Interesting Facts

Things that I am learning about Haiti and the Haitians:
1. You can’t sleep past 6 AM even if you try, because the roosters crow outside your window.

2. It storms almost every night here.

3. The thunder is very loud, so loud that I had to wear earplugs last night to sleep

4. Haitians don’t like to get out in the rain as evidenced by there being no patients when we first got to the clinic this morning. It also rained again in the afternoon and the patients stayed away..kinda funny

5. It takes longer to do things here and often times you seem very busy, but look back and realize you did not do near as much as you would have done in the US. I seem really busy here, but I see A LOT fewer patients.

6. Degage- we were told this term means “doing what you can”. Often times, I feel this way, because I feel like I don’t know exactly what I am doing, but I am doing the best I can with the available resources.

7. Other than walking, the main transportation around here is motorcycles and bicycles

8. They really do balance objects on their head to transport them.

9. They seem very interested in photos once you have taken them. I had a couple of them sit and watch me go through the pics on my camera

10. Most of them have great voices and they enjoy singing. Today, Lynda (a patient) tried to convince me to sing for her. I tried to explain to her that I did not sing well, but she didn’t care. I am supposed to sing a song for her tomorrow..should be interesting

11. The people really do take things in stride, many times patients wait for a long time before getting treatment, casted, etc, but they never seem to get upset. No one has any sort of entitlement attitude like most Americans do.

12. A week is definitely not long enough to experience the culture and build relationships, I am pretty bummed that I did not arrange to stay longer, because I am enjoying it and I feel like I am missing out on a lot by leaving after one week.

13. If you have power, you have generators, batteries, inverters, etc.



I know there are more things, but I will write them as I think of them.



Overall, today was another good day. It started off slowly because of the down pour we had. Thankfully, June picked us up this morning so we didn’t have to walk in the rain and mud. One very exciting thing that I got to do today was walk with my patient, Rita (the one whose story I told earlier). She asked me if she could walk back to her room with her cane rather than being wheeled up in her wheelchair. She walked all the way up the stairs to her room with minimal assistance on the stairs; it was great! You could tell that she was really excited as well. Other patients were also cheering her on, very cool!



We are enjoying our time getting to know the other folks staying at the guesthouse as well. There is one Haitian family from PAP staying here, a husband, wife, and 3 children. He is a minister and seems to be just taking a short furlough here with his family. They are very warm and friendly. There is another group of two men with their sons here. They are both ministers coming to speak at a conference.



We walked around the neighborhood tonight after dinner and went further than we have before. There is a small market where people are selling things from stick huts lit with the small propane cans that you put under catering dishes. We saw cooked food, fruit, snacks, and even a laundry place (we think).



I can’t believe I only have 2 more working days here. The day itself seems long, but when I think about how quickly I am going to leave, it seems very short.



It continues to be a very pleasant experience for me even though I have definitely felt stretched with the treatments (I have never worked with people with amputations before) and with the disorganization. I can easily see myself coming back and helping on a regular basis.