Art

I've never been big on art. My family is funny- my brother is an amazing artist who painted the mural at our high school (is it still there??) whereas my other brother has issues with stick figures. Luckily I have a semi artsy side but nothing crazy. But since coming to Bolivia, I took full advantage of affordable art classes, and started to paint.

Then comes Victor. I could never do him justice with an explanation. In the Bolivian world, he is another hard working totally middle class man. But to me he is one of my best friends, whether he'd like it or not haha. Grew up in what most would consider poverty, but he never realized it because he lived in a village without materialistic things and that's all he knew. The river was the place to play and wash clothes. No such thing as supermarkets or even a mercado/market, what the lower class use in the city for shopping. Instead, local middlemen just sell good out of their front porch basically. His mom and brother still live out there, but he has since moved to SC for opportunity with his wife and son. He works hard. When I'm there we chat about everything- what Harvard means to people, racism in Bolivia, how dance class is going, the things that annoy us and the things that make us happy.

A popular Brazilian artist replicated by Victor, Romero Britto

Anyways, as always whenever I talk about art I end up just talking about Victor. But I have all these pictures of cool things I now somewhat appreciate. Hope you can too : )

An oil of the landmark cathedral of Santa Cruz

A poster from a graphic art exhibit

A sculpture from a Japanese artist about
the post-Tsunami Japan emotions

A Stroll in Fog, replica of Afremov in acrylics, Emi Okamoto and Victor Villaroel
Victor kept telling me to add a lady under the umbrella, but we decided I will add his pair when he
has found the artist.  Til then, he'll just have to walk alone, enjoying the beauty around...

Living life

Santa Cruz has allowed me the chance to live. I am fortunate to have been born with a roof over my head and proper vaccinations and such, oh so much more in opportunities, and my zip code. I came to Santa Cruz on school funds to do scientific research, and that's what we are doing at a normal 40 hours/ week (a little less this time because its impossible to do stats and write a paper all day). And having some money (which goes a long way) and free time, I am able to really live my life.

My life here is everything I could ask of it. I will have to write them in separate posts, but here's some of the topics I wanna hit (I will write them out so I write about them).

Art
Academic challenge and growth
Spanish and culture
Fitness
Dance
Exploration

Camiri Camiri Camiri

The group, including Carlos the
Peruvian entomologist

So our project worked off of 2 sites for their congenital Chagas R01 (wrapping up now) and will try and restart the new cardiac R01 in both: Santa Cruz the huge city and Camiri. Camiri is a town in the dry region of the “Chaco” climate, basically a lowland desert bordering the Amazon where Chagas disease bugs are very prevalent. It was built on the oil industry, and is about 4 hours outside Santa Cruz on a 2-laned, 2-direction highway which supposedly has a name that no one knows.

Driving into the communities. Jackie later laughed "Did you
notice the fact you were drawing blood, and sitting on a log?"

For a different data set, we went down to help catch vinchucas (Chagas vectors) in the communities 2 hours outside Camiri, similar to last year. It’s a different land. Power lines run the road, on which we saw only 3 other cars all day, and we were stopped from going to some communities because of the rain. School children walking to and from lunch just gawked at us. The younger generations all speak Spanish, but most also speak another indigenous dialect (Guarani, Aymara, or Quechua, from Incans). We came to help draw blood, to then be used for stimulation assays to look at effects of people chronically bit by the bug; 1 in 1000 bites actually transmit the disease, but most all people have Chagas meaning they are bit quite a lot. Anyways it’s such an opportunity to see the simple but rich life people live out here, and I wanted to share. Heck, maybe someday you'll find my living out here with my mangy dogs and my piglets : )

The bathroom which the trufi (shared van) from Santa Cruz to Camiri stops at. The ride is about 4.5 hours for $7,
and Jackie and I bought out the row of 3 in the back so as not to squeeze. The bathroom costs 1Bs, or $0.20, and
comes with adequate amounts of folded toilet paper (flush with the water seen in the tub). At night, the speckled sky
here is absolutely stellar and out-of-this world : )

MIERCOLES!

If you have taken basic Spanish, you probably know it’s a day of the week (Wednesday, at that). So we were driving two hours into the communities on the dirt roads which had areas that were a little too muddy to risk.

MIERcoles!  Llovió mucho aca! our driver said. “Wednesday, it rained a lot here!” was the direct translation. Which was confusing because it was Wednesday and not raining, and rain from a week ago would have dried…

That’s when Jackie pointed out that Carlos and his family talk about Miércoles a lot like that. Instead of saying mierda, or “shit”, they switch it up at the last moment to say “Wednesday!”. Like saying “Shoot!” or something of the sorts.  Anyways, I think it’s very cute, and will certainly be talking about Wednesday a lot more : )

Match Day!

So after a year of applying to residencies, writing essays, getting letters of recommendation, flying around the country to visit 19 fantastic schools ranging from Seattle to San Diego to New Orleans to Boston... came Match Day.

To make sure each and every residency spot gets filled, there is a match system. Which means that each person makes a list of places they was to go, and each residency program makes a list of residents they would like (consisting of those 10-30% of applicants whom they invited to interview). Then it goes through an algorithm for 4 weeks, and everyone gets an envelope that says the name of their future residency (which is 3-7 years, depending on residency). So for me, I was looking for internal medicine residencies with a primary care program, hispanic population, good dating city, global health opportunities, and of course a rigorous training.

Our school hands out our envelopes at 12 pm on March 21. However, since we are in Bolivia, we get an email at 1 pm. Jackie and I went to the butterfly reserve/resort getaway outside of the city for the day with our friend Enzo. At 12 pm, Jackie began checking Facebook, and we squealed with joy as friends posted their happy futures online for us to see. At 12:55, Jackie got an email that let her know she was going to her #1 choice- Yale!  I wasn't ready.  My life comes in waves of huge changes. I sat for about 5 minutes just tearing up, knowing everything would change. Then I jumped in the pool, came out, dried my hands and checked my iPhone.  My assignment? Primary Care (part of internal medicine) at University of Pennsylvania! I was thrilled. My fear was replaced with relief and happiness. And then I had a freaking awesome day in Bolivia. Life isn't perfect, and I still have a long way to go to settling down one day. But things aren't terrible for the moment I suppose : ) 

Thanks to everyone for the love and support to get me this far. I'll need more of that to make it through intern year, but I know where to find it... Or do come visit Philly in the next three years!

Leaf cutter ants! It's like they hold up
signs saying "I'm here! Don't step on me!"

  

 

Steak dinner for 8 and a bottle of wine? $120
Great group to celebrate with? Wouldn't trade it for the world
Carlos, Jackie, Enzo, Anne, Vishal, Lulu, Emi, Leny

Steak... and in Bolivia,
it's free range!
(I'm a wanna-be-vegetarian!
... maybe starting in Philly?)

Happy Match Day!  Enzo finishing up med school here, Jackie off to Yale, and me off to UPenn!

Dengue

The Bolivians say "watch out for the
ones with striped legs", or Aedes
(this battle of mine was a lose-lose situation)

In the large room where most of the internal medicine male patients lay, a few nets dangle from the high ceilings (remnants of old European style hospital wards which utilized sunlight and air to treat tuberculosis). That's right, it's dengue season.

Dengue is carried by Aedes aegypti, the primary vector, seen here and recognizable by the stripes on its legs (which are surprisingly apparent while it's flying too). Fun fact, only female mosquitos bite as males don't need as much nutrition for reproduction. As well, Dr. Seuss started his career doing cartoon mosquitoes warning soldiers about malaria.  Back on track...

Anyways the Aedes mosquito often breeds in wet containers, and thus is associated with living in areas of poor trash disposal. It was found in Puerto Rico that broken septic containers can breed immature forms in rates of hundreds per day. The mosquitos live mainly in subtropical areas, and outbreaks have recently been seen in the Florida Keys.

Don't worry, even if I get dengue, I will likely survive. Most people get a mild illness including fever. The biggest risk comes from getting infected with the same serotype (of 4) twice, i.e. something to do with the immune reaction. There is no current vaccine. The risk is hemorraghic dengue, which for pimping you can use the tourniquet test as people can drop their platelets rapidly and fatally. As long as people are in the hospital monitored, they do fine. The main risk is letting people who live in the countryside go, as they may not have access to quick healthcare if their blood counts unexpectedly drop.

When an intern (our friend actually) fell sick with a fever (UTI), the head of medicine became concerned about dengue and the vector control in the hospital. So the next day, they announced the exterminators were coming. In the U.S. this would take about a week of entire staff cooperation, moving patients carefully from one ward to another in a well-orchestrated plan. Here? Just wheel the patients into the fresh air outside the ward, sit the interns next to them, and have everyone wait outside for a few hours enjoying the fresh air. It was quite nice : )

I sold my first painting today!

It was to Victor's friend and work partner, who sells Victor's work from a nicer shop (rather than Victor's workshop). He always comes in and jokes about buying my work too haha. I had a draft of a painting I didn't like, so I was fine to part with it for 5 Bs. He asked for a signature, so I charged 7 Bs in total.  That's an entire dollar for my first sale! 

Meet Jose, my first client! : )