I couldn’t have asked for a more interesting week. I arrived in Panajachel on Saturday and in Santa Cruz on Sunday. The beauty of this place is awe-inspiring. Santa Cruz is a town of about 2000 that sits on a hill on the north side of the lake. The touristy businesses are located on Lake Atitlan but the center of town is about a twenty minute walk up the steepest set of stairs I’ve ever seen. The 5100 foot altitude makes the walk even tougher. I usually walk up the considerably less steep street that winds its way up to the village but still get passsed by 70 year old women carrying bundles of wood. But the tough climb is more than made up for by the incredible views of the lake and the two volcanoes on the other side.
I’m paying a bit more than I wanted for lodging at Casa Rosa but have a nice little apartment complete with furniture, hot water, a kitchen and scorpions. I’ve been told that there also black widow and brown recluse spiders to keep me company but none of them have introduced themselves as of yet. I don’t blame them after what happened to the scorpion. The hotel is surrounded by a small jungle and has some impressive views of the lake.
On Tuesday I went on my first boat trip to a local village named San Pablo to set up clinic for a day. Lots of kids, lots of parasites and even orbital cellulitis. I gave out more albendazole in one day than I saw in a year and a half in Seattle. Wednesday was supposed to be a lecture day but we were asked to help a man in the mountains who had fallen. After a 45 minute climb in the mid-day sun we found the guy and helped him back down to the clinic. Fortunately, he appeared to just have heat stress and recovered well. Totonicapan was our destination on Thursday. The clinic is a 2 hour boat/van ride from Santa Cruz and serves primarily adults. The most interesting patient was an elderly woman with congestive heart failure and diabetes. Not too different from what I saw daily at the VA but both diseases are pretty rare in this region. Both diabetes and cardiovascular disease are extremely uncommon in Santa Cruz due to the shorter life-spans and the amount of exercise the locals get walking up and down the hill. Interestingly, at least three of my patients yesterday attributed their problems to "sustos", or frights, that they had received years earlier. Just one of the cultural differences that makes working here so unique. On the way back we met an ex-pat that lives in Santa Cruz and was doing some shopping. He offered us a ride back across the lake so we loaded our stuff onto his party boat and headed out. About ten minutes into the ride his boat broke down and we were left stranded with a strong wind pushing us farther out onto the lake well after sunset. One of our assistants was able to call a friend to come rescue us but it took about an hour longer than we had planned. The good part was the chance to enjoy the lake after dark. After 3 ½ years in Seattle I had almost forgotten what stars looked like.
My plan for the weekend is to stock up on some necessities in Pana and then hit the market in Chichicastenango. I’ll definitely do some hiking if there’s time. There’s also diving and hang-gliding here so I’ll be running out of money before I run out of things to do.