On Monday the 15th I headed into the field for the first time. We took the 11:00pm bus from Lima to a town about 7.5hrs north called Huaraz. I traveled with my friend, Marijke, her boss and one of Peruvian staff from the Lima office, Magali. Although Huaraz is only about 400km north of Lima, the roads are so windy and rough it takes about double the time it would take to drive this distance on a highway at home. The buses used for long trips in most of South America are called 'Super Cama' (super bed). They are double-decker buses in which the top floor is luxury 'bussing'! We had seats on the top floor, which reclined completely horizontally, with pillows and blankets and there is ever a stewardess aboard the bus serving drinks and a snack - although watching her in a little red pant-suit and red high-heels, trying to serve drinks and maneuver around the bus was more a disaster than a luxury.
 |
| 'Super Cama' buses |
The only foriegners that go to Huaraz are usually NGO workers, on route to the field, or people going on treks through the mountains. Huaraz sits at the bottom of the Cordierra Blanca mountain range. Altitude sickness is a big concern when traveling to this area because it's 3052 meters above sea-level. Altitude sickness here is called 'sorochi', so I started taking Sorochi Pills before we left Lima, just to be safe. The symptoms of altitude sickness are dizziness, light-headedness, nausea and exhaustion. Since Huaraz would be the LOWEST of the towns we were to visit, I thought I should err on the side of caution, and take the pills!
As some of you have already heard, our bus ride to Huaraz brought a bit more excitement than we'd anticipated. Marijke wasn't taking sorochi pills because she had traveled to the field many times before with little problems and around 4:00am she woke up to go to the bathroom on the bus (on the bottom level). She woke and felt light-headed so sat at the top of the stairs to compose herself. She fainted at the top of the stairs and fell down to the bottom. I awoke a while later to her calling my name from the bottom. This began a whirlwind of excitement and obviously changes of plans for the trip. Everyone on the bus was sleeping, so I ran to the bottom and asked Marijke if her head or neck hurt, if she was nauseous, if she could see me, etc (finally, all of those years of life guarding paid-off). She said only her mouth hurt, and that's when I looked down onto the floor...and saw poor Marijke's teeth lying there. Yes, her big beautiful smile is temporarily lacking some pearly whites. I knocked on the door of the driver, no answer; so I climbed into the cockpit of the bus yelling that I needed help, which finally woke up the stewardess. With no cell-phone reception, no first-aid kit, nowhere to pull off the road, our only option was to get Marijke into the seat beside the driver, put some soothing music on my iPod for her, and wait the 1.5 hours until we would arrive in Huaraz.
Upon arriving in Huaraz we were met by our driver, Franklin in his truck who was waiting for us to take us to all of the field sites for the next 3 days. Franklin instead took us to the Huaraz hospital (or, clinic, as they call it...which wasn't very reassuring). Marijke got some pain medicine in the Emergency Room and then saw a doctor. We were sent to another clinic for x-rays of her head to make sure there were no fractures. The ambulance, which was like a tin can with wheels (on cobble-stone/dirt roads...we probably would have been better off walking) took us to the X-Ray clinic. Who would've thought that my first time in the back of an ambulance would be in Huaraz, Peru, holding Marijke's stretcher steady (the wheels on it didn't lock) and trying to catch my breath from being at such a high altitude. When we arrived at the 'clinic', the door of the ambulance opened and I said "ohhhh no way" - we were at a person's home. The nurse and I took Marijke out of the ambulance, into the house, through the living room and into her back room...where she happened to have an X-Ray machine (???). She got the X-Ray and we went back to the hospital to finally see a doctor/dentist.
The dentist's name was Walter and had clearly heard that a blonde, Canadian girl had been injured before he came into the hospital...he was wearing a 3-piece suit, with a velvet jacket when we met him. I think he saw this as an opportunity to improve his English, befriend some foreigners and become the most famous dentist in Huaraz for being the lucky one who got to fix up the white girl. He was a character. He was also, it turns out, a children's dentist. I found this out, but decided not to tell Marijke until he was all finished working on her. Unfortunately, when we walked to his examination room the receptionist was wearing bunny ears on her head and of course this was the one time all day that Marijke opened her eyes to look at where we were - through bandages and broken teeth she looked at the woman and very calmly asked; "are those f*#@ing bunny ears on her head?"
The next 4 hours consisted of Walter cleaning Marijke's mouth to see what was wrong (she had lost 2 front teeth and broken some bottom ones, which were also loose), and me running around the hospital/to pharmacies buying new syringes, sterile needles, unopened bottles of medicine, etc. We agreed that it was best for Walter to only clean her mouth and give her stitches, to close everything up...she would have the rest looked at in Lima and would be fully treated in Canada. No offense to Walter, but after he explained to me that he was going to make her some teeth out of resin, and then put braces on her...I told him that we would be more comfortable to have her treated at home by her own dentist/doctor. Needless to say, my medical vocabulary in Spanish greatly improved that day! After pain medicine, X-Rays, an ambulance ride, some local anesthesia, stitches, and some more pain medicine, Marijke got back on the Super Cama (the bottom floor this time) with Magali to head back to Lima, where doctors were waiting at proper hospitals to give her a cat-scan, clean her up and examine the work done in Huaraz.
 | |||||
| BEFORE/AFTER: we just happened to take this picture before getting on the bus, to remember my first trip to the field, the second is Marijke...all cleaned up, toothless and safe & sound at her dentist's office in Canada |
I stayed the night in Huaraz so that I would still be able to visit some of our program sites the next day. Instead of spending the planned, 3-full days in the field, it was a busy day of driving through the mountains to reach 3 different sites in one day. The views of the Cordillera Blanca were amazing, windy roads with mountains and lagoons everywhere. It was incredible.
 |
| the town of Huaraz & views from the drive |
Because in Peru, Right To Play works only with schools, we headed to three different schools in the region. The first school we visited is called Vistoso and is in an area called Santa Cruz de Pichiu. We drove 3 hours from Huaraz through the mountains to Santa Cruz. We met with a teacher who has been trained by local Right To Play trainers and uses the philosophies and curriculum of Right To Play in her classroom. All of the kids came outside to the playground and had their language arts class outside, using Right To Play activities - it was awesome to see the kids so excited about it and it was obvious that the Right To Play curriculum is used all the time in the school. I visited some of the other classrooms and introduced myself to all the kids. One of the biggest problems for this specific community is that there is no water right now. Like...NO water. I had to go to the bathroom so badly after spending 4 hours driving from Huaraz, and once I saw the bathrooms at the school, there was no way. They haven't been able to flush toilets in months because there is no water. Some families are able buy water to drink that is delivered, or they share...but that's it. It was unreal. No wells, nothing. That was hard to see and certainly left an impression...yet another example of how incredibly lucky we are to live in Canada.
 |
| the playground at Vistoso school |
About 30 minutes from Santa Cruz, we visited a high school in an area called Huaripampa. I stood with a group of teenage boys for about an hour while they asked me all sorts of questions about Canada and learning English. It's funny how even so far away, in a small village in the middle of the mountains their questions were the same as teenage boys anywhere: "How much does it cost to buy a used car in Canada?", "How much is a new car in Canada?", "What are the names of new movies out in Canada now?". The visit was far too short and I hope so badly that I get to go back to those schools again soon. Our last visit was about 3 hours away in an area called Chavin. We met with some village elders and youth leaders who are all being trained to be Right To Play Community leaders.
It was so amazing for me to see some of the elders at the meeting, so engaged in this completely new idea - the importance of sports and play in the lives of the kids in their village. One of the women, "Santa", was about 85-years-old and was dressed in traditional Quechua clothing. Quechua people are an indigenous Andean population who still live in the mountains of South America. Everything about her dress and her appearance was so traditional, and yet she recognized that Right To Play and its programs were fundamental to the development of her community. When we left Chavin I gave them all a kiss on the cheek 'goodbye' (as is the custom in Peru - every time you arrive somewhere and every time you leave). So enthused about the day, I kissed Santa...and she froze and backed away from me. We waived by and I jumped in the truck, panicked that I'd done something disrespectful to her. I quickly asked Franklin if it was appropriate to also kiss Quechua people when you leave, or maybe because she was so much older it wasn't appropriate? He responded saying that I was the first white person she'd ever seen and that she was just very shy and timid...no bridges burned at least!
After visiting the last site, we hit the windy roads again for an unforgettable 4 hour drive back to Huaraz. The Cordillera Blanca on one side and the Cordillera Negra (the "Black Range" - because there is no snow on the peaks) on either side of the road. Although the roads were incredibly windy and rough, the altitude makes you exhausted and I couldn't keep from falling asleep every 30 minutes or so for the whole road. We drove past lagoons with huts clumped together on the mountain side - houses of fisherman who fish in the lagoons. At one point there were huge rocks lined across the road blocking our way, as we slowed down to see what was going on a father and young son ran down from the hill, asking for a ride into town...the rocks were their attempt to pressure drivers into giving them a lift. Right To Play has strict policies that say we're not supposed to drive anyone else in RTP vehicles, so I gave them all of the fruit, water and food I'd brought in the truck and we drove off, hoping that there would be a car not far behind us that would pick them up.
That night we took the 11:00pm night-bus back to Lima - what a way to start off my first experience in the field
 |
| sunset in the beautiful Cordiellera Blanca and the statue of Jesus on the peak - common to find these all throughout South America |
*REMEMBER - you can click on photos to enlarge them to their full size!
No comments:
Post a Comment