Good news! The gastrointestinal rebels were overcome and peace is restored once more in the kingdom of P.Mo. "yet I trust there remaineth an effectual struggle to be made..." so I am being very careful in what I eat and drink.
Yesterday we drove 120 km out of town on very scary roads to a beautiful little village. We set up camp in a catholic church and loads of villagers came out to get their eyes checked. We brought almost 80 pairs of glasses and in the end had to turn a few people away because we ran out. We found a lot of cataracts as well. The indian optometrist we are working with, Dr. Siva, can recognize pretty quickly who will accept treatment and who wont. In a very sad moment, an old man was told he needed a cataract surgery. He shook his head and said he just wanted the glasses, because there was no one to take care of him and he lived alone. He walked away blind for another day, another year, another who knows how long. It reminded me of some sweet people I met in Italy who chose not to see spiritually, for fear of receiving love and support from anyone. I suppose we are all at times a little guilty of letting doubt and fear blind us in some respect.
There are some funny linguistic differences between indian english and american. One of our sharpest doctors in particular uses the word "actually" all the time in speech, in exactly the same way that Mary Hope and Faith use it. That is, to mean "really" or "very much so" instead of "more specifically." Examples:
"You really have got to keep the apartment trashcan clean. It's actually not good."
"Only one in 400 Indian students who apply to medical school are accepted. It's very difficult actually."
"Don't try to catch the apartment lizard. It can be quite rude actually if you catch it. And it eats mosquitoes and crickets."
Other funny differences are that Sunglasses are Cooling Glasses, soda pop (soda? pop? Ok, carbonated drinks) are called "cool drinks." The flashlight is called a "torch" (pronounced "tarch" like a pirate, actually :) Restaurants are called Hotels, and cellphones are called mobiles. Grafitti is the best thing ever in India! The streets are lined with motivational and inspirational quotes spraypainted on the walls!! I have been tempted several times to ask the driver to slow down so I can read them better and take pictures. Hey, if you are going to deface public property, why not at least inspire people?
Indians also speak up, more loudly than I as an american tend to. So sometimes the young optometrist girls will bark out at me, "Piter!! Tarch!!" So loudly that I jump and look frantically for the flashlight, feeling as if I were a pirate slaveling who was just commanded "Shmee! Swab the poopdeck!" They don't mean anything by it, they probably feel they are speaking at a regular voice level.
So I noticed that in my last post I said that we practiced surgery on a mounted goat. I left out an important word in that sentence: eye. A mounted goat EYE! Meaning there were eyes from a dead goat, fastened to a mounting tray and we cut them open and phacoemulsified them. The goat was not mounted, in case any of you imagined a taxidermied goat. Or a goat mounted like a horse (alright, now you sit on its back and make sure it doesn't move while he performs the surgery.) Just thought I'd clarify. This is why photos are good to share actually.
I will make the most of the last two days of this wonderful opportunity you have given me. Thank you!
Un'abbraccio,
Piter
Yesterday we drove 120 km out of town on very scary roads to a beautiful little village. We set up camp in a catholic church and loads of villagers came out to get their eyes checked. We brought almost 80 pairs of glasses and in the end had to turn a few people away because we ran out. We found a lot of cataracts as well. The indian optometrist we are working with, Dr. Siva, can recognize pretty quickly who will accept treatment and who wont. In a very sad moment, an old man was told he needed a cataract surgery. He shook his head and said he just wanted the glasses, because there was no one to take care of him and he lived alone. He walked away blind for another day, another year, another who knows how long. It reminded me of some sweet people I met in Italy who chose not to see spiritually, for fear of receiving love and support from anyone. I suppose we are all at times a little guilty of letting doubt and fear blind us in some respect.
There are some funny linguistic differences between indian english and american. One of our sharpest doctors in particular uses the word "actually" all the time in speech, in exactly the same way that Mary Hope and Faith use it. That is, to mean "really" or "very much so" instead of "more specifically." Examples:
"You really have got to keep the apartment trashcan clean. It's actually not good."
"Only one in 400 Indian students who apply to medical school are accepted. It's very difficult actually."
"Don't try to catch the apartment lizard. It can be quite rude actually if you catch it. And it eats mosquitoes and crickets."
Other funny differences are that Sunglasses are Cooling Glasses, soda pop (soda? pop? Ok, carbonated drinks) are called "cool drinks." The flashlight is called a "torch" (pronounced "tarch" like a pirate, actually :) Restaurants are called Hotels, and cellphones are called mobiles. Grafitti is the best thing ever in India! The streets are lined with motivational and inspirational quotes spraypainted on the walls!! I have been tempted several times to ask the driver to slow down so I can read them better and take pictures. Hey, if you are going to deface public property, why not at least inspire people?
Indians also speak up, more loudly than I as an american tend to. So sometimes the young optometrist girls will bark out at me, "Piter!! Tarch!!" So loudly that I jump and look frantically for the flashlight, feeling as if I were a pirate slaveling who was just commanded "Shmee! Swab the poopdeck!" They don't mean anything by it, they probably feel they are speaking at a regular voice level.
So I noticed that in my last post I said that we practiced surgery on a mounted goat. I left out an important word in that sentence: eye. A mounted goat EYE! Meaning there were eyes from a dead goat, fastened to a mounting tray and we cut them open and phacoemulsified them. The goat was not mounted, in case any of you imagined a taxidermied goat. Or a goat mounted like a horse (alright, now you sit on its back and make sure it doesn't move while he performs the surgery.) Just thought I'd clarify. This is why photos are good to share actually.
I will make the most of the last two days of this wonderful opportunity you have given me. Thank you!
Un'abbraccio,
Piter
A cricket batting cage. Cricket is a big deal here.
Pizza Hut, KFC, and McDonalds are really classy restaurants in India
I bought a cool pajama shirt. Then my roommate informed me that it is a party shirt and definitely not a pajama shirt. Oops.
Some patients a the clinic
This is our favorite rickshaw driver with his rickshaw. He gives really reasonable rates, and he doesn't have a carhorn. He has a large green clown horn that he squeezes. It sounds like a duck voicing it's opinion in traffic and it always makes me happy.
Mathura's family at the birthday party.
The kid in the blue turned 4. These are his cousins.
The cake
The family all together.
This matriarch in the family was born just before India gained independence from britain.
A monument on the beach
A market. I accidentally smelled one of the flower offerings that you buy to give the gods. The lady called out, "no!" just as I smelled. I felt pretty bad; but I learnt that you never smell offerings before you offer them. They are beautiful at any rate.
The goat eye experience
These are cool symbols everyone has at the gate of their home.
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