Sofifi Clinic

 

So sorry it has been so long the internet once again has been HORRIBLE, but is all good. These are some pictures from the actual town of Sofifi where we had our main clinic which was in the hospital there that consisted of like 5 rooms, and a single story.

Above was our team of doctors at the clinic, they were fun. We had one Australian guy and a British woman so it was cool and very global :D.

 

 

I took a picture of these women and then they wanted to take a picture with me so i came over and they like engulfed me, and were laughing a lot. It was kinda funny and they were sooo cute!

 

Cute Muslim family!

These kids were watching our ship come in and seemed to be pretty fascinated by it.

 

The dental part of the clinic where they pull teeth all day. It kinda gave me the weebeegebees so I tried to avoid going in there. The patients were tough though and I rarely heard screaming in there so it seemed to be doing more good than bad :P

 

These are the glasses pts got, it was pretty cool.

So apparently this area is pretty famous for spices (they are called the “spice” islands) and I saw this right out side our clinic so I thought how cool! I then went to ask what spice it was and they happily told me that it was cloves they use to flavor cigarettes, seeing that everyone smokes here I wasn’t surprised but it was unfortunate, ha.

So as i was taking the spice picture I looked over and saw this mom waving her little boys hand at us, they were sooo cute so i had to take a picture. Apparently people live just about anywhere here including right next to the clinic.

Rural town clinic (medcap)

So the first place we went was in a rural town about 1/2 hour outside of Sofifi. We did our medcap at a school and when we got there all the children were lined up outside. It was cute.

 

So in the medcaps (which is what they call them) they have 3 different services. They have medical (which is what I do), dental (where they basically pull teeth all day), and Optometry (where they can get glasses). So its pretty cool. Each patient can get 1 service, and if there are not many people there they can get in line again and get a different service. Since it was a smaller place, many of them got to do all three which is really cool.

These boys were all happy playing around, then i wanted to take a picture of them and they all got soo serous, ha.

These people were all watching the dentists, it was kinda funny.

Traveling to Sofifi

Hey to all those who are following my blog, i am finally back from Sofifi and had an AMAZING but very tiring time. In the five days i was there I saw 286 patients. With my busiest day seeing 70. It was good though. I saw lots of kids along with many old people when the kids ran out. Its amazing how kids are kids all over the world and how much they really are the same  no matter were you go. Anyways I have a million pictures, so Ill try to post the ones that are my favorite.

 

So we stayed on Australian LCHs that were little ships with about a 20 person crew. I’m not gonna lie when I heard we were going to stay with some Australian navy guys I was pretty excited (if you know what i mean ;) but when we got on there they were all really young and scrawny, so that was unfortunate I mean come on, navy men should be hot and buff right??, we apparently not in Australia…oh well they were really funny though so it was good entertainment, ha.

This was were i slept. It was called the conex box which was basically like an big freezer (it even had a freezer handle)  with 6 bunks in it, so it was nice and cozy and made my bunk on the Mercy look like a luxury bed; but hey it had a moderate AC, and was much better than the tent cots everyone else had to sleep in outside.

These are the tent cots, unfortunately they were not water proof which I thought was funny seeing its the navy and they should be like prepared for anything right? ha.

 

Inside the ship it was pretty small and cut. This is the eating place where they had 2 chefs and AMAZING food! We ate well that is for sure!

Tourism Indonesia style!

Yesterday I got the opportunity to do a liberty tour and experience the lovely tourism of Indonesia.  To get there we rode the military “band aid boat” (which is basically a combo of a speed boat/fishing boat) for about 30-40 minutes to the pier. We then hopped on this little wooden boat that looked like it was homemade with a little room with a toilet in it, it was kinda funny and I was like are you kidding me? I just laughed. We then rode for about ½ a hour over to an amazingly beautiful island called  Kakara Island.  Once there we spent the day snorkeling on this reef that was along the shore and exploring the island. It was amazingly awesome and like a little paradise. The locals that were there were soo nice, but there were only a few of them. It was a much appreciated stop.  It was funny because I have been on the ship sooo long, it was weird to walk on something that didn’t rock back and forth. At times I felt myself swaying, I must have looked like I was a little drunk or something..ha.

The boat we road to get to the island, luxurious i know!

The island, not to shabby ay?

 

Snorkeling!!!

Our lunch consisted of fried bananas and fried peanuts, and mmm coconut!

Yes I know it looks like a bug, but its actually a hermit crab. They had them everywhere!! There would be a pile of shells and 1/2 of them would be moving at one point, it was kinda funny and pretty cool.

 

Kids out on the reef trying to spear fish. At one point they were doing it in an area I was snorkeling and it was fun to watch them in the water.

 

The department of medical services, our medical team consisting of Drs, PAs, NPs, and surgeons. and yes I do kinda look like the odd one out don’t I? ha. 

 

 

After the fire drill on one of the rafts. They are contained in these little barrel things and then when they hit the water they immediately break open and turn into these huge rafts. They are pretty cool!

 

helicopter!

 

A ship that came and brought us supplies and fuel. This is the tubes they used to refuel. To get the supplies they helicopters came and got them from the ship. The waves were crazy huge in between the ships and it made the boat rock like crazy. It was pretty cool.

 

Yes this is our gourmet dining. I know your jealous. Ok maybe its not like this every day but who would have thought Navy food would have been pretty good? Sometimes I wish it wasn’t for my health's sake, ha, but I’m not complaining.

 

shirts we made for crossing the line, we had to wear it inside out and backwards.

it was blowing like crazy up there and then a gust of rain came and got our who back side wet, it was great!

 

AMAZING sunset!

 

Our lovely beds, my home is on the bottom.

 

playing cards in the mess deck, the place we go to experience our 3 major events of the day breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

Traveling fun

Hey so we are still traveling and traveling but things are going good. Unfortunately the internet has not been working much so sorry if your checking this like 5 times a day and there is nothing (because I KNOW you are ;). Anyways on Saturday we had apparently a an ancient ceremony called crossing the line which I guess you could say is a celebration for crossing the equator. In the ceremony the "pollywogs" or those who have never "crossed the line" go through an initiation to become a "shellback" which are those who have been initiated for crossing the line. This basically means that the shell backs get to make us do what ever they want…(and it is the Navy so I’m sure you can imagine..) To keep the story short we were woken up at 530 am and sent trough this "initiation" process. This consisted of crawling on our knees all over the place, going through jelly slimed areas and then having to do all sorts of exercises and lots and lots of pushups. We at breakfast but it was on the grown with our hands behind our back. I had a pancake with syrup, its was sticky but very tasty J. We then went up on the deck where they had tons of fire hoses and sprayed us with salt water and I mean a LOT of salt water while doing more pushups, having to jump in nasty pools and getting washed over with a dirty mop fully of jello. But I made it and now I am officially a shellback! And in all honesty it was pretty fun! (sorry they wouldn’t let us take any pictures of it, go figureL )

Other than that nothing too exciting has happened. We had a steal picnic on the flight deck of the ship, but a crazy rain storm came so it made things fun I suppose. As far as my work schedule goes I am really excited because I get to leave the ship and stay over night for 7 days in a remote area of Indonesia where they basically drop us off, we do care and they pick us up in 7 days so it should be cool. Unfortunately it is not until the 18th so I have to wait. Apparently there are a lot of providers and not too many medcaps (medical sites) so I can’t go out everyday. But not everyone gets to do an over night thing so I’m happy. To fill up my time I am also luckily enough to be able to go on a island tour on a remote island and go snorkeling so that should be cool. I am also going to do a 5 k run on one of the sights so that should be fun as well. Anyways Ill post some pictures when I can, hope life is going well in the real world.

 

the ship!

On the treetops of in a Singapore park

On the back of the ship next to a big machine gun (thats covered)

China town.

eating yummy food in Singapore

Joyful life at sea!

So life at sea has been joyful bliss! This has been my 3rd day out to sea and most of what life has been consisting of is walking up stairs, eating, going to classes, waking down stairs and then up stairs and then eating some more and then walking up more stairs. Its great. I sleep in a huge berthing women floor which consists of about 200 beds all stacked in a 3 level bunk bed fashion. I sleep on the bottom bunk which I am grateful for even if I basically have to roll in and out of it. If I can get some pictures to download, then I will post one. There is also only 5 showers for the whole berthing place, so it makes things exciting as well. There are also no blow driers or curling irons allowed. Meaning I wear my hair back all day long and basically my bangs do their own thing (if you can imagine). I also lost my face wash which was very saddening and spend most of the day sweating like crazy because of the lovely humidity and heat (yes there is supposedly air condition, but you know now that goes..). This has unfortunately as you can imagine hindered my joyful search for “you know who” a little I think, but I am holding out for an Indonesia man anyways! Besides most of the doctor dudes here are either old, married, or women, so its all good. Last night I tried a Zumba class for the first time and although my hips don’t have to ability to move like Shakera by any means, its way fun and entertaining to watch others so I think I will do it again.

Today we pull up to Jakarta to get translators and meds. However, we will not be getting off the ship until we hit our next spot in Indonesia on the 13th so it’s a little wait, but I’m excited! The people here are really cool and the LDS group is awesome! So many amazing people that just make me want to be a better person. Anyway I think that’s about it for now. Right now my clothes are hanging on top of the ship drying from premetherin treatment, so I don’t get bugs. Like I said before the internet is crazy slow so I will try to post some pictures, please bear with me. Talk to ya soon!

The joy of traveling and the AMAZING country of Singapore

Hey so this my very first time blogging to I hope all those who feel so inspired to read will take that into consideration and not be offended if I spell a word wrong or if things just don't make since. Also if your wanting to follow me on the trip I am warning you that the internet is on and off and usually runs really s-l-o-w so sorry if I can't post as much as I would like, but I'll do the best I can :).

So as many of you know I am on the Navy ship Mercy doing a humanitarian project with LDS charities. I left on July 1st from San Fran and skipped a day and arrived in Singapore on the 3rd. Here is the story. On Thursday I packed up all my luggage and happily left to airport. Unfortunately when I got there my luggage was too heavy. So I switched some things into my smaller bag which was a tight fit. But I wasn’t too worried so I checked in. Then just as I was abt to settle in, I got a call over the intercom telling me to come, so I came to the checkin and my bag had split! I didn’t know what to do so they had some duct tape and I taped it up like crazy and then I sent it on the way just about after having a heart attack. Anyways so I called mom and she told me she would bring a new duffel bag and she zoomed all the way to the airport and dropped it off for me just in the neck of time. Needless to say I was kinda paranoid about it and so I prayed and luckily when I got here everything was a ok! I was happy and felt blessed. Traveling wasn’t too bad, I slept through a lot of it luckily. We landed in Tiawan for our connecting flight and it was kinda cool I suppose, even though we were only in the airport. They had these flower, garden type places all over the place, I think it was to improve your carma or something. We then hopped on a plane to Singapore and arrived at noon. Luckily my bag was happily there and we went and drove to the ship. Afterwhich we sat through a long amount of orientation and then I had to lug my bag all the way down the stairs and considering I was already completely exhausted, basically I felt I was just about ready to die but luckily I made it and found my nice cozy bed on the bottom of a 3 bunk bed with about 2 feet between the floor and the next bed. It was great!

There was an early 4th of july party in this ball field that night but unfortunately we could not go to it because it was outside the base and we hadn’t gotten our tags yet. So we decided to watch the fireworks off the roof of the ship which we decided to do after we showered (which felt like heaven by the way) but unfortunately they were like 10 minutes early and we missed them which we were sad about but apparently it only lasted like 3 minutes anyway so it was all good and I really didn’t care too much because I was completely exhausted! I then went to bed and I was soo happy to sleep, even if it was in a little hole.

On Sunday we got up early and road a train to go to church. Their train system is amazing in Singapore and the city is very clean and the people are sooo extremely nice, always willing to help. The church was a pretty big church holding about 3 wards all at once starting at 9am. We went to one that was in English and it was really nice. Its was so wonderful to meet with the people, they were soo nice and the spirit was soo strong with them. Its cool that the church is the same even clear over in Singapore.

After church we all went our separate ways and a group of 8 of us went to go eat at a traditional Singapore food court. On our way we met a man who was going there as well and someone in our group talked to him and he showed us the way and surprisingly enough he bought us our food as well. We had this food called carrot cakes which had raddish and eggs and one had soy sauce and green peppers and I think something else but I can’t remember, anyways it was really good. We also had these green veggies in this really good spicy sauce. I really liked it, who would have thought Singapore food was soo good? Why hadn’t I discovered this before? Afterwards we decided to go on a hike at this huge rainforest park and since apparently it was kinda hard to get there our Singapore guy took us there and we rode by train and bus. The park was really cool and we saw monkeys and everything. There was even a part that we went on this suspension bridge over the trees and it was amazing. The only bad thing was, was that it was crazy humid and I sweated like crazy, I felt like I had just worked out and was sweating and it just wouldn’t stop. The trial was about 3 miles long in total and it was awesome. Afterwards we said good buy to our Singaporean man and headed over to china town. There, there was tons of stores and food marts and it was kinda crowded. I had this really good blueberry chocolate cake and I also bought a purple robe for the showers. They had all sorts of foods there though, and cheep stores. I think its because its kinda part of the black market…We then headed back to the ship to that was setting sail the next morning. Singapore was awesome and soo clean and nice. Its funny though how they have tons of rules there such as its illegal to chew gum or to spit. Also if you bring drugs into the country then you get capital punishment. So they are crazy strict, but amazingly nice people!