Starkey Mission Day One: Diving right in
Tuesday, May 9th, 2017 Mission Day One:
Our mission is being held about 40 min away from our hotel at the Cambodia Red Cross building. There thankfully we have access to an air-conditioned building for parts of the mission and a huge airplane hangar tent thing where we do the registration, fittings, and counseling. I got to do otoscopy for the first 2.5 hours, which also means that I spent that time cleaning out ears. Best day ever! I have an undeniable satisfaction seeing and knowing someone got all the gunk cleaned out of their ears. #earwaxnerd.
I've only cleaned two ears ever in my life prior to this so I was actually super nervous. You would think I'd be fine with Dad's cerumen management zealousness in my genes…. I had a Starkey team member that I worked with for the whole time that I was super grateful to have. I've never seen a complete perforation of the eardrum, I saw nothing other than the ossicles connecting to the round window at the back of the middle ear in that ear and it was almost shocking. I quickly had to orient to that a little which I did after seeing it several times. We saw and pulled out everything from bugs, and chicken feathers, countless perforations, hematomas, fungus infected ears, wax etc. Way beyond anything I had seen or would ever see in our University clinic back in Logan. And when there was wax, a lot of times it was a wall of blackness due to the wax being so impacted so we'd have the people wait for 15 min with glycerol drops to soften it. And even then we couldn't always get it out. I felt bad making them wait longer than the hours they were waiting but they didn't mind, they were there to be helped and would have waited all day. They amazed me.
Today we served 250 people from a tiny little country town several hours away. People crammed on flatbed trucks and stood for the entire bus ride with a glitter of hope in recieving help from us. They were all farmers, with sun darkened beautiful skin- if they had teeth they were partially black or just missing altogether. Our Starkey team leader, Meagan said they were some of the poorest people she had ever seen. No one speaks English… not even really the interpreters…. Some of them do but it's really hard to understand a lot of their English and or they just don't understand us… So that was a little difficult… like one man we saw today- had negative pressure ME, and his TM looked like it was close to bursting so we were trying to explain through the interpreter how to help him protect his ear from bursting (the Asia Pacific Starkey member decided this was a good idea until 10-15 minutes of confusing back and forth from English to Tagalog to Khumer and back again- all just to explain that the man should protect his hearing…..) To be honest, I don't know how much of anything the interpreters got across that the people understood, but we're all trying to do the best we can here and the rest will all work out!! :)
We are doing a research portion of this mission today so we all took a turn doing the live voice testing. I struggled talking at the level I was supposed to and it was horrendously loud, but we did the best we could. Oh my I had an amazing interpreter that would explain the directions of the test before I could hardly sit down. She made our job so much easy!!
Fittings: The first girl I had was a girl in her 20's completely nonverbal and had no emotion other than a very uncomfortable look on her face and raising her hand and shaking it as to sign maybe. But she didn't sign either. Her father was with her and we asked how he communicated with her and he said that he just used body language- My heart broke at hearing that, imagine how sad that would be for this girl and how discouraged this poor father must be. But he had hope and that's why he was here. Unfortunately, we were not able to get any response at any level with this sweet woman. So we ended up not fitting her when she decided she didn't want any of the hearing aids. There were only a few people we couldn’t fit, and the ones we couldn't, it was absolutely agonizing. Those ones I said a silent prayer for and hope God will take care of them.
Because we had a 40 min bus ride each way, we had a chance to get a good view of Phnom Phen. Watching the city bustling and alive was incredible. This is real. I really am in Cambodia on a hearing healthcare humanitarian mission. I loved gazing out the window at the people and the city trying to imagine what their lives are like. They just seem to have different life aspirations and priorities here that are nothing like America.
The streets here were packed..our bus almost hit a man and his little girl that fell off their motorcycle (moto) right in front of the front tires. Thankfully she was ok. I honestly don't know how there are not more accidents here, we went the whole week and didn't see a single one despite the traffic lanes being completely ignored, people turning and driving whatever what and whenever they wanted. Motorcycles are the vehicle of choice here I would be terrified to drive a moto or a car here…. In America, you can have faith in the little white and yellow traffic lines, here… it’s a different story. There are four lanes of traffic lines painted on the road 2 for each direction but probably 6 or 7 lanes of motos and cars on both sides that just emerge from everyone going everywhere. I am amazed at how close they drive to us or to each other. Then when we'd stop at stoplights, beggars would walk car to car tapping on windows begging for money, it was such a sad humbling sight. And all the shops? There are so many of them but they are all variations of the same thing whether it is either motorcycle supplies, mechanic shops, furniture places, car dealerships, the random exercise equipment stores or floral shops.
Then everyone else not in a shop was on the side of the street with their portable fruit stands- or they were selling things like snails, cooked meat, folded lotus flowers, or balloons… I didn't get the business idea for selling balloons but it looked just as successful as the women selling snails for food…. I just can't imagine this being your whole life. Sitting on the side of the street as the 5th or 6th snail seller within two blocks. How did I get so blessed to be born into a country where we live to become- we can dream big- go to school, aspire to be a doctor or athlete or have our own home someday or make enough money to go on trips or whatever it may be. America truly is a blessed land.
But despite their simple lives, the children oh the children are so beautiful and happy, and it would rip my heart out when I see them smile and their teeth are rotted, black or just completely gone. I would watch even the littlest ones crouch down in their squat that they all do and rummage through the garbage with the hope of finding some morsel of food or maybe something they can sell to get food. On the boardwalks, the children were running around playing soccer or playing tag with each other, some were running the fruit/meat stands, some were eagerly trying to sell bracelets or other handmade trinkets to be able to eat that day. They are all barefoot too- (these are my children kin, this is why it feels like home!)
Also. Did I mention how much I love how warm it is here? I have been cold for way too long in Logan. It's felt like a Narnia winter there. And to be here with the understanding that my hair is going to be crazy and I am going to be sweating the whole time, I am full heartedly loving this warmth and humidity. Others are not as big of fans of the humidity, and it is nice that we are not standing in the direct sunlight but ohhh my bring it on. #thisreallyisheaven #defrostingfinally
Our mission is being held about 40 min away from our hotel at the Cambodia Red Cross building. There thankfully we have access to an air-conditioned building for parts of the mission and a huge airplane hangar tent thing where we do the registration, fittings, and counseling. I got to do otoscopy for the first 2.5 hours, which also means that I spent that time cleaning out ears. Best day ever! I have an undeniable satisfaction seeing and knowing someone got all the gunk cleaned out of their ears. #earwaxnerd.
I've only cleaned two ears ever in my life prior to this so I was actually super nervous. You would think I'd be fine with Dad's cerumen management zealousness in my genes…. I had a Starkey team member that I worked with for the whole time that I was super grateful to have. I've never seen a complete perforation of the eardrum, I saw nothing other than the ossicles connecting to the round window at the back of the middle ear in that ear and it was almost shocking. I quickly had to orient to that a little which I did after seeing it several times. We saw and pulled out everything from bugs, and chicken feathers, countless perforations, hematomas, fungus infected ears, wax etc. Way beyond anything I had seen or would ever see in our University clinic back in Logan. And when there was wax, a lot of times it was a wall of blackness due to the wax being so impacted so we'd have the people wait for 15 min with glycerol drops to soften it. And even then we couldn't always get it out. I felt bad making them wait longer than the hours they were waiting but they didn't mind, they were there to be helped and would have waited all day. They amazed me.
Today we served 250 people from a tiny little country town several hours away. People crammed on flatbed trucks and stood for the entire bus ride with a glitter of hope in recieving help from us. They were all farmers, with sun darkened beautiful skin- if they had teeth they were partially black or just missing altogether. Our Starkey team leader, Meagan said they were some of the poorest people she had ever seen. No one speaks English… not even really the interpreters…. Some of them do but it's really hard to understand a lot of their English and or they just don't understand us… So that was a little difficult… like one man we saw today- had negative pressure ME, and his TM looked like it was close to bursting so we were trying to explain through the interpreter how to help him protect his ear from bursting (the Asia Pacific Starkey member decided this was a good idea until 10-15 minutes of confusing back and forth from English to Tagalog to Khumer and back again- all just to explain that the man should protect his hearing…..) To be honest, I don't know how much of anything the interpreters got across that the people understood, but we're all trying to do the best we can here and the rest will all work out!! :)
We are doing a research portion of this mission today so we all took a turn doing the live voice testing. I struggled talking at the level I was supposed to and it was horrendously loud, but we did the best we could. Oh my I had an amazing interpreter that would explain the directions of the test before I could hardly sit down. She made our job so much easy!!
Fittings: The first girl I had was a girl in her 20's completely nonverbal and had no emotion other than a very uncomfortable look on her face and raising her hand and shaking it as to sign maybe. But she didn't sign either. Her father was with her and we asked how he communicated with her and he said that he just used body language- My heart broke at hearing that, imagine how sad that would be for this girl and how discouraged this poor father must be. But he had hope and that's why he was here. Unfortunately, we were not able to get any response at any level with this sweet woman. So we ended up not fitting her when she decided she didn't want any of the hearing aids. There were only a few people we couldn’t fit, and the ones we couldn't, it was absolutely agonizing. Those ones I said a silent prayer for and hope God will take care of them.
Because we had a 40 min bus ride each way, we had a chance to get a good view of Phnom Phen. Watching the city bustling and alive was incredible. This is real. I really am in Cambodia on a hearing healthcare humanitarian mission. I loved gazing out the window at the people and the city trying to imagine what their lives are like. They just seem to have different life aspirations and priorities here that are nothing like America.
The streets here were packed..our bus almost hit a man and his little girl that fell off their motorcycle (moto) right in front of the front tires. Thankfully she was ok. I honestly don't know how there are not more accidents here, we went the whole week and didn't see a single one despite the traffic lanes being completely ignored, people turning and driving whatever what and whenever they wanted. Motorcycles are the vehicle of choice here I would be terrified to drive a moto or a car here…. In America, you can have faith in the little white and yellow traffic lines, here… it’s a different story. There are four lanes of traffic lines painted on the road 2 for each direction but probably 6 or 7 lanes of motos and cars on both sides that just emerge from everyone going everywhere. I am amazed at how close they drive to us or to each other. Then when we'd stop at stoplights, beggars would walk car to car tapping on windows begging for money, it was such a sad humbling sight. And all the shops? There are so many of them but they are all variations of the same thing whether it is either motorcycle supplies, mechanic shops, furniture places, car dealerships, the random exercise equipment stores or floral shops.
Then everyone else not in a shop was on the side of the street with their portable fruit stands- or they were selling things like snails, cooked meat, folded lotus flowers, or balloons… I didn't get the business idea for selling balloons but it looked just as successful as the women selling snails for food…. I just can't imagine this being your whole life. Sitting on the side of the street as the 5th or 6th snail seller within two blocks. How did I get so blessed to be born into a country where we live to become- we can dream big- go to school, aspire to be a doctor or athlete or have our own home someday or make enough money to go on trips or whatever it may be. America truly is a blessed land.
But despite their simple lives, the children oh the children are so beautiful and happy, and it would rip my heart out when I see them smile and their teeth are rotted, black or just completely gone. I would watch even the littlest ones crouch down in their squat that they all do and rummage through the garbage with the hope of finding some morsel of food or maybe something they can sell to get food. On the boardwalks, the children were running around playing soccer or playing tag with each other, some were running the fruit/meat stands, some were eagerly trying to sell bracelets or other handmade trinkets to be able to eat that day. They are all barefoot too- (these are my children kin, this is why it feels like home!)
Also. Did I mention how much I love how warm it is here? I have been cold for way too long in Logan. It's felt like a Narnia winter there. And to be here with the understanding that my hair is going to be crazy and I am going to be sweating the whole time, I am full heartedly loving this warmth and humidity. Others are not as big of fans of the humidity, and it is nice that we are not standing in the direct sunlight but ohhh my bring it on. #thisreallyisheaven #defrostingfinally
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