Recap: Beginning of March

It's been a month now since I've posted, so I thought it is bout time that I update you all!  The weekend before my birthday (which is February 28), the group of medical residents at the hospital switched.  They spend eight weeks in Pedro then eight weeks in Quito.  The U.S. American medical student also left on the 29th.  Because of these changes, the first couple weeks of March were rather boring and lonely!  I was readjusting to making new friends in the new group of residents--who are busy and don't necessarily have time to hang out and make new friends.  I mean really, they're doctors.  They work at least 12 hours a day.  I also kicked off March with a large grasshopper chirping and flying around my room as I tried to fall asleep with the sheet over my head.  It landed next to my pillow, and I promptly got it out of my room using a broom.  When I first saw this creature in my room I thought it was an alien.

As far as my project, things were also moving slowly.  I'd been practicing interview questions with diabetic patients.  However, the method for doing this was waiting in the consultation waiting room for hours; if a doctor had a diabetic patient that came in that day, they would introduce the patient to me and I would interview them.  Some days there would be no patients.  Thankfully I had a book to read (I recommend Half the Sky by Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn for anyone interested in global women's issues).  Needless to say, this waiting around got to be rather demotivating and frustrating, especially thinking that I was simply testing questions...I hadn't even begun officially conducting interviews and collecting data.  Unfortunately my on-site supervisor had also been on vacation, so I was also waiting around to get feedback from him.  It was a long first two weeks of March!

Where I hang out at the hospital, the cafeteria.

The waiting room.  Entrance to the right, consultation rooms straight ahead, reception to the left.

On the bright side, my free time and lack of friends allowed me to do some cooking (always a stress-reliever) and go to the gym more often.  The gym has an odd variety of weight machines and non-electrically-powered treadmill and elliptical (one of each).  I use the weights a bit, but the main reason I go is for the aerobic dance class.  The first class I went to was a mix of aerobics and salsa/merengue.  Now we mostly dance to salsa, merengue, cumbia, and little reggaeton and other traditional Ecuadorian songs.  It's not very organized and I can't say the workouts are consistent or targeting specific muscle groups or flexibility, etc...but my salsa dancing has definitely improved!

A few other highlights:
*I had an "admirer" who works at a little grocery store in town.  He asked me to dinner one day and I said no, so now he no longer gives me roses when he sees me.

*On March 5th I went to Quito to visit a friend in the previous group of residents.  I accompanied him to the doctors' class at Pontificia Universidad Catolica del Ecuador (PUCE).  It was interesting sitting in on the class and even more awesome to wander around campus a bit!  It had been a long time since I'd seen so many students my own age; it would be very fun to be a part of the ambiance of the undergrad campus and student body.  After the class, my friend and I drove up the panecillo (which means cupcake), the man-made hill in the center of the city, atop which is a statue of the Virgin of Guadalupe.  We climbed up the statue and had some great views of both north and south Quito.  I didn't bring my camera, not expecting a touristy excursion.  Bummer.  (The background of this blog is actually the panecillo, though, a picture I took in June, 2011 from a huge cathedral in the historic part of Quito.)

*The following weekend, March 11, one of the residents asked me if I wanted to go with her to visit her family in Santo Domingo.  (I think she overheard me telling the dentist that the next time he goes dancing with the women who work in the lab, he needs to invite me because I'm so bored in Pedro.)  It was really nice to do something different and I really enjoyed meeting her family--they were so friendly and generous.  Sunday at her home was definitely "family time," so I spent a lot of time playing with a little cousin (or nephew, I'm sure how they were all related...).  We also visited the farm where her parents now live.  Her 15-year-old niece showed me around, not knowing that I grew up on a farm as she pointed out things like: "this is where the cows eat," "this is where the cows poop," "we put the poop in the fields because it's good for the soil."  I thought of all those summers our farm/the countryside smelled like turkey shit.  But the niece and her father also pointed out things that were very new to me, like: "these are coffee trees," "the red seed pods are the ripe ones," "this is a pepper plant, you harvest the seeds and grind them to make black pepper."  It was borderline torrential down pour as we walked around the farm, so no pictures taken!

*I finally went dancing with the medical residents (the second and third years) and also met some other hospital staff that joined us at the discoteca.  It was a fun night!