Last stop: Sucre

Sucre

Soon enough, we arrived in Sucre early the next morning around 6 AM. We found a hostal, cleaned up, took a nap, and then were back on the streets of a new city exploring. A bigger city than Santa Cruz but much cleaner. The streets and commerce were organized more like cities in Europe.

After some wandering, we stumbled upon the local market, which reminded me of the little market in Pamplona we go to for cheese and olives. It was a little bigger, and of course a little more chaotic, as is the Latin American way of life. They had the usual stands selling meat, fruits and vegetables, pastries, flowers. And on the top floor was their style of "fastfood", in other words women selling full meals they had prepared directly from their pots.

fruit stands

"fastfood"

At night we went to a dinner and show called "Orígenes de Bolivia" (Origins of Bolivia), a performance of different dances and rituals specific to the indigenous tribes that exist this country. Very interesting and beautiful. I'm glad I pushed this show, as my other two travel buddies were debating whether to go to the show or on a tour to see dinosaur tracks...

The next day we didn't find much to do. In the morning we went to the Museo de Textiles Indígenas, a museum that had an exhibit displaying the textile differences between six tribes. There was even an indigenous woman sitting in a room weaving a blanket. What patience! It's unbelievable how they can visualize the different figures they want to create, where each thread and color goes.

weaving

After an uneventful afternoon of dodging the rain, our week of vacation came to an end. Yet another 16 hours from Sucre to Santa Cruz on a nightbus, where once again we got back to sweating and got back to work.

Valley of the Rocks

LLAMAS!!

more llamas!

Day 2 of our tour. We had to get up super early, breakfast at 6:30 to leave by 7:30. A simple breakfast, like most, of toast with marmalade and horrendous coffee. The first stop of the day was "Valle de las Rocas" (Valley of the Rocks). Incredible and enormous formations created over hundreds of years by the simple fores of nature. And incredible doesn't even encompass what I saw. Another AMAZING sight.

Alice and I, tiny

However, our wonderful morning (and consequently the rest of our tour) took a turn for the worst as one of our travel buddies, an englishman named John, made a decision that he would definitely regret later. While the rest of us were being cautious climbing to get good views and a couple cool pictures, our friend John took it a little too far and obviously didn't use much common sense. He ended up falling about 30 feet from the top of one of the rocks. It was one of the most scarring things I have seen to date. One second I was smiling, posing for a picture sitting up on a rock, and the next I was watching horrified. Our tour guides were convinced it was simply a bad fall and a significant amount of bruising, and wanted to leave him at a "hospital" in another town in the middle of nowhere so we could continue with our trip. There was no convincing us though. We insisted on taking him back to Uyuni immediately. I can't say I was happy at all about cutting our trip short, especially since you really have to be an idiot to be doing what John was doing. He ended up ruining the tour not only for himself, but for another five people. But given that morning's events, there was no way I would've enjoyed the remainder of the trip anyway.

Upon returning to Uyuni, we took him straight to the town's hospital, a huge upgrade from where John would've stayed. After some x-rays, we found out it was a little more than just deep bruising-- he had fractured his pelvis in two places. The guy didn't have a single penny on him, and since in Bolivia no care is given until you pay upfront, we continued to help him. At least John had had the sense to get traveler's insurance, and after contacting them, he was on his way to La Paz on a body-board.

And to think that the point of our vacation was to get away from patients and hospitals for a week... but that's life. After our long day, we took another 10-hour long busride to Sucre, the capital of Bolivia, to try to enjoy our last two days.

Uyuni and the Salt Flats

Uyuni is a little town in the middle of nowhere, where there is just about 2 hours worth of site-seeing. But it's from there that our 3 day/2 night tour began, stopping by the Salt Flats, several lagoons, geysers, and hot springs, apart from being in close proximities to various wild animals such as llamas and flamingoes! Our guides were a couple, driver Gregorio and cook Doram, who accompanied us the three days in the 4x4, food and hostals included.

Colchane

Right before getting the Salt Flats is an even smaller village called Colchane, where 60-70 families live off of exporting salt, raising llamas y cultivating quinoa (a type of grain commonly eaten that is a good source of protein). There we stopped by the "factory" where they purified and bagged the salt obtained from the Salt Flats, and by 'factory' I mean somebody's enclosed back yard. They collect it, dry it in ovens, mix it with iodine and bag it, to sell it for a mere $3 per kilo.

salt "factory"

After this short pitstop, we finally got to the Salt Flats, 4600 square miles of nothing but salt. Absolutely amazing. Words aren't enough to describe the beauty of what we saw. And it being the rainy season right now, it was all covered with water, making an endless mirror. Look off into the distance, you couldn't tell where the water ended and the sky began. AMAZING.

mounds of salt

cool reflections!

In the afternoon we went to the Train Cemetery. In the past, the wagons had worked with water and coal, but in 1952 more modern trains were put into use and the old ones were dumped in the middle of the desert. In any other more developed country, they would have disappeared, but not in Bolivia.

cemetery of trains

A couple more hours in the car and we finally arrived at our first hostel, located in an abandoned village, again, in the middle of nowhere. The couple people that lived there had no contact whatsoever with the world. I can't even imagine being a kid so removed from everything. What a life...

during a break before arriving at the hostal

scenery, at the hostal

First stop: Potosí

early morning view from the bus

We left Santa Cruz by bus in the early afternoon. It was a shame that we took the night bus because the views as we made our way up and down winding roads on the mountain side would have been amazing. The road, of course, was not all that direct and on top of that, was less of a road and more of a dirt and rocky path, barely fitting one car in each direction. There was also no sort of railing to keep the bus from falling off a precipice had it moved over even a couple inches. Being one of the only passengers awake at 3 AM I felt obligated several times to sneak a quick prayer in every time I looked out the window and saw no road, just the steep incline down the side of the mountain. But, after 2 very uncomfortable and smelly buses and 20 long hours, we finally arrived at our first destination, Potosí, the highest city in the world, situated at about 14,000 feet about sea level.

one of the many villages we passed

Our first day in Potosí wasn't too exciting. We found a couple cathedrals around the city and then ate a good dinner at a local restaurant, San Carlos, where we shared a couple plates of llama!

a cathedral and Cerro Rico

The second day was a lot more eventful. First we went on a tour of the Cooperative Mines. In el Cerro Rico (the name of the mountain by which the city is built), silver was discovered in the mountain in the 19th century, the reason why the city was founded. Still today, about 10,000 miners work to extract minerals, working in groups or individually. Their income is based on the luck they have inside the mine finding these minerals. According to our tour guide, a petite lady about 4'8", these mines were much safer than the one that collapsed in Chile because of the lack of water inside and the mountain was made up of volcanic rocks, but then again, you have to be careful with what you believe. Nonetheless we all decided to continue with our tour into the mines, maybe a little more paranoid than before. Inside, it seemed as though the tunnels could collapse at any moment, especially having very minimal support. While the main tunnels were pretty cool, when we got into the tunnels where the miners actually worked, the temperature got close to 90 F. The heat was almost unbearable, especially with the ridiculous plastic yellow suits we had on. It was an eye-opening experience; I can't even imagine working from 9-6 every day in those conditions.

the three of us in our very attractive yellow suits

view of Potosí from the entrance of the mine

Our guide also showed us the God of the miners, whom they called George. They make offerings to him every Friday (the signature offerings being cigarettes, liquor, and llama fetus). This tradition started in the colonial period when the Spanish had the indigenous people enslaved and working 6 month shifts inside the mine without exiting.

George

In the afternoon we visited La Casa Nacional de Moneda, a building that was built in 1572 and served as the place to make coins, but now is used as a museum and archive. After that, our days in Potosí came to an end as we ran to the bus terminal to get on another nightbus, this time to the city of Uyuni.

My first vacation!

Neelum, Alice, and I

I just got back from my first week of vacation. Alice, Neelum (a 4th year medical student that has been volunteering here at the clinic this month), and I decided to visit a couple places: Potosí, Uyuni, the Salt Flats on a three day/two night tour, and Sucre. To say the least, it was a very interesting week. By no means was it a perfect vacation, but we were definitely able to enjoy many beautiful sights and places. In the next couple blogs I will explain everything we did, and of course include a couple pictures for everything that words can't explain well enough.

An afternoon in Buena Vista

On Wednesday we saw a total of.... 1 patient! at the clinic. The night before it had poured nonstop, making it pretty difficult for even our 4-wheel drive to get through the muddy road. So instead of staring at the clinic walls all afternoon, all 11 of us took a fieldtrip to the nearby town of Buena Vista, about 45 minutes from Palacios.

main plaza in Buena Vista

walking through town

a little market

another view of the plaza

 a couple little houses and mountains in the distance

La ventita de Elena

Valeri, one special patient

Not to say that one patient is more important than another at the clinic, but when you have endless follow consults with specialists in Santa Cruz with one patient, you get to know several of them pretty well. That's how I met Valeri Gonzalez Dominguez. Interested in knowing more about what goes on here? Well, we have an official website! We update it four times a year with updates about what's new at the clinic, highlighting patients that have received care or have yet to be diagnosed completely.

Here's the link, feel free to take a look at it: Centro Médico Humberto Parra Newsletter. (yes I'm doing a little bit of advertising... We're always looking for more help or more doctors that are interested in coming down!)

And here's the article I wrote about Valeri.

Valeri Gonzalez Dominguez, an 11 year-old girl from nearby Buena Vista, is one of the first patients I have had the chance to meet and follow through clinic visits and many consults at the Santa Cruz public hospital. Valeri had been coming to the clinic for several years, mainly for "bichos" (parasites) treatment and occasionally for back pain, a complaint for which it seems nothing was done. This January, she was seen by the pediatric resident at the clinic, who immediately noticed the very obvious scoliosis. Her spine had a curve of about thirty degrees! Even with no medical background, it was apparent something needed to be done.

I first met her and her family at Hospital Japonés. I had never seen her before that morning but immediately noticed her huge smile that went from ear to ear.  She was followed by her mother and two brothers. That morning, along with every morning after that, she seemed to be enjoying her day around me and Alice. During the long waits in the hospital, I would always ask her, myself exhausted, "Como estas? Aburrida?" (How are you today? Bored?), to which she would respond, shyly and softly, "No. Bien." (No. I'm good.) Valeri never complained about the endless hours in the waiting room. She would just pass the time playing with my hair, quietly humming to herself, or bothering her brothers.

It has been a frustrating couple weeks with Valeri. Some doctors did not notice the scoliosis. Others suggested the pain was simply muscular pain, easily treated with ibuprofen. But the curvature of her spine is so severe it causes pain for her to simply stand. Because she has not hit puberty yet, non-surgical intervention may still be possible. After bouncing around from doctor to doctor, all prescribing different treatments, I think we may finally have come to our final stop-- Dr. Crespo,  a thoracic surgeon at Hospital Japonés. Within the next few weeks, her future will become clearer, and hopefully much less painful.

Even once the foundation has done all they can for Valeri, I will never forget our goodbyes after the long mornings at Japonés. It was always "Hasta luego!" (See you later!) from me, "Ciao!" from her, followed by a big wet kiss on my cheek, then skipping away to catch up with the rest of her family.

I know Valeri will not be the last patient I get to know, find a treatment for, and then never see him/her again. But it feels good to be able to help many that would otherwise most likely not receive medical care.  (I'll post a picture of her at our next consult. She's a cute kid =])

La cucaracha, la cucaracha! Ya no puede caminar!

There's undoubtedly an endless supply of a diverse array of insects always wandering around the clinic and house in Palacios. The typical spiders, flies, centipedes, worms, moths, and beetles. But most of all, mosquitoes. I smash no doubt hundreds of them a day. Yes, its annoying and tiresome, but nothing is more annoying that having tons of bites all over my body and the constant buzzing in my ears. Until Friday night, I have been able to deal pretty well with the annoyance. That night though, my experiences with bugs went to a whole new level. I have never been a big fan of any type of bugs, but cockroaches are a completely different story.

It was around 9PM. Alice was calmly typing away on her computer working on whatever she's always working on. I was staring off into space, my computer having just crashed that morning. Becky had wandered off towards her room when we heard a high pitched squeal. Living with mostly girls, the squeal is a more than just a rare occasion. But in this instance, both Alice and I were summoned to "Come quick! Come quick!" followed by another "No!" and another squeal. Alice rushed over, leaving me to slowly get up from my chair and wander in that direction. I didn't expect the big surprise to be all that interesting or important. But as I round the corner to the hallway, even from a distance I could see the huge 4-inch-long cockroach chilling underneath the horrified stares of Becky and Alice. I didn't feel the need to get any closer, so I just watched from a distance as the cockroach kept meandering down the hallway. Eventually the cockroach met its last moments alive as Alice hacked away at it with a plastic Pil yogurt bottle, sound effects mimicking Jason (from Friday the 13th) included. Hasta luego, cucaracha!

At that point, my plans to go take a shower and go to bed were slightly delayed. I no longer wanted to go anywhere that might mean another encounter. So I paced around the kitchen, mustering up the courage to continue normally with my night. Finally, after a long 15 minutes, I told myself to quit being such a wuss. I carefully but quickly tiptoed down the hallway scanning every inch of the tile floor as I went, and safely arrived at the room. No cockroaches visible in there either. I consider our bedroom a sanctuary away from any sort of wildlife (minus about 4 mosquitoes and a lizard that crawls on the walls). But, as I went about collecting my things, I suddenly stopped in my tracks as I moved my glance to my computer which lay next to my pillow on top of my bed. Surprise, surprise... another cockroach. What was surprising was I didn't scream but calmly walked back down the hallway into the kitchen before my meltdown in front of Becky and Alice. After a photosession with Mr. Cockroach #2, another one 4 inches long, Alice and Becky skillfully and very kindly set it free outside the house. Needless to say, I would've much rather him received the same fate as our first intruder, but such is life.

My luck with our multilegged friends didn't end once we left the clinic the next afternoon. Apparently two more wanted to join us back in Santa Cruz and made themselves comfortable amongst my dirty clothes in my bag. They made themselves at home in our bedroom once again, but were caught red handed by Niko, our Santa Cruz "mom". Niko wasn't so nice; she hates cockroaches just as much as, if not more than, I do. Once she told us at dinner, it made for more disgusted and unbelieving faces from Alice, Becky, and I, but by then, in our cockroach-free environment, it also made for some good laughs.