Gelato Con Queso

my new favorite phrase

2006-07-26T23:42:00.000-04:00

I've learned a new phrase in balmer from some of my patients since i've been here:

"I got banked"

saying you got banked, means you got jacked, or robbed. Which tends to happen a lot in Balmer.

Here is how to use it in a sentance:

"Shit did you hear that last week even our mailman got banked? Yeah some bitch held that motherfucker up and stole anything that looked like a check." (true story)

My fellow interns and I have begun adapting it to mean generally fucked. ie:

"damn my new er schedule this month sucks, I have like 19 shifts and they are all at night."

"shit dude you got banked, that sucks"

I got banked is second only to "my babies daddy" which I hear much too often while interviewing mothers. for instance here is some real conversation:

"so where do you and your baby live?"

(mumbling) "wif my buddersbabydaddy"

"i'm sorry?"

(mumbling) "wif my bruddersbabiesdaddy"

"ummmm, can you say that again?"

(slightly less mumbled) "wif my bruddersbabies daddy"

"i'm sorry i can't understa..."

(a nurse in the backround) "she said her brothers babies daddy"

"oh.... I see."

I'm with kit, not hobie bitch

2006-07-26T23:27:00.000-04:00

The other day I rounds I had what I can only describe as a pretty awesome experience. I had finished prerounding and was about to go onto rounds to explain my plans on my cardiology patients. We have this pharmacy resident who rounds with us. As we were walking down the hall together she kind of shyly said the following:

"you know, I'm sure you've heard this before but you really look a lot like that night rider guy."

"huh?"

"you know, that guy who used to be in that old TV show night rider...."

"....wait you mean hasselhoff?

"huh?"

"hasselhoff, like david hasselhoff? you think I look like David Hasselhoff on night rider?"

"well, yeah, I mean come on you've never heard that before?"

"umm...no not really. wait but you mean the hasselhoff from night rider right? like I look like night rider hasselhoff, not baywatch hasselhoff right?"

"what?"

"I mean like I look like hasselhoff in the leather jacket with the car "kit" and all, not the hasselhoff with hobie and shit right?"

"ummm, I think we should be rounding soon"

"wait but you said night rider right"

"ummm, i think that's our attending we should get going"

Thats right bitches, somehow I look like hasselhoff. Maybe it's because I haven't had my hair cut in awhile and it's starting to get all curly and bush out, maybe this pharmacy chick is just crazy but she thinks I look like hasselhoff. And not some baywatch hasselhoff running along the beach telling summer and mitch what to do and bitching at hobie, I look like night rider hasselhoff.

fucking a

I think i need a leather jacket.

Public Service Announcement

2006-07-13T18:17:00.000-04:00

If you are a patient and your doctor asks you a simple question that you have the answer for, please do not say "can't you just go look that up in my chart." "It should all be in there" For instance, if I am asking the name of your primary doctor, WHICH IS IN YOUR CELL PHONE, and you tell me this, please don't say "isn't that in my chart somewhere?" Your patient record is not indexed by google so that i can go to a computer and type in your name and PMD, so it just pops up, here is a description of your medical record:

First of all it's paper. A 3 ring binder stuffed full of disjointed papers filled with notes written in a rush by doctors with terrible handwriting. half of which is illegible. there is a section with orders written in it when you get a medicine or a test ordered and it's all on carbon paper. CARBON PAPER. That is how we order things, not in a computer, we write it through carbon paper and it is faxed down to the pharmacy just to maximize the illegibility of the process. So looking through those is quite fruitless in figuring out a reliable medication dosage.

Just tell us when you think you had your surgery, what you know to the best of your knowlege, we get quite good at determining who is reliable and who spent their childhood inhaling paint fumes.

It would be like if you were on a road trip and got to a city you had never been to and didn't know how to navigate. The only map you have is a 30 year old map your dad gave you. It's missing a third of the pages, is out of date, stained with coffee, ripped, and not even a good map in the first place. so you end up getting lost for like 30 minutes in some crappy ass city until you see a city information booth set up with someone whos job is it to give directions. You pull up roll down your window and say " hi could you tell me how to get to the interstate i'm lost." The 300 lb woman squeezed into a city uniform barely looks in your direction as she continues to talk on her cell phone. You ask again and she turns to you, palming the phone and says "Ain't that a map in yo' hand???!!"

Thats how it feels.

When someone is at your child's bedside at 9:30 at night and then again at 6am the next morning, watching over them to make sure they don't get in a situation where they suddenly go into an arrythmia and die, just answer their question. I know you may have to power up that cell phone to get the phone number for them, but try to be a little less lazy huh?

Mildly retarded

2006-07-09T21:28:00.000-04:00

So I haven't really posted much lately because well everything that I would want to post would relate to the hospital and well i'm trying to pretty much leave that out of my blog. Which is difficult and if I actually accomplish it will probably mean this blog will mostly likely just kinda go under. Which I think is a shame. Overall though my first week of internship just made me feel mildly retarded. I don't really know where anything is, or how to do anything and I generally just feel a little confused.

But I was off this weekend and due to my sweet ass schedule I manage to have very little call with only one night on call this month. which is sweet. I have next weekend off as well and have to only make it thought this week without causing any serious problems and I am halfway though my first rotation.

My neighborhood still rocks and what rocks even more is that mini kiss, the kiss cover band made up entirely of midgets is playing here next weekend. which is pretty amazing.

On a lighter note our postwoman was robbed last week. Apparently someone held her up and stole anything that looked like a check. who holds up a post man? I mean only in baltimore does someone seek out a mailman to rob.

To be honest I'm a bit down all the sudden and it's not clear why, maybe just mourning the end of the weekend and that I will be getting up at 5am tomorrow. Oh well. Wish I had a happy ticket.

Yuppie Punch

2006-06-22T23:49:00.000-04:00

Today 2 blocks away form my place I saw a middle aged white dude with a stroller waiting on sidewalk. It was an odd stroller because the front of it was actually zipped closed so that there was mosquito mesh protecting the contents of the stroller.

I looked in as I walked by and inside the stroller were two miniature poodles standing up inside the stroller watching me walk by. I almost tripped over such a site.

I looked up and made eye contact with the guy and I think he knew what I was thinking. I think he knew that all I wanted to do more than anything in this world was to punch that man in the face.

He deserved it and I think he knew it. That man needed a good solid fast punch to the nose - The kind that immediately breaks the nose, lets loose a lot of blood and hurts like shit.

Who walks their fucking poodles around in a fucking stroller!!!!!!????

What that man needs is a good solid Yuppie Punch.

Bmore moments part 1

2006-06-14T19:00:00.000-04:00

I live in a pretty nice neighborhood in Baltimore. But it's still Baltimore.

30 minutes ago I looked out of my second story window across the street to see a homeless guy sitting on the stoop of my neighbors place with his head in his hands, obviously just trying to catch some shut eye. I just peeked out again and he is now literally sprawled out on his back on the sidewalk, one leg dangling into the street, sleeping with his head on the concrete steps of the stoop.

I really wish I had a digital camera right now. I would post it.

Another Bmore moment from the morning. I walk into a local coffee shop mildly hung over looking for a newspaper to buy. A sketchy looking guy is reclining in a chair doing nothing. I try not to make eye contact but he pipes up: "Hey buddy that sure is a nice shirt you got on". He says it in such a way and with a facial expression that makes it apparent that he is either 1) retarded 2) high or 3) someone more at home on an inpatient psych ward. He may be any combination of these. I glance down at my recently acquired $12 T shirt which apparently he found really attractive. See this was the most unnerving part of it. I mean it's a cool T-shirt, but it's a t-shirt. It's nothing fancy or even really nice. Certainly nothing that would logically attract compliments from some random guy. Confused I just smiled and said thanks.

Final Bmore moment. Last night I'm at a Irish pub drinking a Guinness about to go home. A fairly drunk looking guy is leaving to go smoke a cigarette. He stumbles, rolls down 4 stairs hitting his head and his shorts fall off. Underwear too I guess cause all I saw was a big white ass.

Everyone laughs including the bartender who served him.

Thanks Mom?

2006-06-14T18:42:00.000-04:00

Are all mothers crazy? Are any others crazy in the manner than mine is?

So I've recently moved to Baltimore, or B-more. I got a letter from my mom yesterday with nothing more than a clipping from the washington post.

The headline read:

Drug Related Deaths Hit 10-year low in Baltimore

scrawled across the top in my moms writing was written:

"maybe your neighborhood will be safer..."

??????????????????????

The article details how through medical treatment of heroin abuse and needle exchanges and education, 17 less people died from heroin overdose in 2005 compared to 1996. It's weird to picture my mom reading this headline and article, and then thinking to herself, "I better clip this article and send it to my son. It will reassure him that he will not be robbed or murdered in Baltimore."

She then sends the article, with the scribble at the top and nothing else. no letter in the envelope, just the article.

Is this weird or is it just me?

Med students suck ass

2006-05-14T18:37:00.000-04:00

So our yard sale was pretty poor. Granted we advertised it would start at 10, and we didn't start setting up till 11:30, but it was hampered by a significant thunderstorm. We had three customers and no sales. The first customer arrived at noon:

us: "So were you interested in anything in particular?"

ms: "yeah the kitchenware"

us: "hmmm, well s has this box of dishes."

ms: "I though you had "lots of kitchenware""

us: "crap(muttered under my breath). well come into the kitchen. So what were you looking for? a pot?

ms: "I don't know I was just hoping to browse."

me: (pulling random pots and pans out of the cup board) "how bout this pot, or this skillet"

s: "hey woah woah woah, thats my skillet it's not for sale."

ms: "so maybe I'll just come back later, after you guys have organized this stuff"

me: "you sure you don't want a hopee indian arm?"

s: "or a kool aid man costume?"

ms: "no"

that was the closest we came to a sale. Motherfucking med students. I mean who passes up all this gold that we're selling? medical manequians? indian arms? kool aid costumes? specimen jars? what the fuck is wrong with medical students.

We later determined many people didn't actually believe we had these items, that we just made it all up. So we spent all day creating a blog with photos. check it out:

http://sellingtheyard.blogspot.com

Best Yard Sale Ever

2006-05-14T10:17:00.000-04:00

Stupid blogger. I wrote this great post the other day only to have it completely lost by blogger. It drove me fucking nuts and now I'm not going back to rewrite it. However my roomate and I are having the best yard sale ever. We sent an email out to the med school to inform everyone. It was in the form of a talking monkey. My roomate knew of this site with a cartoonish monkey that speaks whatever text you write in. here check out the message:

http://www.careerbuilder.com/monk-e-mail/
Default.aspx?mid=9250968&cbRecursionCnt
=1&cbsid=87c2f82b6de945b98adae42f4523c6f2-200882148-W1-2

We then sent out an email detailing what we are selling:

-4 red painted wooden Ikea table chairs
-1 AC window unit
-Various dishes, dishwear, silverwear, etc
-Various medical books, review books, etc
-Beer brewing kit (really sweet one with 2 glass fermenters (originally
>$150))
-2 sets of wooden adjustable crutches
-Dart board with really nice wall mount case
-Life size female mannequin (dress included however 1 lower leg missing)
-Baby mannequin ("detachable head")
-Coleman Camping Stove
-Inflattable 8 foot light-up Santa
-Technics SB-L50 speakers
-Bose subwoofer that may work
-Sony playstation
-Playstation games (Grand Tourismo II, Metal Gear, Medal of Honor)
-Super Nintendo Games (007 Goldeneye, Legenda of Zelda, Tetras )
-Green Couch (best napping couch ever)
-Full-Size custom Kool-Aid Costume
-Full-size Sushi Roll costume
-2 wooden stools
-1 medium ceramic planter pot
-1 large ceramic planter pot (with cool plant!)
-Japanese maple tree in large planter pot
-10-Gallon Fish tank (no fish)
-Replica Hopi Indian Arm from Smithsonian (sorry, just arm ... just to warn
: contains lead based paint)
-Variety of Smithsonian Specimen jars (up to 2 Gallons!!!)
-2 childrens bikes
-Radio shark (Tivo like device for radio . turns blood read when "sharking")

Unfortunately it's sunday morning and raining. I dragged my hung ass out of bed at 9:30 only to have it start raining. Bitch.

Nothing

2006-04-27T21:46:00.000-04:00

You know what I love. I love absolutely nothing. I mean that in the way that I love doing nothing. I'm good at it too. Why I'm choosing to be a doctor when I have this trait, I'm not sure. However I really do love doing nothing. I have been on my last rotation in medical school - neurology - and have somehow been getting out by about 10:30 every day. Two days ago I took three naps. Three. Not some sissy naps either, these were all at least hour long naps. I'm a fucking great napper. Ask Sam.

Granted today I did go for a two hour bike ride, which is doing something. But in the end, expending all that energy allows me to be more focused on doing nothing. It takes away any anxiety and makes it easier to go back to napping. It also makes it easier to eat lots of ice cream, which is another thing I love. You know those Ben and Jerrys pints from the grocery store? I love those too. When I open one, I have to finish it. I can't stop myself. I've tried and it doesn't work. I mean it's like 1200 calories depending on the flavor. And I down it like it's nothing. Fuck I missed free cone day. Motherfuck fuck fucker. it was yesterday. I mean I do have the remnants of a vermonster in my freezer left over from my birthday, but that is beside the point.

I also love milk. Skim milk. i drink about half a gallon a day. When I come home from a long run you know what i grab to drink? no not gatorade... I grab the milk and suck it down. i love it. love it love it love it. I don't know what my problem is but i have to have it. I suspect it may be what causes my clubbing though.

At this point, unless you know me you are probably getting confused... and this is beginning to be productive, so it's best I stop. Tomorrow is my last day of medical school. If I pass my neuro exam I will become a doctor. Which is frightening. Which also means that very soon, I will have to do more. a lot more.

Try to be happy

2006-04-25T18:53:00.000-04:00

not my photo, but i like it. taken from : http://www.davidshrigley.com/index.html

The devil is a Mothafuckin Liar! So you know I ain't worried Beotch!

2006-04-21T12:08:00.000-04:00

So I have to give credit to my brother for this one. He sent me the link to this and it is incredible. Apparently a public access "preacher" of some sorts. I've never really seen anything like it. I'm not sure what the best part is: His hair, his cane, his telephone book looking bible, that snoop is playing in the backround while he preaches, that he cusses out every person who calls into his show, or how he manages to work so many motherfuckers and beothes into his "sermon". This is one of the best things I have seen. Thank you jonny.

Someone should put CVS in charge of the cops

2006-04-18T23:56:00.000-04:00

An odd thing occurred while driving up to Baltimore to look for housing this past weekend. I left with my dad to drive up on a Friday and check out some apartments. We were in his and my step moms mini cooper s, which is a sweet car.

So we're about fifteen minutes from my house, traveling north on 295 towards Baltimore. We were probably going about 65 or so and just as we were passing some naval testing area WHAM! there was load noise to the right of me, and the next thing I knew there was glass showering down on me as the passenger side window disintegrated.

We had no idea what the fuck happened, the passenger window just blew out for absolutely no reason while going 65. So I was covered in glass, we were both pretty freaked out, and honestly we were freaking out a bit because the only thing we could think of initially was that someone had shot out the window. My dad starting yelling and asking if I was alright and I seemed to be... However the wierdest moment of the whole ordeal was sitting there and for a good thirty seconds looking at my legs and chest, expecting to see blood soaking through my clothing from a gun shot wound I didn't feel yet.

We pulled over about a mile past the incident and I called 911 while my dad searched the car for a sign of where the bullet could have exited. I told the 911 guy where we were, that the window had exploded and we thought it may have been shot out and gave him my cell number. Within about two minutes a van with flashing lights pulled up behind us while we were fishing glass out of the car and looking around nervously for a shooter. We were impressed the cops were there so quickly. Except it wasn't really a cop. It was this EMT guy that worked for CVS where CVS sponsors him to drive around and check up on people. So he saw we were fine and then went to move on.

So then we waited for the cops. We kept searching for a bullet hole in the car while we waited and found nothing. And after 30 minutes the cops had still not shown up. I mean we were on a fucking interstate, we reported that someone had shot out our window and no one could get there in 30 fucking minutes. Finally we were convinced there was no bullet hole and just left and drove home. We wanted to get up to Baltimore and see the apartments and figured we would just have to claim it with insurance anyway.

The truly amazing thing about the whole thing is the dispatcher never called back to locate us. After 30 minutes no cop showed up, and no one ever called us back even though they asked for my cell phone number. You would think that after the sniper attacks in the DC area a few years back, they might be interested in a report of a window randomly being blown out that was suspicious for a gun shot. But nope, I guess not.

We never figured out what happened. The best theory was we found a pretty big scratch on the side mirror where a rock could have struck the mirror and ricoched into the passenger window. But it's only a weak theory at best. Pretty weird experience though and doesn't help me put a lot of faith in the police.

But hey, I ended up finding a sweet apartment.

Smash Hand

2006-04-08T15:00:00.000-04:00

I've found a new favorite game. My friend Dan introduced it to me the other night... after approximately 8 beers. It doesn't really have an official name that I know of, but I have chosen an appropriate name to give it : Smash hand.

It contains all the elements of a truly great game in my mind:

1) It's simple. There are relatively few rules and it can be learned in minutes.

2) It's one on one. Like much of our oldest forms of competition: wrestling, boxing, dueling... It's one dude on another, and it results in one obvious victor and one obvious loser.

3) It's painful. Excruciatingly painful. In fact, the person who wins is pretty much whichever person is willing to continue playing despite increasing pain.

4) The game becomes better and better the more you drink.

This is pretty much how it went down the other evening. I was out with a group of friends, and while drinking at the table Dan, who is a rock climber, began talking effusely about his newest game(Smash Hand). He was talking excitedly, almost hypomanic, to James and I who were listening with increasing interest:

"It's like that game in middle school where you hold your hands out palms up, and then the other person puts their hands on your palms. You remember that?"

"then you go like this (flips right hand over to left hand pretending to smack the opponents hand in his left hand)"

"yeah I remember that game" replies james.

"yeah well its pretty much the same idea, but in this game instead of just getting your wrist into it, you get to hit the other person's hand with your whole body(dan gets out of his chair at this point, standing up in the bar to emphasize his point) - arm, shoulder, upper body, even get your hips into it."

"uh huh I see..... so can we go try this?" james replies

"yeah lets go now!"

James and Dan disappeared for no more than 5 minutes, after which they come back upstairs, James rubbing his hands and grimacing.

"dans really fast...that kinda hurt.(grimacing and rubbing his hands) I don't like that game so much."

james sits back down in his seat beaming and rubbing his hands.

"so are we going to go?" I say

"what you want to do too? right now? I mean we were just down there"

"obviously. what are you scared?"

"it's on"

So we went downstairs, outside the bar on the street. It's a street in a college town, lined with bars, restaurants, and shops, popular with undergrads. A street crowded with people, mostly out drinking for the evening.

It's pretty cold for this time of year, maybe 45 or 50, and it's raining lightly. I'm somewhere between mildly drunk and fairly drunk, and I suspect Dan is much the same. Dan goes over the rules of the game which takes about 30 seconds and then we begin. Or i begin rather. As the striker, I keep my hands on my knees until I choose to swing at his hands, and Dan holds his hands together in front of his chest, almost like he's praying. There's some strategy to this game. If i pretend like i'm about to swing, and get him to move his hands that counts as a flinch. If he flinches three times, I get a free hit where he has to keep his hands there and allow me to hit them as hard as I can... which is hard.

So I keep hitting Dan over and over and over. Which seems odd because he claims to be good at the game. But it keeps going on for almost 10 minutes at this point. I mean, i've probably hit him about 50 times and he hasn't been able to make me whiff to make our positions reverse. And then it hits me. Our reaction times are slowed enough from the drinking, that the person on defense can't get away, they can't react so it's not really a game any more, it's just a smash hand free for all. There's no way to get away, and it hurts. Unless the striker is ambidextrous, the defender is going to take the brunt of the blows on one hand. Over and over and over.

After ten minutes the palm of my hand is beginning to hurt just from hitting Dans knuckles. And with the cold, my hand was half in pain and half numb.

"Jesus Christ my hand is hurting" Dan said while smiling and half laughing.

"yeah I bet it is" I say.

But you can't stop hitting. Because at some point things will reverse, and your opponent will have a chance to get you back. And invariably, you'll regret backing off at a later point, as your opponent smashes your knuckles and you can't get away. So you keep going, you keep smashing and inflicting pain on your opponent. And it's better if it's a friend. It starts to become a shared experience and it's just plain funny because of how idiotic it is.

Things eventually reverse, and I'm on the defensive. I hold my hands in front of me cupped together and try to keep an eye on Dans hands resting on his thighs. But he's too quick, I can't get away. SMASH... he catches me with a right, just glancing off the inferior portion of my left hand. I bring them back slowly to the center, biting my lip a little from the nervousness, and I see him move and pull away.

"gotcha" he says as I realize I just flinched.

"fuck" I say and bring my hands back to the center slowly. SMASH... he catches me off guard with his right again as I bring my hands back to center. This time it's well centered on my hand, right on the knuckles, and it burns. Then it starts to ache. I have to step back and take a break, rubbing it. Dan grins from ear to ear...

"hurts, don't it"

"yeah... pretty much"

I step back in line, and before I even get my hands back in position...SMASH... again a clean connection on my left hand.

"FUUUUUUUUCK!" I say as I grab my hand again rubbing it. There are tears welling up in my eyes a little now, I'm glad it's raining so the passerbys can't see. Right now, I wish I had hit him longer and harder before, because I realize that after this round I'll be done, I don't think I'll be able to keep striking with these hands after this, it will hurt so much.

"That was a good one!" Dan exclaims laughing.

I step back in line, focusing on Dans hands and then I realize people are watching. Not a crowd or anything, but people walking by are making comments:

"woah, this is pretty intense" one girl says who can't be more than nineteen.

"what the hell are they doing? it's raining and cold" another dude says

"Hey I remember that game from camp!" another undergrad says.

and I'm in so much pain. I can't tell if I can feel my left hand at all...it's either numb from the hits, and the rain, and the cold, or its just intensely burning from the pain.

And in this moment I realize its about 45 degrees out, it's 1 am, we're drunk, we're on the street corner, and it's raining.
I'm 27 years old, nearly 28, and Dan is just about the same. We're both in medical school, about 2 months shy of becoming doctors. Real honest to god doctors. And here we are, on the corner playing smash hand like eight year old boys... as girls barely out of high school make fun of our immaturity. SMASH... "FUCK YOU!"...........................
And I realize, this is awesome, it's one of those great, hilarious, simple, grossly immature things that makes me love life and realize that I can continue to be retarded and immature forever, and get the same joy out of things as a 28 year old that I did when I was eight.

Why I can't sleep

2006-04-05T00:35:00.000-04:00

So, I can't sleep. I should probably be spending my time doing things like studying neurology during my last rotation of school. But I don't instead I come home, immediately nap, and spend long hours wasting time, which is nice. I spent some time tonight on the found magazine web site. So found magazine is actually a magazine put out by a guy that consists entirely of found writings and photos people find and then mail into the magazine. Then they are published with the accompanying stories of how they were found. It's awesome you should really check it out.

Here is a classic example. This was slid under the door of one person:

I mean, why don't I get notes like this under my door? where do you have to live to get notes like this.

The best part of all these things that are found is the random glimpse you get into the lives of people. No matter how retarded, idiotic, hurt or even beautiful they are.

I mean look at this that someone sent in. Its an old certificate from MCV that was found in an old book, on which someone typed out "my dearest beloved, I hope you go to hell" I mean what is the story behind this, and why the hell don't we get these certificates now in medical school?

This one is one of my favorites. It was found in an alley in chicago, no explanation.

This was found in a park, no explanation. I love to think of the possibilities of what occurred in this situation in the park. What a fireman could have done to piss off a mom so much. I love picturing some mother getting pissed off, and to get back at a fireman, scribbling this anonymous note and then leaving it somewhere for him to find.

This was found in a grocery store and is the reverse side of a grocery list. It's a list of what to do on vacation. First of all, who the fuck goes paddleboating on vacation. I mean who actually plans this as an activity to look forward to. Second, this is quite possibly the most depressing list I could have imagined "lots of sex" to be tacked on to.

Another more interesting list. No information is provided other than it was found in colorado. I can't figure out what it is a list for. Maybe a list for what to do when someone is angry with themselves? I'm not sure. I like the "hide from yourself" entry the best.

This one is awesome for obvious reasons. First of all it's a reminder note to bring pornography. Which means there is some ugent reason for this person to not forget to bring his pornography somewhere. Second of all I can't decide which is funnier : 1) that he is bringing the porn for Ron, or 2) the possibility that ron doesn't exist, that really he is just made up as a cover for why this guy has to write a note to remember the porn. This way if someone finds the note, it doesn't look quite so bad.

This is my favorite though. Someone found this lying on the floor of an elevator when they were having a particularly shitty day.

That's the deuce deuce baby! : my fear of Baltimore

2006-03-28T00:20:00.000-05:00

Sorry to those of you out there who have been keeping up with my blog on a consistent basis, I know that I haven't really written much since returning from Ecuador. The problem is just that in Ecuador pretty much every day I had pure gold to write about. I mean there were lots of things I never even found the time to write about even when I was writing just about every other day.

Things are more limited here in the states though. There have been a number of things that happened in the hospital that would be hilarious to write about, but there can be problems with writing about events in the hospital and I plan to avoid it.

So anyway I'll move on now with the deuce deuce entry...

So I'm going to Baltimore next year for residency. I'm pretty psyched about everything involved with that except well baltimore itself... See I've never actually lived in a real city city. I have generally preferred things like the mountains, the outdoors, biking, running, swimming. I've never really been as much into crack, prostitutes, things like that. Which is kinda surprising because I'm going to baltimore and I'll definitely be there for three years.

I'm not sure why but just the idea of moving to baltimore makes me think of this story from when I was about 16:

So when I was younger, my sport was always swimming. I was a backstroker. I have no idea how i ended up getting into it, it was just what I was good at. I was also a nerd. I mean I still am now, but more in secret now in comparison to then. Then I was obviously a nerd. I was a good swimmer because I was tall and practiced a lot, but I was quite gangly and uncoordinated, with glasses and this horrible bouffant like hair that just kinda poofed up off my head. And also shy, quite different than I am now.

So after swim practice one day at the county recreation center I was lifting weights. There I was, pale, gangly, and new to lifting weights; struggling to bench press two fifty pound dumbbells while lying on the bench. It's important to realize as well that this is the local county rec center and not some fancy ass golds gym or anything. I mean for the most part I was surrounded by little old ladies in leotards that were way to tight and old men in grey sweat suits throwing medicine balls around. Except for this one guy, seated two benches over from me. He was huge. He had to be in his late thirties, but he was gigantic. One of those guys who loves to toss out those "psssssst" noises with every repetition they do with the weights.

I'm quietly sitting on my bench two benches over from this dude, when at the end of his set he throws his weights down to the floor in a clatter and all the sudden loudly yells in my direction:

"YEAH! THAT'S THE DEUCE DEUCE BABY!"

At first I didn't think he was talking to me. Even though he was staring directly at me with his proptotic eyes and veins screaming through his forehead, I slowly turned my head around behind me to see no one behind me but a cinderblock wall. I slowly brought my head back around and he was still staring directly at me, sweat pouring down his face and his chest heaving with every respiration... eyes wide open and focused on me. and then it happened again:

"THAT'S RIGHT! THAT'S THE MOTHERFUCKING DEUCE DEUCE!"

He yelled again directly at me.

I said absoluely nothing and just stared back blankly at him. I really had no idea what was going on, I looked around at other patrons at the gym and everyone else seemed to be actively ignoring what was going on.

I looked back and he was still staring directly at me saying nothing.

"I'm sorry?" I said

"THATS THE DEUCE DEUCE!" He yelled again, and motioned to the floor where the dumbbells lay.

I looked down and saw he was lifting two 100 pound dumb bells when he was benching. It took me a couple minutes to realize that deuce deuce was referring to the weight he was lifting. I mean I got that he was lifting a total of 200 pounds, but it seemed to make no sense that there were two deuces being used, since it was two one hundred pound weights, not two 200 pound weights. I didn't really bring that point up though.

"THATS THE DEUCE DEUCE!" he yelled at me again....

"yeah, ummm thanks... got it, I got it."

he then appeared mildly annoyed, but somehow a little satisfied, and laid back down on the bench to go back to "pssssst"ing. And I just sat there...not really knowing what to do.

And I'm not really sure why, but somehow, when I think of baltimore I think of that dude. I really can't completely explain it. I haven't thought of that story in years, but something about baltimore just makes me think of that story

Holy crap this is awesome

2006-03-10T17:26:00.000-05:00

so apparently this is the swedish olympic curling team perfoming with the hard rock group hammerfall:

Like a proud father

2006-03-10T16:34:00.000-05:00

So nearly the whole last month in ecuador, I had diarrhea pretty much the whole time. I mean a few normal stools but otherwise, just nasty diarrhea. Probably from parasites, because it seems to have cleared after taking my parasite medication.

So the other night was actually quite exciting for me.

I went out with my girlfriend to dinner. A pretty cool bar that apparently also has really good food. I wrote about it in my last entry, it was the place where I ate wings, then steak, then a side of some of the best ribs I've had in a long while. But I also left something out of the story, a small triumph if you will.

Shortly after finishing the last rib, I realized I really had to go to the bathroom. I quickly got up and found my way back to the mens room. Which was a little odd, because being the only mens room in a pretty sizeable bar/restaurant, it had only one toilet and no urinals.

Anyway, I locked the door, sat down, and in about 2 minutes took one of the biggest craps of my life. Not like lots of diarrhea or a whole lot of loose stool, I mean a nicely formed huge pile of log. huge. One of those really satisfying dumps too that requires almost no toilet paper.

So feeling much relieved I stood up and flushed.... and nothing. The bowl filled with water but my triumph failed to clear out of the bowl. I waited in wonder because it really contained almost no toilet paper... but it went nowhere. This was no weak ass ecuadorian toilet either, this was a beefy full on american toilet that wastes a good 4 gallons per flush... and it had nothing on the fruits of my labor.

A small smile crept across my face as I realized this was the only toilet in the establishment, and like a proud father who's son had brought in the winning run, I gave a little pump of my fist as I slipped out the bathroom door.

So it seems my colon has recovered, and I will continue to reward it with all the steak, guiness, coffee, and ben and jerries it can take...

Meat and Guiness

2006-03-09T10:55:00.000-05:00

All I have been consuming since I have returned is pretty much meat and Guiness. I don't know what it is about Ecuador. I never really ate that much meat in the states before, but since going to Ecuador I have just been craving red meat.

My first night back I had an incredible steak and a few guiness with my mom at an Irish pub/restaurant. The next evening I went out with my girlfriend to dinner. I had wings as an appetizer, a steak dinner, and then a side of ribs added on after I ate the steak.

It was awesome.

I also had a bacon cheeseburger that afternoon from wendys.

America, Fuck Yeah

2006-03-08T11:19:00.000-05:00

So I'm back now in the states, after over two months in Ecuador.

And it's fucking awesome.

I love it here. You know what makes the united states so great?

Everything.

Everything here is awesome. Everything works well. Everything is nice.

Last night I went out to dinner with my mom at an irish pub. I got a steak tenderloin cooked medium rare wrapped in bacon. I drank Guinness and wine. It was incredible. Far far better than anything I ever ate in Ecuador. For the first time in months following a meal I felt good, and satisfied.

And now that I have taken my antiparasite meds, my stomach has seemed to calm down and my poops are now normalizing.

It's amazing here. All the food is good and you know it won't make you sick. You can drink the tap water and know you won't be shitting your brains out or vomiting the next day.

A shower is once again a wonderful experience. High volumes of hot water that is not heated by an electrical shower head that shocks you if you raise your hand too high.

Riding in a car is almost confusing here : there is no constant jarring shocks to your lower back and kidneys, no near collisions every 10 minutes with buses as everyone jockeys for position.

And finally it's quite here. There aren't dogs barking throughout the night at all the other dogs, and amazingly there are no chickens. To walk down the street and not see chickens everywhere is new now, and to law in bed at night, without constant crows is a new and pleasant experience.

To put it simply: it's really nice here and I'm glad to be back.

Come with me I´ll take you to a safe place to eat

2006-03-02T20:57:00.000-05:00

So we were working at this small clinic 2 hours away from puyo in a small town of 3000 people. After being there all morning it was time for lunch and one of the nurses came up to us and said:

"Come with me, I´ll take you to a place in town where there is good food and I assure you it will be safe to eat"

See the thing about the food here, is that it is absolutely horrible. The traditional meal starts with a bowl of shitty soup, and then the main meal normally consists of about half a plate of white rice, some shitty lentils, and then some incredibly overcooked, hard, chewy, ill defined meat that has no taste and is just pain nasty. This is pretty much dinner every night, and if you are not careful where you go, lunch as well. So we normally try to find pizza places and things for lunch, because pizza is pretty hard to fuck up. But it was kind of hard to get out of lunch when we were invited.

So we go into this place for lunch, and immediately I know we are in trouble. As we enter I can tall its another traditional ecuadorian lunch place and i´m swallowing the vomit that is rising in the back of my throat.

The soup actually wasn´t that bad, it was some potato based soup that was fine.

Then the main dish came out and I knew immediately what it was.

me: "So ummmm.... what kind of meat is this exactly?"

nurse: "intestinales"

me: "hmmm... I see"

med student : "what did she say?"

me: "intestinales"

med student: "what does that mean"

me: "intestines. It means intestines. And I´m pretty sure that I see a little bit of trachea in mine as well. So I guess thats a bonus for me."

Motherfucking Med School!

2006-02-28T11:50:00.000-05:00

So a long time ago I was signed up for a radiology elective and then dropped it. Went through all the appropriate paper work and called the radiology department and told them I wouldn´t be coming. Only the radiology department screwed up and didn´t take my name off the list. So now because of all these "rules and regulations they have to be consistant with" the administration plans to drop a credit off my fourth year. MOTHERFUCKERS. luckily I planned for this type of ass raping from the school and had planning in 1 buffer week so I will still graduate.

It just pisses me off. The structure of med school and how pain in the ass fucking rigid and fuck you in the ass it is.

So now i sit here in ecuador on the edge of the rainforest arguing over email with the administration.

hijo de puta maricon.

Peechie come back or the tigers will eat you!

2006-02-27T15:45:00.000-05:00

So I´m back from the jungle now. I spent the last 4 days in the jungle with two other medical students living with an indigenous family in the jungle. It was pretty cool and pretty amazing, but also a little boring. I previously went into the jungle on a tour with a guide - which was pretty sweet because we just spent all our time doing lots of hikes in the jungle. This time however we just went to live with a family and while the jungle is sweet, it rains a lot there, because well it is the rain forest.

So in order to get there we rode a bus out of puyo for 2-2.5 hours on one of the only roads that goes out into the jungle. We got off in this one tiny village and met this guy who took us on a 4 hour hike to his "village", which really consisted of his house and one other in the middle of the jungle with the next closest village being 8 hours away by foot.

We just kinda of lived with them for a few days - ate, slept and chilled out. There was a lot of chilling, because when it rains, it rains a lot and there is not much to do but sit around and talk.

One of the sweetest parts was the first night there after our dinner of rice, fried plantains, some jungle leaves, and mountain boar that had been killed the day before by this dude ramons neighbor - he offered us some tobacco to enjoy. I thought that maybe we would smoke the jungle tobacco, but it is much better than that. They had this huge leaf of tobacco they had gathered in the forest and they toasted it over the fire and then crupled it up and put it in a cup of boiling water to soak. Then nikia, this indiginous dude who was a really sweet hunter(who also incidentially has a brother who blew his hands off with dynamite while fishing), demonstrated how to use the tobacco.

He poured a bit of the tobacco water into his cupped hand bent his head over, and snorted the tobacco water up into his nostrils. Then kinda coughed a bit, and did it over and over. The he looked at me and said with watering eyes and tobacco juice pouring out of his nose
"now you do this" and promptly blew two huge snot rockets into the dirt.
I laughed and taught him how to say snot rocket and what it meant in english.

"you want to try now?" he said?

"obviously"

So I did the same thing, and it was definately tobacco. kinda like dipping, but it just burned the shit out of your nose and the back of your throat, but it worked.

"so this is supposed to do what?" I asked of nikia the young indiginous guy who was 30, and ramon the 40 year old indiginous dude who liked to walk around in his red tighty whities with a machete at all times.

"well, it kinda makes you dizzy, and if you inhale too much, you will vomit. The last time, peechie tried it (peechie is his nephew who is 5 by the way) peechie vomited all over the place. and when he was vomiting, a huge white worm came out of his nose. (lots of laughing in the family now) remember that peechie?"

peechie just kinda stared blankly at his uncle

And that is pretty much what the jungle tobacco did, it was kind of like dipping a lot, made you dizzy and a little nauseous. sherwin would have loved it.

The best was when ramons 9 year old boy did it. He started inhaling it which seemed to please ramon, and his eyes got real teary and he got obviously dizzy. No vomiting of worms though. It was wierd to be snorting tobacco in the jungle with an old indiginous dude in his red tighty whities, with nikia, and two little boys.

Nikia was this dude who was pretty awesome. He was 30, had grown up in the jungle, had 10 brothers and sisters, and then 10 other step brothers and sisters. He was in the ecuadorian military as a paratrooper, where he explained he learned to shoot. According to him the best meat in the jungle is the following pretty much in this order: mountain boar, armadillo(however the very large armadillo is no good for eating), various birds, and monkeys are actually very good to eat. He actually went hunting for monkeys one night, but was unable to get any as it was raining too much which keeps the monkeys in the trees.

Peechie was nikias son. Peechie is 5, looks like he is three and is one of the cutest kids I have seen here. He seems to know his way around the jungle. He´s adept at riding a horse through single track trails in the jungle and seems to know a lot about jungle animals. For example: I was showing him photos i had taken on my girlfriends digital camera. we came to a series of animals I had shot around town. A duck, some chickens, a dog, some parrots. He seemed to know the names of all of them. When we came to the photo of a large pig that lives near our hose he just pointed and shouted

"Those are good for killing with machetes"

"what?" i replied

"machetes, you use machetes to kill those. like this...." (makes hacking motions)

"hmmm"

remember he is five.

However, it wasn´t that surprising, as their family and the others out there really do just live off the land. They kill lots of animals around there in the wild with a shotgun they have, and cook them up over an open fire in a little hut they have. they collect plantains and fry them up, collect corn, yucca, and all sorts of other things in the rainforest to eat. About all they buy is some rice to supplement their diet and cooking oil, the rest comes from the jungle.

My favorite moment was on the second day of the trip. we were all down sitting around the neighbors house, just chilling under the roof of his house talking because again it was raining. It was just starting to get a little dark and was about 6pm. I was kinda looking up above the tops of all the trees in the primary forest, watching at least a hundred different little birds flying all over the place from tree to tree.

All the sudden, Peechie and his cousin started yelling excitedly at nikia, peechies dad and pointing off into the edge of the forest. Nikia ran to the edge of the house, grabbed his shotgun and a couple of shells and went running off to the edge of the forest. when he got to the edge he slinked into the brush and disappeared.

"what is he going after?" I asked peechies mom

"they saw a big bird up in one of the trees, I´m not sure what kind"

we waited a few minutes and then there was a blast from nikias shotgun. Next I heard Peechie and his cousin cheering and they took off, bolting for the edge of the forest.

as soon as they left, peechies mom started yelling at peechie. Much like a mother in the united states would yell at her child for running into the street - the same tone and urgency i mean. only it was different:

"Peechie you get back here now! Peechie! I´m talking to you get back here now its not safe in there right now for you. Peechie!(Peechie continues to run and is almost at the edge of the forest)"

"Peechie you better get back here, there are jungle tigers in there and if you go in there they are going to eat you!!!!!"

Peechie then turned 180 degrees on the spot and came bolting back to his mom and everyone watching laughed at peechie.

5 minutes later nikia came out of the forest with a bird roughly the size of a chicken. Ramons wife smiled at me and exclaimed "tonight, you will eat bird!"

and we did. with more wild boar. and it was good.

Pick-up record

2006-02-23T18:05:00.000-05:00

I saw 12 ecuadorians in the back of a pickup today. a small pickup too.

The most ecuadorians i have seen on a motorbike is 4.

Worms in the bum

2006-02-23T17:54:00.000-05:00

So the diarrhea that started a little over a week ago continues now. Whatever is doing it has endured continued doxycycline from my malaria prophylaxis and a round of treatment with Cipro. Thats pretty broad coverage and while there are still a few things it could be I´m beginning to accept the fact it´s probably some wormies.

I discussed it with my attending today:

"so you still have that diarrhea huh?"

"yup"

"and you took 3 days of cipro, a gram each day?"

"yup"

"yeah that should pretty much cover most things"

"yeah"

"It´s probably parasites, or i guess it could be maybe salmonella or shigella"

"sweet"

(other medical student smiling says): "I bet you have ascaris. You were at that lecture yesterday, like 100% of people in the jungle have it."

"yeah. fuck."

(student) "those worms are probably crawling up your trachea right now and then going down your esophagus."

"shut up"

Ecuadorian pick up experience

2006-02-21T19:55:00.000-05:00

Well I think I have just about completed one final thing that was necessary on this trip - a serious ride in the back of an ecuadorian pickup.

I went out with a doctor and his team today to do some public health work on malaria in a jungle town 3 hours away. we went with him to give a presentation to the community and to spray for mosquitos. I even fumigated a house myself with their leafblower like fumigator.

During the process of driving around fumigating, I rode in the back of a pickup with 7 other ecuadorian guys... plus there were 5 in the cab.

Coming back from the village I rode in the back of the pickup for 2 hours back to puyo. This wasn´t on some highway or smoothly paved roads either. This was on shitty ass jungle roads - unpaved, not even gravel. Pretty much just rocks. small rocks, big rocks, everything in between, and tons of potholes. Me and 3 ecudorian dudes in the back for 2 hours getting tossed around while we held onto side of the truck or the roof. not to mention the back of the truck also held the two fumigator backpacks, filled with gas, oganophosphates for the mosquitos, and there was a loose gas can floating around.

I´m so sore, and I think I´m going to be peeing blood tonight.

Holy Fuck that is a sweet machete

2006-02-20T10:45:00.000-05:00

So I was supposed to have a lecture this morning on snakebites, but once again the ecuadorian dr. didn´t show up. This seems to be somewhat frequent here with everything. People are always kinda late, don´t really have that much to do, and sometimes just kinda don´t show up. Makes me a bit pissed since i really want to learn about snakebites, for obvious reasons.

About all I have to do know is go machete shopping. First though since I have a few hours I´ll relate a story from this weekend:

So I went back to banos this weekend with the two other students I was with to do some hiking. Banos was the town I was originally in when I got to ecuador to go into the jungle. So as soon as we rolled into town, I noticed something odd, it was like there was a dust storm or something in the air, and there was some townspeople wearing masks walking around the street. Which always worries me because no one ever wears face masks even when treating tb. It turns out it was raining a bit of ash, which made sense because there is an active volcanoe nearby. Yeah thats right active volcanoe. I mean now it just kinda periodically dumps out some ash, but way back in oh...1999, it actually erupted dumping out enough ash that the sun was blacked out in the area and they actually completely closed down the town for 2 years.

So we were in town to do some hiking because the town is situation down between andean peaks and is gorgeous...there are some photos of it way back on my g rated site. It is actually where they filmed the movie proof of life. So anyway we began looking for the trailhead out of town and while walking the streets this dog started following us, which is really common in ecuador.

Near as I can tell, everyone has a dog here, no one pens them up, walks them or feeds them. So there pretty much are just dogs constantly roaming the streets eveywhere. It´s sad though because if you try to pick up a stick to play catch with them, they whimper and run off. Why you ask?, well because pretty much eveyone beats all the dogs when they come near them.

So this dog starts following us and it´s mildly annoying but I can´t bring myself to beat it or throw rocks at him. Which is seriously what the doctors family tells us to do when the family dog follows us out. "just throw rocks at teddy bear and he will return home and won´t follow you"

So the dog is following us and he is actually pretty hilarious because he is really into chasing cars. I mean every car, truck or bus he sees, he takes off after and runs all the way to the front of it, positions himself just in front of the car or bus running, and just barks and barks. Which is kinda of hilarious to see how much he really loves this. So i figure if he follows us on our hike, no big deal. So as we begin up the trail he routinely takes off chasing after chickens(which are everywhere here) and at one point runs off behind a wall by a house and all you could hear were some geese going nuts, a small child crying and then this dog came screaming back out from behind the wall tearing up the trail. That made me a little nervous and started to worry me a bit.

About an hour later the trail dumped us out onto a road. Just after exiting onto the road, there was a duck about 200 feet up on the edge of the road besides a crappy little farm. The dog took off at top speed after the duck, which saw him only at the last second and went flapping and squaking off into the sugarcane and corn trying to get away. we kept walking up into view of the farm and the next thing i noticed there was another dog chasing after the one who had been following ours. After that I saw this figure come rushing out of the corrugated steel shack chasing after the both of them. It was a small indiginous woman hunched over and chasing them with a big stick. Except it wasnt´t really a stick, it was actually a massive machete she was swinging at the dog trying to take any chunk of meat out if it she could since it was going after her duck. They all did a lap around the sugar cane and then the dog came bounding up the hill, ran directly toward the other students and I and then abruptly stopped in the middle of our group and sat down.

He kinda looked up at us with his tongue hanging out of his mouth and a grin on his face, content to have been chasing ducks and chickens all day.

Meanwhile all I could think was "fuck".

Next thing I know this indiginous woman who was about 5 feet tall and draped in lots of colorful shawls came crawling up the hill as well. She stopped at the top of the hill, looked directly at us and the dog, opened her toothless mouth and just started yelling at us. The whole time her right arm was raised high in the air brandishing her machete and shaking it at us.

Really I should have been scared, or at the least bit worried. But I couldn´t be because all I could think was

"Holy fuck that is the sweetest machete I have ever seen"

It was huge like all machetes are, but the thing that made it awesome was that the end of it was kinda hexagonal. so instead of being round at the end, it just got kinda broad and had a odd shaped hexagonal end to it. It was awesome.

I would have asked her about it, only she didn´t really seem to speak spanish, just an indiginous language, and she may have tried to cut me if i got to close.

So anyway, I´m going out to look for one of those machetes today to buy, and Ive begun throwing rocks at dogs now who try to follow me.

This chinese guy taught me ju jitsu after I saved his daughter from the sea

2006-02-19T11:00:00.000-05:00

So this weekend we traveled to banos from puyo. It´s only about an hour long busride, but it started off rough with me and my diarrhea and the general nausea and stomach pain I was having.

It didn´t help when this ecuadorian guy got on the bus and sat next to me. I knew it was bad news when he sat down next to me. He was immediately chatting me up like crazy, was kinda jumpy, and his eyes were always just as wide open as they could possibly be. I was thinking to myself this guy must be coked up. And I don´t mean a little I mean it seemed like this guy had just been snorting alternating handfulls of coke and amphetamines. I pictured him sitting on the side of the road, waiting for the bus, his right hand piled high with coke, and his left with meth, the whole time thinking "fuck, the bus is coming, I gotta use this" He was really odd, but i was forced to talk to him because he was next to me.

He told me he was a teacher, which was a little frightening. Also that he lived in banos and then taught at a school in puyo and slept at the school through the week. For the weekend he was returning home to visit his parents and relax. After talking for a half hour I began to realize, he may not be on drugs, that this is just how this guy is... During the second half hour our conversation got a little wierder.

me "so what kind of things do you like to do when you have free time, when you are back in banos"

miguel "On sundays when I am home I like to work out"

"oh yeah, what kind of sports or exersise do you like to do"

"I´m very into ju jitsu. It´s like my religion. Every sunday I like to go up into the mountains where there is this house that I can train at"

"woah, ju juitsu huh"

"yeah, I like to fight. To enter competitions and do free fighting."

"you mean without gloves or padding?"

"yeah only tape on my hands, nothing else. When I was living in Chile i was really serious, I won like four fights.(He then starts looking a little more agitated and intense and makes his hands into like karate chop shapes and starts jabbing them into the seat in front of us)"

"woah, uh huh.... so where did you learn ju juitsu?"

"well I was living in chile, and I got trained by this chinese guy."

"oh so this guy had some sort of gym or something I guess?"

"no, not at all. He was a jui juitsu master and didn´t have any students. But his only daughter was drowning in the ocean and I saved her"

"you saved his only daughter from the ocean?"

"yeah and when I brought her to shore, he look at me and said that now he was obliged to train me in the art of ju juitsu, that he had to train me for free"

"wow...."

"yeah he was a master and he taught me everything he knew"

"everything, wow. So for how many years did he train you?"

"4 months."

"oh. only four months huh"(at this point I was getting a little more worried. This just seemed a whole lot more like this guy had integrated some portions of movies and stories into his life and that he was kinda substituting them into his life.)

"huh, so what else do you like to do?"

"I like to lift weights"

"oh yeah me too, so is there a gym around here you use?"

"no(getting really excited). I don´t use weights when I lift weights"

"you don´t use weights?"

"no, my brother and i work out together and we lift each other, no weights. For instance, he sits on my chest like this(pounds his chest between his pecs) and then I do like this ( doing a sit up motion in the small confines of the bus seat)"

"huh"

"yeah, never weights I always lift my brother...and he´s really big and fat, like twice my size."

"wow, that must be a workout"

"yeah. (now he leans in really close to me, with wide eyes and kinda starts to whisper) You know why I lift my brother and not weights?"

"uh..... no"

"(whispering) because if you lift weights, you know your limits. You know how far you can go and how much you can lift. When I lift my brother, I don´t know how much he weighs....(points at his temple now).... So you see I have no limits(smiling)"

"yes, yes, I see."

If you´re even in an Ecuadorian jungle village, don´t drink the lemonade

2006-02-19T10:39:00.000-05:00

So starting friday afternoon I began having some pretty nasty diarrhea, which continued into saturday when I also began to feel extra shitty. There are two main things I can think of that could have caused it.

1) Thursday we traveled by bus for 3 hours outside of Puyo to go out to this clinic that is pretty much the last full size clinic in the jungle. So pretty much after this clinic, there is nothing but thousands of square miles of jungle. Only a couple increadibly crappy roads and other than that lots of litte villages with like 20-100 people scattered out in the jungle. So if you live out there and get bitten by a snake and hurt in some way out, the only way out is walking, by canoe, or by airplane. And if you don´t have an airplane ride, it can take up to 2 weeks.

So anyway we went out to help our doctor for one day with a public health project in this village. Lunch was included. One of the things he brough with him was a plastic shopping bag that weighed about 15 pounds. When i asked him what was in it, he replied with a smile "meat and cheese"

So our lunch consisted of pretty typical ecuadorian food that was prepared by one of the women in the village in her little hut of bamboo and leaves. It pretty much consisted of a soup with some potatoes and unidentified stringy meat in it, and then a main course of about a pound of rice with some hard stringy overcooked meat on top of it. And i don´t mean like a little piece of meat. I mean like a 8 inch long piece of hard dried beef with no seasoning. I wasn´t actually scared of the soup or the meat, because that is pretty much what I eat here every day, and you hope that the soup was boiled and the meat is always burnt so much it´s gotta be safe. But what scared me was the lemonde. The village woman had made some lemonade(ther are lemon trees everywhere here) and it was just in this big orange jug on the ground. I was so freaking thirsty, but really didn´t want to drink the lemonade as I was sure it would make me sick. Plus they had plantains there which were cooked. Which are basically big, meaty, dry banannas. So I was thirsty as shit, and finally broke down and had like 4 glasses. so that might be where the diarrhea is from.

2) So I really like dairy foods. I mean a lot. In the states I drink half a gallon of milk a day and eat yogurt whenever its cheap. Here, they drink no milk. Pretty much every meal is half a plate of rice and some dry nasty beef that is hard. So I´ve been hard up for dairy for like 1.5 months. The yogurt here is really good thought. And it´s sweet because it´s like a drink - all liquid, so you don´t have to spoon it into your mouth, you can just suck it down. it´s freaking awesome but both families seemed to stop buying it after they saw how much i would drink every morning at breakfast. So friday I was at the market and I saw they had big jugs of the liquid yogurt - $1 for a liter of the yogurt. A LITER. So i was like "fucking a" this is going to be awesome. I bought a liter of strawberry yogurt and sucked it down in like 4 mintues. It was awesome. Really good. Although i think it kind of scared the 2 other american students i was with. So yeah that may also be why i have diarrhea.

So i started some cipro and am currently am also on doxycylcline for malaria prophylaxis... I´m hoping I don´t get C diff.

Is that a lemur crawling in your wifes boobs?

2006-02-17T13:19:00.000-05:00

So I went out last night with two other students to a local bar in Puyo here. we watched a soccer match on a big projection screen and drank pilsener, the national beer of ecuador. A better name for the beer would be "shit", but pilsener is a pretty good name too. Pilser is a pretty light beer, comes in a bottle that is incredibly large(roughly a 22oz), costs 1$ and all the ecuadorians love it. Oh and it tastes like crap. It´s a good metaphor for pretty much how everything is here in ecuador: Cheap, effective, and crappy.

So last night I drank 4 of them, which cost me $4.

Later on in the evening I was sitting at the bar with this columbian dude just drinking shitty beer and talking about columbia, peru, and the jungle in ecuador. He seemed like a pretty nice guy, or he was just waiting for an opportunity to spike my drink with scopolomine and rob me, either one really.

Anyway we were just shooting the shit with his ecuadorian buddy who was working the bar. I noticed the guy because when he came in he had one of those same lemur like animals on his shoulders. He walked in and plopped it down on the bar and it was just runing around and crawling on people and hanging out in the bartenders dreadlocks. I got a better look at it and it´s head is almost the head of an anteater, and proportionally too big for the body. The body is almost like a racoons: furry with lots of rings and a little tail.

So this one was a baby and really cute and everyone was playing with it. Apparently it´s cool to bring racoon lemurs into the bars, but if dogs try to come in, you throw rocks at them. Everyone in ecuador seems to have a dog, yet no one seems to like them or feed them. And when they come around they throw rocks at them or hit them. Racoon lemurs however are welcome at the bar.

So as the night went on and more pilsener was consumed I kept talking to the columbian guy who apparently had married an ecuadorian from the jungle 2 hours away and lived out there. This is kinda how the conversation pretty much came to an end:

"Huh so you and your wife life out in the jungle like 2 hours away from here?"

"yeah we have 2 sons and have our own place out there"

"thats cool you like it out there?"

"yeah we do it´s a pretty relaxed life you know"

(suddenly I notice the female bartender with a pretty ample bosum and a low cut shirt. The racoon lemur is kinda squeezing between her breasts and trying to scamper down into my shirt. She´s trying to scoop it out but not being very sucessful. Obviously my response is to alert my new drinking buddy to this)

¨hey hey look(smacking his arm and getting very excited), that animal is crawling down into that girls boobs! Look look quick right there!"

(with a serious expression) " Thats my wife"

(still laughing) "what was that I didn´t hear you I was laughing"

"thats my wife"

"whos your wife"

"her, right there with the animal in her shirt."

"oh, oops sorry....... I mean it was kinda funny.....(he still has a serious look on his face).....I mean sorry."
"I thought you guys lived in the jungle two hours from here?"

"thats my wife."

"oh, ok right...... hmmm well. that is a pretty cool animal though..."

Wanna buy my racoon lemur?

2006-02-15T13:47:00.000-05:00

So i was walking to clinic yesterday afternoon and was less than a block away from my house. I looked over a fence and saw a little girl carrying a small animal that looked like a cross between a racoon, a rat, and a lemur. It was really cute and obviously a baby, but looked like when it grew up it would have potential to be mean.

I called out to her and asked her to show me her pet and come over. She was either quite or only spoke ketchu, one of the indiginous jungle languages so I couldn´t get much out of her. She put the animal down and it went running around the front yard.

Her dad came by to talk to me eagerly. He was about 5 feet tall, clothed only in cutoff sorts and big rubber jungle boots with a machete in one hand.

"so ummm what kind of animal is that"

"its an animal form the jungle"

"huh, umm so whats its name?"

"it doesn´t have a name its a jungle animal. look, see how it runs like a dog"

"like a dog?"

"yes it runs like a dog, and you have to watch out because it hides under the rocks so you have to be careful"

"Why would I have to be careful?"

"You wanna buy it?"

"Buy what?"

"The animal?"

"Buy it? what would i do with it"

"keep it as a pet. it runs like a dog."

"didn´t you just say it was dangerous?"

"You can eat it too."

"oh really.........hmmmm....maybe I´ll come back later...thanks"

The water fight with my madre

2006-02-14T17:34:00.000-05:00

So there was a request to update the story on the water fight with my ecuadrian madre.

So the night after she waited in the bathroom to try and dump a pitcher of water on me, my roomate and I set a trap. We pulled the old, set up a pitcher of water on the top of the kitchen door and wait for our madre to get soaked the next morning.

We were pretty responsible though. there were a series of dishtowels tied to the pitcher and then to the doorknob so the whole pitcher wouldn´t crash onto her head...just the water.

So it was set up all perfect, and her daughter accidently set it off that night, just barely missing her. So we made some adjustments and set it up again so if tripped it would definately soak whomever opened the door.

The next morning she was pissed. She knew we had tried to soak her the night before, so my madre was expecting the trap and disassembled the whole set up. But I think she was really pissed because it took her a long time to do. She is barely 5 feet tall so she had to pull a chair over and stand on it and take it all apart. And that door is the only way into the kitchen so she was way behind on getting her morning started.

I came down that morning and she just yelled at my roomate david and I. Apparently setting traps is against the rules of carnivale, it´s too devious or something. Plus she is convinced the pitcher would have fallen on her and hurt her, so she said that she won´t play with us anymore and she routinely calls david and I "los diablos" or the devils.

She continues to threaten me off and on though. She says she is waiting for the day i fly home, and then she will spray me and all my luggage with the hose right before i go to the airport to fly home.

we´ll see.

Wanna see my snake collection?

2006-02-13T17:56:00.000-05:00

So the thing that I love about Puyo compared to Quito, is that it is not a big nasty city and I can go running here and get away a bit. And also it is on the edge of the amazon....

So I went to explore a bit today on a run. Headed out of the small city of puyo on a rocky dirt road. It was pretty sweet because it was just this random road heading out of town and within 5 minutes i was just running on a dirt road into the rainforest just outside of puyo. Not thick rainforest, but rolling hills with less dense vegetation. It was awesome.

About 20 minutes into the run I saw a sign advertising some sort of touristic hacienda on a little side road and decided to check it out. I keep running over a few hills surrounded by lots of vegetation ¡ bannana trees, coconuts etc. I eventually came upon the hacienda and walked onto the land.

I was greeted by an older couple who were happy to see me. They explained that they owned the "hacienda" and that it was kinda of a little resort for people to come to and hang out on the weekends or have parties at. I´m not sure why, but they were really excited to see me and to show me around. They showed me their equivolley court, their "pool" which was about 10 feet long and 5 feet wide and full of greenish brown water. One thing that was really cool is that they distilled their own sugarcane alcohol there. They had all this really old machinery - presses and things to process the sugarcane, and then a couple large vats to distill the liquer in. Unfortunately they hadn´t made any recently because I had some previously on my jungle trip and it is really strong (85% alcohol) and good. But the wife did run off and get me a bag of sugarcane that i could chew on and enjoy.

They showed me their duck pond where they had over 40 ducks. (obviously so when they had large weekend parties they could slaughter the ducks and cook them.) The guy also took me into one building where he had his "collection de serpientes" or snake collection. He had preserved all the snakes he had recently killed on his land in jars of his sugarcane alcohol. He had at least 40 or 50 snakes of all sizes and colors. One was friggin huge. He had no idea what there names were and couldn´t identify them, but he knew it was cool and enjoyed showing them off.

His wife pointed out to me all the fruit that grew naturally on their land. As I stood there she pointed out pineapples, lemon trees, guyaba plants, naranjita, oranges, avacado trees.... all that just happened to grow naturally around there. They they invited me over to an outdoor fridge they had and pulled out some freshly made lemonade from the lemons they pulled off the trees. They poured three glasses and made a toast. All the time I was thinking "sweet, here I am, on the edge of the amazon, there is no way this lemonade is not going to make me sick given the water they made it with."

But how could you not partake of such a generous offer from a guy who just showed you his snake collection?

So I finished my lemonade, checked out thier 400 year old tree complete with vines you can swing on and drop off into a little lake, and talked a little more. Then I headed back home, running for about 20 minutes with my bag of sugarcane in hand to chew later.

Snow huh?

2006-02-13T10:43:00.000-05:00

So looks like you guys got some snow huh? Is there any in charlottesville? I see they shut down the washington airports as new york got 27 inches? damn.

Well no snow here. It´s 75 and sunny. it´s pretty sweet.

I´m in Puyo now which I actually just wrote an entry about on the g rated site.

I like it a lot more than quito because it´s smaller and not nearly as big. Plus i´m just on the edge of the rainforest which is pretty sweet.

I´m living with the doctor we´re working with in puyo and he´s pretty nice but quite. I´m a little tired and can´t think of much witty stuff to put up.

The doctors family does have a family of chickens as well as two ducks in the back yard. I´m pretty sure we are going to eat them. I bet they use a machete to chop the heads off.

I´m looking for some machetes to buy here and bring back too. they are all over the place, and cheap from what I hear.

Lost Blog Entry?

2006-02-11T16:37:00.000-05:00

So.... one of my blog entries has disappeared.

It was a sweet one too, about the guy who accidently shot himself in the leg, a couple of neck stabbings as well as the cat in the hospital cafeteria who hunts the mice.

Whats the deal blogger? who stole my entry? anyone got any input on this one? I'm kinda pissed.

Commonwealth of Virginia : you can suck it

2006-02-10T20:30:00.000-05:00

HA!

I was called up for jury duty in 2 weeks. Unfortunately I am here and will not be able to serve. Suck it commonwealth!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

What I want

2006-02-10T20:09:00.000-05:00

I want a big fucking steak and as many pints of guiness that I can drink. Real guinness. Not the carbonated shit that is in the old bottles because that is all they have here. Real guinness with nitrogen. And real steak. Steak that isn´t hard, that is thick, and that bleeds when I bite into it because I know it´s good meat and it won´t make me sick when it is undercooked.

And bacon too.

My pickup seats 18

2006-02-10T19:47:00.000-05:00

So I´m getting ready to head back to quito this evening on a bus from bahia. The same 8 hour bus I took previously, only now at night. It has been reported to have been robbed at night in the past, but hey it´s easiest and cheapest way to travel.

So canoa was pretty amazing. For the past 4 days I surfed everyday in some of the best waves I have ever surfed in, and did nothing else other than run, eat, drink, and chill. The hostel we were in had tables and a bar right on the beach and it was cheap and good to eat and drink there. So pretty much every day was spent surfing in the morning and drinking throughout the day on the beach and then more surfing in the evening. I don´t have any way to put photos up now, but i found a photo online of some old people at the same hostel. you can see them seated at a table on the beach with some distant cliffs in the backround. check it out:

http://www.puertoamistadecuador.com/CANOA%20HAPPY%20HOUR.JPG

my boat ride across the river back to bahia was quite sketchy. I got on this rotted out narrow ferrey boat that for no apparent reason heeled over to the left side quite dramatically. The driver who was up in front of the ferry apparently couldn´t really control the thottle from where he steered the boat. So he had this 8 year old boy stationed near the engine - and by engine i mean there was a car engine sitting in the floor of the boat. When he honked the horn of the boat, the boy would reach down near the engine and push a lever to adjust the throttle and another to adjust the direction the engine ran. Once we got underway the boy came up and handed out lifejackets. 4 to be exact. It was a little confusing since there were about 30 people on the boat. The exhaust system for the ferry was sweet too. there was just a big ass pipe that went directly up from the engine, through the roof with a car muffle welded to the top of it.

but hey it was 10 cents to cross.

So anyway, I should be back in Quito by 6am saturday, then i´m on to Puyo on sunday on a 6 hour bus. Puyo is the small city that boarders the rainforest where I´ll be working for the next three weeks, so I´ll fill you In when I get there.

And oh yeah I´ve started a new game. spotting how many ecuadorians can fit into the bed of a pickup. And keep in mind they don´t use big pickups here, they are more like little daihatsus. The most I have spotted is 9 in the bed of one pickup. And amazingly enough, there was room for more.

Canoa story on G rated site

2006-02-08T16:12:00.000-05:00

So i am currently in the slowest internet place ever. I would write some comical entry about things here at the beach but am tired of this connection. I did however write a bit about canoa on the g rated blog. so check it out by clicking on the link to it on the right.

Trip to the Coast

2006-02-06T11:40:00.000-05:00

In 30 minutes i´m catching an 8 hour bus out the coast. i managed to get this week off and am heading to canoa. A tiny town on the coast known for its surfing. Plus apparently jan through march is the surfing season.

here is a link to a photo of canoa i found on the net:

http://students.washington.edu/ashwortj/Ecuador/images/Ecuador/Scenery6.jpg

Fuck yeah you can pee right here.

2006-02-01T13:45:00.000-05:00

So one thing that I have noticed since coming here is that it is odd that it seems quite normal for men to just kinda pee anywhere at any time. Apparently there is no need to use a bathroom, that if you want to whiz, you just whip it out and pee where you like.

I see guys all the time in the city, just peeing on a wall, in the middle of the park, on the sidewalk.... It´s pretty hilarious.

So today I´m riding back on the bus from the ER and there is this woman with a little boy about 4 years old. The bus is real crowded, I mean packed tight with people standing up everywhere. This woman is sitting in a seat with her little boy in the seat next to her. Out of the blue she reaches over, stands him up and pulls his pants down. Then, out of her pocket she pulls this crappy little plastic bag. Probably a little bigger than sandwichch bag here in the states - like 5 inches high and a few across. Not a zip lock bag mind you, just this crumpled up, crappy, nasty little bag. She holds it under his little penis while piss just dribbled all over the place.

When he finished, she knotted up the top of the bag and then slid it into her coat pocket. Maybe I should have been grossed out, but I actually was laughing so hard I was crying.

Why I will not get a motorcycle

2006-01-31T14:46:00.000-05:00

They wheeled a guy into the ecuadorian ER shortly after I arrived this morning. From what I gathered he had been in a motorcycle accident. I was standing on the left side of his body and initially he didn't look that bad at least grossly.

Then I peered at the right side of his body. He had probably 2-3 feet of small intestine hanging out of a 1-1.5 foot laceration that ran vertically down the right side of his abdomen. He got a lot of fluids in a short period of time and immediately went to surgery.

After he left I noticed someone on a guerney laying next to us. I hadn't noticed him before. "what's going on with him?" I asked one of the residents.

"he died." The resident replied, and then didn't add anything else.

Cock Fighting Reference

2006-01-31T14:45:00.000-05:00

Today somebody found my blog by googling "cock fighting ring diameter"

I love to think that my blog serves as a reference material for cockfights.

Carnivale

2006-01-30T22:19:00.000-05:00

So the ecuadorians have a tradition of carnivale. I guess it's the same thing as in brazil, but a big part of it is that the whole month of februray they have these water wars, where they constantly play tricks on each other and soak each other with water.

So tonight our madre dumped water on another student. Later on in the evening I poured a glass of water down here back.

My room is actually this little room under the house around the side and so I have to enter and leave the house from one door. Our water fight actually escalated to the point where I went downstairs for a little while, and during that time my madre waited two stories above by a window, hoping I would return so she could dump water on me. The best part was this window she waited at was in the bathroom, so she was standing in the bathtub with a pitcher of water, peering over the edge for like 20 minutes, hoping I would come by.

There is just something hilarious about a fifty something year old little ecuadorian woman, patiently standing in a bathtub for 20 minutes, just so she can get me wet.

Perro Stick

2006-01-28T22:17:00.000-05:00

There are a lot of stray dogs and pet dogs around here that just kinda chase you down sometimes.

There are also apparently lots of dogs with rabies around.

I've started bringing a stick with me to smash them if they come around.

I call it my Perro Stick.

Estamos Contaminados

2006-01-28T11:25:00.000-05:00

So I showed up at the ER the other morning to see the door into the waiting room chained closed and there was a big sign made out of paper with the words"Estamos Contaminados, no Pueda entrar" scrawled on it. Which translates to

"We're contaminated, Do not enter"

So I waited for a few minutes and then when a new patient arrived via ambulance I entered with the patient. I walked in to see everyone wearing facemasks, which was worrisome since I have never really seen that here. I mean even when being exposed to Tb people don´t seem to wear masks because it is so endemic here.

Thank god I had my N95 tuberculosiss mask which I whipped out and put on immediately. I walked in to be greeted by the attending who has this amazing mustache and is always smiling no matter what. I gave him a confused look about the sign and the masks and he just laughed saying "We have a suspected case of bacterial meningitis".

Which was amazing because while it happens in the states it is not all that common and I have not actually seen it in medical school. But they had a girl there who had fever, was all obtunded, had nuchal rigidity, convulsions, petechiae all over her body, photosensitivity, positive kernigs sign. And her tap was cloudy as shit. If it wasn´t bacterial meningitis it was tuburcular(sp) meningitis. Either way it was amazing to see it so fulminant. Needless to say I took some cipro for prophylaxis so I am now on both malaria and bacterial meningitis prophylaxis.

I was glad I had my mask for this reason, but I was also glad I was wearing my mask because of the patient they wheeled in when I entered the ER. His eyes were kinda swollen and he was breathing quickly, I figured he was in anaphylaxis or something. Yeah it turned out he had horrible miliary Tb. Which was pretty amazing to see as well because I never really saw much tb in medical school and have never seen a case like this. It was really bad. The worst Chest Xray I have ever seen.

Hopefully I won´t convert my PPD when i return home

updated g rated blog

2006-01-26T20:45:00.000-05:00

there is some new stuff on my g rated blog linked on the right of the screen. There will also be some new stuff up on it this weekend.

I'm quietly judging you

2006-01-26T20:09:00.000-05:00

So I went to fucking spanish class today even though I am really fucking sick. The only reason I went is because I hate it so fucking much i want to finish my required hours and end it all this week.

For the past two days i've had fevers, chills, headache, muscle pains and have felt just all around crappy. If I wasn't already on malaria prophylaxis I would worry I had malaria. So I missed clinic this morning because I felt so crappy.

So one hour into the hell that is spanish class one on one with my teacher, she writes down an example of the use of the subjunctive and writes the following:

No Creo que estas enfermo.

She then writes it in the past tense as well to demonstrate the past tense form of the subjunctive.

So this translates into "I don't think that you are sick"

That fucking passive aggressive little ecuadorian bitch incorporates this little shot at me into her lesson plan, which pisses me off pretty substantially.

I don't know if you have seen the movie magnolia, or even just the scene in it between tom cruise and the reporter. But it pretty much went down like that for the remainder of the class which is 3 hours. For three hours I just kinda sat there staring at her and just didn't really aswer any of her questions. It was intensely awkward, which was awesome. I'll probably do the same tomorrow for my last class ever.

Subjunctive this bitch

2006-01-26T12:47:00.000-05:00

One thing I have come to realize on this trip, is that I harbor a deep hatred of spanish class.

Don't get me wrong I love speaking in spanish, I love conversing in spanish, and I love talking to patients in spanish. I just hate spanish class. I hate the fucking preterite - both imperfect and perfect, I fucking hate plusquamperfecto whatever it is, and most of all I fucking hate the subjunctive.

The program I am on is supposed to give us a lot of medical spanish instruction, but I am finding that rather than medical spanish instruction I am receiving what can only be a form of torture.

For three weeks now, every afternoon I have had spanish class for four hours in the afternoon. It's me with a spanish teacher one on one for four hours. We don't really do medical spanish, it's pretty much spanish grammar for 4 hours every day. Which is essentially my worst nightmare.

After 3 weeks of this the only thing that I am sure of is that my teacher and I share a mutual hatred of each other, and that I can't wait for the classes to end this week.

Pelea de galletos : Cocks, whisky, and fear

2006-01-23T13:32:00.000-05:00

This weekend I experienced one of the most amazing events of my life. I went to an Ecuadorian cock fight.

I traveled up to otavalo which is north of quito with two other students in my program and we went to this local market which is a big tourist draw and did this amazing hike around the rim of a volcano which I will write about on my other blog. But more importantly, I´m going to dedicate some serious time to my entry about the cockfight.

So from what we understood the cockfight starts at 6pm. There is actually a cockfighting arena in otavalo which is dedicated entirely to cockfighting. It took a little while to find as it is tucked away at the edge of town and its doors are hidden behind street vender carts. However, it is unmistakable for what it is. We walked in to find it completely empty. When you first walk in, you enter a room with walls covered in chipped paint and immediately notice two large murals on opposing walls. One a large painting of two chickens going at each other(pictured at the top of this post), and another of a larger bird swooping in to attack a human figure lying on the ground(pictured below).

You walk further in and in the center of the arena, is a cirular ring probably 15 feet in diameter that is completely red and it is surrounded by 4 or 5 rows of raked seats and steps. There is also a bell and a clock mounted on a wooden post.

We met the owner, who told us the festivities started at nine. So with the 3 hours of free time we promply found a bar and began drinking Johnny walker and cerveca.

We stumbled back down the street towards the ring in the dark. Behind abandoned vendors's carts, by numerous dogs meandering the streets and picking through garbage, and past a few sketchyy characters hanging out in doorways.

We were some of the first to arrive even though it was nine and so we figured maybe we should get a beer from a nearby store to enjoy the show with. One of the other students found a guy in the ring and asked him where we could get a beer. He motioned for us to follow him, walked back to the room with the murals of the fighting chickens and he threw open two large wooden doors to reveal a crappy decrepit bar full of various bottles of different hard liquors, all of weird Ecuadoriann companies I have never seen before. Ecuadorian music was pumping out of the room so you could barely hear. The Ecuadorian was wearing a leather jacket, and it was then when he lit up a cigarette with one hand and started pouring whisky with the other, that I noticed he had a tattooo on the webbing of his right hand: It was the silhouettee of a chicken.

We each ordered a whisky and coke - which came in a tiny flimsy plastic cup that held about 2 shots of whisky and an equivalent amount of coke. Each was $1.

We wandered back into the arena and took our seat about 4 rows up from the action, providing a good view of the action but not drawing too much attention as we were the only solid gringos there.

Then the Ecuadorians began to arrive with their chickens. In little time it became apparent that there was a divide between the old and new school of Ecuadoriann cock fighters. The old school which consisted of two old men and their nephew with downs syndrome and a cane, and the new school of younger Ecuadorianss. They all filed in one by one over the course of an hour with their cocks tucked under their arms, or in colorful bags. The old school collected to the upper left of the ring while the new school was gathered in the upper right. We were situated closer to the new school.

It was nearly 10 and no fighting had commenced so we wandered around the back of the stadium and found most of the trainers andcompetitorss weighing in. No joke they actually weigh the friggin chickens in before the fight. Here is a photo of the scale:

After that they had this confusing pregame evaluation where all the trainers would stand their chickens up on a table so everyone could examine them. what they were looking at I couldn't guess but it was pretty amazing to watch. I wanted to take a photo so bad but was worried I would get beat down quickly as the gringo intruder. We got a second whiskey and on my way out stopped in the mural room where I saw one of the most amazing images of the night. As I stood there sipping my whisky I watched while the ecuadorians prepared the cocks for battle. Before every fight, they file down all the nails to points. They then melt wax onto the legs of the cocks, attach a metal adaptor of sorts, and then carefully wrap this adaptor in differing tapes. Then they take some more melted wax and use it to affix blades to the adaptors and wrap it all in more tape. The blades are about 1 1/2 inches long and mean looking. The old school crew has their own kits of 20 or more blades they carry around in a small leather case. I actually got an amazing video of all this and ifIi knew how to put it up on my site I would.

We went back into the ring and the first fight commenced. It was pretty awesome. I mean people are really into this shit. I shot some videos and if there is anyone out there who can tell me how to put them up I will because the photos do not do justice. You really need to see the cocks going at it, the yelling, and you especially need to hear the constant crowing that is going on in thebackgroundd as the other cocks waiting to fight go nuts. There wasn't quite as much blood as I expected but there was lots of cocks going at it and feathers flying:

Above is a view of the ring with a fight in progress

Above is a shot of the dude who made our whisky drinks with the chicken tattooo. He was somehow in the ring for every fight and made these clicking noises to encourage his cocks. He was pretty excited in this photo.

Below is another cockfighting scene.(I really have amazing video so if it is possible to put it up let me know how.)

You really have to understand atmosphere of complete sketchness that was there as well. It was pretty much a perfect "Bad Idea Jeans" sketch for those of you who ever saw that SNL skit. I mean besides two other Germans there is was about 40 drunk ecuadorian dudes who are really into cockfighting. I was talking with my buddy at the fight and said something like this: "you know this is just one of those scenarios where when you are there you know it could just go really bad. And then when you try to explain it to someone in the future it's just going to sound so fucking obvious that it was going to go bad. ie "So I was at this Ecuadorian cockfight...."

Not to mention the fact that 20 minutes into the fight this ecuadorian dude well on his way to being wasted sat down next to me and started shooting the shit with me. I really wasn't sure if he was just interested in talking to the gringo at the cock fight or if he was just sizing me up. He explained to me that besides soccer and equavolley(this weird variation on volleyball which is a national sport here) he considers cockfighting a national sport. He tried to explain the training regimen that the cocks go throught but was so obviously wasted he couldn't or he didn't really know - so he called over the dude who trained all the new school's chickens. I was getting a little worried to be attracting so much attention but at the same time was really fucking interested in how you train a bird to fight in a cock fight. So the trainer came over and was telling me all about it, but I couldn't understand shit because I really don't know much cockfighting vocabulary in spanish. He tried to explain, he was crouching down and ducking his head down and pushing his handsforeword in front of his face making these weird motions, but I just couldn't make heads or tails of it. So he just got frustrated and offered me some whisky. Which was nice but I was also worried because apparently in ecuador it is quite common to lace peoples drinks with scopolomine and knock them out so you can rob and or rape them. But at the same time I didn't want to refuse a good faith offer of whisky from the trainer of the new schools cocks.

So I took the whisky and slowly sipped it, figuring if there was scolpolomine in it, and I drank it slow enough I would feel it before passing out and maybe be able to stop in time. Plus I figured it may help the effects of the whisky too.

So thats pretty much how the night went on for awhile. watching the fights, drinking whisky and figuring I had about a 50/50 chance of getting back to my hostel without being murdered/raped/robbed.

I did make a new friend though- hector - with whom I share a passion for whisky, addias sambas, and now cockfights.

Cockfight report soon to come

2006-01-23T13:30:00.000-05:00

I did indeed make it to the cock fight this weekend and it seriously was one of the most amazing and sketchy experiences of my life. I will finish a story about it soon, but now i have to go to my spanish class to drastically dissapoint my teacher like i do everyday.

Mission

2006-01-20T12:36:00.000-05:00

This weekends mission:

Trip to Otavalo in search of a Cock Fight.

More to come.

Mad Max versus los estudiantes

2006-01-19T13:38:00.000-05:00

So apparently pretty much every year at this time, and pretty much throughout the year off and on, there are protests in Quito. Not really protests like lets march in the streets and chant with signs and stuff. More like lets wear bandanas, throw large rocks, and ocassionally throw moletov cocktails. This is apparently very normal though.

It's wierd because the police have these big mad max like trucks. They look like large dumptrucks, with plates of steel welded haphazardly to them, with two big hose turrets on the top. And they are painted all black with wire mesh covering windows. Apparently they drive them into crowds of protesters, shoot them with water and shoot tear gas grenades.

Above is a photo I found online from protests in april of 2005 of one of the mad max trucks chasing down some protesters.

I've yet to see this, but it's on the news all the time and other students have been late to hospitals because the bus lines will just stop and dump everyone in the street before they get to the protests.

My Spanish Madre knows her homosexuals

2006-01-18T13:19:00.000-05:00

My Spanish madre gave us a lesson the other evening at dinner on all the homosexual actors in Hollywood. Apparently the following are gay : Tom Cruise, Ricky Martin, Leonardo dicaprio and many others. She is more than certain of it because it is detailed in the Ecuadorian news quite often who is and who is not gay in the U.S.

This morning at breakfast she also asked us to tell her about the experiments in the United States where we freeze living people for up to ten years and then thaw them out, just so that they can live in a more advanced time. I told her I was quite certain that hadn't actually happened, but she was very adamant that these experiments had occurred in the U.S. and we just hadn't heard of them. This she also saw on the Ecuadorian news.

Ecuadorian medicine : fast, cheap, and out of control

2006-01-17T13:15:00.000-05:00

After only a week working in ecuadorian clinics I am trying not to be too judgemental. I had heard in the past, that when coming to a place like this one can learn a lot about relying more on clinical skills because there is no money to do expensive lab tests and imaging. That would make sense, that they would take more care with exams and clinical skills given their lack of technology. Only so far it hasn't really been the case. Actually so far, the clinical skills I have seen with two general pediatricians has been either decent or poor.

There isn't much money, or fancy tests, or fancy expensive imaging. But also, It's just kind of crappier. Which is a bit dissipointing. It doesn't cost any more money to do a complete history and exam, yet the histories and exams i see here are far less complete than what I see in the US. And what medicines are used and how they are used often seem to make little sense. Just today I was told the following by a pediatrician. Quite emphatically I might add:

1) Nothing below the chest causes fever in a child- specifically in reference to a bladder infection

2) Apple juice is the best thing to give a child to rehydrate them when they have diarrhea.

3) It was amusing to the pediatrician how much myself and the student before me like to wash our hands before examining patients. She doesn't really do it and seemed to enjoy joking with the patient about how we do it so much.

For those of you who don't know apple juice is about the worst thing to give a young child. It actually causes diarrhea because it is pretty much sugar water and undigestible cellulose type material so it doesn't replace any electrolytes and just causes more diarrhea by osmotically drawing fluid into the pooh with it's undigestible material.

And it's pretty sad not to wash ones hands. Soap and water are pretty friggin cheap and if there is one thing that should be done, it's washing your hands. First do no harm?

On a scale of 0-10 so far my impression of the medicine here is somewhere in the range of craptastic.

More photos and Macs debacle

2006-01-15T09:43:00.000-05:00

So I added some photos from our trip to old posts - mostly on the other blog site - check them out if you like.

Also it seems that while on the trail to macchu pichu mac was robbed and lost his camera. Nothing was backed up so it seems that much of our jungle photos are lost for good.

My buddy

2006-01-14T11:33:00.000-05:00

I'm a little worried this is what is going on in my stomach, it is actually quite common here:

Oh can I George, can I?

2006-01-14T11:20:00.000-05:00

In Ecuador I am a giant. Everything here is made for people who are much smaller than I am. Everywhere I go I smash my head on ceilings, on doorways, on pretty much everything. The other day in clinic there was a TV mounted on the wall and I smashed my head on it, much to the amusement of a 3 year old Ecuadorian girl who just kept laughing and pointing at me for about 20 minutes.

Every car I sit in is like a clown car, and Ecuadorian are amazed at my size 12 feet. I literally cannot buy clothes or shoes here because those sizes simply do not exist here.

In clinic, the doctors and medical students cannot get over how huge my hands are. Every time I examine a baby, The doctor and med student just start laughing and speaking really quickly in Spanish and say something to the effect of "your hand is so gigagantic - how can you examine the belly when one hand is bigger than the belly?" One mother was a little worried I might crush her baby when examining it.

I think the Ecuadorian view me kind of like Lenny in Of Mice and Men. To them I'm kind of this gigantic oaf who can only really communicate with them on the level of a 6 year old child.

Johnny walker kills parasites

2006-01-12T13:41:00.000-05:00

There is a half empty handle of whisky sitting on the shelf in the patient room of the clinic I am working at now.

I'm not sure why.

Juan Travolta

2006-01-10T21:47:00.002-05:00

This is Juan Travolta. He was our guide in the rainforest. He asked me to post this and let all american girls that he is available and that he prefers american girls. He enjoys night rider and the A team and supplies the best sugarcane alcohol that can be found in Puyo or Banos.

I'm not making this shit up.

update

2006-01-10T21:40:00.000-05:00

note there is a new post below - the chinatown bus

estomago

2006-01-10T21:30:00.000-05:00

something is not quite right with my belly for a few days now.

vamos a ver

Update

2006-01-08T17:16:00.000-05:00

so the G rated site has been updated with some info on the trip thus far.

get to it by clicking on the link in the links section on the side of this page.

The Chinatown bus doesn't have shit on the quito-banos autobus

2006-01-07T22:54:00.000-05:00

The China town red dragon bus from washington dc to new york may be pretty cheap and ghetto, but it ain't shit compared to the quito - banos autobus.

So chris and i took el autobus back from the rainforest following our three day tour this morning(more on the tour later). The banos to quito route is kinda like the chinatown bus - it's cheap, sketchy and crappy but it gets the job done. only the buses here in quito are far sketchier than the chinatown bus.

Does the chinatown bus cost $3.60 for a 4 hour ride, because el autobus does. the bus from puyo to quito is sketchy. You have to cram your luggage under your legs and make sure to stay awake during the harrowing ride or else you'll be robbed of everything you have. Unlike most buses, which seem to have regularly scheduled stops, the buses here pick up anyone and everyone at pretty much any location. There is no limit to how many people they pile into the bus and they will pick up anyone anywhere.

They also like to use buses with blown out shocks and then drive them like F1 race cars. Never mind the road from banos to quito is 2 lanes wide and packed with other buses and semis, and that it is packed with potholes and parallels steep drop offs. It's no matter because if you drive the shit out of the bus, pay no attention to lanes, oncoming traffic, people it is possible to get an ecuadorian bus up to 90mph or so on sketchy ass roads. All the while the ecuadorians pay no attention to the activity and random people jump onto the bus selling ice creams and odd fruits. I swear I saw the helper to the drive bribe a cop to let them block an intersection to pick up more passengers and i saw the same helper push a small child out of the bus to get people on and off quicker.

the bus was pretty much the scariest traveling experience of my life... but it's the only way to get around ecuador

I kicked my brothers ass

2006-01-01T12:58:00.000-05:00

To my brother Jonny, who commented in his typically pc fashion on my last post, by calling my web site "far gayer than anything he has ever done on the net." :

You may be big and play rugby now, but don't forget that I kicked your ass for the first 18 years of your life. As evidence see below:

This is Jonny, laying at the bottom of the hill in front of my house, in the gutter, after I kicked his ass at the revenge of the nerds party at my house.

suck it you candy ass.

Big Mac will get dengue

2005-12-25T13:08:00.000-05:00

So I just met up with Big Mac to talk about our trip to Ecuador that begins a week from today. I kinda figured that since he will be getting there the day before me and that since "he knows people from Ecuador" he might be a bit more prepared than I since I have done pretty much no planning.

Not really ....seeing that he has no vaccinations, no meds(ie malaria prophylaxis) no books or anything on Quito. All he had was two printed pages of an email a friend sent about Ecuador. Those were soaked in rain, blurred, and crumpled. They were useless anyway. They pretty much contained some crappy information emailed to him from some guy he works with, who knows some other guy, who's got a sister who lives somewhere in Ecuador hours away from where we are going. But apparently she has friends who are girls. So Big Mac is excited. That's the planning we have. Those emails.

I think this trip will be a success if we avoid 1)death by disease 2)death by murder 3)actually meet up in Ecuador 4)returning home.

Oh and for anyone that may be interested in following our travels, I plan on creating a separate blog that will contain some photos and stories. That way I can direct all friends and family to a G rated version that anyone can look at and I can post additional info here.

So keep an eye out for that link on this page.

Poop, Steve Buscemi, and Ninjas

2005-12-20T12:31:00.000-05:00

Being new to blogging, I discovered an interesting feature. See when you type in things into your profile, you can later click on those interests and see what other blogs you get linked to.

So for instance if you type soccer into your interests, you pull up other people who listed soccer as an interest. So you would likely get other soccer players, soccer fans, soccer dads, etc.

So obviously my first thought was to type in poop as an interest. This was actually surprisingly not that exciting.

Next, I tried Steve Buscemi. I feel like this had a lot of potential but I actually didn't really check it out that much because I nearly immediately thought of typing in Ninjas. Which I knew would be good. Because really, I feel like you can catch two main groups of people. People who have a good enough sense of humor to list ninjas as an interest, and also those who really really honestly like ninjas. The first blog listed was by a guy who calls himself Ninjatron. Which is just freaking awesome. He posts a picture of himself posed with a samurai sword while at the same time wears a deceptacons t-shirt which is also awesome.

oh I did forget to mention that the poop listing did turn up one incidental finding that I enjoyed. One guy listed "your mom" as his primary interest.

Suck it Big Mac

2005-12-20T00:41:00.000-05:00

In 13 days I will be in Ecuador. This trip is bound to succeed for the following reasons:

1) I have not spoken spanish, in any coherent form in at least 5 years.
2) new years eve I will be smashed at a wedding, wake up early news years day to drive to DC and fly to Miami ,where i have an overnight layover at the airport.
3) I'll arrive in Ecuador at 10 am to meet Big Mac after 2 nights of no sleep, and we'll promptly catch a bus to the amazon. Where hopefully I will not get break bone fever.
4) Following our week in the rainforest I'll be in Ecuador for over 2 months doing something or other medical
5) During the fourth year of medical school I seem to have developed a bit of a "drinking habit" and hopefully will be able to fend off the DT's.