FEB-B-1
MALAYBALAY, MINDANOA
- Index to Feb-B-series, the second
phase of Mindanao
- Arrival in Malaybalay, a Navajo
flight in the co-pilot’s seat from Surallah to Nasuli,
a tour by air, on foot, and jeepney of the SIL retreat
and Bethel mission hospital, Malaybalay: rainy day
jeepney view of the Kaamulan Park, and a disastrous
investment in an afternoon’s exasperating futile
effort in an Internet Café.
- Our outing day from Malaybalay
to the mountain plantations: “going bananas” in
a very big way.
- OK, try as I may to overcome the
greatest exasperation of this trip: I will make
a fifth attempt to send a message from my concluding
the intensive surgical mission in Tboli land, Navajo
flight from Surrallah to Nasuli, and arrival in
Malaybalay—and this time to see if the new Internet
Café does not erase it completely for the fifth
consecutive time of futile effort with zero yield
in communication or recorded summary of events on
my ONLY half day off from a very intensive non-running
work schedule.
- First operating day in Bethel
Hospital at Malaybalay, Bukidnon, Mindanao.
- In full swing at Bethel Baptist
hospital on the second full day in Malaybalay OR:
doing goiters, hysterectomies, a seminoma, and a
staff lecture on tropical surgery.
- A great and glorious day in Bethel
Baptist Hospital: beginning with a run around Kaamulon
Park! Then followed by a full or day with goiters,
hysterectomies, and a giant splenectomy for hypersplenism
all accomplished without a hitch, in time for the
celebration festival of the host hospital staff.
- Valentine’s Day: recapping the
events of last night’s lechon feast and BBH’s farewell
program and MMI celebration, beginning with a run
through Kaanulan Park, the final operating day in
BBH, a day of still further email frustrations,
seeing off the Tboli reconstruction patients, completing
the last general surgery cases, and a quick tour
of the Benedictine Monastery.
- Final morning at BBH, and pack
up from Malaybalay, for transit to Cagayan de Oro
and seaside overnight, before packing up to leave
the Philippines via a long lavyover in Manila tomorrow.
- And away I go! Up through central
Mindanao from bottom to top, overnight in Coconut
Bay Beach Resort on a dark rainy day in Cagayan
de Oro, before the flight to Manila, where there
will be a very long layover to begin a much longer
day (times two!) racing the sun in its eastward
course toward San Francisco as a port of entry,
for an even longer layover, before a two-step red
eye home.
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