The clinic I went to for my excellent medical care...before the lady doctor

By the way, the biopsy for the lesion in my mouth came back benign. Woohoo!

But back to last Wednesday...it became apparent I needed to go to a medical clinic. The first one I tried to go to that Lonely Planet recommended was for tourists...I went there because I thought they would speak English. To my disappointment, the clinic no longer existed. So instead, I went to the clinic fairly close to the FairPlay school that I had overheard John recommend to Amy when her altitude sickness was all wonky. It had a big friendly sign over it that read (in English): "Travel safe, come back soon!" I was pretty damn sure I did not want to come back soon, but the inside looked clean and the sign was in English, so I went in anyway. I asked for an appointment and was told by a very nice man that I would have to see a specialist. He said "The specialist is not here but we will give you a complimentary ride to her office in our car. Your friend can come too." I agreed (only because John said the clinic was legit) and Amy and I waited in a nice room with two hospital beds and a TV until the car was ready. We climbed into the car (the nicest/least smelly car I´ve encountered in Peru) and the nice man behind the wheel drove off. It wasn´t until we had been driving for about 15 minutes and it started getting dark and the driver twisted and turned through what seemed like progressively more rural/less clean neighborhoods (there were dirt piles in the middle of the road) that Amy and I looked at each other in the rearview mirror and thought "Oh god." The driver pulled up in front of an indescript door with no label on it, stopped the car, got out, and rang the buzzer. No one came. I turned to Amy and said, "So, how do you feel about being sold into slavery?" Leave it to Peru to have an unidentifiable medical specialist in the middle of bumfuck nowhere. At that point, a boy child of about 12 years opened the door. I said, "If he´s the doctor, I want my money back."

Luckily, he wasn´t the doctor. He showed us into a large, tiled waiting room where the smell of incense wafted down from the massage clinic above, and I relaxed/felt slightly less sketched out than I had outside. Then a woman walked up to me, shook my hand, and asked me if I was the patient...in Spanish. I balked a bit...the man at the other clinic had spoken English. I asked her if she spoke English and she said "Un poco" and I thought "Well shit, that means no." And that´s how, after only 2 and a half weeks of speaking Spanish, I ended up on my back in a bare, yellow-walled room in a third world country with a doctor between my legs babbling in Spanish and poking at my cooch. I suppose it´s a testament to FairPlay and its school that I was even able to communicate with this woman at all. But somehow, between broken Spanish and English, drawings, and much gesticulation, I was able to tell her the problem and she was able to tell me that I was fine. PHEW!!! And it only cost 80 soles (28 US dollars) even though the clinic was private. Now, you all are witnesses to this...I am BEGGING the universe for no more medical emergencies surrounding my trip to Peru.

Also, Amy and I have adopted a cat. There was this little kitten running around our house who the host family said was a stray and they weren´t feeding her. However, she would not leave the house and she was the most emaciated little thing I have ever seen so Amy and I decided to buy her some food. Now every time we come home, she runs up to us and meows and after she´s eaten, she curls up on our laps and purrs and is sooooo cute. The only problem though is that (like most animals in third world countries), this cat probably has worms, which are transmittable to humans. Therefore, every time I see her, I am torn between cuddling her and running away to save my own insides. Amy says as long as we wash our hands after we touch her, we should be fine. But I worry, coz this cat is a little ball of the cutest disgusting I have ever seen...her fur is all thin and weird and uncared for and she smells like shit and looks like she´s on the brink of death from starvation. But she´s sooooo cute and small and will always be that way because starvation has stunted her growth (she´s actually about 2 and is not a kitten at all...Amy checked her teeth) and now the host family is saying she is our cat. We call her Gatita, which means "Little Cat." Mom, Dad, will you kill me if I bring her home?

written by  kfox on June 28, 2010 from Cusco, Peru
from the travel blog: Peru Adventure!
Send a Compliment

---

LOL!!! Last sentence is priceless...

written by  Mel on June 29, 2010

comment on this...