Today’s adventure, I mean clinic, took us to Parroquail Rural Flores, a conglomeration of 27 rural communities in the hills outside of Riobamba. When we arrived all we were offered for our clinic space was a large open and very well lit (by numerous windows) gymnasium. This was not going to bode well for doing exams. After some logistics and consternation, we finally built an exam space for Ray and me under two tents placed in a corner while initial screening and Cheryl’s team of opticians worked on the main gym floor. Then came the real problem. The natives in this area do not speak Spanish, but rather a local dialect called Quichua. So for those of us not fluent in Spanish it meant 2 translators for each patient: English to Spanish to Quichua and then back again. In spite of this I set a personal record having seen 153 patients today. We wound up booking over 100 cataract surgeries, several corneal surgeries, 2 lid procedures, and dispensed over 100 pair of glasses. Just another slow day at the office. You can see the transformation in the pictures, as well as a woman spinning her own yarn from her sheep, and Miss Riobamba making a thank you presentation to our team. A big thank you to Felipe, a Brazilian native and medical student from Upstate Medical School in NY who assisted me and acted as my primary translator. I wouldn’t have made it through without him. Plus we had a lot of fun and laughs along the way.
How exciting, beautiful and rewarding! Bless you and the group for doing this. You are probably as enriched by it, and you get to try some good food too! You look wonderful, healthy and happy.
thank you for sharing the gorgeous colorful photos, and answering the question – do they speak Spanish!