Friday night we were all exhausted from meeting so many new people and from our first day at the hospital. (I will write a separate entry about the hospital after this one, because there is a lot to say.) We had planned to go to the gym after dinner, when it wouldn't be so busy but we were all too tired and went to bed really early.
Saturday morning we did get up and go work out. It was fun to watch all of the surfers as I ran. We also went to yoga class. If I had to describe a Peruvian yoga master it would be this man exactly - petite, very fit, long dark curly hair, and way more flexible than any person should be. The yoga class was very relaxing. All of our mats faced out a giant glass window, which looked over the ocean. Only about 30 of the 90 minutes were hard. At the end of the class the instructor gave each of us a short neck massage. I felt bad for him, because I was so sweaty... he's probably used to it....
For lunch we went to a place on our block that serves chicharrones (pork sandwiches). You are supposed to eat them for breakfast but we didn't know that. Obviously I didn't eat any - but Sarah and Chrissie told me that if I were to ever eat meat again this is what I should eat. The pork is served on a bun with yams and onions. I just had a side of yams... still very delicious.
After lunch we joined Andrea and a bunch of her friends for their Pisco tour. Pisco is a brandy made from grapes that originated in Peru. The standard drink it is served in is a Pisco Sour - 60% Pisco (84 proof) and the other 40% sugar and lemon, and topped with egg white. You can also serve Pisco with fruit juices, ginger ale, etc. All of them are very potent, because the alcohol is masked by the sugar. I only had one small drink and could definitely feel it.
After the first stop on their Pisco tour we left to meet one of our colleagues from DIGESA, Dr. Osorio. She had told us that we were going to see water falls, but really she meant water fountains. She met us at the front of Parque de la Reserve. The park is filled with water fountains that light up at night and some are synchronized with music. There were also some fountains that you could run around in - maybe without getting too wet if you were smart about it. We didn't want to get wet, but there were lots of little kids who kept getting sprayed. A couple of interesting facts: The park was redone in 2007 as a gift from the mayor costing 13 million american dollars. It holds the record for the largest water fountain complex in the world and the tallest water fountain (80m) in the Americas. Below is a picture of me, Sarah, and Dr. Osorio in front of the large fountain.
After the water fountain park we rejoined the Pisco tour. Before they got another drink we all stopped at Bembos. Bembos is the main Peruvian fast food place - like McDonalds but much more expensive and I think much better quality. They have lots of different interesting burgers. Sarah got a burger that had guacamole and doritos. It reminded me of "walking Tacos".
The next stop was a bar called Munich - a german piano bar. The pianist knew many, many songs by heart. Our group was very loud and sang to a lot of songs by the Beatles. Then the pianist started to play a lot of Peruvian traditional and pop songs. It was still fun to see them all singing along, especially since they were all on their third drink and I only had one 5 hours before. Below are Andrea, Sarah, Chrissie, and Francesca (another medical student at Cayetano and Andrea's cousin) with their beer mugs. I tried a sip of the beer. It was very creamy - not that I know much about beer or even like it that much. I don't know how they drank such large steins... and these were only the smallest of 3 sizes....
On Sunday our faculty mentor from the U of M, Dr. Valdivieso, met us for lunch. Dr. Val and his wife, Astrid, took us out for Chifa. Chifa is Chinese-Peruvian fusion and extremely delicious. I was worried that they wouldn't have much vegetarian food, but because Peruvians love fish there were a lot of appetizers with shrimp and fish. For our main course they brought us 5 or 6 huge platters of food. Specially for me I got a mushroom and tofu dish and vegetarian fried rice. We have so many leftovers in our fridge that it takes up almost all of the space. Now we have meals for almost the whole week.
Later that evening we were invited to Dr. Valverde, one of the directors of DIGESA, for "tea". One of his friends, Norma, picked us up in a Taxi. When we first arrived it was just Dr. Valverde and his family, Norma and us. His family was very nice. His son is in his 3rd year of medical school (kind of our 3rd year of undergrad) and his daughter is trying to help set up a better recycling program for Lima. She authored two manuals about how to help build a recycling system and how to protect workers and give their job more prestige. Building a recycling program is very difficult. Even hospitals just dispose of hazardous chemicals in normal waste and they know the health risks.
About an hour after we arrived Jonathon Woods, the business man that visited the treatment plant with us, and his business partner from Uruguay arrived. After they arrived the night started to get a little rough. She loved to talk and would speak in rapid spanish telling 20 minute stories that no one would stop and translate for us. After 20 or 30 minutes of her talking she would finally pause and someone would sum up the entire conversation in one sentence. Then finally after an hour and a half we sat down for dinner - a HUGE dinner. They had made risotto because they knew I was vegetarian and they had been vegetarians before as well. They served humongous portions and none of us were hungry for any food after such a large, late lunch. I tried to eat as much as a could. Dr. Valverde (who doesn't speak English) started asking me in Spanish why I wasn't eating and if I didn't like the food. I felt so awkward. I tried to explain that it was good, but I wasn't hungry. Sarah had eaten the same amount as me and knows Spanish but never got called out. I was very flustered. For dessert there was ice cream, a cake, apple pie and lemon cake. I can't believe how much food there was. Finally, after over 5 hours we got to take a taxi home with Norma. It was very nice for them to invite us over, but we were all frustrated that we were there for so long and with the conversation being dominated by the woman from Uruguay. By the time we got home we all collapsed in bed.
This morning we met Dr. Valdivieso at DIGESA to talk about starting the project this week. They need to apply for papers to take water samples from the water treatment plant, Sedepal. They wanted to start next Monday, but we are anxious to start so we are going to take samples from some of the 8 different districts in Lima that we are testing on Wednesday (we don't need papers to take water samples there). While at DIGESA we also looked at our practice culture plates that we prepared last Monday from water taken directly from DIGESA. On one of the plates there were red colonies growing. According to our protocol they looked like H. pylori colonies. These colonies will be prepared and sent back to Michigan for analysis. Hopefully, it worked (and on our first try)! It would send a very powerful message if even the water at the department in charge of monitoring water quality had water containing H. pylori.
We had the afternoon off to relax. It was nice after not getting any time to ourselves last night. This evening we met Mrs. Montesinos, the woman who had us over and to the club the first Sunday we arrived. She just got back from Arequipa, because she is arranging all of the social event for the PAMS (Peruvian American Medical Society) conference that we are attending next week. She reminds me of my Grandma Jaffe, because she is very active in rotary club. Her late husband was a pediatric cardiologist (and I think a surgeon). Together they created a congenital heart clinic for lower socioeconomic patients that is completely sustainable, among participating in many other service projects. The clinic even has the best catheter lab in Peru. I am excited to attend Mrs. Montesino's rotary club meeting on Thursday morning with Dr. Valdivieso. Mrs. Montesino is such an interesting person and extremely generous. I can't wait to get to know her better.
We are going back to the hospital tomorrow to shadow one of the medical students that we met there, so I will catch up on all of the hospital news/info after we go back tomorrow!
No comments:
Post a Comment