Saturday, November 29, 2008

T-day 2008!

I've finished my last full week at the Hospitalito! The time has flown by (mostly) :) Last week was a blur: clinic on Monday and Spanish class, on call on Tuesday, slept on Wednesday and got sick enough to actually not even go to work on Thursday, T-day dinner that night which I unfortunately couldn't resist, and clinic again yesterday with Spanish class and a B-day celebration afterward (complete with pinata!). Some disconnected musings:

1) Thanksgiving dinner was very impressive. Traci and her husband Jared, who are volunteering here in Santiago for a year and are the 'Mom and Dad' at Las Milpas where most of the Hospitalito volunteers live, cooked up a storm! (Here is their blog.) They even got a turkey! Someone who recently came down also brought canned pumpkin and cranberry sauce :) Different people made their favorite T-day foods which were fun to try, and I made an apple crisp (thanks Anne and Stephen for the recipe!) which was a hit. All things considered, it was an excellent T-day (besides the being sick part), but it certainly did make me miss everyone at home! Here is a picture of the feast:


2) Last night we watched the movie 50 First Dates, a romantic comedy with Adam Sandler. It features Drew Barrymore who, a la Groundhog Day, can't remember anything day to day. Now, she certainly 'lives in the moment', but that phrase must mean something different from the inability to make new memories. Any thoughts?

3) Today I finally felt well enough to have a piece of pineapple. If you are not already familiar with my attachment to fruit, suffice it to say that I adore and crave it probably as much as chocolate. Well, I guess I chomped down too hard on my fork. Here is before and after:

I had a little filling between my two front teeth that is no longer there! It is kind of funny because a similar thing happened to me in Morocco when I was very excited about eating salad. I bit down too enthusiastically on the fork and chipped my tooth. Coupled with the GI distress I seem to be prone to acquiring, the tooth problems make me think that perhaps fruits and veggies are a true menace!

4) Today a veterinarian came to town to fix dogs and cats. Some of the other volunteers were saying that it is a lot more efficient in terms of 'family planning' to fix a male dog or cat. I'm not sure if I lost a bit of brain when the filling between my two front teeth came out, but I can't seem to understand. Of course I understand that gestation takes time and so that in one year a male could father many litters. However, as far as I learned in the 80s in school, each baby needs a mother and a father -- so how can it be more efficient to neuter one versus the other? If there are, for example, 2 males and 2 females in the entire population, how does better control the population to neuter one male versus one female? Please please explain this in a way that makes sense. It is driving me crazy.

5) I've been busily making plans for the next month or so. On Tuesday I'm heading up to Tikal, and on Friday to meet Chris, Chad and Laura in Belize. We'll be there for a week with part of the time on the beach :) After that I'll meet my mom in Mexico City for 9 days!! I'll work my way back South stopping at San Cristobal de las Casas and stay back here in Santiago Atitlan over New Year's. Jess is coming to visit from the 5th to the 12th and we will have a few glorious days in Guatemala before I come home. I'm not sure how much I'll get to blog in the next few weeks, but I will take some pictures and post them later ... I hope that everyone is doing well and I would love to hear from you :)

2 comments:

Gary Ohama said...

Hola Rebecca,
Sounds like you are wrapping-up your duties at the hospital. Time really seemed to go by quickly. This was a tremendous experience for you. I'm glad there is a tremendous vacation to reward yourself for all the dedication and the committment that was made. I'm looking forward to more photos. Today I heard a wonderful program on medicine, practice, the meaning of medical practice and being a physician. It was by a professor at U of C San Francisco. Her grandfather was a Kaballa mystic and physician and she related some stories he told. One of her questions was "How would I live if I were exactly what's needed to heal the world?" She also posed the question of "What do you do when you run out of treatments?" She calls the sole mission and calling being the issues of the person. You should listen to it at Speaking of Faith.org with Krista Tippit. The physician is Rachel Naomi Remen.
How a good time traveling and vacationing. I'm so proud of your accomplishments.
Love ya,
Gary

Gary Ohama said...

Hola Again,
I'm not good at family planning but I think the reason to fix females is that if there is only one male unfixed, the entire female population could be impregnated. Sort of like if you want less eggs you go for reducing the number of hens.
Gary