A soft bump heralded our arrival at every village, as the boat came sidling right up to the shore, along with the high pitched voices of children drifting hither tither through the windows. Our welcoming committee. The boat would dock right against the muddy bank and everyone would scramble off, stethescopes swinging.
The medical students and crew would set up shop in the school. A large concrete block building with filled with tiny desk and chairs. Large tupperwares of boxes filled with Tylenol, permetherin cream, and various other drugs served as the pharmacy. The doctors worked in teams of two and saw every single person that came, which ended up being about 150 people per village (aka EVERY SINGLE INHABITANT). Frances and I sat and listened to the translators as they described the various ailments of every patient. Headaches, stomach aches, and flu. Lots of the smaller children had scabes, and were rubbed down liberally with permetherin cream.
I watched as someone demonstrated how to put on a condom with his thumb to a thirteen year old girl, nursing her first child. Her eyes were wide as she took the proffered prevention, a look of tredeptation on her face. I wonder how many of those will be made into to balloon animals after we leave.
There were so many sick people that the doctors couldn´t treat. A tube of antifungal cream and some tylenol only goes so far. I spoke with several of the medical students during the trip, and while they expressed some feeling of accomplishment at being there, doing something, they felt useless too. Before we arrived at the first village, I helped fill plastic sacks with Flinstones vitamins, which were essentially a placebo. When villagers come to the doctors, they don´t want to leave empty handed, so Flinstones vitamins are given to everyone. Here, take your animal shaped vitamins, FEEL BETTER.
The people suffer daily with ailments that would incapacite me, yet they go out and work for 8 hours in the sun, tambien. Talk about relativity.
Around midday, when the sun is at its zenith, the earth steams. Time for a swim! The water, though completely opaque with floating particulate, feels amazing. From the top of the boat, two stories above the rush of the current, you can see into the canopy of the forest. Strange birds swoop in and out of the dense foliage, and bright blue butterflies the size of dinner plates waft lazily on the breeze, dipping and glinting in the wide shafts of light coming through the leaves. A bird call like the sound of water dripping from a pipe into a metal basin followed by three short chirps, the hum of a billion insects, the distance cry of some unnamed creature. Monkeys swing through the tree tops, chattering happily amongst themselves. The smell of sun warmed earth, sticky ripe fruit and flora makes for a heady scent, unlike anything I have ever smelled before. You stand and take it all in as the sun heats reflects white light from the fiberglass of the boat. Looking down, the water streams in whirls around the hull, continuing its swift passage downstream. Close your eyes and jump. The air whips past cooling damp skin, and your stomach drops. A large splash announces your arrival at the surface and you plummet into the cool depths. All of your senses are obliterated for those few seconds before you surface, take a gulp of air, and wiggle your toes hopping the pirhanas have had their fill of lunch today.
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