Gene's Joint

Back home . . . for now

Finally back in good ole San Francisco after 27 hours or so of flying. Highlights yesterday: enjoying the crisp bay area breeze after stepping off the plane, taking the first sip of tonkotsu soup at Santa Ramen with Ariel and her bro and cleansing myself with a nice hot shower.

Can’t say I am all here yet though, my mind is in a thousand places right now. Saying goodbye to San Francisco, saying hello to my new life and new friends at DMS (I just got my new address today), preparing myself for the challenges ahead.

Whirlwind trip to SF then Hanover

The next two weeks are going to fly by.

I leave SA on Tuesday, arriving around noon on Wednesday in SF and leaving around noon on Sunday. Between debriefing at CFHI, shipping my stuff and saying goodbyes I’ve got a pretty full plate.

After I leave SF , arrive at DMS in time to pick up my parents then attend orientation the next morning for a week. Entertaining, buying furniture and a car and settling in will take up that week easily. Then my family and I will probably take a short trip that weekend before I start class on Monday Aug 15. Whew! Better rest up in SA.

Goodbye South Africa

Wow, can’t believe I am leaving so soon. Its really been a blur these last two months and I still feel I have so much left to do.

Its interesting seeing people’s reactions to coming/going from a place, hellos/goodbyes. One of our June students who has been with us since about the time I got here just left amidst tears, melodramatic goodbyes, etc. I doubt I will feel the same way when I leave. What I am not sure of is why I don’t feel too much emotional attachment here despite the experience I’ve had and the people I’ve met.
Have I become so jaded from traveling around the world and meeting people that I cannot form deep emotional attachments anymore? Or maybe I am just a spoiled, rich kid who assumes that I can always fly back to any place as I wish?

My approach to traveling: I see myself walking my own path in life, at different times and in different places, I will cross paths with people and form connections with them. We may walk together for a time or go our separate ways. Either way, I treasure the time we have together. If we see each other again great, if not I wish you well on your journey.

The Internet helps but it too has its limits. We shall see, I have two goodbyes coming up: one for Capetown and another for San Francisco.

Pictures from Lesotho/Durban

New pictures from my weekend trip!

The Drakensberg mountains on the way to the Sani Pass

Having a Maluti (Lesotho beer) at the highest pub in southern Africa

Taking pictures with kids we met from Lesotho at St. James Missionary.

Mr. Moshoeshoe and his home in Lesotho

The rows of tricked out minibus taxis in the streets of Durban

The dirt roads and mud houses of Umlazi (a poor township near Durban) and interviewing microfinance clients and their microbusinesses

The view of Umlazi, rows upon rows of poverty

The view from my hotel room in Durban on the beachfront, white sandy beaches and frothy surf breaking on the shores. Money = Happiness right?

My Goal (for now)

Dartmouth asked me to describe my goals and dreams for the future for advising purposes so I suppose I will take an excerpt out from my response:

I saw a woman today who was suffering: eyes bulging out of their sockets, body emaciated, legs so weak she could not stand. Although we went through the motions of an HIV test, we did not have to look at her chart to know the result: she was HIV positive.

I decided to become a physician in order to equip myself with the tools to help patients like this. However, the experience of watching patients die in South Africa this summer has taught me that even as a physician, I will lack the tools to treat the underlying causes of disease: unemployment, poverty, malnutrition, drugs, violence, conflict.

My ambition is to find ways to treat both socioeconomic ills as well as the diseases afflicting the poor and sick. Currently, I would like to start my own organization providing health care and micro-loans to the poor and sick. This organization would have both a clinical and social objective. Clinically, it would aim to improve the health outcome of HIV positive patients by increasing access to ARV drugs and health counseling in under-resourced communities. Socially, it would help the poorest of these patients generate income through micro-loans. These two objectives would reinforce one another, for instance the loans would make provision of drugs sustainable as the patients would make contributions from their interest payments to the cost of drugs. It would also create economic incentive for the patients to remain healthy and productive. Ultimately, the goal of this clinic would be to show poor people that they can take charge of their own health and lives and that they do not need to depend on government handouts.

The point of this exercise is to be idealistic of course and I am sure this will change as time goes on but for now, I think its a pretty good target to shoot for. Now if I could just make money doing it . . . :)

GOOOD FOOOD!

Last week, the June CFHI group left but not before they fed the students. Of course, the esteemed Alumni Fellow was also invited to some of these meals. Here are some highlights

Rooibos tea with Mark at the Noordiens, and yes the men get served here first!

Snoek braai by Mr. Snyders! He loves snoek!

and the table was set for the feast . . . First course: snoek braai with honey sauce, avocado and pineapple salad and three kinds of bread

Second course: Rooti with lentil curry

Dessert: a divine apple turnover!

Me still eating . . .

So much to do in so little time . . .

Man, I can’t believe that I am leaving Africa in a little over 3 weeks. It feels like I have been here forever and not at all. Since the last group, I have decided that I have seen enough tourist things and it will be time to get out to the communities and learn as much as I can about their developmental needs.

Today, spent some time digging around to find the right contact for microfinance here in the Western Cape. Another lead, another name but so far still no actionable activity. However, I did make a useful public health contact at the University of Capetown who would be very useful should I decide to come back to do research sometime in the future.

I will probably going to Durban in the Eastern part of the country next week to do some traveling and visit FINCA, a microfinance network whose founder I met in Berkeley.

Note to self: Somewhere in the next two weeks, I also have to budget myself some time to just sit and relax . . .

The Big Irony

My roommate just got a bunch of money stolen from her room. I think it was my host mom who stole it. The same host mom who tells me how all “African” blacks are liars, cheats and theives and how the coloureds are so much more proper (the term coloureds refer to mulattoes, allowed to get an education and more upwardly mobile under the apartheid regime).

How ironic.

Anyway, sucks for Anna but she is taking it as just a lesson for herself. I guess it just shows me once again the light and dark shades of Africa. Its about halfway through my trip and the time really has passed very quickly. Hopefully I will be able to relax the rest of the way through and distance myself from the students in the group a bit (too much drama).

Feelin a bit blue . . .

Feel strange today. Had a meeting where I got lectured about students skipping rotations and how I was condoning it by hanging out with them on Wednesday etc etc. So I guess I cannot hang out with the students, but can I just hang out with these old guys with families. Not either. I did not sign up to spend my last summer of freedom around strangers and feeling isolated and out of place. Argh!

I tell myself that this is not really not that bad. I am still having a good time, the weather is nice today and there are always interesting things to learn and see here. The key is to relax, I say. Yet, how am I to relax when everything around me is foreign and kinda strange and I’m not allowed to hang out with the people I came here with? Maybe I’m just homesick. . .

The Perfect Day!

Yesterday was a PERFECT day in every sense of the word! Wine tasting in Constantia, visiting a farm in Nordehoek, swimming in the Atlantic and watching the sunset. Here are some highlights.

A view of the vineyards at Groot Constantia with Table Mt. in the background

A farm house at Nordehoek, we might go horseback riding around there!

The beach at Camps Bay, beautiful and serene . . . maybe I will retire here

The houses at Llandudno beach (beautiful little cove) against little Lion’s Head. I am going to have one of those houses someday.

Sunset at Llandudno beach . . . one of the most beautiful I have ever seen.