Long and low

Yesterday I advanced to the newest level of the car driving game here in Nicaragua. Now it might seem as though I am fixated on these car adventures, but let me explain how driving cars here in Nicaragua is not like anywhere else I have ever driven. What do you do when you need to pass someone? You do it, no matter where or when or how. As long as everyone else sees that you are coming. Stoplights? Those are optional. Stop signs? I have seen one. Most intersections are rotundas, and those scare me. So the daredevil stunt driving Nicaraguense combined with my healthy respect for anything auto-related makes for an interesting cocktail of misadventure. Especially since yesterday I was promoted to ambulance driver.
Story goes like…. I was sitting in the pharmacy (the real one, not the green one) with Sarah (she escaped the oficina for a full day!) when Pat came in. There was a mild bout of chaos and Spanish and then she looks at me.
“Okay, so we have a patient who NEEDS to get to the hospitalito ASAP. She is probably having a heart attack. We have a vehicle here and therefore we usually like to run an ambulance service if we can. I would go, but I can’t really leave the American doctor here by himself. Can you take her?”
Seriously?
“Oh, wait do you even know where the hospitalito is in Ciudad Sandino?”
This is my break. I know the hospitalito is over by the mercadito, but from this direction I have no clue how to get there. Not in any fast manner that is, and I suspect driving a patient having a “possible heart attack” would necessitate a speedy trip.
“Ohhh… uh… the hospitalito?”
“Sure you do! Its over by the mercadito! The pinkish-peachish building. We pass it every Saturday on our walks!” chips in Sarah.
Thanks man.
“I can send Juana with you, she knows how to get there and she can tell you the quickest way. I know this is a lot to ask but if you can’t do this then we will send her home. And it would really be best if she could get to the hospitalito. She might be having a heart attack.” Pat reiterates.
Fine, yes okay I can go. I will be driving the microbus (seriously the largest conversion van I have ever seen) with my Spanish speaking guia, a panicked family member and of course the woman who might be having a heart attack…
The roads of Ciudad Sandino are worn thin - even more so than the meager stretch of road where I have gotten all of my practice. I have to cross entire arroyos, giant gulleys of waste and water and waste water. The streets are slowly being paved but before they are improved they are completely ripped apart with giant holes every 10 feet.
The microbus is low and long. I knew this as soon as I got in but I also knew it because Pat told me several times.
“You gotta get her there, but you gotta drive slow. The microbus is low and long.””Mind the side mirrors when you make turns, this vehicle is much lower and much longer than the Isuzu.”
“Have I told you Alyse, the microbus is low and long.”

Regardless of length and clearance height, I got the patient to the hospitalito. Juana was a great guia, even though we took the shortcut and at times I am pretty sure I was driving through peoples yards. And I got confused at my only stoplight and almost hit a few people to which she yelped Dios Mios! But in the end, it was a happy ending, another thing crossed off my list (I still have to check if I ever at anytime in my life have actually wanted to drive an ambulance…) and the patient is safely in the hospitalito.

In other news, I had my first follow up appointments yesterday with patients. They both went amazing! Maria Fuentes had come in complaining about a painful skin ulcer on her leg for which I gave her some aloe. She loved the aloe saying it really soothed her inflamed skin when she washed with it in the morning and evening. We talked for a while about other plants she used. She has an oregano plant that she uses to cook with her pollo whenever her companero has a cough. And she loves cilantro. I gave her more aloe and then an entire aloe plant. That way she can always have it on hand.
Maria Silva was suffering like so many others from a cold. She had a scratchy throat and small cough. I had given her a jarabe de zacate de limon y oregano (lemongrass and oregano syrup). She gave me very useful feedback on how long it lasted and the taste. (Enough in the bottle for the 5 days of treatment, and it was very sweet which was great because her cooking was very simple. Almost like a little dessert). She had used the treatment successful and cold tell it helped her. I went ahead and gave her a little more (after discussed the fact that there were no herbal injections available) and she too was very happy.
It wasn’t until later that I realized I had conducted two complete interviews by myself in Spanish.