guy, he didn't do a half-bad job.



But, there were stitches to be taken out. I would have simply gone back to the free clinic, but I was going to be out of town the whole next week at the General Meeting (i.e. party). Fortunately, there's more than one way to skin a cat, or in this case get medical care without paying a dime. One of my friends is a fully registered, licensed, and bonded nurse, and she graciously offered to lend her services free of charge. So, one afternoon we all headed to a friend's hotel room and performed the operation. Under the skillful care of the Nurse and the rock-solid support of C-Love (the guy with the lamp), I had nothing to fear.




Though you might be thinking that wasn't the best place for a medical operation, trust me. The free clinic wasn't any better. So after a few minutes of laughs and pains, I came out a new man:



Yeah, you can't tell much difference in the picture, but it was better. I enjoyed the rest of the meeting stitch-free, and figured I was finally done with the strange ear growth.

As it would turn out, though, whatever thing was growing on my ear decided to start growing back a couple of weeks later. My team leader had had enough, so we went together to the real doctor (i.e. the kind that charge money) to get it looked at it.

To make a long story short, it turns out I had an infection in my ear (thanks free neighborhood clinic), but besides that the doctor didn't see anything serious. So she sprayed some liquid nitrogen gas on it and sent me home, telling me it would go away on its own. That was a few weeks ago, and though my ear looks better, there's still something growing. I go back to the doctor next week, and hopefully another blast of liquid nitrogen gas will end this story.

12:05 PM | |

Thursday, September 20, 2007 

Ramadan's Revenge

It's Ramadan time around here, which means no one eats, drinks, or smokes anything while the sun's up. They fill up EARLY in the morning and then again when the sun goes down. That is, for those that actually do it. Most people around here don't do the fast, and life for the most part doesn't change. I do get this strange sense of guilt when I drink water outside now. And, as is par for the course, I've had a couple of nice cultural blunders:

Last week I was talking to my neighbor while enjoying a delicious piece of fresh-baked bread. I offered him some and he politely refused, so I continued eating right in front his face. After I said goodbye and started to walk away, I remembered it was Ramadan time...



A few days ago a (non-fasting) friend and I decided to go play some basketball, so we headed to the court to find some people to play with. There were only 2 other people at the court, so we started a 2-on-2 game. They went up on us 15-0 at the beginning, but then we started really picking it up. My mid-range jumper started to fall, and I was running circles around the tired guy on the other team. My friend was grabbing every rebound, and we were having our way. The final score ended up being 30-27. I'm not sure who had 30 and who had 27, but who cares? We came back from a 15 point deficit!

I was pumped and seriously impressed with my friend and I's amazing basketball performance, until I realized one of the guys on the other team was fasting. The dude hadn't eaten or drinking anything ALL DAY and was out there playing basketball. No wonder I was running circles around him. Somehow, that made our amazing accomplishment somewhat less amazing.

"Yeah, we totally annihilated that team with the guy that was about to faint because he hadn't eaten or drinken anything all day!" That just doesn't sound all that inspiring.





The most frustrating part of the whole Ramadan deal for me is that some people fast from backgammon as well. I've come to love (and hate at times when the dice don't go my way) the unofficial official sport of the country. What better way to spend a morning, afternoon, whatever, than sipping some tea and playing backgammon? That'll have to wait for about a month, though, since my friend decided he can't play during Ramadan. I don't think that's actually written in their book, but I probably won't bring that up. I'll just be in practice for the great showdown about 3 weeks from now...

12:22 PM | |

Sunday, September 16, 2007 

Adventures in Health Care (Continued)

So I headed down to the neighborhood clinic with thoughts of world-class, completely free health care bouncing through my mind. I approached the plain, pink building with confidence and went inside. After taking my number, I waited in the hallway for 15 or 20 minutes before I got to meet the "doctor." I use "" because I later found out they don't always have actual doctors working at these things. But, he had some blue scrubs on, and he looked pretty professional with his big medical books and nice wooden desk. I showed him my ear and he asked me 2 straightforward questions:

1. "Did you try to pierce your ear?"

2. "Have you exposed your ear to any toxic substances?"

After I answered in the negative, he took me to the examination room across the hall, and had me lay down and face the wall. I had actually just wanted his advice on some medicines or creams to take for this thing, but before I knew it he had taken some scissors (not a scalpel, scissors) and was digging that thing out of my ear like it was fool's gold.

He was talking to me while cutting and yanking my ear with those scissors, but honestly, I wasn't paying too much attention. Needless to say, my language wasn't kicking on all cylinders at the time. What else could I do? It was too late to stop. So, I laid there and he finished the cutting job.

To my relief, he put down the scissors. Then he said something about having to plant. Plant? Maybe this guy was talking to me about his summer garden while working my ear over. Then he started stitching me up. There's a vocabulary lesson you don't forget.

So, when it was all said and done, I had a couple of stitches and a giant bandage on the right side of my head. Not knowing what else to do, I called my team leader up and went over to his house for some burritos.

10:44 AM | |

Monday, September 10, 2007 

Adventures in Health Care (Part 1)

For the past several months I've had some thing growing on my right ear. It had been around for a while, and I wasn't too worried about it, but then I noticed it started growing BIG. So, one afternoon I went out into the neighborhood to take some action on this thing.




I decided to head to one of the neighborhood pharmacies. Over here, you can get anything and everything you want over the counter at a pharmacy. No prescriptions, no doctor's notes, if you want something, just get it. As if that weren't reason enough to head to the pharmacy, there's at least 3 expert medical advisers at every site. Granted, 2 of the 3 experts are 19-year-old guys just out of high school, but they know their medicine. If you ever want to drink some tea and talk about your ailments, just head to the pharmacy. I asked them one day where they get their expertise from, and they just looked at me and said "We read." You can't argue with that.

So anyway, I was heading to the pharmacy when I ran into my apartment manager guy. I told him my problem, and he recommended the neighborhood clinic. Now I've been living in the same place for a year now, and I had never seen the neighborhood clinic about 100 yards from my apartment. He said it was clean (it wasn't overly clean), professional (we'll talk about that later), and free (Yeah, it was completely free). With such a glowing recommendation, how could I not stop by? Thinking I'd get world-class medical treatment and save a few bucks all at once, I headed on down to the clinic...

10:53 AM | |

Thursday, September 06, 2007 

And We're Back

After all the card games, basketball games, ultimate frisbee games, nintendo games, naps, buffets, conversations, singing, prayers, and hiking, it was time to leave. The games were fun, the food was plentiful and tasty, the programs were good, but the best part was of course the people.

Meeting up with old friends and meeting new people was by far the best part of the week. Eating 8 desserts a day ranks a close second, but hanging out with like-minded, English-speaking old and new friends was the best.

After a week of doing nothing but goofing off, you might be thinking it's hard going back to work. Well, you'd be right. I've been working harder than ever the past couple of weeks playing backgammon, drinking tea, watching basketball games, going to fairs, fishing, and generally just wandering around talking to people. It's been a hard transition back to the dog days of working here, but somehow I think I'll manage.

12:55 PM | |