We have now officially finished this week of traveling. On Wednesday morning, we left for Riobamba with Amelia, my least favorite CIMAS staff member. When we got there, we toured a hospital of Tradtional and Andinian medicine, and once again heard the lecture on basically the world view of Ecuadorian indigenous peoples. And it is STUPID. I really do NOT care anymore about the lives of the indigenous, and probably cannot stand to hear another lecture on "pachamama" or the "living earth".
Overall, it was a really lame trip, at one point they took us into a villiage and actually let us try biomagnetism (a crock in which you ask someone's feet about the rest of their body to determine what is wrong) on this smelly indigenous woman. I guess it was more interesting than observing, but then I couldn't pay attention for the rest of the visit because all I could think about was how much I wanted to wash my hands.
The hostel we stayed at was alright and comfortable enough, but the restaurant was AWFUL. For lunch we had this chicken and super salty veggie medley, for dinner "spaghetti", which ended up being lunch on top of noodles. Gross...and it pretty much continued in that pattern from there.
On the way home, Amelia FREAKED out when we told her that we had to go to the bathroom (after three hours on the bus) and told us we wouldn't stop. But then when she wanted to get ice cream, we made an unscheduled half hour detour....reason 1,000 as to why I dislike her.
After 5 1/2 hours of bus on which should have taken a little over 3, we finally got back to Quito. The following morning (today), we again got up early to go visit yet another Traditional hospital, this time in the South of Quito. It was just as boring as all the rest, because after the first visit to a hospital, no one has anything new to tell you, and you hear the same information over and over.
I am really frustrated with the hospital system here. They have publically funded hospitals in which the treatments are FREE. And still, people choose to go to "healers" who "clean your bad air" with leaves. If you are an adult and make the decision to die of appendicitis because you choose an Andinian method over a FREE surgery, fine. But I am SO mad at the number of children that these people choose to use these bullshit methods on. For example, we had a kid (maybe Aidan's age) come in with his mom with a HORRENDUS cough...I think he must have had bronchitis or TB or pneumonia. It was bad. So what treatment do they choose? They basically pick a Yachak (healer) to CLEAN HIM WITH A CIGARETTE. A Marlboro, to be exact. This man smokes the cigarette, and blows the smoke on this boy (face and all), because tobacco is a sacred healing herb.
I am SO frustrated with this whole system, but the worst part is--there are PLENTY of medically trained doctors (many of whom studied in a 1st world country) that will provide care FOR FREE. So so many people die just because they refuse to try a legitimate type of medicine. It's awful.
I wish I had more to tell about the trip, but in all honesty sitting on the bus listening to my iPod was the most entertaining part. When I got home today, Alejandra made herself and me lunch, and we ate together. It was really good, and I hope she does the cooking more often. Not to mention she didn't use excessive amounts of fats or add sugar to anything.
Tonight, I think some people are going out, but I have no energy to use towards that sort of shenanigans. Tomorrow, Kelsey, Sarah (a new girl from Minnesota), and Andrea (my sister) are going to go have sushi. And then on Sunday, we are going to write our paper. The topic is comparing and contrasting horizontal, water, and vertical birthing methods. It's a good topic, but we are limited to 3 1/2 pages of text, and I feel like in so little space we won't really be able to write anything worthwhile. But whatever, not my problem I guess.
No comments:
Post a Comment