FEB-B-9
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
Feb. 15, 2002
Ah, glorious! Three out of three days started with a pre-dawn run! That they happen to be the only three days I have run at all since arriving here is a sign of sad deterioration, but I have a story this morning that will make up for this deficit.
I figured out (late, I agree) how to get in a run here with all the other activities and avoid some of the smoke and diesel exhaust. I got up before dawn and my whole run was before the reddening of the sky over Mount Kilgalad. This is somewhat dangerous, not since there may be people lying in wait behind any bush, which there probably are, but they are the curious types, trying to greet me on the unusual sight of a running European (in this case running only in shorts and shoes, since I have all my shirts either laundered and packed or already given away), but because of the broken pavement and curbs and debris in the road dark under foot. I made it without stumbling, and made three passes around Kaanulan Park.
The old man who always sees me and has greeted me two mornings running with a “Guten Tag” to which I respond in German, figured out to day that, wherever I come from, I must also speak English, so on the first pass I heard “Gut Morning!” I answered in English, and kept on running. He was ready for me on the second pass. As I was running he shouted as I was still at a distance coming toward him: “How Old?”
I laughed and yelled back: “Sixty!”
I came around at the third pas by which time he had gathered a number of his peers in the dark and was gesturing in my direction. As I got closer he yelled, “You say ‘Sixteen?’”
Bless his sweet heart. As I said, it was very dark.
The Valentine’s Day dinner of blue marlin last night at the Pines Restaurant—a very fancy affair with all the medical staff and spouses, with an elegant setting that set us back not quite ten dollars!—included testimonials of various sorts as to the meaning of this experience. Allen asked me to lead off, presumably since I needed the least rehearsal time.
I think the three keys were the 1) “A Team”—i.e., Al who makes all things work not only in the OR at BBH which he runs, but also just quietly goes about getting things done in environments such as TECH, Don, the anesthesiologist with whom I work so closely, that when we are at induction and intubation giving injections and positioning and prepping the patient, there are four hands moving, and neither of us is sure which hand is attached to which head; and Janet Molina, the very competent, not hesitant, but safe surgeon who is going to be the mainstay of Malaybalay’s BBH; 2) the ”B-Team” i.e., Valerie (our token Polish Catholic) a veteran of many MMI’s who competently scrubbed on every case I did until yesterday, and fun to be with; Holly Dolly—the “Dizzy Blonde (even though her hair dresser has borrowed some help in making it red) Southern Belle, who trips over things, talks Tennessean which was often far more foreign than Tboli, and would be the caricature of Nurse Holly were it not for the fact that she consistently comes through, doing just the right things for the sake of the patient, to whom she is emotionally attached—came on this trip for a spiritual renewal at a crossroads in her life—these two of the MMI team were those who worked most closely with me; and 3) the locals, including the Tboli TECH team and the larger group, all of them much more passionately involved in the mission of their calling than any comparable stateside group; among this group I would have to single out Dr. Regan Espina, brought here on a two day three boat trip on his wife’s birthday in order to get the advantage of “post-graduate OJT with the Professor” to which he responded so well. He was the reason I said last night that I was sure that the 96 major operations and 14 minor operations had benefited at least 110 patients, but certainly more than that the health care teams in three venues---South Cotabato around TECH, Malaybalay around BBH, but most of all Leyte—and we have not even been near there, but we have extended that health care education through a multiplier in Regan.
So, it was gratifying to hear the kind and wonderful things each had said last night about our successful mission project, but it was probably more significant for me to have Josephine Tano come to me as the Tboli contingent of reconstructed patients were loaded in the TECH ambulance to travel back to South Cotabato and have my favorite severely deformed sweet 14-year-old girl hug me tightly and not let go for a wordless several minutes. Each had touched my grasped hand to their foreheads, but no one could be more grateful against impossible odds, than this courageous young girl.
Imagine the TRUST! Here is a stranger, fallen into their lives from another planet, and they cannot even understand the words he speaks nor the strange rituals and high technologic tricks he is using, many of which cause pain. Yet, through non-verbal reassurance and from the motivation that brings us here and unites us, they have faith that we are here to help them, giving them unaffordable care and—probably more valuable –hope. It is a humbling act of courage on their part to be entrusted.
Now I leave BBH and Malaybalay. As we left the restaurant, Steve and Terry Gels were coming in for their first visit there to celebrate Valentine’s Day as we all posed for pictures with this unlikely group of people gathered up, somehow, from the most eclectic collection of backgrounds, in a surprisingly functional unit of efficient care giving. It worked. The team is small enough that it could not have any ciphers in it, nor did it need any drum majors or non-operating orator leaders’ we just somehow pulled it off. And WE did not fix any of the 110 patients operated on or the thousand consultations—each was done by and accredited to one of the local practitioners empowered by this educational capacity-building experience for the indigenizing of the skills left behind—so, it is hoped that this is a sustainable expertise. We have not created followers, but new leaders, and that may be a bigger legacy than simply fixing a number of folk that the number crunchers can tally for the sake of some record reportage.
Valentine’s Day was a love fest, with a rather unlikely group of what might otherwise have been unlovable people. It was carefully noted that there was a sacrifice eon the part of loved ones a whole world away to make this mission project possible, and there was a hope that the loved ones far away might join in the next or future projects, with appreciation for the understanding that had made it appropriate for us to be here rather than home where we might otherwise wish to be.
This has been a “lovely” day.