It's
3:45 am, and I am in my private sanctuary of netting, mosquitoes hovering a safe distance away. These past three days have been tiring, but I can already see how satisfying a decision it will have become to embark on this adventure. Although the planning began long before I started travelling, I choose to introduce you to my travels with my bus ride away from home. Sitting at the terminal waiting for the double decker to arrive, amongst the bevy of Yankee hats, designer suitcases, and way too large sunglasses, I was getting excited about the idea of spending a day in New York City dressed for a safari.
Arriving in Manhattan, loaded up with a hiking pack, day bag and a large green handbag full of medical supplies, I started walking with confidence, I kept a secret that would change my life for the better. My cliche life changing experience would be anything but cliche. It quickly became obvious to me that I must have looked rather the opposite of that confident feeling. Loaded down with bags, covered with too many clothes, wearing boots not yet broken in, looking lost in a crowded city, I most likely aired more of a pathetic vibe.
In my past travels I have often seemed to have pretty great luck running into people that I know. When arriving in New York, not more than twenty minutes after disembarking from my bus ride, did I see a familiar face. An old friend from ultimate frisbee crossed my path. I got to spend some time with her walking too far on my aching feet, enjoying a city who's greatness often escapes my opinion. The day was closing and after saying my goodbye, I made my way to Andrew Silverman's apartment. Andrew was the younger brother of my long time friend Ben (who's name also happens to end with Silverman.) We reminisced with stories of our past and plans for the future, as any long time friends would. It was a pleasant prelude of my journey to come.
The next morning, making my way from lower Manhattan to JFK airport, proved to be much more cumbersome than I thought. The dense green duffel bag full of bandages, ointments, soaps and unforgiving heavy liquid antiseptics made a valiant effort at removing my arm from my shoulder. The hour and a half subway ride showed great relief when it allowed me to check my two heaviest bags before my dauntingly long flight.
Regardless of what anybody says about the UAE, United Arab Emirates has a hell of an airline. Flight attendants toting comforting Arabian hats on their perfectly groomed hair, food that could pass for good in a decent Middle Eastern restaurant, free booze, and a movie selection blowing Netflix out of the water. Not a bad way to spend 13 hours in a crowded steel box hurtling through the atmosphere at speeds certainly higher than evolution intended us to travel at.
Landing in Dubai was as if I spent the night at Caesar's in Vegas. Herded through labyrinths of designer perfumes, clothes and liquor, I finally made my way to the train entrance. After getting off the 5 minute ride to Gate B, I had to then get on a 10 minute bus ride to what I can only imagine is the peasants terminal. This airport is bigger than most cities, and my flight to Kathmandu was the heroin laced, broke, over the hill stripper section of the Vegas strip. A place no good Jewish boy find himself with intention. The four and a half hour flight to come would be welcomed.
Kathmandu's airport is different than Dubai's. Very Different. It is one room, no shops and a possible homeless man behind a folding table offering to change currency, sell visas, declare customs, and trade his shirt for yours, specifically mine. I declined the offer. I was greeted by about thirty taxi drivers, who all seemed to know the best place to take me. They were good friends of mine. As a good friend, I declined to take their gifts of the best prices for tourists. I just wouldn't know how to repay them. Instead I settled on the man holding up a sign that read "Chisang Clinic". What a great coincidence that was, because that is where I was going. He drove me down what at the time I thought was the wrong way of a one-way road. It was actually considered to be a two-way, 4 lane highway. Pedestrians were encouraged to use any lane they liked as a sidewalk. From above I imagined this looked like the most epic battle of childhood, the black ants versus the white ants on the TV screen when you turned the dial to a channel that did not quit exist yet.
The house was a Spanish style abode in a sea of poor. The winding cross streets and hills brought me to the house of the founder of Chisang Clinic. I was greeted by his son and his parents. His son, Pratik is a 17 year old with perfect English looking to atttend college in the U.S next year. He was nice. He translated the niceties exchanged by his grandmother and I before walking me to his grandfather's bedroom.
He was sitting up in bed and motioned for me to rest next to him. He, speaking no English, and me, no Nepali got along great. Laughing about what we didn't know and smiling about stories we did not share, he became an instant friend. According to the way too young looking 16 year old house boy, this man was an ex-prime minister of Nepal. I'm not too sure at this moment how true it is, but I'd like to think it is.
My travelling is not nearly complete. Exchanging bows, palms pressed together, fingers pointed up with our hands held high out of respect, we all said our "Namaste" and I was gone. Back at Kathmandu's airport, this time at the domestic "terminal", the realness of my remote travels hit my thoughts. The room was packed with rugged backpackers, religious Hindu and Buddhist travellers and the not-so occasional Chinese Tourist. Most were going to Pokhara, a supposedly beautiful mountainous district of Nepal; the trekking paradise. I was not. In fact, the only people who had the same color ticket as I, were a select few who assuredly were from my almost final destination of Biratnagar. Yeti Airlines was my guide and their probably not up to code prop plane my vehicle. After a shakier takeoff than I care for, the flight was gorgeous. The Himalayas out the left sided windows looked like pearly shark teeth jutting through the flimsy hull of the boat made from clouds. Beneith our vessel lay digital-like steps carved into the side of any usable hill side. This was surely the only ladder to the houses of the rural inhabitants below.
Biratnagar is billed as an industrious city. I wouldn't be able to make that description myself. Its airport was a countertop, bambo roof above. Its roads, loose rock and dirt. Its industry, rusty bicycles, goat herding, and foreigner staring. The car I met at the airport took me through a congested and adrenaline producing seventy five minute drive. We turned down a non descript path for a few miles past more goats than I knew existed.
Bhaunne village is in the Morang district of this small country. Morang is the lowlands of south east Nepal. It has a hot jungle like climate with incredible fertile soil that would let even the most incompetent stay full. The villagers don't see a lot of outsiders, especially those with my skin complexion. They are self-sustaining, growing any fruit or vegetable they eat and rising any livestock they use for food, milk or harvest. Water is pumped from wells dispersed throughout and shared freely. Although Kathmandu is close to equal parts Hinduism and Buddhism, Bhaunne seems to be Hindu with some Buddhism sprinkled in. It definitely appears to be more of a cultural and social significance than religious.
One of the few concrete-made buildings in town is the Chisang Clinic. The only medical service around was founded three years ago. The structure looks much older than its age, with worn paint, broken cement floors, and uneven doors. An open air edifice with walls only providing shade, not wind or rain protection. After being looked at like a mutant while driving through the village, pulling up to the clinic, I was welcomed with happy and energetic faces. Degu and Kate were the first people I met. Degu is a Tibetan looking late 20's woman with a large smile perched on her face. Her home village is about a nine hour bus ride away and moved here to work at Chisang. Now she lives next to the clinic. She is a "medical assistant". Kate is another volunteer (which is unusual to have two at once, due to the scarcity of volunteers in general.) She graduated from Georgetown last year and took this past year off beffore she starts medical school this fall at the University of Virginia. They walked me through the clinic's front doors into a small waiting room which also housed the book keeping desk and served as a examination area. One bench, one table, 3 plastic stools. Attached via curtain was another examination/storage room. Exams in that room were for those that required any serious privacy or a place to lay down. Storage included all of their medical devices: an old ophthalmoscope, an ultrrasound and a reflex hammer. Walking past the main area is a larger room with a few cabinets hosting knock-off Indian medicines, expired antibacterial creams, a collage of various bandages and suture equipment. It's actually quite advanced considering the surroundings. Perhaps the most impressive aspect of the clinic was the side room of the back cabinet area. This held the laboratory. The lab has a small centrifuge, vials for blood and urine, test strips, along with equipment for drawing blood and a microscope. Yamuna runs the lab, she is also a woman from a far away village who came for the job.
After my brief tour, which included stocking the cabinets with the supplies I brought (thanks to a few friendly donations), I was led upstairs. The floor is uneven, cracked concrete. Walls a pale yellow, begging for some reprieve from the dusty breezes. A corrugated tin roof donated shade to half of the living area. a few clothes-lines reached across from two of the roof bearing poles. The room has two walls and is much more of a large balcony than a room. There are 3 bedrooms with screened doors to the open main area. Simple rooms with a few beds draped with mosquito nets in each.
Also attached is the kitchen. A six feet by five feet enclosed room. It has a sink, countertop and burner with gas tank underneath. Loxmi runs the kitchen and maintains the clinic. She is the only permanent resident of the building. She is tall and slender, about thirty years old and has more swagger than she knows what to do with. Often quipping with the local children, she acts like a big sister/mother hybrid to the young villagers. Not to mention a great cook.
The building does have some electricity. For a couple hours per day we can use artificial light before the inevitable blackout. That is much more than most people around can say. There is a water well right through the back door, where after a few minutes of pumping comes the clear, cool liquid. But this is not fit for drinking, at least not for someone with my delicate westernized gut colony. As the Village natives drink freely, I must carry the water to the kitchen and boil it using a gas burner rivaling a cheap piece of camping equipment. Generally I don't find boiling water to be too refreshing so I let it sit overnight before indulging. On the roof there is a large covered bucket with a hose leading down to the well. Every morning, we hope to be able to turn on a pump which drives the water up to the roof. That determines our running water availability for the day as the bucket is hooked up to a sink in the kitchen and a shower next to my bedroom. We do have a toilet. Nepal actually makes sure that there is no public defecations unlike neighboring India. Our toilet is a small room with a hole in the ground that resorbs all that is placed in it.
Now that I've talked about the feces, time to move onto the food. The food is great. Mostly rice based, it is decorated with cooked vegetables and a lot of lentil combinations. Sweet hot tea is enjoyed a couple of times per day. People here wake with the sun and rest with the moon (unless there is a late night drum circle happening). Breakfast is generally around
7:30 am, lunch
at 10:30, large snack at 4 and dinner around
7:30 pm. This rice and the constant baked goods might give me traveller's diabetes, but aside from the constant sugar spikes, the diet is fairly nutritious. Walking down the street from our home, I am treated like a celebrity. Little children ring out perpetual cries of "Hi" and "Bye." To which I can only respond with a hand wave and similar diction. But the best perk is always being invited into people homes to enjoy some freshly made local eats, or slaughtered goat.
The healthcare at the clinic has been primitive but adequate. As there is no true doctor or nurse for that matter, a standard algorithm of symptom and corresponding medicine is followed. It is nice to be able to teach the staff things like cough syrup isn't always the answer for a cough. Within the first couple of days I've mostly seen some cuts and scrapes, some requiring me to suture, skin infections, helminthic worm infections, corneal abrasions, and the usual cough, vomiting and diarrhea. I've certainly been able to enjoy helping out in a hands on experience with very limited medicine and resources. Being the only doctor in town (no matter how freshly out of school) has taught me well very quickly. Most notably how to deal with the responsibility of being the lead decision maker.
I have walked down the road about an hour to find a few minutes of internet. I hope this message finds you all well and that you enjoy reading it. Forgive any grammar or spelling mistakes as this is being typed essentially on a notepad and not a word processor. I will send more updates soon.
Namaste,
Dan Blatt
