Bits, Bites [including bran] and Big Thank You's... and Reconstruction - Erv's Nose and the Hospital Plant

Joy! Joy! Joy!   

I remember many years ago one of my children was having a terrible time with Genetics in university and had to wait for the final mark to arrive in the mail.  There was a Happy Happy Joy Dance on the kitchen floor after reading the report card.   Well, the first year students were equally excited about their new laptops!

It has taken a while to get everything organized, so the students could use the computers immediately.  Most of the setting-up, modifying, adapting, etc. [for example we loaded a free virus software and Open Office] was done by Dr. Tony.   I knew he was in charge because he was always yelling at me about something, e.g., "Now you have really screwed it up."   He did praise me, though, as being an excellent "dummy" to discover the problems...

On Tuesday morning, we borrowed the morgue trolley to transport the computers to the classroom.  Earlier we had distributed and explained the contract.  Basically, the hospital owns the laptops until the student graduates in 3 plus years with an RN and then the computer belongs to them.  There was no student who owned their own computer, though several had home access through a parental one.

Tony showing muted amazement that we were ready to distribute the netbooks

John handing out the computer boxes

The computers [netbooks] that many of you donated some dollars towards are from a company in China, Hongkong Fortruth Technology Co., Limited.   They are 10" netbooks in five colors, 1 Gg Ram, 250 GB Hard DD, Wifi card, etc... The costs per unit were approximately $210 US, including shipping.  All the computers are working satisfactorily ..... Amazing!

It was Christmas in September when we arrived at 11 am.   As we distributed the boxes, there was so much expectation in the room it was electric.   We tackled the most important task first ..... Choosing a color!  If you wanted a different colour you had to swap with someone who wanted yours ..... and the next miracle of the day was everyone got the colour that they had wanted!

Tony and I had spent the previous afternoon setting up and locking the router and extension cords in the classroom.  Now they could take it out of the box and record the serial number on the contract.  Then, Tony led them in a step by step process in a way that only a true obsessive can achieve...  Small problems, but no major difficulties; all the students were soon online with their own accounts.

Red, Yellow, Black, Pink, White

"Yours looks exactly like mine."

 

"Do you think Dr. Tony and Rev. John will know we are on Facebook?"

I have written many times before about the gratitude of the Guyanese students and on Tuesday it was overflowing.  They wanted to write THANK YOU! notes to everyone...  It meant that I had to find snail mail addresses.  So they are writing as I write this.  I don't think I missed anyone, but if you do not get a note within a month tell me and I'll get another one written to you.

Speaking of "Thank You"s, we cannot forget a couple more:   Guyana Christian Charities Canada through whom the overseas purchase was completed, and who along with the Sisters of Mercy of the Americas issued tax receipts to all who wanted them; and, finally,  Mr. Taju Olaleye who shared his shipping company as well as his living space to store all the computers till we arrived. 
Also, we have furnished the Internet Cafe at the School/Hospital with three large laptops for student and staff use.   The computers that we [I use the "royal we", as it was Tony mostly] had rebuilt, did not fare well in the humidity and heat even though the cafe is air-conditioned in the daytime.  The three new ones will be enough along with a few that had been donated from other sources.

Peace Corps Grant Computer

Anonymous #1

Anonymous #2

Two were received anonymously from Canada and one was from a grant by the FROG group of the Peace Corps.  They are present and past Peace Corps volunteers who had made the grant available.
The future work/study that these students will do will be the judge of the benefit of your sacrifice to make these donations possible.  I know that as their teachers, Tony and I are very grateful.

Speaking of Tony:  there is now a bran shortage in Guyana; major supermarkets have reported barren shelves where there were various packages of bran cereal.    The papers have indicated that it may be speculators in bran futures, drug cartels hiding the merchandise in boxes no one actually uses, or someone has been building a two story home made entirely of bran.   The answer is  -  it's Tony!

Morning Mound [for perspective:  that is a serving spoon and platter].

One of our bran shelves in the kitchen.

Finally, and probably most importantly...our colleagues, Dr, Malika Mootoo, a Mercy Pediatrician; a nurse, Dianne Daly, just starting to teach a critical care certificate course, and Dr. Erv Janssen, the senior statesmen of volunteers to Guyana, were involved in a car accident on Tuesday night.  They are all recovering; Dr, Erv took the worst of the collision and has been a patient at Mercy Hospital since then.  He has had some bruising and a broken nose that refused to stop bleeding, so required surgery early Wednesday morning to pack his nose. 

Who is this Masked Man?

 And then on Thursday, to cheer him up, we gave him the opportunity of teaching all the first year students in his room.  I had spent some time with them to get a couple of questions, but there was no need!  Erv was in good form and might still be teaching except that the students had to go home.

Always a teacher...even when on the "other side".

In the picture above, there is a sculpture on the wall - coloured balls.  Tony bet me I couldn't make up a story: So  just so you know, it is The Three-Eighteen Helix, a human gene that is responsible for human caring and it is commonly known as the Dr. Erv Janssen Gene...  The students were in awe of such a great man; however, Erv being a Good Lutheran and  overwhelmed with the need to tell the truth, said, "No, none of that is true!"  At least it was a good story.

Yippee! The CEO's new office

May I have a "finally" finally?  The shack above is a most welcome site at the hospital as it signifies the start of the rebuilding after the Fire of May 2010.  Much more in following blogs.

More than enough; thanks for coming with me.

Losing: ....Sleep, Mangoes, Doc Daniel and Parent’s Dreams

Losing Sleep over Mangoes

No, I have not suddenly desired mangoes over chips…  This is the story:  At the back of the Calvary Lutheran Church property and directly outside the back bedroom window is a majestic 3 story mango tree just sitting there quietly; it is hardly noticeable – until those little fruits ripen… and then the dogs go crazy – barking for hours at a time two or three times a night for the last three nights.   Do my dogs like mangoes?  No… Let me finish the story.   They go into barking fits because a thief sneaks [?] onto the grounds and climbs the mango tree and fills his sack with mangoes… and then he leaves.

It did take me a few times to figure out what was happening… but after the second time I saw him with a very heavy-looking sack over his shoulder nonchalantly walking towards the street and the market which is open 24 hours to sell his new cash crop.  [And my dogs barking ferociously still!]   I yelled at him and he kept going as if he knew what was good for him.   Ah sleep… not.  He returned at 4ish to the same cacophony of dogs throughout the neighbourhood, led by my two guard dogs.  I promised Anne not to do anything “too” stupid… So I just chatted with him from my window about intelligence, relationship with his mother, and other street niceties… and he left… and now time to get up.

The local wisdom was that he wouldn't come back two nights in a row.   Other local wisdom is: stand on your roof and throw bricks at him.  Okay plan; but couldn’t figure out how to get on my roof… and it may have violated my passivist sensibilities and the “too” stupid promise.   Well, he did come back around midnight… ..  So I shot him – several times!

I told him he was now on candid camera and I was going to send his picture to the newspapers as a “tief” who steals from a church.  He really did get out of the tree in a hurry and with an empty sack.   When I looked at my proof of theft… I had wonderful pictures of the flash highlighting my screens.  

Now I was really mad and had to have him to return -- not so much to get justice as that I just couldn’t believe I made such a rookie mistake with my camera.   Wishes do come true…  He returned later that night and I got him.   The dogs were trying to climb the tree and I told him... “Keep the g-d mangoes.. If you come back I am going to break both knee caps.   He left with the mangoes… and I went to sleep till morning…  And I had a picture!

To his credit, he clung to the tree like a squirrel.  And mangoes grow at the outsides of the branches…  It would be something interesting to watch – if it weren’t in the middle of the night.

The next night at about 11 the dogs go crazy… Ugh!   So true to my word I grab a large stick and head out to the tree.  And, oh yeah, the new live-in caretaker is now with me, and he has a bigger stick ..…  I figured this decreased my action to “reasonably” stupid and I could just watch as Michael pounded him, so I could still be a pacifist.

Well, he got over the back fence before either of us could reach his knees.   We sure showed him that time!!   And I did answer one ongoing question: “Do your dogs bite?”  The answer now is clear.  The thief says, “No.”  I guess the dogs are pacifists, too.   And buying mangoes at my supermarket will never be the same again.

Doctor Daniel does not go to Dinner – Again but, “Pierre” Appears

Doc Daniel is a gracious doctor here to whom I have referred many times.  He must be the official greeter for every volunteer and doctor from India.  He is the leader of a missionary church here as well as being a doctor at Mercy.   He invites all the volunteers to dinner at least once during our stay, at his home or a restaurant… and I have never had him agree to come out as my/our guest.  This last Monday, he agreed!  We planned to meet at 6 and go to the Windjammer and let Sylvia have another free meal. [We don’t want her wasting away to nothing.] 

As I was leaving, Tony called to say Doc is sick and can’t come.. we were going to cancel it all, but we remembered how excited poor, hungry Sylvia was, so we decided to go anyhow…

I get there early [what else is new?] and as I am sitting there with a beer I was chatting with a Guyanese heavy weight boxer… and then a guy comes dragging himself in and I say, “You look tired.  Canadian?”  He nods and we shake hands… Now my story begins.

I get him a beer [He’s Canadian, eh?]    And he starts on his tale ..…  Briefly:   he is married [for the second time to a Guyanese woman] to an Amerindian woman and they live in region 1 on the far west of Guyana in a village called Maruka.     His wife was pregnant and dutifully attended al her prenatal clinics in the country.   And everything was fine… until she started to have contractions.   The rural midwife attended and after her waters broke and for the next 32 hours she had contractions and pain… 

The baby was trying to be born breech.   This was not noticed by the midwife ......   After many hours of this, “Pierre” got his wife in a speedboat [can you imagine the smooth ride?] down river to the town of Charity and a local hospital where they did notice the breech, so sent them by ambulance another hour or so down the road to Suddie and the regional hospital there.  Here, as “Pierre” describes it, they had wonderful care from the doctors and nurses and the baby was delivered by C-Section.  He said that the doctor was caring, skilled, etc… and spoke only Cuban Spanish, so several of his Cuban colleagues did a joint English translation. 

All this eventually led to the parents being told that their baby had fluid sacs in her head and at the lower part of her spine and they were going to have to go to Georgetown Public Hospital for treatment.   So off they went by ambulance, speedboat, ambulance ..... to the city…    They spent a week or so at GPH and no one came to see the baby or offer a solution, so up they went and got the baby to Davis Memorial, a private Seven Day Adventist Hospital in the city.   Here they did meet a surgeon who said that he was to operate on the baby the next day..    This was the morning of the day I met "Pierre" … and the surgeon had not showed up all day…..
 

No wonder he looked tired; I couldn’t even imagine what the mom was looking like.  Their baby has Spina Bifida of the most serious kind.   I tried to do my best therapeutic grunting routine and not say anything as he was just talking about sacs…  Just then Tony arrives… and I introduce him to “Pierre” who briefly describes his journey and problems with the baby… and I could see that Tony is preparing to deliver his three hour clinical presentation on SB, complete with drawings he was planning to make on the hotel’s napkins.   Whoaaaa… and like a good spouse, I gave him the “eyes of death” [and for those of you not married, it conveys:  "you do what I think you are going to do, you won’t see the sun rise!"]   So he adopted the therapeutic grunt technique as well… A similar process was repeated with Sylvia.
 

We did offer our condolences and moral support for him and his wife… and then a couple from Canada also joined us… He was a sixties exile from Guyana who married a Canadian girl… and (small world!) knew Elizabeth Abdool [I haven’t told her yet, as this is a test to see if Elizabeth reads the blog] who is the President of Guyana Christian Charities in Canada. 

On Wednesday, a Senior Student Nurse tells me that Mercy Hospital has just admitted a baby who has SB…  Yup, Mercy had the necessary requirements to perform the surgery and follow-up, so “Pierre’s” baby and wife were here.   And I thought they would make good patients for our new clinical rounds.

They agreed – and so did the surgeon with the usual “who has the bigger ......” requirements, just to show who is really in charge. 

At 2 pm [Guyana time] the seniors interviewed “Pierre” and his wife [don’t really have to give her a fake name too, do I?   I think if you really want to know their real names you can see Tony’s blog.]   It was a sad time and the parents were articulate and had learned so much in a few weeks – and really will have so much more to learn in the years to come.   And Tony got to do his modified three hour lecture.    And the students answered some of the patients' questions at the end and thanked them for their effort to help them learn about their child and about a real life family and their journey.  When I asked the parents what they were both worried about, they were in agreement:  What were they going to do with their child [a special needs child] in a small remote village in the mountains of Guyana?   Seems like a fair question!    

Some things about “Stuff”

• Sister Beatrice Fernandes, who has not been well the whole time I have been here, wants everyone to know that she takes strength from all your prayers.   Actually, when I visited her this week, she was on the verandah “catching some breeze.”

This statue is at an entrance to the convent.  I have always liked it.  am not sure why because it is really no nun that I ever knew growing up... no yardstick in her hand!

Two colleagues and friends from McMaster, Charlie Malcolmson and his wife Cathy Lee will be joining Tony and me for a week on an “exploratory” visit to see if there is something for them to do if they come back again sometime.   Cathy is a Nurse Practitioner and Charlie is a Paediatrician from McMaster.  We have arranged a schedule for them.. and in true Guyanese fashion have put it in pencil!   It will be good to have them here.

The Black Board picture in the slide show is how the seniors saw my personality profile… Not bad for an old guy…  Tony was upset because he didn’t get a TEN in the “cool” factor!

I do try and keep in correspondence with everyone who writes me… but sometimes it takes me awhile.  And with company coming and the surge in worry about getting everything accomplished in our remaining two weeks… I’ll probably not get around to responses this week -- but I really do value your comments…

At Calvary Church, they actually want me back preaching this Sunday.   The last time I talked about slavery and my limited mind has not left the topic.  I will talk about freedom.  Now to do this I changed a reading… a liturgical mortal sin.  [However, I am not worried as it won’t be my first liturgical sin.]  My mind has played with a Chinese proverb,

“I dreamed a thousand new paths.

I woke and walked my old one.”

May you all be seekers of freedom and may some of your paths be unknown.

                                                                                                                                             John

Postmodern Happiness, Postmortems, Post Layoffs and "Watch that Post!"

I am supposed to think "Happy" this week.   At least, I have one good time.  

I have usually had a "trust walk" type of experience for my students.  However, with the fire and there being no building and everyone still feeling lousy, I redesigned the basic walk to the cafeteria and back.   Early in the day, I went to the cafeteria and brought 24 nice chocolate bars... and began my mission.  I had written out [even earlier that morning] directions involving 12 people and places throughout the complex that I was going to have the "blinded" students go to, either to get instructions or receive their reward.   Now I just had to make sure that those people wanted to play... Hence the extra chocolate bars... you can bribe almost anyone in Guyana.  Sure enough, everyone was glad to help after they had a chocolate bar in their hands.

I stole the number of tea towels required, and we were ready... They were ready too because we had given the students an exam in the 11 o'clock spot.   I had them pair up and they chose which one of them was the more adventuresome... So that one got to be blindfolded and the other was the guide.  I gave each of the blindfolded students a piece of paper with their directions on it of where they had to go in order to get the next directions.  There was a general rebellion about how they were expected to read it when they were blind.  I said that I didn't know and shoved the first pair from the classroom.    

Well, they had to find and ask people to read them the directions - and some people actually couldn't read my writing!  When they arrived at their first destination they had to say the magic word for the staff member to proceed.   So, after "Please",  the staff member instructed the students to switch the blindfold.  So those guides that were too tough on their patients... now were thinking that they shouldn't have laughed so hard.  After the switch the staff member gave the new blindfolded one a slip of paper with new directions.  [I tried hard to get the farthest possible distance between all the sites.]   When and if they arrived at the second stop and after the magic word, they got the chocolate bars. [At one second stop it seems that the staff ate all three chocolate bars .....]

On return, after a short time of writing a reflection, we had a discussion about trust, handicaps, responsibility of guides, nurses as navigators.   Then CEO Helen joined us for the discussion and was particularly pleased with one student who talked about hospitality of a hospital - as CEO's philosophy is that a hospital should be a hotel for people who are sick.   A really lively discussion.

 

One of the spin offs from the walk (besides confirming to all the staff that I had lost my mind - again) was that the complex was filled with laughter .....  It is still a sad and fearful place and for a few moments was a happy one too.   Pretty good for $20 worth of chocolate bars.  Now if the rest of life would be that easy ......

The Visit to the Morgue at the Georgetown Public Hospital for the Freshmen’s Rite of Passage was the same as always .....  and different.   This year I had the Sophomore Class asking to go [as I had missed teaching them – and it seemed that they also did not get any psychology or sociology and while they said that they had ethics, they had no recall of any ethics word – ugh.], so I had to beg to arrange their schedules to not be working that morning.   Well, as usual,  five minutes before the appointed time, there were three of the 31 expected students there… This maybe the only issue on which Tony looks normal compared to me.  I cannot figure for the life of me how people can’t get someplace at the time agreed.   Well, I guess it is a good thing that this is Guyana and even Dr. Singh was on Guyanese time and as he arrived @ 8:15, he welcomed me with a “Mind waiting a little as I need some coffee to start the day? …”  “No trouble, Nehaul, but I may have another body or two for you this morning!”  My students slowly meandered in the gate armed with the wonderful excuses that students have used  -I imagine – for centuries, such as:   “Rev. John, you never told us the Middle Street entrance…”  To which thankfully others said that I had written it on the board, sent an email, and said it at least five times.  Undaunted, and as if possessed by a Jumbie logic, the student responded calmly, “Maybe if you had written it 6 times, I would have known.”   I murmured to myself,  “Okay, Dr. Singh… I think she’ll be a fresh one for your autopsy today.”  

Dr. Tony led the students into the morgue as I waited at the entrance for the stragglers… and the no-shows [about half of the sophomores took the ”Chicken Exit” and went to work… So we had about 25 altogether.  It was a good thing that Tony went first because Dr. Singh had arranged to have a complete set of internal organs set aside so the students could look at them.”   And by the time that I arrived several of the students had gloves on and were examining and cutting open the heart, etc.,  with Tony  telling them the names of what they had only seen in their texts.     

There were three young people's bodies there and one child of a year old who was propped up like a “doll”… (this is how the students would describe her).    As to be expected the children were the most upsetting for the students… some of whom had their own young children.   And when they reflected later, these were to be the source of much wondering about life and justice – and defending of their god’s justice, love and mercy.    
One student reflected: "Even though I arrived late, I was intrigued by all those dead bodies just lying around, young and old.  My heart wept for the young unfortunate ones. I just couldn't understand why until I realized that Oh Yeah I have got a baby girl.  I'll do anything and everything possible with God's help to keep her out of harm's way. Anyhow, that's beside the point...."

Well, the joint was crowded with police and about a half-dozen senior doctors who were there for some of the younger children.    One of our paper problems had a patient who might have had Guillain–Barré Syndrome;  Tony had said – and the students remembered -- that no one should die of it… AND one of the children seemed to have done just that.   She had also come from the interior of the country – and that was part of our present PBL problem and the ethics of no health care resources there.     Our students became quickly so engaged in discussions of neurology that I only occasionally issued knowing “grunts”…  and with a silent prayer of thanks that Tony only needs half a nanosecond before talking – and is a lot more informative than anything neurological that I could conjure up.

Another interesting discovery was that the Sophomores did not know any neurology either… and so were less energetic in their questioning… though one or two were quite inquisitive, with one dedicating her career to be coming a pathologist.    Later, in our discussions back at Mercy I took the sophomores and led them in a reflection of what the experience had meant for them.   It took some time for them to be willing to share their thoughts and feelings as they “needed” to have the “right” answer.   Of course, their responses and feelings were as typical of any class that I ever had – it was just they weren’t used to expressing their opinions… and questions and wonderings.   In some ways, I felt more like a “dentist” pulling and scrapping…  I had given them a piece of paper and told them to just write some of their awarenesse's from the start of the day till the present; after ten minutes, most of them had written nothing as they said, “I don’t know where to begin and no one has ever asked me before…”   So they worked hard – at least between their ears; it was hard to find the words for their feelings and questions.   I gave them till Monday to write about their feelings and reflections.

We chatted for about 40 minutes and then I went over to the freshmen who were engaged in a gab fest of ideas, feelings, wonderings, neurology questions, remembering of paper problems.. [They had already written one or two pages from their experience.] I joined them and watched as one after the other expressed themselves.   It seemed that the only way it ended was that it was the lunch hour and they forgot that there was a test after that and as usual needed to cram.    I am still not sure that they know more, but the PBL method makes them more lively and more fun for Tony and me.    [I know some of you were wondering how autopsies were going to be happy.]

There was almost a tragedy at the end… I had promised the students that on the long grueling walk home of 6 blocks that I – as I have for the 7 times before – would buy a pop for each – and Tony – from my little pop-stand friend Paul.  When we got there, his stand was there but he wasn’t, so we waited about ten minutes and, the students were complaining of “cruel and unusual” punishment that they had to wait…  Well, I know how much 25 sales means to him, but we had to go…  [Wait, I promised happy.]   As we were entering Mercy Paul comes screaming up and says that he had had a puncture and could he deliver the pop to the classroom.  He did; the students were happy; Paul was happy – especially after I paid him on my way home; and, the rite was complete!  They could now tell the story of their entrance into nursing as the others before them had.

Nothings of Note

• As I write this Blog, I am sitting eating my breakfast of pickled onions and peanut butter on crackers… Ah! The breakfast of champions.  As I am sure that you remember, the freshmen had their Food Sale last week and no one had brought any pickled onions even though I had said that would be the only thing I would buy.  Well, one – my now most favoured – student brought in a jar of pickled onions just for me; however, I found out that Tony likes them too [though probably not for breakfast], so I had to share them.

• Tony and I will be hosting a gathering of all the Mercy staff who were recently "let go" at my home on Sunday afternoon.   We have an agenda that will allow them to chat about their experiences, describe some of the common feelings and thoughts on losing their job, explain some of the labour laws in Guyana, look at helping them articulate their skills, write an employment letter and resume, offer individual assistance and use the wisdom of the group to help others.   Mercy staff had written to the other hospitals and some major companies and sent the names of all the newly unemployed to them in case they were hiring.   I do know of at least 5 people who have been hired and a few more who have temporary positions.    I have brought the cookies [mmm, there will be leftovers; I did buy a lot of them] and pop for the meeting, so I am all set, except for the dogs who will go into their wild protective mode.   I am tempted to open the gate and just let them out on the street… I imagine they’ll come back to get fed.    

• I now remember why I couldn't be a Catholic again.... I was invited to address the trainers for a sex education programme for the RC diocese here.  It is to help the young people who will be peer counselors be able to teach the chapter in their book.   No problem there – until I got the book!   The chapter is filed with very accurate pictures [sorry – line drawings] of male and female genitalia,  the responsibility of have a baby and all the terrible diseases that happen to those who have sex and closes with the promise [A Pledge of Abstinence] of no sex before marriage.   There was no mention of sex or any sex behaviours at all!   Now I am known for my ability to do and say things that might not be exactly what I think… BUT… this was just too much.   So Tony is going to do the presentation… and his only worry is that the Catholics are going to be too radical for his beliefs!  

• Thanks for the assistance with my previous problem.  I thought the ideas so good that I shared them with my neighbours.  The man in the picture used to bathe naked with a bucket he dipped into the canal water beneath the boards in the sidewalk.  However, I told him that my son said he could also wash his underclothes if he left them on during his bath.   He agreed… and will stop in personally to see my son if he ever gets to Iowa.
• As a counter point to the first student's comments, another wrote: "My first 20 minutes of entering and being in the morgue was pure horror and HELL.  The images of the bodies were very obnoxious.  Standing away from the bodies and seeing the morticians cutting them to take out the internal organs was gross, disgusting and frightening.  My first reaction was "What the hell am I doing here?"  After about 10 minutes I began to feel upset, scared and started to cry and felt like I was going to faint away. I left the area with the thought of never returning.....   Some of my batchmates had put on gloves and examined closely the internal organs of a woman and also her brain identifying various areas of them and relating them to what was talked about on class.  Seeing the way the doctors discussed the cause of death was the most interesting events apart from seeing the postmortems which was still horrifying."

Have a good week... John