Tuesday, January 26, 2010

Second day at Blanchard




I needed to continue my training for the Paris Marathon in April so I had to resort to running around the compound numerous times to make up to 5 miles. I got really tired of running in circles, frightening a mother hen and her chicks. This reminded me of the time when I ran in the village of Maseno in Kenya and stepped on a chick walking along my path with its mother. Miraculously the chick got up and walked away unscathed after some grumbling noises made by the mother hen.

Only Susie and I ran the clinic, the rest of the crew went to Carrefour, the epicenter of the earthquake to assess the destruction and need. We decided to see 100 patients today and hoped that the triaging people would let us see the sicker patients first but it did not work out that way. Towards the end of the day, sicker patients who apparently had been waiting all day were finally noted by Gale and sent to the front to be seen. This created some small disturbance as temper flared because of the long wait for all concerned. We saw quite a number of malnourished kids, block injuries...

A young lady brought a baby who was the sole survivor of her family. Every one in her family perished in the collapsed home but her mother happened to send her to her next door neighbor for the afternoon. Was it fate? Another orphan added to the long list of orphans.

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