Puppy goats, bucket showers, and fish balls

Saturday, our bus ride to Baguio City was scheduled for 1145am.  However, we got to the bus terminal and low and behold there was no 1145am departure.  So we finally left Manila at 115pm.  Manila is so fricken hot when you're waiting in the sun wearing jeans consumed by diesel fuel fumes.  Anywhoo, the bus ride to Baguio City was supposed to be 5 hours...it turned out to be 7 long hours of traffic and loud movies (picture at right is us looking very excited about the bus ride).  We arrived at the Microtel Inn & Suites in Baguio at 830pm and promptly took over the lobby with our attempt at "packing light."  Saturday was Roxanne's birthday and we planned to take her to dinner, but given our exhaustion we ordered in from ChowKing mmm! 

FYI: the island is called Luzon----the region is Cordillera----the province is Benguet----Baguio and La Trinidad are the cities within it all. 

 

The next morning we met a few of the nurses and midwives as we checked out.  They helped all of us and our junk to get to La Trinidad.  One of the public health nurses owns a building with transient apartments available.  We are renting two apartments from him for two weeks and he shuttles us around to where we need to go as well.  Mr. Yoshio Labi is a funny guy who surprisingly looks a lot like Alfred HA.  While on our trip to the grocery store we saw a baby goat, AKA a kid, AKA to Alfred a puppy goat.  Hence the title and source of numerous jokes.  We cooked our first meal together that night and what a lovely dinner it was.  

Our first morning waking up in the apartments was interesting.  Ever taken a shower out a bucket?  What about boiling your water on a hot plate to pour over your head?  WE HAVE!  Hence the second part of the title.  That morning, Monday, we went to Municipal Hall of La Trinidad and had such a warm welcome from the Mayor, the doctors, the DOH, and the midwives we'll be working with.  They presented us with a gift with the seal of La Trinidad on it (picture on the left is Melanie and me with our gifts).  After the welcome program we had a tour of Benguet General Hospital...WOW extremely eye opening, especially coming straight from the critical care rotation.  There was one patient in the ICU and he was feeding himself.  All you classmates of ours know that guy would be in med-surg real fast if he could feed himself.  The NICU had four beds, compared to Kapiolani's 42.  On the OB/GYN ward two women deliver in the same room and the nurses autoclave their own instruments.  Taking it all in is very humbling.  Its amazing that they can deliver beneficial care with such limited resources.  It makes me think that everything we do in the U.S. is not always necessary.  After the hospital tour we were wined and dined with a fabulous lunch, then back "home" for dinner, homework and bed by 9 o'clock. 

Today, Tuesday, was our first day of work.  We went to the main health center called Poblacion where Mr. Labi, public health nurse/landlord/shuttle driver, oriented us to the forms used in the clinics.  Then we went to meet the Governor!  He had funny hair HA.  We took too many pictures and went on our way.  Two of us are assigned to one barangay (neighborhood/community) where one midwife cares for all the people who live in that barangay.  Roxanne and I went to Barangay Pico where we listened to a combined total of 23 fetal heart tones, did Leopold's maneuvers, took BP's and gave injections.  Melanie and Alfred went high into the mountains of La Trinidad and made home visits to dying patients.  They received bananas for their service which we decided to make banana lumpia with :-).  EJ and Janelle went to Barangay Bahong and gave 7 injections to the children and learned how the midwives teach family planning.  At the end of our clinical day we met at Municipal hall and danced!  The midwives lead exercise classes a few days a week.  Today was kickboxing! and we learned a traditional Filipino dance.  We all felt more awake after the exercise...tomorrow is Karate!  Then it was home for homework, dinner, another early bedtime, and of course updating the blog!  (its very late so please ignore any typos HA). 

Aloha from Kimmie, Melanie, Roxanne, Alfred, EJ, Ines, and Janelle

P.S. the third part of the title is something very delicious made of flour and fish (not really fish balls) that I was brave enough to try :-)