Hello my beloved friends and family -
Greetings from the Himalayas! It's Saturday afternoon, and the sun is lazily stretching across the walls as I sit on a bright Tibetan cushion in our living room. I've finally grown used to the steady stream of horns and diesel engines roaring outside our window on the winding road separating our apartment from our hospital. If I squint, I can see the gentleman in room 2, here for weeks for his poor infected tubercular lungs.... we had to place a chest tube today, and now are worried about complications.... I never really feel separate from the patients here, but for some reason, it doesn't feel suffocating like it would at home. I just want him to get better.
.
I have been trying to find the time to write home ever since we arrived 17 days ago, but it's been a whirlwind since we set foot. It took a saucy little GI bug this morning to keep me home from the hospital long enough to sit down and write -- I was supposed to be on call this morning, but turns out I need to be within 10 feet of a bathroom (I'll spare details), so my blessed colleague is covering. Ah, India...
But, oh, it is so beautiful here. In so many ways. Part of what has kept me from writing is the sheer futility of it -- I wish I could capture the beauty of these people, this land, this history, and send a little piece home to each of you. Instead, I'll send some little impressions, a few photos, and a promise to share more over tea and dinners when I'm home again, all too soon.
Matthew and I are in Dharamsala, India -- the very northern tip of the country, much closer to Pakistan than my mother would prefer. This is the home of the Tibetan government-in-exile, as well as his Holiness the Dalai Lama, and has been ever since his escape from Tibet in 1959. We are working in the Delek Hospital, which is the primary hospital serving the Tibetan community here. So it often takes a pinch (or a GI bug) for me to remember that I'm actually in India, not Tibet. I'm surrounded by Tibetans all day -- Tibetan food (delicious), Tibetan language, Tibetan patients, Tibetan flags, music, prayers, dogs (obese and lazy... very loved). Even the mountains echo the photos of Lhasa -- it's no wonder the Dalai Lama felt at home here.
We're quite busy at the hospital, but the work is good, so I rarely feel tired. Delek seems to offer the rare perfect balance for us young idealistic physicians -- a vulnerable, needy, and endlessly grateful patient population combined with remarkably adequate resources and dedicated, compassionate staff. All it was missing were a couple of extra doctors, and we gladly fit the bill. We alternate between covering clinic vs. inpatient, and take call every 2-4 nights. When I'm the clinic doc, I'll see anywhere from 30-50 patients in a half-day, mainly colds and coughs (always worried about TB), but also an exciting little epidemic of Dengue fever, plenty of abscesses, a few broken bones, tons of travelers diarrhea, and a sprinkling of chronic disease. It's actually quite fun. As the inpatient doc, we manage lots of Dengue, lots of TB complications, some cellulitis/abscesses, heart failure, pancreatitis..... and then do all of the procedures drummed up by the clinic. There is a delivery room, but we have yet to see a pregnant woman, so no babies yet. Our patients are probably about 85% Tibetan, 10% Westerner travelers, and 5% Indian.
It is difficult to avoid comparing the tone of the work here to our recent work in South Sudan, and honestly, to our own home county hospital... what a contrast..... fascinating to consider just what goes into creating the morale of a workplace. Perhaps not surprisingly, for anyone who knows Tibetan culture, there is a pervasive sense of peaceful devotion and mission that stretches from the head physician to the Indian cleaning ladies, who fiendishly scrub every corner of every room all day long, hanging out of 3rd story windows in their bare feet to reach the last inch of the faded glass, grinning when they see you and bowing a "namaste" in greeting. It's lovely and humbling and teaching me something important, something I need to learn, something about self-sustainability in this ever-demanding and ever-rewarding profession.
Well, I'm sure this is long enough to have lost everyone's attention by now, and it's getting close to dinner time, so I'll wrap it up. Matthew and I are going to cook up some pasta and applesauce for my poor belly, and maybe take a walk to get my mountain-fix for the day. We're both doing very well -- excited about our work here, and finding some much-needed space for considering what comes next. And tomorrow is Sunday, so we get to make pancakes, which makes us very happy (see below):
I'm hoping to find some more time in the upcoming weeks to send some stories from the hospital and our adventures outside. We're attending a public teaching by the Dalai Lama next week -- I am counting the days.
I love you all dearly, and am thinking of you every day. Travel is such a blessing; I am struck by the same message that resonates every time I venture away -- I am so blessed, and so grateful for my people.
With great love,
Kali
Greetings from the Himalayas! It's Saturday afternoon, and the sun is lazily stretching across the walls as I sit on a bright Tibetan cushion in our living room. I've finally grown used to the steady stream of horns and diesel engines roaring outside our window on the winding road separating our apartment from our hospital. If I squint, I can see the gentleman in room 2, here for weeks for his poor infected tubercular lungs.... we had to place a chest tube today, and now are worried about complications.... I never really feel separate from the patients here, but for some reason, it doesn't feel suffocating like it would at home. I just want him to get better.
I have been trying to find the time to write home ever since we arrived 17 days ago, but it's been a whirlwind since we set foot. It took a saucy little GI bug this morning to keep me home from the hospital long enough to sit down and write -- I was supposed to be on call this morning, but turns out I need to be within 10 feet of a bathroom (I'll spare details), so my blessed colleague is covering. Ah, India...
But, oh, it is so beautiful here. In so many ways. Part of what has kept me from writing is the sheer futility of it -- I wish I could capture the beauty of these people, this land, this history, and send a little piece home to each of you. Instead, I'll send some little impressions, a few photos, and a promise to share more over tea and dinners when I'm home again, all too soon.
Matthew and I are in Dharamsala, India -- the very northern tip of the country, much closer to Pakistan than my mother would prefer. This is the home of the Tibetan government-in-exile, as well as his Holiness the Dalai Lama, and has been ever since his escape from Tibet in 1959. We are working in the Delek Hospital, which is the primary hospital serving the Tibetan community here. So it often takes a pinch (or a GI bug) for me to remember that I'm actually in India, not Tibet. I'm surrounded by Tibetans all day -- Tibetan food (delicious), Tibetan language, Tibetan patients, Tibetan flags, music, prayers, dogs (obese and lazy... very loved). Even the mountains echo the photos of Lhasa -- it's no wonder the Dalai Lama felt at home here.
We're quite busy at the hospital, but the work is good, so I rarely feel tired. Delek seems to offer the rare perfect balance for us young idealistic physicians -- a vulnerable, needy, and endlessly grateful patient population combined with remarkably adequate resources and dedicated, compassionate staff. All it was missing were a couple of extra doctors, and we gladly fit the bill. We alternate between covering clinic vs. inpatient, and take call every 2-4 nights. When I'm the clinic doc, I'll see anywhere from 30-50 patients in a half-day, mainly colds and coughs (always worried about TB), but also an exciting little epidemic of Dengue fever, plenty of abscesses, a few broken bones, tons of travelers diarrhea, and a sprinkling of chronic disease. It's actually quite fun. As the inpatient doc, we manage lots of Dengue, lots of TB complications, some cellulitis/abscesses, heart failure, pancreatitis..... and then do all of the procedures drummed up by the clinic. There is a delivery room, but we have yet to see a pregnant woman, so no babies yet. Our patients are probably about 85% Tibetan, 10% Westerner travelers, and 5% Indian.
It is difficult to avoid comparing the tone of the work here to our recent work in South Sudan, and honestly, to our own home county hospital... what a contrast..... fascinating to consider just what goes into creating the morale of a workplace. Perhaps not surprisingly, for anyone who knows Tibetan culture, there is a pervasive sense of peaceful devotion and mission that stretches from the head physician to the Indian cleaning ladies, who fiendishly scrub every corner of every room all day long, hanging out of 3rd story windows in their bare feet to reach the last inch of the faded glass, grinning when they see you and bowing a "namaste" in greeting. It's lovely and humbling and teaching me something important, something I need to learn, something about self-sustainability in this ever-demanding and ever-rewarding profession.
Well, I'm sure this is long enough to have lost everyone's attention by now, and it's getting close to dinner time, so I'll wrap it up. Matthew and I are going to cook up some pasta and applesauce for my poor belly, and maybe take a walk to get my mountain-fix for the day. We're both doing very well -- excited about our work here, and finding some much-needed space for considering what comes next. And tomorrow is Sunday, so we get to make pancakes, which makes us very happy (see below):
I'm hoping to find some more time in the upcoming weeks to send some stories from the hospital and our adventures outside. We're attending a public teaching by the Dalai Lama next week -- I am counting the days.
I love you all dearly, and am thinking of you every day. Travel is such a blessing; I am struck by the same message that resonates every time I venture away -- I am so blessed, and so grateful for my people.
With great love,
Kali
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