Things I learned In India

Reflecting on the past 8 weeks I realize how much I've grown as a person while in India. I've met a ton of wonderful people and will miss being here. I am excited to be back home, but I am very thankful for this experience and for all the people who made it great. Here are some of the things that India has taught me:

• Honking while driving doesn't mean that you are mad at the person it just is more of a warning that you are there or there is something to look out for
• There are no such things as driving lanes and it is perfectly acceptable and routine to stop on the side of the road and pee when you need to
• Lizards won't hurt you even if they do come into your bed, neither will other bugs even if you would prefer they just stay outside
• It is probably not in your best interest to just nod yes in agreement to people when you feel uncomfortable or aren't exactly sure what they are saying since you really don't know what you are agreeing to 
• Being able to see babies on the ultrasound is an amazing experience
• Watching surgeries is possible if you make sure to eat a good breakfast, chew gum, and look away when you are feeling not quite right
• I am very thankful that I will not be having a baby in rural India 
• If you make an effort to ask questions and really try and get to know people you will be amazed at how much you learn
• Technology is a wonderful way to keep in touch with your loved ones at home and make it seem like you're not really as far away
• Washing machines are really great and I won't complain about doing laundry for at least a week when I get back home
• Indian food is actually pretty good once you get used to the spicyness 
• Indians are great at multi-tasking and seeing multiple patients at the same time while also maintaining multiple conversations
• Pravara does a wonderful job of using the resources that it has to the best of it's ability. There really is hardly any waste in any of the medical departments that we visited.
• Going outside of your comfort zone allows you to really learn more about yourself and what kind of person you really are.
• Indians really value family and the social structure of their families as well as marriage
• It is refreshing to have things done at a slower pace you can usually learn a lot more about others and yourself if you slow down and really take time to talk with them and aren't just worried about rushing off to your next appointment
• Indians are some of the sweetest people that I have ever met. They are all so very nice and welcoming and really made my experience.

Last week in India

Here is my recap of my last week in India.

Monday:
We went to Pravara Public School along with the group of interns from the west coast and did a workshop on what health is. A couple of the other interns (Nathan & Stephanie) planned the whole workshop so the rest of us just helped out. We broke into groups of 2 interns and about 6 students and had the students draw pictures about what health means to them and then present their posters to the rest of the group. It was interesting to learn about what they all thought health meant. A common theme was that laugher is the best medicine and an apple a day keeps the doctor away. I think almost all of the groups had those things on their posters. Nathan and Stephanie also gave a powerpoint presentation on health and what it means and we had some time to answer any questions that the students had before we played some games with them. It was a great break from our usual posting and was very nice to actually feel like we were doing something. Plus getting to hang out with kids always makes things better.
In the evening we then went to a salon and had mehndi done by a couple of women there. It took about 3 hours for the 5 of us to get it done on our arms and we really appreciated them staying late to do it and also chatting with us. They did a great job and each of us have a very unique design that will stay for a couple weeks and remind us of our time in India, plus it makes us feel like we got the full Indian experience.

Tuesday:
Today was a holiday for PMT. It was the founding day of the school so we didn't have any postings. It seems like the month of August is the time for holidays in India as this is the 3rd one that we have had. I spent most of the day working on projects that we have to do for our certificate of social medicine as well as for our rotation. I was actually pretty productive so that was good for me since I had been putting some of the stuff off for quite some time. We also went out to eat with Tanvi at a seafood restaurant that people had been telling us to go to. I am not a huge seafood fan, but the food was really good and we all ate way to much and also had a fun time taking some unattractive photos.

Wednesday:
We were posted in orthopedics. We observed the outpatient department and watched them interact with the patients and also got to see them put a cast on a man's leg. The professor also had us do a little drug research project about vitamin D and its use in rickets. We wrote up a short paper about vitamin D and gave it to him and he seemed really pleased with our work so that was nice.

Thursday:
We were posted in the tuberculosis department. We spent the morning with the medical officer and he took us to the wards and showed us the tb patients. I was very surprised to learn that all of the tb patients are in the wards with the rest of the patients. I expected that they would be separated since it is passed very easily through droplets. Then we went back to his office and learned a little more about tb, how they treat it, and then spent time just talking about the US.

Friday:
We did a presentation about our time in India to the staff at the Center for Social Medicine as well as the other interns. Then we said our goodbyes to everyone. Saguna invited us to her house and she gave us each a sari and blessed us as well. We also had to say goodbye to Tanvi, which was hard. We decided it would be a lot easier to leave India if the people weren't so nice and hospitable. At 4 pm we'll be headed to Mumbai and then start our travels back to the Des Moines through Munich and Chicago. I still can't believe that I was here for 8 weeks it was such an amazing experience and I will never forget it.

My group working hard on their poster

My second group presenting their poster

Out to eat at the seafood place

Friday Fives

This will be my last Friday Five post from India, which is really crazy. It's still hard to believe that I am leaving Loni today at 4 pm (India time) to start my traveling adventure back home to Iowa and will arrive in Des Moines Saturday at 7:40 pm as long as all of the flights are as scheduled. It's been a wonderful experience and over the next couple days I will post about my last week as well as what I learned from India as well as any other random thoughts that I have as I reflect on the 8 weeks I was here.

1. Spending this week hanging out with all of the wonderful people that I met in India. I spent more time this week talking with the interns from the west coast and so that was fun. I really enjoy talking with all of them. I also spent more time with Tanvi and enjoyed all of that time as well.
2. Getting mehndi done on Monday night and talking about India with the women who did an amazing job doing it for us.
3. Trying out new types of Indian food this week. We went to two new restaurants that we hadn't been before and had some really good food. We were wondering why we hadn't discovered them earlier.
4. Getting to go home. I really enjoyed my time in India, but I am also ready for the comforts of home.
5. The great opportunity that I had to do one of my rotations in India. I have met some amazing people, learned a lot about another culture, and have just enjoyed living in an unfamiliar place and discovering more about myself these past 8 weeks.

Week #7 Recap

Well it's crazy to think that I only have 1 more week here in India. My time in India went really fast at some moments and then other times it feels like I've been here forever and this is my life. It will be strange to re-adjust to life in the US since I've been gone for 8 weeks and haven't really dealt with a fast-paced world for awhile. I am looking forward to being back home though and seeing everyone again.

Monday:
I was posted in surgery again and since Courtney wasn't feeling well in the morning I went by myself. I talked with one of the professors in the outpatient department and we discussed some similarities and differences between the US and India in regards to surgery. He also asked me about my thoughts on India and what kinds of things that I have enjoyed about the country. It was a really good discussion and I enjoyed seeing his take on the Indian healthcare and education system. He seemed to think that India would be a lot further along if they did their own research instead of relying on other countries. He also thought the rural areas would be better off if there was a way to recruit more specialized surgeons and physicians to these areas.  I think having qualified healthcare providers in rural areas is something that all countries struggle with since they may not have the population to support these specializations or they may not have the lifestyle that these providers are looking for. I then went to the OT and watched a prostate resection surgery. It was an interesting surgery to watch and really didn't have any blood and there wasn't any cutting that I could see so I liked that a lot better. In the afternoon Courntey and I went to the outpatient department and talked with a few of the residents and professors, but mainly just observed what they were doing.

Tuesday and Wednesday:
We were posted in gynecology. We started out in the outpatient department and observed the prenatal check-ups that were happening. Once the professor that we were supposed to meet up with came she told us a little bit about prenatal care in India and then asked us what we were hoping to get out of the experience. We told her that we wanted to see both a natural birth and c-section and she said that a c-section was scheduled for this morning so we were able to go and see that. We got to the OT and changed into scrubs and then went in to watch the c-section. I started getting a cold this day and I couldn't breathe very well so this along with the crowded, hot room and the cutting I didn't last too long watching the surgery. Both Courtney and I were in and out of the room quite a bit since we were both feeling a little lightheaded. We were able to watch most of the beginning and saw her get an epidural, and then we got sprayed with some amniotic fluid, and the baby came out so quick I didn't even see it. But I did see it after it was in the doctors arms. When we decided we'd had enough we headed to the labor room and got there just in time to see a natural birth. The rest of the afternoon no one gave birth while we were sitting in the labor room so we decided to call it a day a little early. Wednesday we were back in the labor room and didn't see any births until the end of the day and then we saw 2 right in a row. I have decided that I'm very glad that I am not a women giving birth in India because while they are in active labor they are in a room with at least 7 beds and then once it is time to give birth they go into the delivery room where there are 3 beds. The doctors and nurses also don't seem to be super compassionate to these women and there is a lot of yelling at them while they are giving birth. The mom is also alone and isn't able to hold her baby after she gives birth so that seems a little sad to me. I am obviously just used to seeing how things are done in the US so that is why this seems different to me. I know that the privacy of things isn't possible in this area when there are so many women who are having babies.

Thursday:
It was India's Independence Day today so we woke up early and went to the flag raising ceremony and then we had the rest of the day off. I spent the day relaxing for the most part I watched a movie, did some journaling, played some card games, and did random other things that I can't really remember. It was nice to have the day off, but really felt like a Saturday so the rest of the week and weekend will be kind of strange.

Friday:
We headed to Pravara's Ayurveda College and Hospital about 100 km away. Ayuveda is India's traditional system of medicine and I wasn't very familiar with it before going to the college. We saw a lot of the crude herbs and minerals that they use to make the products and also learned some about how they are made. We also learned the basics and got an overview of this holistic approach to medicine. They gave us a tour of both the school and hospital and it was a very interesting visit. Since the tradition is carried out through texts in the local language it was a little hard for them at times to translate it into English for us, but overall they did a really good job of explaining things. Once we got back we decided to go to the temple on campus to watch the sunset. It was really pretty even though the sun was partly hidden behind the clouds.

She's lost so much weight since being in India

Pumped for the flag raising ceremony

Some of the herbs at the ayruveda college

We decided the cloud looks like a ruffles potato chip

Friday Fives

1. Getting a package from my parents. I wasn't sure if it would ever arrive, but it did on Monday so that was a good start to my week
2. Breakfast at the hotel on Sunday. It's the simple things like having waffles for breakfast that can really make your day. I think the meal that I miss most from home is breakfast since it is so different in India.
3. Seeing the taj mahal. It was really amazing and I'm still just in awe that people were able to build that all by hand.
4. Chatting with Tanvi  in Courtney's room on Tuesday night. I just love when you can make friends and can talk about random things for hours on end and not even realize how much time went by. I think it's great that no matter what country I am in I can always find new friends.
5. Seeing the miracle of birth-getting to see 3 natural births and 1 c-section was truly amazing. Even though I was slightly grossed out by it all. It is still something that is very neat to see and so amazing that there is now a tiny baby that I watched come into the world. 

Weekend Trip to New Delhi and Agra

Friday was a holiday in India so we weren't posted anywhere and so we decided to use this extra day to take a trip to New Delhi so we could visit Agra and the taj mahal. Friday we drove to Aurangabad and then flew to New Delhi where our hotel picked us up at the airport and we checked in and went right to bed since we had to get up early to drive to Agra to see the taj mahal. Our hotel was really nice and the beds were soo comfortable that we didn't want to get up the next day, but we did. It was about a 3-4 hour bus ride to Agra where we picked up our tour guide and headed to the taj mahal.

The taj mahal was amazing-all of the intricate details are so awesome to see. I am still amazed that people 400 years ago were able to do all of it by hand. I can't even imagine building something like that today with the technology that we had. Our tour guide was very good and told us the history of the taj mahal and also helped direct us to where we needed to go since there were so many people there. We joked that it would stink to have been the 1st or 2nd wife since he didn't build anything for them. I am very glad that we decided to take a weekend trip to see the taj mahal even if it was a little crammed in because it is truly that amazing and now I can say that I've seen one of the 7 wonders of the world. (Along with being able to say that I've seen one of the 7 natural wonders of the world when I went to Victoria Falls on the Zambia/Zimbabwe border).

After the taj mahal we visited a marble museum shop place where they showed us how they would have inlaid all of the stones into the marble and then had a shop for us to buy things if we wanted. We also went to a couple more touristy shops and bought some souvenirs to take back with us. Most of the shops we went to didn't do too much bartering so that was a little disappointing to us since we were hoping to do more of that.

We visited the Agra Fort where the family lived and also where the king was imprisoned by his son where there is also a view of the taj mahal. The fort was really neat and since it was made of the red marble there were paintings on some of the walls since the stones don't work to inlay on it. After the fort we headed back to New Delhi, which took some time since the roads were really crowded in Agra.

Sunday morning we slept in a little and had breakfast at our hotel which was amazing. I ate a waffle, omelet, and had some yogurt. It was so nice to have a waffle since I've been craving one for awhile. After checking out of our hotel we road a rickshaw to a downtown area of New Delhi and walked around a bit looking for some shops. Then we had some locals help us out and tell us where to go to buy handicrafts and also insisted that it wasn't safe for us to walk there, but that we needed to take a rickshaw so we did as we were told. We were glad that we listened to their advice since it would have been a long walk and we probably wouldn't have found the shop. We bought some more souvenirs here and then headed back to Cannaught Place and walked around and went into a few stores before we ate lunch at McDonalds. I had fries, a mcchicken, and a mcflurry and it was wonderful to have that little taste of America. Then we headed on the metro and went to the airport where we flew back.

It was a quick little trip to the city, but I really enjoyed it and am glad that we decided to go. It was really nice to be in a city again and have so much happening around. I think I could have spent at least a week in New Delhi looking at all of the sites to see and wandering around. Maybe someday I'll go back and really enjoy more of the city. I took quite a few pictures while there and have posted some of them to facebook, but I'll post a few more here. If you'd like to see even more let me know sometime and I can show them to you!

Eating out before we got on the plane

Riding the bus from the plane to the airport

Entrance to the taj mahal

Taj mahal

Our tour guide Raj

Agra Fort

Riding the metro back to the airport

Friday Fives

It's crazy to me that this is the end of my 6th week in India and there are only 2 more weeks to go. It has gone really slow at times and really fast at others. I'm sure the next couple weeks will go pretty fast until the journey home when I just want to be there and traveling will take so long. Well anyway here are my Friday fives:

1. Getting my package from Chris. I had been waiting patiently for a couple of weeks for it to come and it finally did on Thursday so I was pretty excited about that. (I'm still waiting on the one my parents sent so we'll see when that gets here)
2. Having lunch with the pharmacology guys talking with them about America and India
3. Being posted in family medicine and actually having people talk to us and really explain what they were doing. I felt like I learned quite a bit from the doctor and interns in this department
4. Hanging out with Tanvi on both Saturday and Sunday night. She is really awesome and I love hearing about her life and talking with her. Courtney and I also made her a collage one night so it was fun to do.
5. Dinner on Tuesday with all of the international students. It was great just to all be together and enjoy trying out some Indian food that we hadn't had before.

Week 6 Update

The internet has been down the past couple of days so I haven't been able to post any updates, but it's back to working now for the moment so I can. Here is an update of the things that I have been up to the past few days:

Monday:
We were posted in the family medicine department. This was probably one of my favorite departments because the interns and doctor really took time to explain what they were looking for with each patient as well as what they thought the patient had and the treatment options for them. It was also apparent that the doctor really cared about each of the patients that he saw. He took time to really examine each of them and talk with them about what was going on, which is something that I haven't seen in all of the department. He also talked with us about different diseases, medications, and health care in general. He was very interesting to talk with and I wish that we would have been posted longer than just the 1 day and am hopeful that we may fit another visit into our schedule.

Tuesday:
Today we were posted in general medicine and so we started off the day by going on rounds. This was an ok experience, but they really didn't talk to us much about any of the patients so it felt like we were really just following a group around like lost puppies. We found out that a lot of the general medicine patients are in the hospital for things like organophosphate poisonings, snake bites, and things like this. In the afternoon we were in the outpatient department for a little bit and just observed the interactions between the residents and the patients. We also spent some time in meetings. In the middle of our day all of the international students met with staff from CSM as well as the Vice Chancellor of Pravara to give feedback on how things were going. Then in the afternoon we went to CSM for Ben's presentation on his time at Pravara since it was his last day. It was really fun to listen to him give his presentation and see his view on how things went. It seems like his time here was really short even though he was here for 4 weeks, and I wish I would have gotten to know him a little better. In the evening we were invited to the guest house with the staff from CSM as well as the vice chancellor for a meal. It was outside and had multiple courses. The food was really good and I ate way too much. It was also great to chat with the students from the other universities and get to know them all a little more.

Wednesday:
Today we went to a rural area nearby called Bhandardara where we visited 2 rural health centers in the area and a mobile clinic. We talked with the staff at each of these locations about the types of patients that they typically see and got tours of the facilities. The staff were all great and really seemed to care about the patients that they saw. The patients that are mainly served by these locations are tribal people and people that are very poor and don't have a lot of access to health care. I was really impressed with all of the things that they are able to do at these sites with limited resources. They really make the most of what they are given and really don't waste much. At one of the clinics we made friends with a dog that Courtney named Bill. He followed us around the village and even followed our car for a bit when we left. I also made friends with a little boy and got him to smile at me as well as play with my watch and look at me without crying so I'm making some progress with the small children. The area that we went to was also really scenic and was surrounded by mountains so it was really pretty as we drove around. On our way back we were also able to stop at the dam that is nearby and take pictures around it after doing a little hike in my sandals.

Tomorrow I'm posted in surgery and then on Friday we are headed to New Delhi to go see the area as well as the taj mahal so I'm pretty excited about that.

Dinner on Tuesday night

It was a red top black leggings day

With Bill (the dog)

My new bff

Making Friends

We have actually started to make some friends from the departments that we have been in so far and this weekend we had the chance to hang out with some of them and had a lot of fun.

On Saturday we went over to one of the professors from the pharmacology departments house and had mutton biryani. It is a traditional Indian dish made of spices, rice, and lamb. It takes about a day to make and they special order it from a person in Loni. When Courtney and I were in the pharmacology department the guys were appalled that we hadn't eaten it yet or even heard of it before so they said that we all had to eat it sometime. It was really good, probably one of my favorite things that we've eaten so far in India. It was quite spicy so it was best when we mixed it with some curd (a sour cream/yogurt type thing) and it actually ended up tasting very similar to a chipotle burrito bowl (which I have been craving recently) so that was really good.

We ended up just sitting at his house and talking for quite some time about a lot of random topics. One of the Indian guys knows quite a bit about America so we talked about America for quite a while. I think he knows more about America then we do, which is fine. We all also just joked around for awhile and they made fun of us for a variety of things. It was a great afternoon and I am so glad that they invited us over and made sure that we had this traditional Indian dish.

Saturday evening Courtney, Jill, and I went over to one of the ophthalmology resident's (Tanvi) room and talked with her for quite some time. It was really nice of her to invite us over and just chat about life with her. We learned more about India and the marriage customs as she is engaged to be married in January as well as her plans for after she is done with her residencies. She is a really awesome person to talk with so we had a great time just having some girl time.

Sunday night all of us went back to Tanvi's room and we brought pizza from the London Twist and she made us pasta. The pasta was so good especially since we haven't had any while we've been here. We spent a few hours in her room just chatting again and talking about all sorts of random things. It was a really great evening and so I hope that we continue to hang out with her during our remaining time because she is so sweet and just an amazing person to talk with.

What the biryani looked like 

Pasta and pizza