Manta Day 3 (16 May 2011)

Yesterday I left Manta to go to a town named Roca Fuerte.  Today I went to Monte Cristi.  This town is much closer since we must have traveled more than 40 minutes to get to Roca Fuerte yesterday.  Conversely this ride only took us a few minutes outside of Manta.  I had been there yesterday when we dropped off the other cadets on our way to Roca Fuerte.  The clinic itself had taken over the local school (built by CPO Labrada's Sea Bees three years ago).  The school is practically on top of Monte Cristi itself.  We could see the whole village from the playground area and the entrance.

Today I was with ''Family Practice'' which seemed to be mostly overflow from pediatrics and general medicine.  I am really excited to help people who really need it, but we spent a lot of time (like yesterday) talking to parents who had healthy kids and were just overly worried about colds and growing pains.  Whatever children come in with we send them away with vitamins and parasite treatments, so that could have something to do with the heavy traffic.  Today the really important cases that came in were an 18 year-old young man who had broken his arm a year ago that nearly had to be amputated.  The arm had grown crookedly but had a metal plate in it, so the doctors would not have been able to rebreak it.  We did refer him to a special clinic that will be held on the ship so that he can learn some exercises that might give him more function in his arm and maybe some more feeling in his hand.  Unfortunately it was already badly atrophed.

Another case was a young boy that had had a bone infection three years ago and was operated on, but now his foot was curling and twisting.  By then the X-ray machine was down so we also referred him to the orthopedic clinic on the boat.  The last serious case was girl with parasites that had moved from her stomach to elserwhere in her body. Uncomfortable, but  a fairly easy fix.

I was persona non grata in the radiology clinic when I asked a young man in Navy camos how his day was going.  Apparently he had heard that us cadets were staying in a hotel instead of on the ship.  I asked him if he was aware that the Navy uses ships when he joined, at which point he directed me to his rank that showed that he was, in fact, a marine.  I left it at that instead of informing him that he had, regardless of being a marine, joined the Navy...

But I really do feel like a jerk living the high life while everyone else crams on the boat.  Personally I'd rather live like everybody else, but our budget was much larger and our purpose was different so I guess they felt the need to give me a room with a beachside view,

in a hotel with a view of the whole bay.

I hope I didn't just kill any sympathy that anyone had for me being far from home.  As fun as this is I wish Ada were here to experience it all with me. BTW, the Comfort is that tiny white square at the very tip of the bay.