Vias Activas and Halloween!!!!

Last Saturday, in Puerto Ayora was the third Vias Activas event. Vias Activas was started a few months ago as a health awareness program after the son of one of the top government officials was killed riding his bike by a car. What started out as a small event has blossomed into an all day affair on the last Saturday of every month. Aside from working in the hospital here, I had decided I also wanted to be involved in continuing a health project that Galapagos ICE had started called Ponte En Forma. The project is basically a general health assessment of the population of Santa Cruz consisting mainly of people from Puerto Ayora, Bellavista, and Santa Rosa.

We decided that a great way to collect more people was to have our own stand at the event and offer free blood pressure and blood sugar screenings. They had closed down some of the roads in the main part of town so we were able to set up right next to the road. Between 9am and 1pm, we were continually busy checking about 50 people. Since I was the only one who was checking pressures and sugars, we were pretty slow, but ended up having a good system (almost BEMCo like!), and it was great to get a break around noon by Sienne, who took over. For people who had readings that were high, we told them that we would be available on Monday to check again for free with information about how to control blood pressure and sugar levels. It was amazing to hear that a decent amount of the people who came had never had their blood pressure or blood sugar levels checked.

After Vias Activas, I joined Dr. Hok Wah at the hospital to work until night. They were extremely fortunate for Vias Activas as it meant that the ER was running pretty slowly. I had the chance to do stitch a couple people who had fallen off their bikes or got their foot caught in the chains, so I’m hoping that by the time med school comes around, I’m going to be a pro.

That night was Halloween, which is celebrated here in conjunction with Day of the Dead when people pay their respects to their ancestors. It was very cool to walk by cemeteries and observe families gathering around graves in the midst of the night. My friends and I of course decided to go out. I dressed up as Dr. Love aka Doctor Amor wearing my scrubs with a big heart on my back. I had also made some little ¨prescriptions¨ cards which were in Spanish for me to hand out to girls. They had things written on them like take one kiss on the cheek from the doc or one dance with doc, etc. I didn’t give out as many as I would have liked, but I did give out some and I had a fun time at the bar! It is a costume I might have to reuse in the States for Purim or next year’s Halloween. We went to Bongo, the dance bar we normally go to. The pool table was removed, so the dance floor was larger ad it was packed with a mixture of locals, volunteers, and tourists. The bar put on a couple of dances one to Moulin Rouge's "Lady Marmalade." There are definitely some amazing dancers on these islands as well as some really bad ones too. We headed home around 3 in the morning. Overall, a very fun night!

I am starting to get into a routine here, so nothing exciting, other than partaking in a great barbecue, which allowed me to have the fresh perfectly made fish I have been craving here this whole time!!!! Hopefully these barbecues will be a weekly or bi weekly thing, though they can never compare to those great times in Israel at Hebrew U! A big shout out to my boy Jared who has finally joined basically everybody in our class of being 23 (except Winston cause she´s a baby). Happy Birthday KIDDO!