We have internet here, obviously, or you wouldn't be reading this (actually I don't have it right now for some reason).
So, we arrived in A Luoi yesterday, early evening. We are staying at a Vietnam guest house. Now, let me just tell you about a Vietnamese guest house... Ok, imagine a 3 store townhouse mixed with a Motel 8. On the bottom floor is an open room with a front desk/bar, stair case, and about 10 tables (which make up a restaurant). If you choose to go up the stairs you will enter into the "guest house" part. The top to floors are laid out the same. A hall with 5 bedrooms, 2 on one side and 3 on the other. When you arrive at the door to your room and put the key in, you have to give the door a pretty sturdy shake for the door to come unlocked. At this point if you walk into the room to fast you will hit the other wall. The rooms are, how do you say, simple, possibly a little dirty (as in sleep with your whole body covered), and with a chance of some type of fungus. Two twin beds are crammed into this "quaint" little space. The beds are lets just say there. They have only a fitted sheet with a "baby making" fleece blanket folded at the end. There is no air condition but the fan will turn the room into a ice box (if thats any indication of the size of the room). There is a bathroom, I mean shower, I mean bathroom. Um, well, it's a 4 foot by 6 foot room with a toilet, sink (that drains to into the floor), mirror, towel rack, and shower head; call it what you want. So, when you take a shower you have to remove any thing you don't want to get wet including the toilet paper. And when you get finished everything is wet (including the toilet seat). Oh, and another thing, the toilet paper roll is probably half the size of American rolls. I mean I'm not saying that Americans have fat butts but the Vietnamese just don't require as much tp.
After dinner last night Me, Jb, Michael, Debbie (psycho roommate), Steve (deranged triage leader), and Lou (ragged out pharmacy pirate) went out with the college translators. They took us to do none other than karaoke. Now, here, in A Loui when you go out for karaoke you go this place that is once again very similar to a Motel 8, but one story. You went into this 12' by 12' room that had a plastic "leather" couch that was fallen to pieces, a little tv, a disco ball, two speakers, and two microphones. They even had a book full of english songs you could choose from (if you were born in 1934 they would have been your college jams). We stayed there for a good 2hrs and then returned "home".
Today was the first day of clinic for this place. There were a lot of old people, a lot of little babies and a few in between. The people didn't seem to be as sick. We did however still see over 200 patients. During our stay in A Loui for lunch and dinner we will eat at the same restaurant every day. Hopefully by the end of the trip they will realize that we don't particularly care for things that have bones sticking out or isn't completely cooked. Dinner tonight was the first time in the past 4 meals that I didn't just eat rice, it was really good. Fried rice, french fries, veggies, and steak bites; about as American as they could get it. Have I mentioned that the coffee is amazing., well it is.
Tomorrow will be the last day in this clinic. We will move to another clinic, just down the street always for 2 days. Then on Tuesday we will go to the Furama for the final days.
** Lou & Steve are actually way cool people.
No comments:
Post a Comment