Ocobamba #2

This time I joined the team as a dental assistant!  Well, not quite as qualified as that - but I dressed in scrubs, held the teaching material about dental hygiene while others explained it in Quechua, and sterilised the dental instruments in the autoclave so those who were qualified could keep on working.  It was a shame that the power was turned off early on, which meant they couldn’t do any fillings, which was what a lot of people needed - but there was still a lot that could be done.  It was nasty watching children have their teeth pulled out (although probably them being given the anaesthetic was worse) but afterwards they were given a latex glove blown up as a balloon, which seemed to compensate them quite well!

 I went back to visit the lady who lives next door to the church (which had been turned into a clinic for the day), to talk to her again and see whether I could help connect up her water supply to the lovely, new, but unused, flushing toilet she has.  It wasn’t as simple as that, partly because I tried first of all in Quechua which proved to be definitely not up to the task (but I was proud of myself for trying), but also because I discovered it’s part of a larger issue in the whole village, and decided that helping just one household would not be a wise approach.  So in breaks from helping the dental team I went to chat to other people in the village to find out a bit more - helped by 1-year-old Oliver who I looked after for a spell, and who very easily invites himself into people’s houses.

The village has a water system that was installed in 1994 and is still working despite some damage to the structures.  The local government has just completed a “drainage” project to address the health problems and high incidence of parasitic diseases in the village - so each house has been provided with a flushing toilet and connection to a new septic tank.  But the project only involved drainage - so it’s up to each household to provide the cistern needed for flushing their toilet and make their own connection to the clean water system.  Possibly something that might turn into an AIDIA project later of the village requests it, but a larger undertaking than I had originally thought.  There was also, helpfully, a big billboard proclaiming the completion of the recent project - so now I can go away and look it up!

 

On the way home we stopped off at a bridge made from palm leaves (it does have cables runnign underneath though as well).  Another highlight was a avocado tree - definitely something I love about Peru.