Orientation

Met Mr Gonzalo. An awesomely pleasant gentleman (which you can hardly find at this day and age). He's our program coordinator and basically showed us round the area we will be needing to know and bla. He also gave us a lecture on

Cultural Competency and Global Health

. For the former, I think cultural competence has a lot to do with the ability to communicate with people from different parts of the world and RESPECTING their way of life(AND THINKING). Its kinda like EQ which, I think I have....or so ppl tell me...In La Paz, Mr Gonazalo said nobody cares about ethnicity... whether you're Gringo (Ang mohs for the singaporeans reading this.. or just basically, whites), Chinese or Indian. Everyone adapts to a common culture, relates and develops from there. Apparently, Bolivia has a very high Human Development Index? and the country doesn't have to be rich to attain this. Eg, The Arabs are filthy rich cause of their natual resources..oil.. but they are not the most developed country... Anyway back to La Paz, working in the medical scene, I must understand that there are certain beliefs amongst the ppl here because of its tradition. And these beliefs clashes with modern medicine. What these beliefs are? Beats me.. must be some... "I am sick and I will drink coca tea and pray to the sun god" kinda thing. LOL. So having said that, that is a current problem doctors now face in Bolivia. The difficulty of integrating traditions, beliefs and modern medicine. I think this problem will eventually evaporate after more constructive development in Bolivia. How long will it take? I have no idea. No one has.

After lunch, a lovely meal prepared by Elizabeth and her maids, Karl, Smitha, Ann Marie and i "trekked" (it was very far for me... u know me.... walking kills me...) to the language school- Central Boliviano Academy to take a Spanish placement test.. which I clearly failed. LOL. Actually all the MCQs were ok... I could still eenie meenie it out.. but then there was the written section.. lets just put it this way.. opps? haha. After the test, we went for a wee walk around that left me panting... Kerry and Roz would totally call me a weakly..haa

In the evening, we met Dra. Uribe. She's lovely. She gave us a lecture on the most common problem among children in La Paz- Congenital Dislocation and Developmental Dysplasia de la cadera(of the hip). We learnt the cause of the problem, how to diagnose the problem, treatments (depending on the severity)-harnesses, metal rods, etc... However, all she spoke was in SPANISH. Thank goodness I've done the lower limbs. So I understood quite a bit...ish...

Anyway, everyone I met so far is soo nice. All the participants, the mentors... the ppl in La Paz... absolute gift from God. So thankful to have gotten this lucky so far. Alas, some luck has appeared in 2011. Hope it stays this way!

Ciao amigos y madre...