Reflections: Guatemalan Style

I could sense the initial fear from her eyes as she sat down, hesitating to look directly at my colleagues or me. Instead, she looked down at the floor as if she was ashamed for doing something bad in front of her parents. After the translator had finished explaining to her who we were and what we were going to do, I smiled, looked directly at her, and began asking questions to complete her intake form. In the aftermath, upon receiving medication for her diagnosis, she got up and walked over to each of us, giving us all a hug and saying, “Thank you.” Considering how she was the very first patient I encountered on my trip in Guatemala, it is easy to see how much the people there appreciated what we were doing for them.

I took part of this trip not because it’s something cool to put on my résumé or as a vacation, but because I wanted to learn more about the medical field and gain a first hand experience on diagnosing and treating patients, all while immersing myself within Guatemalan culture. The difference between this trip and my trip to Ghana was that here in Guatemala; I was actually doing something relevant. In Ghana, I had originally wanted to volunteer at a hospital but that never happened and as a result, I became enamored with simply being there and traveling around, reveling in the experience of being in a country completely different from the U.S. In Guatemala, I had the perfect balance of work and play, with 6 8-hour clinic days to treat as many patients as we could (while taking enough time to accurately diagnose each patient instead of rushing over them) and other days to travel around, shop, eat and learn more about the history of each city we were in.

The program I travelled with is called VIDA (http://www.vidavolunteer.org/) and I learned about them through my school. VIDA has 3 programs (medical, dental, veterinary) and they lead students who sign up for the programs onto trips in Guatemala, Nicaragua or Costa Rica, where they get to provide basic medical services to the people and animals in communities who need it. There’s a VIDA club on campus that was planning a trip to Nicaragua in September and I wanted to go, however, I was also applying to be an HIV Peer Counselor at the time and the training dates conflicted with the program dates. So I looked into other programs and picked this open trip to Guatemala, in case I did get the Peer Counselor position (I didn’t). 

To be blunt, Guatemala, in general, is a country filled with short people. Within moments of stepping outside the airport and looking at the giant crowd of people waiting for their loved ones, I noticed the majority of them were at my chest level. I wasn’t towering over these people, but it’s different when people who are in their 20’s look like they haven’t hit their growth spurt yet. The majority of them practice Catholicism, but some retain their traditional Mayan heritage and blend both religions together.

Regardless, the people usually kept to themselves, never staring for too long at foreigners or trying to initiate conversations with them. I think it’s because of the language barrier, as they probably assume most of us don’t understand Spanish or any of the indigenous Mayan languages. In Ghana, people would come up to me and strike a conversation all the time, because they all knew English (and maybe because they thought I was Jesus with my beard), so that was a little different. The areas we travelled through were mainly through very green mountains with scattered volcanoes here and there. It was nice though because the weather would always be perfect, a nice mixture of sun, wind and clouds.

Being a vegetarian in Guatemala was easy, although a lot of my meals were literally raw or cooked vegetables. Like, just vegetables. No soups or rice, only veggies. But I can’t complain that much, since it was the best they can do, and it’s not a big deal. At least I was healthy! But the main staples are corn and tortillas, with beans, eggs or some sort of meat. The food can be spicy and flavorful at times but I really liked how colorful all the vegetables would look on my plate. They also have this tea called Rosa de Jamaica (hibiscus tea), which seemed like a commonplace thing to have anywhere we went, but it was really, really good.

I started off the trip by being the first person from my group to arrive and things became a little complicated when a flight carrying 4 other group members from Atlanta got delayed, but eventually we were all together in the evening, having our introductory dinner and getting to know one another. We had an 8 hour orientation where we split into our respective groups (medical or dental) and learned about how to ask questions, fill out the intake form and check vital signs like temperature, blood pressure, heart and respiration rate, height and weight. Soon after, we headed to Parramos, where we got to stay with a host family for 3 nights. Thankfully and surprisingly, my Spanish was good enough to hold actual conversations with the family, and I, along with another girl in our group who spoke Spanish, soon became the group representatives whenever we would go out to eat or shop.

We then had our first 2 clinic days in a small community called Zaragoza, near the bigger city Chimaltenango. 3 of the students were part of the dental group and 6 of us were part of the medical group. The 6 of us were divided into 2 groups of 3, where we worked with a translator who would act as a communicator between the patient and us. A typical clinic day involves unloading all the equipment from the bus, setting it up, and getting chairs to form circles for the patients and us. Once we were ready, the translators would go over and bring a patient(s), who were usually women with their children. Each one of us in the group of 3 would be in charge of asking questions, writing responses down on intake forms or checking vital signs, and we would alternate jobs with each patient that came in. During the 3rd and 4th clinic days, we sometimes got patients who could only speak one of the Mayan languages, so we had to get a Mayan to Spanish translator, which made each round much longer than normal. Patience was the key during these days. After we were done asking questions and the vital signs were checked, we would call over the doctor, where we reviewed the case with him and gave him our diagnosis. He would then make sure that our diagnosis was sound before proceeding to describe the treatment plan with us. We would then go over the diagnosis and treatment plan to the patient with the help of the translator. Sometimes, the doctor would also talk to the patient to answer their questions or give further instructions or recommendations. Once the patient left, the doctor would ask us questions related to what we saw before leaving us to see the next patient. On the second leg of clinic days, we would have case discussions where each group had the opportunity present a noteworthy case and ask further in-depth questions. We would get a snack break at around 10 and an hour lunch break at 12 before continuing seeing patients until 4 or 5, depending on how many were left. Afterwards, we would leave our equipment if we would be returning tomorrow, or packing everything up if we were leaving to a new town, return to our homestay/hotels, freshen up, and go out for dinner before lounging about and going to bed.

From Parramos, we travelled to Panajachel, a city on Lake Atitlán where we had 2 more clinic days in Sololá. We also got to explore around the lake and do the most of our shopping from the vendors lined up outside our hotel. And finally, from Pana, we went to the former colonial town of Antigua, where we took part in a city tour, had an evening intro to Latin dance class, and finished up our last 2 clinic days in Sacatepéquez, before congregating back to Guatemala City for our final farewell dinner.

All in all, one thing I can say from this trip is that I’m more strongly leaning towards going to med school now. It’s always been my mentality since entering college to go to med school, but I was never really confident with that mindset. However, trip pushed the needle in the med school direction more. It was eye opening to see how many patients listened to people who were not doctors and as a result, took medication that was irrelevant to their conditions or they didn’t even believe they had certain complications. For example, one patient was told from someone not a doctor that rubbing coffee and dirt into a wound would help make it better. But the important thing in all this is education: making sure patients knew that they had to go see actual doctors and take their medication even if symptoms weren’t explicitly showing, while encouraging better lifestyle habits. It’s a good feeling knowing that I made a difference in these communities, regardless of how big or small it was. And patients clearly showed their appreciation for what we were doing, in the form of shaking hands, hugs, kisses on the cheeks and simple thank yous.

I would definitely recommend this trip to anyone interested in medical, dental or veterinary fields and I’d be happy to answer further questions if you want. And lastly, I’m not sure if any of you will make it this far to read this part, but thank you to the coordinators, translators and doctor for all the work and help you’ve put in making this trip seamless. And also, thank you to my fellow volunteers for making this trip memorable to me. I had so much fun interacting with all of you and you’ve all taught me so many new things apart from sciencey mumbo-jumbo. I hope you don’t forget me in my little corner out west!

Reflections

After flying on 4 different flights across 5 cities that involved spending the night at an airport and passing through customs and immigration during crunch time, I finally made it back home last night. I'm honestly surprised jetlag hasn't hit me hard, but I guess I should be thankful. But now that I'm back from Ghana, I'm sure the first question on everyone's mind was, "How was it?"

Honestly, there's no way any of you are going to truly understand how Ghana was unless you actually go there yourself. I'll probably say something like, "Oh it was amazing, definitely a life changing experience," but that doesn't even begin to capture the essence of my trip. It goes so much more deeper than that, more than I can describe in a blog post or in a few seconds. Really, I'd have to sit down with someone who's interested over lunch or something to talk about it, and even then I'll probably forget telling some important stories or details because there's so much that happened the past 4-5 months. Heck, it would probably be better to sit down and go through all my photos together.

Most of my stories from Ghana largely focus on the so-called negative aspects of it: no running water, horrible bathrooms, mosquitoes, dealing with constant sweat and dust caked on the skin, language and transportation barriers and so on. But the way I see it, those negatives are what makes Ghana so interesting. Being in Spain for 6 days made me realize that studying abroad in a developed country is so much like living in America essentially, there's not much to talk about other than cultural differences. With Ghana, there's another dimension to it; the fact that I was living in a country totally unlike America, something that many of us haven't experienced.

Sure, we might go to Asia and many countries there aren't on the level of modernity that America has but we're often sheltered from the reality of life in those countries because our families there are well off. Whenever I go to India, I know that poverty exists on a grand scale and life is tough for many Indians in the cities, but I don't have many memories of it because I was never exposed to those sights. Many of my fellow study abroad members would ask me to compare Ghana to India and many of them asked about India in general and I would often say that Ghana is exactly like India, only less chaotic. I would also tell them that poverty and social strife exists there but I couldn't recall any memories of stories as proof. I believe this was because I was always traveling via private car or plane and I always went to the nice places, many of them specifically for tourists. In other words, my cousins in India were able to shelter me from those things. In Ghana, while I lived in a university, I was still able to get a good look at daily life for Ghanaians because I immersed myself in the culture and had nothing to hold me back. In a way, I was rather forced to let myself go in Ghanaian culture or remain hostile towards Ghana until I left. I allowed myself to rely on slow and packed trotro's instead of taking speedy and comfortable taxi's everywhere, I did most of my shopping at wild and hectic Ghanaian markets instead of air conditioned supermarkets owned by Lebanese immigrants or South African conglomerates, I took a class on one of the local dialects rather than choosing to speak English everywhere I go, I even chose to live in one of the Ghanaian student hostels rather than the international one because I wanted to fit in with the locals as much as possible and not remain closely attached to America.

Being sheltered in India made me realize I had nothing really to talk about other than all the touristy stuff I did. I couldn't really talk about the lifestyle there. It's one thing to travel as a tourist and another to travel as a traveler. In Spain, I considered myself a tourist because I was there to see the sights and I kept hopping from city to city each day, never really stabilizing myself anywhere. I rarely got time to try and understand Spanish culture fully. Spanish nights start pretty late, say 12-1AM and I didn't allow myself to go out at night and experience it because I didn't think it was worth it to stay up late, but who knows what would've happened. I think it's important to try to follow the lifestyle of whatever country you're in because you're playing by their rules now, not American ones. If I tried to get Ghanaians to eat fufu with a fork and knife instead of their right hand, I would be considered an idiot. It's none of our business to meddle with another country's culture. That's why the next time I come to India, I want to be considered a traveler, actually living and immersing myself into the country and not as a tourist just trying to see each landmark, snap a picture and move on.

The point is, the major differences in lifestyle between the US and Ghana forced me to adapt to Ghanaian standards and in turn, I learned a lot about the world and myself in general. That's something I'm sure you can't get in a developed country because nothing is different. There's nothing to adapt to. I mean, Spain was great and all but nothing interesting happened to me there. Because it's developed, I was able to navigate my way easily though the country. In Ghana, things weren't spoon fed to you and you have to rely on a more naturalistic approach, using your senses and asking people for help rather than pulling up Google Maps. It's really just like studying abroad in, let's say, French America or Australian America. Just add the country label in front of America.

I have to insist, don't imagine Ghana as some backwards country with no infrastructure or intellect whatsoever. It's not like that at all. Many people around the world believe that LA is absolute trash but I don't think that's true at all, at least not everywhere. Ghana has it's positives. The sense of family and community there is unlike any other I've seen. There's no such thing as doing things alone really, everyone is in it together. It's not like the individualism we have in the states, with all of us competing against each other for spots in graduate school, even trying to sabotage each other over grades and all that. It's pretty depressing for me personally, coming back to that attitude. All we care about is trying to get a good job with high pay, a hot husband/wife and kids, retiring by 50 and some other really stupid stuff but no one in the states ever takes the time to just chill. Let things go, take it slow and easy, there's never any rush to do anything. If any of you have seen 3 Idiots, you should remember the line, "Don't chase success, let success chase you instead." It's important to work hard and all but sometimes it's good to just sit back and take a break. I'm definitely going to miss that vibe. That alone makes up for all the negatives I faced in Ghana, and honestly, conditions there weren't even that miserable. I barely used any of my DEET for mosquitoes and the weather was bearable despite being covered in sweat within 2 minutes of being outside. Okay, maybe the toilets were awful but still.

It definitely takes a certain kind of person to want to go to Ghana, which is why I'm not going to try to persuade anyone to go. It takes a certain kind of person to be able to deal with an inefficient "university," being called obroni or Jesus or Osama (yes, people did call me those things), average infrastructure, lack of Internet, lack of late night meal options, strange insects, scary driving and so on. I think that's why many of the California kids were from Santa Cruz, because banana slugs have that kind of "change the world and be different" mentality. And I like that. I'd love to see someone I know well decide to go to Ghana, but if not I'd be glad to assist in anyone interested in studying abroad in general.

So then, how have I changed? What have I learned here? The answer? I have no idea. There are the obvious ones, like learning how to bargain and my beard of course, but I believe that Ghana left an impression on me that won't reveal itself in plain sight, not just yet anyway. I think that it's a more underlying effect, and that time will have to pass for those effects to show. I've only been back in the states for 2 days, so give me some time to figure that out!

But looking back to my first post, I talked about how I wanted to try to figure out what I wanted to do in the future. I'm positive that Ghana has helped answer that question through a via negativa process. Rather than explicitly seeing what I wanted to do, I ended up narrowing down my potential interests. I learned that I do not like working with children and that I don't belong in a hospital setting. I think I'm more geared for a therapist/psychiatrist/counselor kind of role. Even that grouping just shows how far I am to being specific about what I want to be, but it is narrowed down somewhat. Also, I have to keep telling myself that I am pretty young still. I was the youngest person out of all the international students to study abroad and I was pretty surprised when I figured that out. I thought more sophomores would jump on the chance to come to Ghana their 2nd year but talking to my older study abroad friends, they all remarked about how I had my act together to be able to go my 2nd year. And because of that, I'll be able to go abroad again my senior year (Thailand '17!). While everyone else was taking classes for their major, I was taking classes for my general education requirements and I was really just relaxing. Part of the reason I didn't do any volunteer work or internship there was because I had no intention to do any of that. I just wanted to travel, learn and explore on my own rather than put in the time to do something I probably have no interest in. So while I have figured out a direction I want to go in, I still can't place a specific title for what I want to be.

To conclude, Ghana left a lasting mark on me that is difficult to put into words right now. I just know inside that I've changed for the better. I wish everyone could understand what I've been through but it's just not enough to convey it through words and pictures. I'm glad I didn't get malaria or get pick pocketed throughout my entire time abroad. There was only 1 weekend where I felt miserable and of course I had diarrhea and I got ripped off bargaining a few times but those are little things compared to what some of my fellow study abroad mates went through; I've heard many horror stories about their times in the hospital. I'm also glad that I got to be able to do all of this before I even turned 20. I think that itself is something pretty special, to have a life-changing trip while still at a raw age. To the California group, I don't know if all of you guys will read this but almost all of you have left a positive impression on me one way or another and I'm thankful for all the wisdom and memories I've received from all of you. There were times I've embraced being that little kid of the group but for the most part, I think I've been able to hang with all of you. I'd be glad to talk more about Ghana if any of you readers are interested, preferably in person. Even after writing this post I've probably forgotten a few things that I wanted to write about but too late now. But lastly, thank you to my family and friends for being supportive while I was away and for looking out for me and keeping in touch in general.

November Update

It's been a while since I've posted anything and part of that is because nothing major has happened this month that deserves a post all by itself. Another reason is that I've just been busy with school and midterms and all. But here's a quick (lengthy) overview on my November with a little bit on what I'm expecting to occur during my last 2 weeks here in Ghana.

One of the first things I did in the month was travel with my roommate and one of my floormates to his hometown in Kumasi. I wanted to go just for the opportunity to see Kumasi again, through a local's viewpoint this time. It was definitely a great experience to stay with his family in his compound. I noticed immediately how it wasn't just the nuclear family living there, there were many different people who were extended members of the family living there as well. In the middle of the compound was a giant courtyard where many family members would do laundry or dishes and it fostered a lot of outdoor communication between other members of the family whenever one of them would come outside and walk by. I thought the nicest part of it all was that my floormate's mom cooked me local foods that were specially made vegetarian for me, and they were absolutely delicious. It honestly might have been the one time where I didn't feel skeptical about my meal having bits of fish or chicken in it. It really added to the hospitality they went out of their way to give us, and I'm especially grateful for that.
As for the overall trip, my floormate took us around Kumasi and we saw some of the main touristy sites like the zoo, but also went to some of the more lowkey ones, such as this sacred mountain where the Virgin Mary is supposed to appear if you spend the night at the mountain. We also did a little bit of shopping at Kejetia market, which is so much more hectic and crazy than the markets in Accra. My floormate navigated us through the market, dodging minibuses and pushing our way through narrow passages full of vendors grabbing our arms and trying to pull us into their stalls. I got called Jesus a countless amount of times because of my beard and I promise, I'll shave it once I come back home. However, we did get to see how bargaining is really done, when my floormate was able to get a pair of jeans from 50 cedis ($17) to just 5 cedis (less than $2). Overall, it was a humbling experience to get to live among a Ghanaian family for a few days and get a glimpse of their overall life and to be able to participate in it.

As I said a few posts ago, I traveled to Togo for one weekend just to be able to go outside of Ghana. This time, I took it a county further and went to Benin for a weekend. I would write a post just on the travel but my blog focuses on Ghana, not other countries. To sum up Togo, there really wasn't much to it. The capital, Lome, was pretty run down and looked more like a main city than a capital and there wasn't a lot of touristy things to see. The only interesting part about that trip was going up on top of this mountain to this monastery which had a very eerie feeling because when we got there, it was dark and stormy and the sky kept flashing white, like a typical horror movie setting. The monastery was like a refuge from the bad weather and it had that typical smell of incense and old books. There was even a neat little gift shop with homemade biscuits and special herbs and oils and coffee and all that. The drive down the mountain was something because our taxi driver just plowed through the muddy, pothole infested road and our car was getting poured on by rain to the point where we couldn't really see anything past maybe 6 feet or so. But other than that, Togo was just...Togo.
Benin, however, had a lot more to it in my opinion, and I was more excited to go there than I was with Togo. Literally right from the start of Benin, like at the border, there was drama. I tried taking a picture of the border on my camera just because, you know, it's the border. One of the guards saw me take the picture and started yelling some stuff in French and I didn't think it was directed at me until some other guards at the immigration office came up to me and demanded to see my camera. So I gave it to them and showed them the picture I took, which was literally just a giant iron gate pained red, green and yellow, and they made me delete it. They then wanted to see through my other photos, which I showed them, and I think they were just curious at that point to see what else I had. They saw a photo of the "Welcome to Togo" sign at the border with Ghana but I told them that it was just a sign, nothing else, and they let me go. I thought about trying to get a photo on my phone on the way back since it would be harder to catch but I decided against it. It makes sense though, Africans are pretty picky when it comes to taking pictures of national monuments or anything like that.
Anyway after that, we spent the night in Cotonou and saw the Ganvie stilt village on a canoe. The story is that the Tofinu people were escaping from the Dahomey people who wanted to capture them to sell them as slaves and so the Tofinu's went out onto the lake since the Dahomey people were banned by their religion to enter the water. It was cool to see how a population can flourish on living on water for so long. We then visited the python temple and slave walk in Ouidah, a town famous for its role in the slave trade and for voodoo. There was a nice memorial for the slaves at the end of the walk on the beach but I wasn't able to get a close up look at it because some people wanted me to pay. I don't even think they were real guides or anything, I think they just wanted to make some cash. I don't really understand why we should pay to see memorials like this either, they should be open to the public like the Vietnam Memorial or the one for 9/11, but I still snagged a picture while they weren't looking so I guess I'm content.
Benin definitely had tourist infrastructure in place and it satisfied the history nerd in me with the countries role in slavery. The language barrier wasn't too much of a problem as I traveled with two people who knew some French back in high school. It was nice to enjoy some crisp French baguettes compared to the uninspiring loaves of white bread we have here in Ghana. The people there were also very friendly and it added to the overall experience of traveling through those countries.

Lastly, my Thanksgiving weekend was a blast as my study abroad program hosted a special dinner for all of us filled with good food and great musical performances and laughter and all. I even got a copy of the book that one of the papers I wrote for my orientation class got published in! The day after, I went up to Akosombo with one of my Ghanaian friends who was first a friend of my brothers when he was in Ghana. I helped organize and host a sort of Farewell Party for my study abroad group and we chartered a bus to his sisters place where there was a lot of food cooked just for us and where we played a few games and played with his sister's baby and walked around the town. I ended up spending the night to see more of Akosombo, and luckily, his brother in law was able to give us an exclusive tour of the Akosombo dam since he worked there. The dam is what pretty much makes Ghana what it is today. It was built in 1965 by damming the Volta River, which resulted in creating the largest man made reservoir in the world. Without it, there would be no power in Ghana and everything would just crumble apart.
After, we went to this private beach on the Volta River where there were people splashing around in the pool, playing volleyball, table tennis, football, or just chilling underneath some umbrellas. It felt like being at those typical college spring break party things. We chilled there for a bit to soak it all in, and then went on a speedboat which went up and down the river for almost an hour. On the way back to Accra, our trotro got pulled aside by policemen and us foreigners were told to come out of the trotro as they wanted to go through our bags. When the policeman opened my bag, the first thing that popped up was my dirty boxers but he seemed unfazed and kept digging around. He opened my camera pouch and saw that I had money in there and he ruffled through the bills but still didn't say anything. He also patted me down and at that point I couldn't tell if he was looking for something to use against me or if he was just curious to see if us foreigners had anything interesting. I still think it's the latter reason but I'll never know. The whole process took about 20 minutes of our time and eventually we were on our way without any problem. In the end, was a nice little vacation that probably would've been better than anything else I would've done over Thanksgiving break back home.

So as December has rolled in, there's now 2 more weeks till I leave Ghana. It honestly hasn't been on my mind that much and I don't know why. I feel like the excitement about leaving and seeing my family and friends back home isn't there, at least not yet. I still have final exams to worry about (as my first two are this coming Saturday) and the academic life here has been pretty frustrating. Classes here are so disorganized and inefficient it's hard to get an idea of what exactly we're learning in class. Then again, it's almost a joke to try and learn something since all professors want you to do is spit out everything s/he said in class word for word, so its not really like we're learning anything. To put it simply, it's like being in high school all over again instead of being in a university. There's no room for personal opinions or analysis, it's just pure memorization. We don't memorize the significance of something, we just need to know the definitions. That concept of learning killed me on one of my midterms but hopefully I'll learn from those mistakes and apply them towards the final to give the professors what they really want. I've heard that professors here tend to grade international students easier but I haven't seen that happen to me yet. Of course, I shouldn't be thinking that school here was going to be similar to how it is in the states, nor should I be banking on professors giving me star treatment, because nothing will be the same when you're on the other side of the globe. But it's still something I needed to vent about.
As my time in Ghana is coming to a close, I've started trying to process how I'm going to put my 5 months abroad into words because, as you can see from my posts, there's just SO much to talk about. I've also thought about how will I be able to reintegrate myself back into American society because I don't think it'll happen overnight. Being out of the country for 5 months is a long time and things change. It's something I'll go into more in depth when I come back home and reflect on my time here. But for now, wish me luck on my finals and I'll be back home in 3 weeks! And yes, I did mean 3 weeks instead of 2.