Jam-packed with Old Friends and New Students

"Not as funny" last week?  What happened?   I have sat and thought about that at least as long as I have sat and thought about nothing.   And I have concluded that Guyana is now so familiar that there is nothing that jumps out at me as strange or different.  Minibuses, canals, puri, noises, cold showers, clean-ups, heat, school: they all blend in to my awareness -- though our shower does have an orgasmic tendency as it starts and spurts, and I am developing some sensitivity about how a cervix must feel .....  They are all just a part of my normal living like a Cape Sable accent, Sterling's golf swing or a Pubnico Fog at the Creamy Treat.   Maybe it just means that I am getting old, or/and maybe all the differences we see when we first encounter a stranger or another culture are really not important, or at least not as important as the people who become like us as we become like them.

It is a good thing that I still have Tony to provide material!   Tony has slowly been introducing "rules" -- really, more like personal commandments that will guarantee good health.  For example, we now have two communal towels: a bath towel in the bathroom that is for hands only, not bathing; and a hand towel in the kitchen that is never for hands.  The ritual purity of these will no doubt offer a comforting aura to the germ phobias one of us has.   Given that there is mould all over, on every surface in the country which has not seen a detergent/antiseptic near it for a decade, we will have no fears.   This commandment is not without difficulty as I have run into a real quandary:  I have not figured out how to dry the dishes without touching the hand-towel-that-is-not-for-hands with my hands.   I had thought of buying a carton of sterile gloves, but that does seem a little over the top.   I have, however, been very careful only to use the shared bath towel for my hands, as I think Tony sends samples to the lab.

All joking aside, Tony and I have lived and functioned well together so far with way more pleasure than frustration.   We both share a desire and commitment to make our students the best that they can be.     And we both look past the strangeness of the other to achieve our goals.  

The first two weeks have been filled with "Hello Again".   There are old students - and their children, staff (present and past), members of Lutheran churches here, acquaintances in all parts of Guyana.   I could have spent the last  two weeks visiting, eating and liming with them all.  ("Liming" is roughly to casually relax with a group of close friends or family, and it sometimes occurs in the presence of alcoholic beverages.)    This would have been the case, except that I have also been meeting and liming with new people.  Claudette has introduced us to her circle of friends and we have been upscale-liming.

Helen Browman, Ian Donnelly, Nikki demonstrate advanced liming techniques at Claudette's home.

Speaking of old friends: I miss my companion/colleague of the last eight years. Pastor Richard Young - "Dick".  He left last year and wanted to retire to his farm in Oregon and serve the church part-time; however, there is no longer room for old missionaries, so he packed his bags and headed to Africa.    It is just not the same here without him.  Be well in Africa, my friend!

Our PBL experiment [The Sequel] has been going better than expected in that we seem to have generated some interest in the approach beyond Tony and me.  Claudette and Marysia have brought a Guyanese and Nursing perspective to the small groups.   And our "guinea pigs" from last year asked me if they could actually sit in to help the new students in their groups some day!    Strike while the iron is hot I say ..... always a good thing considering my memory, too.    So in less than a flash they were added to the first year groups that afternoon.   Supportive upper class students ..... I almost fainted!  

The second-year students in my group were great imitators of Tony and me.  They asked questions and supported the first year students' wonderings, and even asked new questions for themselves about the story they had explored last year.  This is another clear violation of the purist PBL rules, but it worked out great.  (I will now have to concoct a descriptive rationale so it seems planned rather than just "a good idea at the time".)

Speaking of changes, we had our students go to the wards to spend 30 minutes with a patient - just chatting and understanding what the world of a patient was like.   When I went to the wards to arrange this, I figured that I'd get the "overworked, too busy" stuff and I did -- AND I got "Sure, Rev"!  So on the following day, Tony and I led out 20 students to be thrown alive in front of patients and upper classes and staff... No one died - at least, not right away.   The working nurses greeted the students and took them to the best talkative patients on their floor and guided them with respect and interest.     Amazing!  No hazing, no intimidation; I figured that I would wake up at any moment.   Nope, it was really happening.

I took some pictures during that time and had them ready by the next day's class, in which the students had written individual thank you notes as a homework assignment and were giving them to "their" patients.   One or two patients had been discharged home and one had received the "Ultimate Discharge" and died.
Our student was devastated to find out her patient had died; and, she with her thank you note and picture in hand.   The first person who dies in our careers sometimes leaves significant marks on us.  (The first for me was William C. Rae... not bad 40 years later for someone who can't remember a name 10 seconds later.  I guess it was important.)

I chatted with the student, and her batchmates supported her, and with some encouragement she shared her experience and personal feelings with the whole class.  And she went back to the ward to get the address of his family to write a second thank you note.   She had almost not talked to him as he was very sick, but Tony sent her back to be with him.   She had held his hand and smiled at him and asked him lots of questions to which he nodded.  I guess having a beautiful young girl pay attention to you and hold your hand is not too bad a way to die ... but he was only 26 .....  And so the first scar appears on her nursing soul... She will remember him and herself... as I remember Rae and my own journey.  

We have added a new student, Zaheeda, who was a Mercy Graduate before my time even.  She is doing her Masters through St. Joseph College in Connecticut. (This is an unpaid announcement:  the nursing school/faculty at St Joe's College has been extremely supportive for Nursing in Guyana.)  Zaheeda has been asking us all sorts of theoretical questions -- I usually send her to Tony.   In true McMaster style, she moved from observer (actually, she hadn't even got to observe a group yet) to tutor, in order to gain a better perspective.  ( It may have also been that we were short a tutor .....)   She survived and is returning, even though she has filled the requirements of her course.   

You know this succeeding is so un-Guyanese... I should be worried, but hey, I can be depressed another day... Today we are winning.

I didn't get to write about my girls at St. Ann's, my Elmer Gantry impersonation, the gratitude for (and use of) the donated computers,  my "sons" Julian and Rashleigh - who always find me ..... but enough for this time.

Thanks for remembering me...