That week we were in the office again. I had already done everything I could do to help out with the text portion of the annual report, so my time was spent either shadowing the doctor in the clinic upstairs or surfing facebook in the office. Shalini, unfortunately, was still working on the layout of the report, which meant she was constantly busy changing pages according to Dr. Martin’s daily edits.
Shadowing Dr. Shamilla was great. She’s worked for Asha for over a decade so she has a relationship with many of her patients and is extremely familiar with their situations and the health challenges they face. Though the patient visits were conducted in Hindi, the doctor was great about explaining what was going on.
One thing that struck me was how many patients visited the clinic each day, often close to 50 in the space of 4 hours. Of necessity, each visit was quite short. We couldn’t help but wonder with these kinds of constraints how thorough a health evaluation was possible. Many diagnostic tests are expensive or must be done off-site, so the tendency in the slum clinics is to prescribe rather than performing a thorough diagnosis. However, this is not to criticize Asha in anyway: we understand the financial and personnel constraints that make more extensive testing impossible for the time being.
Another aspect which was noteworthy was the similarity of the problems which many of the patients experienced, many of them direct consequences of their standard of living. Antenatal care was the most common reason for slum dwellers to visit the clinic. Other common ailments were pain in the abdomen assumed to be kidney stones, severe asthma, and open wounds that needed cleaning and bandaging. Contraception consultations were also very popular. While shadowing the doctor underlined all the progress Asha has made over the past few decades, it also highlighted the ongoing challenges facing Delhi’s slum communities.
We also went back to Mayapuri for the last time to say goodbye to the kids and staff. Traci and the other ladies who work there gave us little farewell gifts and had bought cookies and chips for us, which we were so touched by. Shalini handed out all the Harvard and Canadian stickers and pencils that she had brought from home, which the kids went wild over (literally). When we finally had to leave, saying goodbye was very difficult. We have gotten to know many of them very well over the past weeks, and they have given us such hope about what is possible in the future. Throughout our experience, we have continuously been amazed by the strength and joy we have found in Mayapuri. We wish all of them nothing but the best, and our thoughts will be with them often in the years to come.
Monday night we saw the Lotus Temple, which was one of the most beautiful structures we've seen in India, offset even more by the huge park around it with actual GREENERY. It is Baha'i temple and welcomes people of any faith to worship there; the whole place was wonderfully serene.
On Tuesday, we went to Punjabi by Nature, a very well-known and upscale restaurant with supposedly the best Indian cuisine. It lived up to its reputation. The food was absolutely amazing and we all ate until our stomachs hurt.
Wednesday night, Shalini, Alex, and I had Paul, his wife, and Felix over for dinner. I left work early (I didn’t have anything to do anyway) to go home and start prepping for our feast. Shalini made a few wonderful Indian dishes including chicken and spinach curry and dahl, along with raita, parathas, and rice. I contributed the appetizer, bruscetta, and Alex made a delicious benafi pie for dessert. It was so nice to have a chance to have our coworkers over, and just hang out with Paul and Felix before we left. We’re really going to miss them!
Thursday night we went with Michelle into Old Delhi (about time!) and saw climbed to the top of a tower in the mosque and got a great view of the whole city. Then we caught an auto to the DLF Mall and saw Inception. Sooo good!
Our last night in Delhi involved the craziest auto experience ever. Our driver crashed into another auto, explained that the reason was because his brakes weren’t working, drove on the wrong side of a busy street into oncoming traffic, abandoned us for ten minutes during a traffic jam, took us to the wrong place, and made a pit stop at a liquor store before we decided that we had had enough and got out. The night went more smoothly after that. We finally arrived at our friend Udai’s house and had a great last night. Shalini showed off the skills she had honed during her tomboy years playing video games (Barbie alumni Michelle and I were amazed), and we played pool and Taboo. It was a perfect end to our Delhi experience.
Hai,
ReplyDeleteGreat Tour, i like these all images,