Things were going pretty well in Rurre and through working at the clinic
I got the chance to go on a trip to some communities. I didn’t really have much
of an idea what was going to happen and what we were going to do or IF I could
really go, but they actually took me, and it was a great experience.
When I went to the clinic on Wednesday morning, things were packed and
ready to go. We had two big boxes full of drugs, sponsored by the German
embassy, and a whole bunch of other bags, with even more pills. I was a little
nervous, I didn’t even know who all would go on the trip and what I was
supposed to do, but then I met Ilka and Anna and Nikolai. I didn’t even know
that there were Germans working with the clinic too, but apparently Ilka was
the one why all those trips even take place.
And Anna and Nikolai are two doctors who came straight to Bolivia after
working 6 months in Nepal. I learned that besides two Bolivian doctors, a
dentist, a pharmacist, three park rangers and a cook, the three of them were
coming on the trip too, and I was happy to have someone to connect to.
It took us a while to get everything together and stored on the boat,
but then we were ready to go. I was excited and happy and the trip could begin.
But since we are still in Bolivia, nothing works straight and after a
while on the river we remembered that we forgot the gloves. Though rarely used
in the clinic, we couldn’t go on a three-day-trip without them and so we had to
turn around, go back to Rurre and get the gloves.
After we got them we were way later than planned (what a surprise!), but
we were finally on our way to our first stop: Embocada.
Embocada
I’ve always loved being on a boat and
so I really enjoyed this journey. Besides, it was finally something different
than a bus, of which I’ve seen so many in the last couple months. We went about
2 hours upriver, taking a turn to the left at the end, leaving the big Rio Beni
and continuing on the smaller Rio Quiquibay where our first stop would be. I
slept a little on the boat, and time flew by. Soon we saw some people on the
shore and stopped. They were from the community of Embocada, but their village
got hit by the flood too and so the families had left their houses and spread
out. The family on the shore was living under a plastic sheet put over some
branches.
When we arrived we first went to see
their village – most of the houses got destroyed, the school building didn’t
exist anymore and the church was a chaos of mud and benches. We tried to figure
out what would be the best way to work, and while that we had some delicious
pomelos – of course we foreigners got really excited about that, especially
when they showed us how to cut the pomelo so you can drink the juice directly
out of the fruit.
After a while we sent the family to
get the others and went to get the drugs from the boat (that took a while,
because we kind of couldn’t find the way back and got lost). Since we had no
other choice we had to set up our attention desk under a palm tree.
And then work started. I still had no
idea what was going to happen, so at this community I mostly watched and took
pictures. And helped the kids take their pills.
It was my first experience in a place
like that and it was a very interesting one. More than just a few people didn’t
really know how old they were or their birthday. Almost all of the women had at
least one kid in a sling around her neck and one at her hand. Most of them
didn’t look very healthy, but were still smiling and talking. We gave out vaccinations
and vitamins to the kids, and then treatment for whatever problems they had. I
soon learned that it was mostly the same – problems with the stomach, colds and
the flu, and back pains from their hard, daily work. Also the dentist checked
and cleaned their teeth.
There were not very many people there
that day, and so it didn’t take us too long to finish our work in this
community, put the stuff back in the boat and continue our way up the river.
Asuncion
Our second stop was Asuncion, a more
developed and quite big community.
When we arrived, we first had to
bring all our stuff up the hill. Fortunately the people there, who had already
been awaiting us and watching our arrival, helped us and working all together
it didn’t take too long.
The community has a nice open space
where we first put our stuff. It looked nice, but here as well, the flood hit
and some houses were just missing. Still, they even had running water and a
health post, which was decided to be our “home” for the stay. So we brought our
things there, and then, since it was too late to start work that day, we split
up to go for walks, talk to the people or play soccer. I enjoyed the time, and
also talking to my German companions was good. And again we go to eat some
delicious fruit - freshly picked coconut this time.
In the evening we had a good dinner
and then sat together with our flashlight and some wine, before putting our
tents up in the health post and going to sleep. We would have a long day
tomorrow.
In the morning we got up, had
breakfast, took the tents down, set up our tables and then waited for the
people to come. Of course they were late, and they were a lot.
That day I started working with
Felipe, the Bolivian doctor, and helped him with writing the prescriptions
(which would be my job for the rest of the trip). It was really interesting,
because it was just completely different than in Austria. Every second person
got a prescription for Antibiotics and I still wonder if they remembered all
the pills they were supposed to take and give to their children. Some of them
seemed kind of confused and in this community we also had our first
communication problems – some people just didn’t speak any Spanish and we had
to find someone to translate for us. And again, some of the kids were in bad
health condition, mainly because of the missing nutrition.
At the end of our attention in
Asuncion we gathered the kids to give out tooth brushes and tooth paste and did
a little workshop about those things, accompanied by those nice little pills
that make your teeth blue. He kids had a lot of fun, and we did too.
But then it was time for us to leave
again and pay our next visit.
Charque
By the time we got to charque I was
already used to my new job, but I was also tired.
There we set our tables up in the
school, and work began again. But what was nice was that charque too had a lot
of good fruits.
We spent the afternoon working and
then set up our camp on the beach. Originally we had planned to go to the next
community that day, but we were behind in time and in the afternoon we also ran
out of one of the most important medications we had. While having hot
chocolate, dinner and wine in our camp, we also decided that it would be best
if Antonio went back to Rurre early in the morning to get the medication,
before we would move on to our next and last community. I went to bed early
that night, but the others (especially the rangers) had some kind of alcohol
with them and when they left around 5 am to go back to Rurre it took them
forever to get going and I’m pretty sure they were still drunk. They were super
loud and it didn’t really sound like they knew what they were doing.
When I got up a little later it was
quiet again and our boat was gone. Before breakfast I went to get some fruits
with Felipe. We got along and got used to each other working together. And I
liked talking to him because he knew a lot about life in the communities and plants
around, because he’d lived in them as a kid himself. So besides taking a bunch
of pomelos for the others, he also got me some cacao (the best!) and sugar
cane.
After breakfast and getting our stuff
together we waited for our drunken adventurers to come back. As expected it
took them just a little bit longer than they said it would but eventually they
came and we went to our fourth and last community.
Torewa
Torewa is supposed to be a big
community but when we got there we hardly saw any people. But they had a school
and actual teachers too and there were even some kids in class.
Still, we had to wait until people
came, and not many came. But there was finally some work for me as a paramedic.
One kid had burned his foot and another had a big cut in his toe. Both of them
tried to fix it their way – the burn was wrapped in a banana leaf and some
dirty cloth and the toe was sewn together with some dirty thread. I was excited
about having some work to do, and Felipe was too and so we cleaned the wounds and
put clean bandages on them. They’re probably not gonna stay clean for very long
but it was worth a try.
The attention in torewa didn’t take
as long as expected, and after we had lunch in the school we were ready to go
back to Rurre.
I was exhausted, but very happy. I’ve
learned and seen so much in those three days that I couldn’t even summarize it.
For me a dream had come true, and I’m so glad I got to make this experience. It
was definitely one of a different kind.
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