1st of November

Its that time of the year again. The first of November arrived and passed and suddenly, there is a whirlwind of anxiety?? in the air. Before you know it...Christmas is here. New years is here and  then another year is here OMG. On the 1st of November, the things that always run through my mind are

1) Cyclone season.
This year, cyclone season (or the 1st of November) actually started off (in Savaii anyways) with wind and gusts and torrential rain. To put it ironically, I was actually sh$%*ing my pants that a cyclone was actually going to hit. What the!!  So I dont like that. I dont like living a boat ride away from my parents and family..ie a boat that could stop sailing, the port could get damaged the reef could  get battered and even a sailing ship could not leave!!OMG..those are all the thoughts in my head. PLease let all the digicel posts stay up so we can keep in touch by phone with everyone!!

2) Insurance
Why the hell did we not just go on and get the darned insurance (bar the too expensive too complicated excuses ) ....now I really should just go and get it. And then get a loan too as well.

3) Flying. I might have to go to NZ for a short trip and as much as that is woop di doo- get some shopping- type thrill, I would hate to fly through bad weather. On the news today, Air NZ pilot suffers an aneurysm moments after landing in Auckland....OMG. That and the weather is enough to put me off. Eh se kao ia se. Pala'ai kele.

4) Christmas.
Every year we make the family oriented decision to close our business down for Christmas, both to give all our staff the priveledge of this family oriented holiday and to Celebrate Christmas itself, and because its our Daughters birthday on the 23rd. And then we never really get around to planning something great. We might have a BBQ here..a dinner there...but sometimes we are left thinking...well we could have actually done that and kept our business open. Last year we went to a beach resort on the other side of Upolu. And it was shit. To put it bluntly.  Big white elephant of  a resort with crap service and crap food...is just what people who run a hotel/bar and restaurant DONT want to be faced with on their one break a year. Thanks much Samoa Hide..........resort. Lets just leave it there shall we. Now , scratching my head over ideas of something fun/great/fantastic to do that I wont get an earful for the rest of the year from my hubby for!

5) New years resolutions?
nah..I dont actually think about that. What is the use of making up a resolution which is basically something you've wanted already all along and just not had the will power to do/achieve/go out and get- what difference does announcing it on the 1st of Jan actually do to motivate you?? I would rather watch Dr Phil or listen to TOny Robinson and try to get an inch more motivated then I am now..realistically might do better then me saying this silently in my head (lose weight this year bla bla)

6) Getting Old.
Well, This season doesnt make me feel like I am getting old but after talking about the above 5.. I do suddenly realise that these cycles happen every year and I am definitely not getting any younger.  Some days, I worry about what the heck I am doing with my life or we are doing with our lives. When did this become part of our future plan? But then I look at my father in law. The English man from England, who many centuries ago actually caught a ship to the southern hemisphere met his wife and moved to Samoa. And now has been here yonks. Had dedicated his whole life to this island living, and in Savaii too.  And I think well here is a person who gave up everything for them. His wife, their future, their land, their place in the village the aiga. And I wonder whether I am doing that or whether I am being selfish thinking about me all the time?

On a side note..this morning I watched while a over-testosteroned male was yelling at one of our aigas staff members, and my father in law stepped in to calm things down and explain the situation. Then this dickhead of a local man got louder and even almost got out of his car pe fia fusu ea  while my father in law was being his quiet pleasant old self speaking slowly and clearing about what had happened(as it was, it was just a small error with change which had been corrected) and I had to hold myself back from geting involved- just about walked over to bring out the mufasa in me. (called the men in my family instead to "come to the shop now" and be around..ie this old man is like 50kg and the demented guy is like 200kg !) I dont know what it is but sometimes, I think when locals have a palagi intervene on something, they get over inflatted egos and then go fluffing their feathers and flexing their muscles...calm the dick down mate. Ke vaai aku a o le palagi paee  e le kaikai lava ga fia fusu ma oe..ae fia faa-aliali  a lou temper/power ki'o. Koeaikiki ou aluaku kui oe se antipsychotic.

 Anyways...theres my rant for the day.

ciao

Touch wood

Thank goodness for this immune system. If this is what the man above has dealt me in my line of work I am seriously grateful. It always surprises me how much contagions  I have around me and yet I always miss out or rarely get affected. This week, I have my youngest down with a nasty cold...cough snot fevers and sweat is what it is. How she manages to still have smiles and her usual cheek in her I dont know, shes my little fairy princess. The next one up has caught chicken pox. I am almost entirely sure it is from school and maybe even from some kids we give a ride to everyday because one by one a family of 3 has become just one child coming as the others are 'sick'...hmmm..anyways. Chicken pox is nasty. Its everywhere, in her hair behind her ears,  down her back and in places she cant reach. Its itchy as anything and my eldest daughter is as miserable as anything. Im trying to put every anti-itch thing you can put on it as well as an anti-itch tab at night and she is still miserable. Bless her little soul always the obediant daughter- having been told not to scratch she will just sstand there and jump up and down wailing "Im so itchyyyyyy!"...its heartbreaking but Im nursing her through it...

And last but not the least, Dad has got the good old chikungunya. Thankyou american Samoa, thankyou south america.. or wherever this came from. He has it full blown, rash, fever, itch, sore joints, headache, not an ounce of energy and in bed all day. Thank goodness for the babysitter or I would have had to shut 2 businesses down to care for this lot. Luckily Im only a hop away from home so in and out all day to check on these 3. Its been a week now and I was waiting to see when I would get something....but alas..the week is almost up and surely this lot should be going downhill from now on a recovery road and not so much as a sniffle from me. I remember feeling like this at the hospital too. When in outpatient with almost zilch hygein and infection control..and still...never caught anything.

Well its touch wood, that I actually don't get infected who knows...maybe next week Ill come down with something but I am counting my lucky stars for being spared and being able to care for all these sickies in the house.

Please keep spraying your homes because as far as I am concerned, Chiku is still around and in full force  (esp in Savaii)

Some Days

Some days, are just mung days

 And I am dying..in Savaii.

I would rather be in a two piece, at a luau..

That Ive never been to or seen, in Hawaii.

( if I had a body to go with that

Would be great, lose half my fat

Love handles apparently I am told

Guys like a little more curves to hold)

Some days…and just crap days

That I feel like wasted space..wasting oxygen

And other days , are fun days

I'm a blast and can climb a mountain.

I can’t quite decide…if I want to hide, or thrive…

If I want to be here..or leave here…

If I am happy or sad…if life is good or bad…

The torture of confusion…is draining.

Some days..people say

How lucky we are to live here

So peaceful and quiet and just lovely

To be here…to work here to while here…

Other days, I am asked “how I do it’

Like an offer of sympathy

How I stand it, live without it..make it through it

A realization of something sacrificed

Something nice? It?

As I said,

Some days, are just mung days

 And I am dying..in Savaii.

Post US Sum up.

So we did a holiday to the US. 3 weeks Aeroplanes, spare ribs, supersized sodas, las vegas, Disney, knots berry, visiting family, freeway freaking out, freeway ACCIDENT, catching up with old friends, meeting NEW family, sleeping eating, walking in malls, running in malls, shop til you drop and fast food on the go all you can eat seafood chinese buffets. Uma laia.
It was a fun filled trip. We all put on weight (shock horror) .Most satisfying are the people we met/caught up with and taking the kids to theme parks, the looks on my kids faces meeting mickey mouse and Cinderella....my daughter yelling at the top of her lungs (she is 4) at a robot-olaf snowman (from Frozen cartoon) "OLAF! ITS ME MOANA,YOUR FRIEND" on top of a roof of a shop at disney because she was over the moon to see him in "real life"...was awesome.

We have done that trip, ticked that box. Would I go back again...I don't know, it would be hard to say yes to that. Thats my honest answer. Maybe for a wedding, or a family function, or even a shopping trip if I had lots of money (to pay the fare!) ....but as a holiday?? it was actually kind of hard to relax. Maybe because we had a jam packed itenirary, maybe because it was just too fast for me...life on the go, on the run it felt like.

The impression that the big USA left on me was....masses. Mass consumption, mass production, everything is Massive so as to make life more convenient. I was giving way to people at a park one day on scooters feeling sympathetic that they were disabled, only to watch one lady hop off and say to her partner "ok your turn I'm gonna get my legs moving for a little while" ie....the sit on scooter was actually just so that they didn't have to walk ...wow.

What I saw was that everything is done great- packaged and perfected, even 'having a good time' had been well thought out. We went on a 3 day cruise to mexico and were told it was all about the fun. And it sure had fun thought up and mastered. At 12 noon a big disco broke out on the main deck by the pool, a handful of waiters marched around with really inviting looking cocktails, cheap too, handing them out and charging peoples rooms in all of about 2 seconds (like fastest waiters ever) , then a really cool looking pirate gets up and MCs and manages to get everyone on the dancefloor and teaches them a pretty cool looking line dance . All pin pointed and pasted..12 oclock awesome boogie.  Fun is timed and on time. The whole trip was planned and thought out like this. And there were plenty options.

But where it started to suck for me, was when rote learned greetings replaced common sense. I stood in a line to get off the boat (which holds >1000 passengers) and my dad had to turn around for 5 mins and backtrack to grab something he had left around the corner, and me my kids my mum and husband got chased back to the end of a loooooong ass line because some (dickhead)staff member was(yelling) giving instructions- NO WAITING IN LINE....the line needs to MOVE (ie we were letting people overtake us waiting dad who only took 5 minutes) but they had no ears for our explanations and we just kept getting that above instruction yelled at (infront of everyone) common sense no more.... instances like this cropped up throughout our entire trip..in stores, in restaurants , in the park even by "park police" ( which by the way - who the freak are park police??) people did not have the time of day to listen, there was no common sense. Maybe this is why this country has gone bonkers and sues every tom dick and harry for the dumbest things......?

Then, I started to miss just fresh food....all this fast food, burger pizza taco shit....every corner every street you drove on had fast food places side by side...like 4 burger places on our block on one street across the road. How do they make money? How could they make an all inclusive breakfast $2?What is in those sausages/hashbrown/bread that makes it so cheap??and How long has that been in the freezer for?? Give me an oka, limu or a poke any day over a burger. Then the waste..so much waste...waste of food in restaurants etc....all I could think was, consume, produce and let someone else deal with the devastation. That someone is people in the pacific who will be the first to suffer from rising sea levels from the by products of mass production which is getting out of control The side effects of the waste of mass production are already known but only few are worrying about it. In Samoa, everyone is aware of all the climate change stuff that is in the media all the time. In the US, I honestly felt like no one gave 2 hoots. You never caught a drift of this issue anywhere. You had fast food and a glamourous life being shoved down your throat (the latest gadgets, clothes, celebrities in the media all the time) Climate change?? I don't know....SMOG. I don't get why someone cant build a big suction fan mop in the sky and just filter all that crap out of the air. Honestly I am sure it could be done??SURELY. It is so thick it obscures buildings sometimes so its like a blanket hanging in the air. I say put a wet cloth in the sky and suck air threw it...ok, patent that idea :)

So what else has that made me think of ?? Ancient civilizations - I can't get over the fact that there are civilizations that existed 1000s of years ago who were so brilliant. History tells that some like the Indus valley civilization housed about 5million people (! like waaaaa) they built great buildings, had smart architects (like...what happened to all that knowledge??) had sewage systems and bustling trading centers etc...artists and all sorts... one day ,that all  disappeared. All their awesomeness , their intelligence, all that they had built and gained and acquired over time...lost. Why and how they can not be sure of but there are theories of getting too big for ones boots and being unable to sustain so many people, disease, climate change droughts and famine. Then they just disappeared off the face of the earth, their 'peoples' maybe resettling into smaller nearby villages but without all the grandiosity that they once had. This is what I worry will happen to  us again, except it will be larger scale...we are getting too big (well , 'some of us' ) for our boots. too greedy to gluttonous with the way we live, we are going to out do ourselves and destroy the earth we live on ..and poof everyone will die and disappear. Then maybe 10,000 years from now,pockets of surviving humans revive a new era of humans  and " our time" will be discovered and remnants of our buildings etc will be dug up and our history pondered on, and it will be found that we were stupid enough to destroy ourselves. Amen.Uma laia i'i ga.

My ra raa RAHHHH for the day ;)

Why is it that-

When the sign says we close at 12  people RUSH into the carpark…at 12.02 ..ie we are sweeping the floors and closing the windows…everything has been counted balanced put away and turned off. The last available appointment is- 11.45. They then  proceed to stand in the window and frown and hold on to their sides  like they have appendicitis or are going to give birth to a baby or something.

You

Had

All

Morning.

But obviously, mines a  a job where a closing time is non existent so….my babysitter develops a headache because she wanted to leave at 12.30 to go look after her own kids but now…I'm running late. My receptionist is grumpy because not only is it the time I need now to see someone but all the closing procedures have to be repeated. Count, balance, put away, turn of. Been there, done that. ALREADY. My kids get to see LESS OF ME..and more of the TV. Because –you decided to come at 12 and not before 12. The phone even dares to ring and a sulky voice on the other side goes “eeeaaaaa….you guys close at 12?a ea?....” to which the answer is obviously YES. Then they go “mmmm…ua ke'a le sefulu lua a ea?   eaaaaaaaa….mafai ga ou laku pea loa le kaimi gei fai vave a saka kalavai?’’…..

leeeeaaaaaaaaiiiiiiiiii

Why is it that.

People do not see the hysteria and comic of their actions when they come to see me for the first time (ie their file is BLANK) and they pronounce…”FAAFOU  IFO KA FUALAAU KOKO”…and then when asked what they take the proceed to go “KAILO- e pa’epa’e lapokopoko le fualaau”- do you take Panadol for your BP?? Oh wait maybe Metformin?? Oh but septrin looks like that too…goodness grief there are a million white round tabs and you are one person whos been drinking this pill from a packet with a label for 5 years dont know what its called....even a cizzzaaa-something I can do (and I get alot too) but a kailo?? ok...I'm gonna write that on your script.

Go

Learn

Your

Tablets

Names.

Fullstop.

Why is it that.

I go on holiday for a few weeks and then come back to a hoard of angry patients. Most of the convos go like this “ia, well I ran out of my BP pills and now  I have nothing so of course my Bp is UP”- followed by a glare that  kinda looks like a ‘its all your fault’ kind of glare….then a “So I came for a repeat script and YOU WERE NOT HERE”- say it loud incase I didn’t hear or know, that I-was-not-here

Many conversations like this and I was actually saying sorry. Hold up.

Take

Charge

Of

Your

Own

Health

Ie- use another dr the hospital etc….a ou oki ga a lea??? I did have a notice up for a month before I left to which only 2 people were pro-active enough to come get future scripts.

Just a couple of white hair moments..nothing like being welcomed back to Savaii hamo style.

Why oh why ??

OMG
If another male patient takes my polite "building rapport" -ness the wrong way and decides to share with me  all the weird and quirky things they feel  and dont feel while bonking their wives/girlfriends/whoeverIdontgiveacrap.... when they intially just wanted me to check their cold out or refill their script...I might just have to shoot myself. Seriously. like WTF. Is there a sign on my head that says SEX THERAPIST....ok I know my scope of work can sometimes cover some man problems (and sometimes women too) in that department and their are some diseases and meds that can help in that arena...but old men with bedridden wives who want to describe in detail this feeling and that feeling and then BANG...honestly.... and young men who are like " then when I go faster and faster" when the convo initially started off with "my stuffy nose and sneezing wont stop"....I seriously just want to spew in my mouth....

Im trying really hard to tell myself that sometimes, people may have a legitamate problem they need help with. But more often then not, the things that get described are absofuckinglutely normal and I dont know why people feel the need to share with me. Like seriously. You are crossing a barrier. I am just uncomfortable now. The same way your daughter should feel uncomfortable if you told HER about you freakin sexual excursions....it freaks me out too.

And to add to that, I dont need to know that you think that 'cold rush' you feel at the end ...is because you walked over that grave last week and you think a spirit is floating in and out of you. Like seriously, freaky and then scarey...

I am a lover of signs. Signs tell people all the unspoken stupid things that they should be doing that I don't want to waste my breadth on like "please wait patiently until  your name is called  before entering the office" (and not just barge in on other patients  when you feel like it) and "If you would like a repeat prescription, please bring in your medications or at least write down their names"(as oppposed to "koe faafou mai ka fualaau", and then you ask what they  are taking and they say "kailo")
Im contemplating a sign for the above problem but how would one word it ?? please keep the sexual talk to a bare minimum and only if requiring treatment???

eh se kailo se...

Things you can't see

This week, I've had a rollercoaster of experiences over things you cant see. Some my own, some of other people. In my job, often I am a listener. I think its important in a job where you provide a service, to be a good listener.  So I have been listening alot to people that have been suffering, but they suffer from things you can't see. Funnily enough, Ive been experiencing this a little myself. I have found myself the unfortunate victim of a symptom called "Tinnitus" which is basically a ringing sound in your ears. Like, all the time. Its kinda really annoying when trying to appreciate the stillness of the night, the quiet, the full moon, the stretch of black water...and then this darned ringing like someone has a high pitched radio stuck on no station just going EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE.
 You get my drift.

So, this week Ive listened to people who have things in their eyes (blurred vision aching eyes), their heads (pulsing headaches and migraines) , some depression and even morning sickness! And its made me feel a whole lot of empathy for these people who have these things that you can't see. You look at this person and they look absolutely fine, a picture of good health really! And then, apparently, they are sick. And the most dissappointing part  about what they are feeling is that no one else understands what they are going through, and are even getting annoyed with them. Basically if you can't see something, its hard to understand the nature of whats there. Its also hard to empathise at the right time, and support people who have (ringing in their heads and nausea left right and centre) ....I can see why someone with a not so obvious symptom, could easily fall into depression. Unless you have a really caring on to it support person who ASKS you how you are ...its easy to feel ignored and left to suffer in your own silence.

I try to encourage these sorts of people to bring their support people, their other halves, or a sibling in with them. Someone who you can reiterate the nature of the problem and the severity of their ailment. That does not always happen and this is not always an ideal world. heck, even I feel like that many a time, but sometimes I think my other half is too mechanical with his way of thinking about life. You have a problem, whats the solution, right you're on that tablet huh..the end.And I don't think he is alone in this mannerism. I think alot of people (men) are like this.... and sometimes it is our job to (knock some sense into them ) tell them about whats going on and what you need from them (eh) I am also sure alot of medical people fall into the trap of everyone expecting them to 'treat' themselves as it is our profession- and that includes, nurse oneself and ask oneself how one is. (!)no need for anyone else to ?interfere.  
Not trying to go all Dr Phil on you but in a way I am so too.

Anyways, so just a word to my friends, if you know someone that has something, that isnt like a broken leg in a cast, make the effort to remember and ask- hey hows that _______(insert symptom you heard about in the past but can not see) Because I think human nature makes us look at our friends and family and partners for empathy/sympathy as a way to help get us all through any sort of suffering. And many types of suffering are unfortunately silent.

Adios people:)

My top 4

Top 4 meds that Samoans will sell their souls for.

Having to constantly try to win an uphill battle with an enourmous number of patients, has left me a little flabbergasted to say the least. It seems for every 1 person I try to educate, 3 more don't have the time to listen. And so, in lack of any other brain destressing excercises to deal with this little everyday frustration, I have devised a list of top 4s. For all ye future medicine seeking bradas (and sisters) yet to experience the wrath of BMIs >35, old age, smoking and drinking too much !lol

Sitting at number 4 is- Fualaau Sela, aka- Ventolin tabs.
 I dont really know what it is with our people and this aversion to using an inhaler. A patient will happily sit in front of me and debate that -: they dont have sela (asthma) but uhm...why are they requesting ventolin tabs?? (i.e 20yrs of shortness of breadth and wheeze but they feel that if they admit to the diagnosis the inhaler is automatic) so they will sit there and describe symptoms of cough at night and shortness of breath but deny the obvious diagnosis. Then we go through the whole dilly dally of trying to dispel their beliefs that- the inhalers make it worse....trying to convice them that- the tablet and the inhaler have the same basic drug in it.... that it is better to deliver the drug straight to the diseased organ rather then your whole body... bla bla bla. Often after this whole excercise, I get some ooohhhhs and aaahhhhs and then a smile and a, "well can i try to the inhaler next time but now I will just take the tablet thanks"...like I even gave them a choice (tired much??) Not that there is any harm in giving a ventolin tab...its just in times of emergency you can give yourself multiple puffs of your inhaler whereas you can't do that with a tab...so yea, I kind of worry about those times...being so far away from the hospital...and having something on hand for those times of emergencies...anyways I can only advice thats all...

Number 3 is antibiotics...namely amoxycillin and flucloxacillin
Pneumoniaes and boils. Maybe one out of 3 times, you might have the mentioned, but many a time, people just have simple viral infections or wounds /cuts that could do with a little cleaning and care , and  do not yet need  an antibiotic. But my frequent flyer customers will often pull out all the whole dramatic fiasco of why they need antibiotic "oh my cold started this morning- and my nose just wont stop dripping!- and I know every time I take amoxy my nose turns off right away please really  this is all I ask of you, its a simple request- the pharmacist usually just gives it to me everytime I ask, even they know my nose well "
 Really ? man I want to know where you get your amoxy from because even though it has absolutely no nasal drip stopping properties, any med that can do it that quick whatever it may be should be made known to all !   I am constantly fighting  an in-my-head save the world battle with the overuse of unneccesary antibiotics.  Sure I dont want to miss anything but at the same time dont want to add to the ongoing plight of antibiotic resistance ever growing in Samoa- most people will now know the name of the antibiotic they think they need, most wont know about MRSA and other organism resistance which is brewing in Samoa ( note to readers- in Auckland they have isolated a strain of resistant bacteria known as  the "Samoa varient of  multi resistant....bla bla bla"- otherwise known as the resistant bug that came from us...hmmmm think a minute next time you offer that friend your 'leftover antibiotics in your fridge' )  When I dont perscribe antibiotics, I am often made to feel like I did not give patients their moneys worth...that being said- I always tell my patients to come back if things dont get better or get worse in a few days. Most of the time , they never come back- so I think they either got better without needing anything just as I had said , or they  just doctor shopped along to the next place that gave into what  they wanted haha:)

Number 2 is gonna be Voltaren.
Fuala'au ponaivi aka fualaau gugu. Ive spoken about this craze before. I dont know who decided and came up with the samoan terms for medications, but I wish "fualaau Gugu:" translated to a drug called Allopurinol and not Voltaren (or Naproxen for that matter). Unfortunately, for  a population of patients who learn very little about the human body and disease, Voltaern surely must 'feel' better then Allopurinol and so one goes on how they feel. Take the former and the pain goes away instantly  the latter is meant to decrease uric acid which helps improve gout slowly over the future months  after taking it religiousloy (ie it is meant to be preventative) ..unfortunatley the latter process can still be littered with episodes of excrutiating gout attacks  and so people who do not understand wholy what this drug was for, get disillusioned and give up. I am constantly being approached by people asking me if I have Voltaren at hand. Most of the time, they are not even seeing me as a patient but just asking me over the counter and out right...as if I would just dish it out if I had. What they don't realise is I have a recurring night mare of all the people I have seen with Gastric bleeds from Ulcers. Ulcers that were caused by years of Voltaren abuse (and no sign of Allopurinol anywhere!!) ....What people dont know is how difficult it is to treat an active GI bleed without having gastroscopes available in Samoa. What people dont palpitate over (like me) is the vast open sea that seperates where I live from where the main hospital and surgeons and more intense help is available. People dont realise my nightmares because they dont know any better. I wish I could given them a snippet of the movies going on in my head, rather then try to convince them about the risks of their risky pill popping behaviour. The Facts are- Voltaren increases your risk of GI bleed from 1 to 4. A Voltaren addict is 4 times more likely to develop (and maybe die) of an ulcer then your average Joe. Other interesting facts??- Brufen increases risk by 2 only (all NSAID class meds have a risk but there is a ladder) Naproxen is even worse coming in at 9.2 X more likley (!! Yikes!!) Yes folks...lets go easy on the orange and white tablets...and lets all start to befriend Allopurinol.

And to top my list at number one, its Voltarens best Friend- Dexamethasone.
I had never really heard of Dexa apart froma  few mentions in pharmacy lectures until I got back home.  Where I trained and previously worked, everyone was always so conscious about the use of steroids (Dexa is a steroid) . Steroids are a potent anti inflammatory and if you look up the uses of Dexa you will quickly find literature on it being used for "Rheumatoid Arthritis ( a life long and sometimes severely debilitating illness) Bad asthma, Crhons and cancer"...all of which some form of severe suffering warrants its use. For everything else, there are less potent steroids which should be used spppooorrraadddiicaly throught out ones life. In Samoa, Dexa is popped like candy. Seems like any little thing and its - Dexa to the rescue. So much so that patients now counsel other patients and the word in the village spreads like wildfire about this wonderful little white magic pill. People have bottles of their own supply from goodness knows where...and they all seem to have the same moon facies, humped backs and stretch marked stomachs...hmmmmmm I wonder why. The problem with this drug, is it is 26 X stronger then the naturally occuring equivalent in the human body it is meant to replicate. It is 7 x stronger then its much more friendly and smaller counterpart- Prednsione. Being stronger although will make one feel better in the short term, in the long term has terrible side effects. Such as  the most obvious being- an immunosuppressant or "suppresses your immune system" in layman's terms so- makes you more susceptible to other diseases/infections- next on the list is  osteoporosis (brittle bones) - kinda ironic given people with gouty arthritis are the ones popping these....High blood pressure, fragile skin and Cushings syndrome (which is what the whole moon faced, back humped combination describes) Unfortunately we are not really good at testing for this as we dont test for hormones in Samoa.... so alot of the side effects and bad effects just fly under the radar  and people just then end up living with all these other things. My issue really with such a strong drug is how relaxed people are with using it. Something like Dexa should only be used by a doctor for a short time and with monitoring and ongoing advice. Unfortunately my fellow Samoan has discovered and enjoyed the relieving short term effects of what I like to call - the "superman pill" that cures all ailments (with a price to pay) . For some, I guess the relief of pain is worth the side effects.  For others, they simply do not realise there are less side effect induing ways to treat their ailments- many patients would have jumped 4 or 5 rungs on the ladder to land at Dexa. My point is to know all the rungs and start from the bottom up...one step at a time.

Okidoki...so thats my little rant for today. My top 4 headaches that I have shared with you to educate yourselves your bradas and sistas , your fathers and mothers and uncles.Happy reading!

25 days in China..Part 1

So I am  writing this blog from my room in the Hainan University exchange hotel, Haikou City China. I never would have guessed a month ago, this is where I’d be at this moment in time. In fact, on a Thursday morning I would be at my clinic going crazy trying to juggle patients and getting the payroll for the hotel done and hoping our bank would process it on time.  To cut a long story short, 4 invitees from Samoa where brought over  by the Chinese Embassy to attend a 3 week tourism seminar/conference. Unusually, Samoa has the largest number of participants (4) whereas other countries have either one or at the most two invitees- makes you think a bit doesn’t it.

Anyways, it has taken 2 whole days of traveling to get here. An overnight in Auckland, a 12 hour flight to Shanghai- 4 hours killing time in their aiport and a 3 hour flight to Haikou, which is on an island South of China ( had no idea it was on another island!lol) 

The flight to China was Long to say the least…we got dinner and breaky and I got maybe 4-5hours sleep. Arriving in Shanghai the first thing I noticed was ?fog. Then I remembered my mother in law telling me how polluted the air was in parts of China and if this indeed is the extent of that its pretty scary. Surrounding the airport was what appeared to be a thick fog blurring even the nearest airport hotel across the road from the airport.  We didn’t do much exploring in what I am sure is a huge airport, only because we suddenly felt so miniscule in the big pot of China 20 something million people in this city alone…, were a little scared we’d get lost so went straight to locate our departure gate and then parked up at a coffee shop charging our cellphones and calling home.  A young Chinese lad came and asked to take photos with us which was kind of funny…

So my first taste of Chinese I guess would be the meal  on Southern China Domestic  airline which was a noodles and mince concoction. My hopes for enjoying some traditional Chinese cuisine were not satisfied by this option but I put it down to maybe just bland airport food?? There were like 3 other small packet things , one of which I opened and looked to be some sort of fermented cabbage?? Like cabbage in a sauce which smelt terrible…..hmmmm

Arrive in Haikou and its bloomin 34degrees Celsius. Even for an Island girl getting above 30 is really not to my liking and I felt like a sweltering pig in my wooly top picked to keep me warm on a long plane ride! The two young ladies from the university who collected us were friendly and looked dressed to be at a beach with very short ripped jean  shorts and airy cotton topsJ I immediately regret not bringing a pair of shorts L

The drive to the university had me and a friend joking about the road rage our driver appeared to have but also secretly ensuring our seat belts were fastened and clinging to our doors! The roads were narrow and lots of bikes and carts and in some places the rules and lines seemed to blur and we, more then once appeared to be heading straight towards an oncoming vehicle one of which was an ambulance lol!! Our driver honked her horn practically the whole way to our hotel and by the time we reached here I was truly relieved and almost wanted to yell something along the lines of “Hallelujah!”…

Our room is on the 4^th floor of a building whose elevator is out of order. We are now all joking about how much weight we will lose  while we are here! Dinner last night was broccoli and some other vege?? Sliced beef, ?duck…chicken wings, deep fried chips, fried rice and fruits….Im still waiting to be awed by Chinese food. Im sure it will be any day yetJ

2) it’s the morning of day 3 in china and I am awake at 5am. I’ve woken at 5am every morning since arriving and struggle to go back to sleep.  You can hear the echo of birds bouncing off the hundreds of  large brick buildings that make up the apparently 9 universities housed in this complex we are staying in. Ive never seen so many 7 story buildings lined up uniformly in the same area before. I counted 22 X 7 story buildings  this morning on an attempt at some exercise and this is only in the one small block we are located in…. It is kind of weird but in a way- very Chinese. Its reassuring to hear the sound of birds because sometimes when I stand on the hot balcony of this hotel room, the thickness of the air and heat  make me wonder if this is just Hainans climate or if the air is thick with pollution.  At least the birds are not dropping dead midflight which is almost what I expect with what I see,  so perhaps that is a good sign lol

Yesterday was our first day of lectures. Our first lecture was in introduction to China and its history. It was interesting to learn about how ancient the Chinese civilization is  and the struggles they have faced. But it was kinda amusing to hear so many ancient proverbs being used to justify things being done in such a modern era lol. They’d talk about bigger neighboring countries and use expressions such as “we will not be bullied”  and “when going up the mountain, be prepared for vicious tigers” ….there was also particular reference to a particular neighbor (se malo uncle Sam) and one could easily read between the lines that their emotions towards this country were not happy ones lol.

The lectures are really tiring because they are done in Chinese and translated by a young lady whose English is not very good either. We’ve had about 5 questions being asked so far in class and not a single one was answered, I am sure it is because of the language barrier but it’s a bit frustrating at times. One question asked was whether the Panda is a protected species and the answer was to describe to us that Pandas are a symbol of peace to the Chinese. We have given up on asking questions now….learn quick. We’ve had a right jolly time trying to communicate basic things with hotel staff where we are staying using our phone translator apps. We spent a good afternoon trying to find an iron from reception and would enter the text into the translator to write into Chinese “I need an iron please” and the response we got was “iron is your translation”…we couldn’t figure out what the hell the receptionist was going on about as this was always his answer but it later worked out that he had given the iron previously to our “translator”  and was trying to say  it was with her!lol…

We are grateful to know that our meals are all provided. But its been a bit of an underwhelming experience so far. We have to walk through a local cafeteria to get to our meal room and when its busy there are people with really interesting looking things on their plates…but our table always has fried rice, steamed veges and Fries. Two basic meat plates like fried chicken and beef stir fry…and watermelon for desert. I kid you not with the fries, we get fries for breakfast (yes breakfast!) lunch and dinner. Served with Coke and Orange juice!lol….its amusing but we think that perhaps they see us as foreigners and think this s what we want!lol…Ive made a subtle request for dumplings and local delicacies to our host so fingers crossed that we might get to sample something exciting soon!

We went to the night markets last night. There are several shops mostly a mixture of clothing, jewellery and accessories and food. It was hard to find a shop with my size though and took me the whole night to find a t-shirt that looked to fit me. Everything else you could see appeared to be fit for size 6 size 8 stick think figures!lol. The ladies at the clothes shops kept laughing when trying to sign out the size of my ass (ie for pants)  and I have since learned that in China, Im a XXXL...dang it!

Day 4.

Today we get to go sightseeing in  the countryside. Apparently we will be going to the beach. In one of our lectures earlier, a lecturer described Hainan as being equivalent to Chinas “Hawaii”.  Having never been to Hawaii before I cant help but at this moment in time think the only thing they have in common is the weather …although I am not entirely sure even Hawaii has weather this hot. The tour guide was eager to tell us there was a beautiful Beach but then went on to add “but you must remember that China is a very Pollution..so don’t go far into the water”!!!....this seems to be a common tone in a lot of their lectures and descriptions- owning up and reminding everyone that “China is a lot of Pollution” …whats sad to see is I don’t really see any effort to majorly tackle this issue. They say they are developing Hainan to be Chinas Hawaii…but the streets are full of rubbish, the air is polluted an so far every river I have seen is a thick dirty brown….there are just too many people and I don’t know if they will ever be able to deal with this problem!!

Yesterday we went to the big city and very quickly one was swallowed in the enormity of Chinas Population. We had asked our tour guide if he could stop by a shop where we could buy a simple phone to call home, and the place they took us, along the way, was some 4 or 5 story building (shopping mall with 4- 5 levels) with I am sure over a million products, all electronics . Phones cameras laptops wires. It seemed like every store sold the same thing and was crammed from the floor to the ceiling with shelves full of electronics. There were so many stores the isles were small and crammed too…  I couldn’t help but start feeling a bit claustrophobic and just absolutely flabbergasted…what started as an itch to see if I could buy a nice phone ended in a tarpit of indecisiveness and uncertainty over what was real and what was fake.

The Samoan lot soon found ourselves outside by a food cart trialing some Chinese Hotdog (savoury sausage on a stick…who knows what kind of meat it was haha) and some Chinese round puff pancake things. The other thing about Chinese is that probably 99.9 percent of them are thin. And you can see the whole place is geared so that people are not encouraged to be lazy…so many buildings with NO elevators….everyone just takes the stairs- that’s just normal… when I bought 1 hotdog and a small bag of 8 pancake things (just a little bigger then the size of a marble) the shopkeeper exclaimed that I was “eating a lot!”..lol…as we stood outside the electronics mall I watched all the stall vendors, one guy quite close by was eating his lunch which consisted of 3 small round metal containers which had lovely steam fuming off it. In these 3 he was  scooping into a small bowl in front of him,  Rice, what appeared to be seaweed and boiled watercress. That’s it. I couldn’t help buy envy him. If I tried to introduce such a diet in my homeland of Samoa I am sure I would be shot!lol….

Funnily enough, our sponsors took us to Mac Donalds for Lunch. As my sister in Law did warn, even McDees tasted a bit Chinese with the chicken burger having two options of mild spicey or very spicey…and it certainly was more of a Chinese spice J Was rally thankful to  be there though as they had a Mc Café (YAY) And I had my first decent coffee on the trip which immediately killed a lingering headache Ive had the entire time in China (Coffee addict!) I was not impressed with the toilets however, the ladies had 4 toilets and they were all SQUAT toilets (OMG) our group had a good laugh describing each persons attempt at trying to figure it out, didn’t know which way we were meant to face and having to take all our bottom half clothes off in fear of accidents OMG…like I will NOT miss this ever. Funnily our chinese hosts claim to prefer these!

  Heading into town was an experience. From seeing fields of Taro planted in swampy land, to the several sky rising buildings…and not just several like a handful…several like rows and rows and rows, old ones new ones half complete ones… I felt like I was watching something from star wars where the drone army surely must be kept….on this day I really felt the enormity of the population of China…so many people they have to live on top of each other….we are so fortunate in SamoaJ  What I thought about though while watching all the skyrising buildings was another statement our Chinese History lecture said which was that they are not afraid of being bullied by the big powerful countries because one of their weapons was a huge mobile human workforce…hmmmm….they moral of the story is- don’t mess with the Chinese.