"Tell the world, I'm coming home."

I think the title says it all. It's from one of my recently favorite songs by artist J. Cole and as soon as I heard it about a month ago, my heart nearly split into two different directions.

Tomorrow I leave Durban and fly to Mozambique for one last African adventure. Then in one week, I board my long, much-awaited flight back to New York City.

On the one hand, I'm more unbelievably excited than words can express to be going home. I miss America and the people in it. Yes, even the crazies, the bums and the Republicans.* I miss fast-speed internet and banks that close at 5 PM rather than 3. I miss Chipotle burritos, Pinkberry yogurt and Checkers fries. I miss my homes. Yes, homes plural. I miss Florida, Boston, New York...I've often joked to people back home that I will be liable to hug a subway pole the first time I ride a train again because I EVEN miss the subway. If I see a rat scurrying around down by the tracks or even (as has been known to happen in my fair neighborhood of Washington Heights) just lounging on the platform waiting with the rest of us, I may even turn to it and say, "Nasty, disgusting rat with a tail longer than my arm, I've even missed you."

Most importantly, I've missed my PEOPLES. You all know who you are because if you're reading this, then you're probably who I'm referring to. (At least I hope... have never prior to now considered the possibility of a complete stranger reading my blog. Hm. Interesting. If that category fits you....nice to sort of meet you?)

In any case, yes, I miss YOU. Because all the rest, eh I can live without. I can live without the terrible and wonderful fast food, the homes I grew up in...I can most definitely live without that rat, no matter how sentimental I get. South Africa even taught me that I can live without reliable internet! (To a point...)But you guys.... you're who I cannot live without.

Which brings me to explain why my heart felt like it was being torn in two when I heard the J. Cole song. Because while I definitely feel like I'm coming home, until now, I've never quite known what it's like to leave a piece of my heart behind...to use a terribly cliched statement.

And I most definitely will be leaving a piece of my heart, and in fact, myself here. Durban, South Africa has seen me grow as a doctor, as a caregiver and as a person. This city and the people in it have treated me with kindness beyond words and I will never, ever forget them. Durban now feels like one of my homes and I don't see that changing anytime soon.

Maybe everyone here can see that. Because people have been asking me not if I'm coming back but WHEN I'm coming back. I'm glad they ask it that way. Because while I cannot give a definite time (I've started saying, 'Sometime in the next 5 years? I promise.') I can definitely, DEFINITELY say that I will be back.

But for now... United States of America, land of the free Starbucks internet, home of the brave furry creatures who deign to scurry on rather than below platforms, here I come.

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* Just kidding! There are many Republicans whom I leave dearly. :)

This Too Shall Pass.

I apologize for the paucity of blog posting recently. The month of March was tough. Mentally, I went up and down, sometimes without really understanding why. On the surface, it seems like my stress stemmed from three main sources: my work, my social life and my trip-planning. I know what you’re probably thinking, “Um…you’re complaining about having a happening social life and the opportunity to travel?!” Then maybe an expletive or two? Does that sound about right?

Unfortunately, God’s honest truth is that despite the fullness of my life, I for some reason kept returning to an emotional state that was more gray than my usual. I’ll try to explain but I apologize in advance for the somber tone, the heavy reading and the fact that my point may be a bit convoluted. I never promised clarity in this blog, just a portrayal of my life here.

There were a couple really stressful life things that happened last month. For starters, my boyfriend left. Then a few short weeks later, my old roommates came to visit and left. Sounds like these should be good things and they are. But for some reason, when people I love come visit, their leaving always takes a lot out of me. Then my car, my little Lily, decided to just die on me. Like literally die. On the highway, as I was driving myself to the airport to catch a flight, the engine just gave out. After enlisting the help of some fine young gentlemen to push it onto an off ramp and into the nearest gas station, a mechanic friend managed to come help me. He literally rushed me to the airport then went back and… I don’t know… performed CPR on my car or something so that he could drive it to his shop. He later delivered the news; it would cost at least 10,000 rand to repair. My love for Lily immediately ended and I sold her.

But really, the reason for the general feeling of down-ness that enveloped me last month has to do with work. After getting approved, my project took on a life of its own and then almost immediately, a mysterious fatal disease started ravaging our wards. I was enrolling children in my study, excited about data collecting and tracking how these children grow, then in the blink of an eye, two of my subjects were suddenly gone; both had been less than 2 years old. Then shortly after that, two caregivers suddenly went MIA on me, taking their children with them. It was one disappointment to realize I’d lost some of my subjects to follow-up and yet another to realize they had also stopped attending their appointments at the anti-retroviral clinic. Never mind my little study. Without proper treatment and follow-up, these children are being denied the only tools we have to help them literally fight for their life. Sounds dramatic? Well that’s intentional because to me that’s how serious it feels.

And yet, I steeled myself, knowing this is what I came here to learn. I was learning to face the disappointment of infants dying and others not getting the medicine we desperately wanted to offer them. And slowly I noticed that I was starting to take these figurative slaps in the face in stride. “Do what you can,” my external mentors and internal voice instructed. “Then move on to the next child who needs help.”

Then another child died. This one wasn’t in my study. He was just one that was very familiar to our team because he’d been in and out of the hospital many times. What made his death different is hard for me to explain because I don’t know that I quite fully understand it myself. I just know that it hurt me in a way I hadn’t yet experienced.

This little one came to us with disseminated tuberculosis. We’d found the TB bug in many lymph nodes throughout his body and even in his liver. Fortunately for him, we’d managed to successfully start him on TB treatment two months ago, wait for the TB treatment to start doing its job, and then also start him on anti-retrovirals for his HIV. He was doing well, was one of the success stories and the whole team was pleased.

During those months, I’d also been having a little success story of my own with him. I’d spent weeks and weeks trying to gain his trust, trying to get him to let me into his world if only so I could play with him and distract him from being in the hospital. It’s a small teaching exercise I’ve given myself. Since I can’t physically provide the medications, can’t yet do anything “doctorly” so to speak, I’ve tried to spend some of my time here learning and fine-tuning my way of getting children to trust me.

This little boy was a hard one to crack, trust-wise and I thought I knew why. There were little behavioral hints that had made me begin to harbor the faint suspicion that he was being abused at home. Like a red flag to a bull, the small ways in which he sometimes jumped with fear when you’d wave a hand over his head enraged me and made me want to show him that some adults can be trusted. I pushed myself even harder to bond with him, overriding the professional distance I had been learning to create with the other sick children in the ward.

And slowly, slowly, he began to let me in. Just a few weeks prior to his demise, he’d begun to wave hello and goodbye when I walked into the wards, and flash a shy smile whenever I tickled him. Then, he fell ill with this infuriating mystery of a feverish rash that had killed the others and a week later, succumbed to a terrible pneumonia. One short week later. He was five.

I was and still am devastated. In fact to be perfectly and painfully honest, I’ve had to write this post in stages because the first few times I sat down with my thoughts and feelings about his death, I would get the urge to go lie in bed and cry.

The emotionally taxing nature of this experience colored every aspect of my life. The regular frustrations of life became overwhelming. I became stressed about planning dinners or weekend trips away with friends. I became easily frustrated about people not responding to emails quick enough or about the internet not working well, even though I thought I’d reached a state of acceptance about that one. My car dying and having to sell it for next to nothing became a calamity. I desperately wanted to go home. In short, I had lost the calm, collected baseline I’d come to depend on for mental sanity here. More importantly, I allowed this grayness to infect my life without realizing why or trying to figure out the reason for its existence.

Then one day, one of the pediatric professors here asked me to come into her office to speak with her and then point blank asked me if I was ok. “Yes,” I responded, confused. “I’m fine…why do you ask?” This busy, important woman then proceeded to explain that she might be wrong, but she’d noticed a change in my demeanor, a change in my face. I was floored. Literally shocked because a) this incredibly busy woman was taking time out of her day to do this, b) I had not even realized I’d been feeling down and c) I’d had such few professional interactions with this woman that it was unbelievable she could have discerned what I had not even realized about myself. After thanking her and walking back to my desk, I realized it was time to just face the summed effects of everything that had happened in March and do what I needed to do to get back to my baseline.

What I think was really getting me down was not only the tragedy of the little boy’s death but the fact that I was trying to stay strong and failing miserably. I was struggling emotionally, yes. But on top of that, I felt guilty both about having to struggle so much (because it meant I’d allowed myself to get too close) and about not wanting to have the emotional struggle. I felt guilty towards this child about wanting to go dancing with my friends to forget about him and guilty towards myself for feeling guilty at all. Confusing? I know…. It was very confusing in my mind as well.

I share this personal story for three reasons. First, so people back home can see that even when I’m in the lowest of funks here, some guardian angel appears to help me or shock me back to life. Secondly, because writing helped me and I was wholly surprised by that. Of course it doesn’t help everyone and I’m not saying that all life frustrations and tragedies are overcome with a pen and a paper (or computer screen in my case). But if this blog didn’t exist, I wouldn’t have considered writing and wouldn’t have discovered its therapeutic effect for me. Maybe food for thought for some of you reading this?

The final reason I share such heavy thoughts is because this story exemplifies the truth of the phrase, “This too shall pass.” A good friend of mine once said told me to remember that phrase when I was feeling overwhelmed and it’s been the single wisest thing anyone’s ever said to me. It’s just simply, the truest thing in life. Because now, although I still have to wipe away the occasional tear when I think of that little boy, I can write about it and talk about it without crumbling.

Everything passes. I’ve decided it’s fine if one day I once again feel the need to go lie in bed to cry about the death of a child. So long as I remember that the sadness will pass. I will move on. And that’s not a bad thing.

Better than Hollywood

I’m sitting here eating a little piece of heaven in the shape of a dark chocolate combination mousse brownie cake that I picked up at the very first patisserie in Durban. Chateau Gateaux opened a few weeks ago and it happens to be located oh about three blocks from my flat. I’ve decided to couple this decadence with some visual indulgence by watching some Sex and the City. This of course reminds me of New York, so I think it’s high time to write about my recent little vacation with my New York man.

Now I have a warning. Part of this post will be the gushy gooey stuff of chick flicks. Because me oh my, was the time we spent together here just plain amazing. But interestingly, the past two weeks were more than just love happiness. Life continued for us and everyone in our respective worlds. Life, with all its ups, downs, beginnings and ends.

But before the heavy stuff, I’m going to get all the gag-worthy goo out first. So. Here goes. And don’t say I didn’t warn you. Although I live in Durban and my boyfriend’s ticket here was booked from New York to Durban, our many-month separation ended…in Johannesburg. How did this happen? Well, as it turns out, almost all international flights into South Africa have to go through Joburg. And it’s much cheaper to book national flights through the local budget airlines so I offered to book the Joburg-Durban leg of his trip. After I’d booked his seat, I forwarded him his e-ticket. What I didn’t forward him was MY e-ticket. Booked separately, but on the same day, same flight, also from Joburg to Durban.

See my plan was this. Given the general cheapness of internal flights and the fact that one of my newfound South African friends was celebrating her birthday in Joburg on the night before he landed, I decided I’d fly to Joburg for about…16 hours… to personally welcome my love to this country. I know, I know. I’m crazy. So Friday night after work, I made my way to the capital and spent the night celebrating with my friend. However, I left the bar a bit early because I had to get a good night’s rest for the next day. My plan for Saturday morning was to arrive at the airport just as B’s plane from New York was landing, check in for the flight back to Durban before he did and sweet talk whoever was at the counter into seating us together. Then when he got off the plane and had his domestic flight ticket printed, he’d be none the wiser that he’d already been seated next to me. Then he’d go straight to the gate and there I’d be waiting, with open arms.

At least that’s how I pictured it going down in my head. What ending up actually happening is that my taxi was late to pick me up so by the time I arrived at OR Tambo International Airport, B’s flight had landed and he’d already checked in. (Always the efficient traveler.) The thought of my plan not being executed to perfection made me panic and before I knew it, I was spilling my personal life story to the women at the ticket counter. I swear I thought I was a composed woman but man, I guess I can be pretty convincing as a half-crazed girlfriend. Because I spent the next three minutes of my life literally blabbing to these three women that the love of my life was somewhere in this airport, and by the way I haven’t seen him in five months because we’ve been living continents apart but somehow we’ve made it this long and oh my goodness, we simply MUST sit next to each other on this plane ride or else my epic plan will have utterly failed. Well, my emotional rant must have turned a boring Saturday morning into an airport soap opera because I had all three women leaning in towards me with sympathetic “Oh shame”s. (South Africans say “Shame” to everything from cute babies to neurotic people like me.) After listening to my story, the woman who was actually checking me in then goes, “Ok honey, let’s see. The flight’s pretty full but maybe there’s an available seat next to him.” All four of us then waited with bated breath until she looked up and with a literally triumphant smile stated, “The aisle seat next to him is free!” I swear, I don’t know which one of us cheered louder. I departed with my ticket in hand and three of the friendliest South African women telling me to “Go get your man, baby girl, go find him!”

Picture if you can, a Latina version of the Pink Panther and you’ll have an image of me. My heart was racing and I was excited as a kid in a candy store but I was still (for who knows what reason) trying to follow my original plan of surprising him at our gate. I didn’t want us to see each other from across security lines as we each put our bags into the scanner, because everyone knows there’s no romance in security scans. So instead I stealthily crept my way through the line, then through the domestic wing of the airport, trying subtly to hide behind columns, all the while stealing covert glances all around me. (Again, I know, I know… I’m crazy.) Well, I made it to our gate and…he wasn’t there. “Did he decide to wander?” I thought to myself. “Why can’t he just beeline to the gate?” (Clearly when I direct chick flicks in my head, I expect the unknowing party to follow my script.) I started getting restless and in a burst of inspiration, decided to send him a helpful little text message: “If you’re early and want something to do, there’s a great little coffee shop called Vida e Caffe you could go to.” Proud of myself for herding my unsuspecting prey to a place I could easily find him, I started to make my way up the stairs to said coffee shop. And that’s when we finally found each other. In the middle of a stair landing, with travelers streaming around us, we were finally together again.

I could go into detail about the next ten days but suffice it to say that it was just as perfect as those first few minutes on the stair landing. We spent the first weekend in Durban doing basically the same simple things we enjoy doing together everywhere else. To resurrect the chick flick analogy, you can picture these days as the part of the movie where they play music and stitch scenes together without allowing for dialogue so you can watch several days’ worth of action in a single song. Our movie would have a shot of B&D tanning on a beach flowing into a scene of B&D watching a movie, before segueing into a view of B&D at dinner. Nothing special, just plain wonderful.

Then on Monday, we flew to Cape Town. This is where the movie becomes downright sappy. We watched the sunset on Table Mountain on Valentine’s Day, enjoyed wine and chocolate pairings in Stellenbosch and lounged/napped in the famous Kierstenbosch Gardens. We posed with penguins on the beach and ate delicious Malay-style curry at the home of some wonderful family friends. Then on Friday, we flew to Joburg to stay with another family I’ve become friends with through my boyfriend’s family. (My boyfriend’s family connections in South Africa have truly hooked me up.) After a day of driving around the greater Joburg area and getting lost in the middle of nowhere when my trusty GPS lost signal for hours, we were ready for our safari.

I still can’t decide what the best part of that safari was. There was of course the fact that we got to stay at a luxury lodge for a THIRD of the price because of a fantastic website that heavily discounts pricey lodges and hotels if you book within 7-14 days of traveling. Then there was the fact that we were the only ones on our first ranger-led game drive so we got our first bush sunset all to ourselves. Oh incidentally, we were also the only ones on this drive when an elephant raging with hormones (technically called an elephant “in musth” which essentially means desperate to mate) passed so close to our open-air jeep that we could have reached out and touched it…. had we, you know, wanted to die. Scary? Actually quite terrifying because of something that had happened just a week prior in the same game reserve we were at:

http://www.2oceansvibe.com/2011/02/23/aroused-elephant-flips-car-in-pilanesberg-game-reserve-updated/

But, exhilarating? Hell yes. (Incidentally, this is obviously a great story only because....we're ok...)

If I had to pick though, I’d say my favorite part about our safari experience was the ranger assigned to us. He led us on all three of our game drives and boy was he a character. Not sure if this picture does him justice so I’ll try to supplement it with a description. He’s clearly a tall, large man with the face of a baby which created the illusion of a grizzly bear with a teddy bear head.

He told us that he was new to the lodge and thus didn’t yet have a uniform. In retrospect, I now believe this was a subtle attempt to excuse the fact that he may have worn the same set of khaki shirt and shorts at least the 3 days we saw him. Interestingly, though he perspired profusely on our tours, he never sme

lled….How he managed this is just one of the many unanswered questions I have about that man. Another mystery to me is how a guy who looks like he should play rugby for a living (and indeed he apparently used to play non-professionally) goes from being an athlete to a semi-professional motorcross driver to a hairstylist for South African fashion models before finally settling down on a game reserve as a safari photographer/bird watching aficionado. One of these job descriptions is NOT like the others and I loved it and him. I love people who do not fit into pre-conceptualized boxes mainly because I like to fancy myself as one of those people.

In any case, I guess it would take someone like him to get me excited about everything from every little brightly colored bird in the bush to whatever dung we happened to pass by. (I kid you not, at first the man at was stopping for nearly every piece of poop on the ground, explaining how he knew it was a certain animal’s and why the coloring was such.) Sounds weird? Well yes, at first I was semi-annoyed. But after spending hours with him and his uncanny ability to accurately guess where the best animal sightings would be even when more senior rangers were taking other routes, I became a believer in his methods. Take for instance, the last day of our safari, when I wanted to sleepily strangle him because he was itching to go before even the scheduled 5:30 AM departure (oh yes, 5:30 IN THE MORNING) but then we rounded a corner before any other lodge guests had ventured out and bam! Three huge male lions just lounging on the road. My camera doesn’t have night vision and since it was essentially still night time, I don’t have the best pictures unfortunately. But I’m sure the image of that breathtaking scene will be seared in our memories for a long time.

So it was a great safari, to say the least, and a perfect ending to a perfect trip with the perfect man. (I was hoping to say perfect at least three times in one sentence so that was definitely intentional.) However, as you might recall from the introduction to this post, I mentioned that this trip showed me how life continues even when we feel like we’ve escaped into heaven for a few days. Both our worlds moved on and we both had to deal with work-related stressors while we were together in South Africa. Deadlines continued to exist, emails had to be answered, calls taken and HIV didn’t stop killing children just because I was happy and away from the hospital. In fact, as we were on our way to the aforementioned perfect safari, I received some devastating news.

Remember that little patient I spoke about in a previous post? The teeny tiny smelly little girl with scabies who was the first official subject I enrolled in my personal study? In less time than it took for my boyfriend and I to fall in love all over again, she came down with meningitis, got admitted to the hospital and passed away. I write it like that because that’s exactly what it felt like. On the one hand, I was having some of the best days of my entire year abroad, happier than I’d ever been, but when this news hit me, I literally felt like I’d been slapped.

It’s not like I hadn’t prepared myself for the possibility and in fact, inevitability of this. My study enrolls some of the sickest little children in the world. They’re severely malnourished and contracted HIV at birth; they are thus fighting two of the major causes of infant mortality in the world. So I knew this could and would happen. Patients I knew and got close to would die and to be quite frank, it’s one of the reasons I came here. As anyone who knows me well can attest to, it is quite easy to make me sad (I’ve been known to cry during cheesy credit card and life insurance commercials. Embarrassing? Yes. I only mention this to elucidate the pullability of my heart strings.) In any case, given what I knew about myself and given that I knew I was choosing a career path that would place sick and dying children in my path, I knew I had to do something drastic to strengthen my heart. So I came to one of the countries with the highest infant mortality rate. Trial by fire, I thought to myself.

And it’s not like I’ve been here 5 months and not seen a child die. Unfortunately, that above statistic exists for a reason and a good number of the children we’ve had in the wards end up dying. But what I never predicted would happen (and yes I understand my naiveté now), is that this trial by fire would continue when I was on vacation. Don’t ask me why, it just never crossed my mind that one of my little subjects—and I only have six so far—would go and die on me while I was purposely trying to create emotional and physical distance from them.

It was a valuable lesson. I learned to mourn while living my life, to grieve but then come back to the happy moments that were playing out in my present. I suppose I’ll get better at it with the years, but I’m still struggling to find a balance for myself. Part of me understands that in order to emotionally survive decades of sick children, I shouldn’t feel like I’ve been physically hit, slapped or punched every time a child dies….

Or shouldn’t I? I can’t think of a greater tragedy for the world than when a child dies and shouldn’t someone feel the greatest of pain when it happens? Yes, I understand I can’t be the one to feel the greatest of pain all the time. But maybe it’s ok and in fact necessary to my humanity to feel a painful jolt every time. And I realize now that these lowest lows can and may come tightly interlaced with the highest of highs.

At the end of my trip, as I settled back at home still riding the high of reaffirmed love, I received one final painful jolt. My family informed me that my golden retriever, my beloved Golden Rose whom we’d had for 11 years, was diagnosed with inoperable cancer while I was away and had been put down. As I cried for her, I realized man, God is really trying to drive this point home for me.

Not quite the chick flick ending you were expecting? Yeah I wasn’t expecting it either. But I think this is better than Hollywood. Happiness and sadness are entwined in life. One does not prevent the other and I can’t change that. So I might as well embrace it.

The Best Valentine's Day Gift Ever.

This short post is simply my way of blowing off enough excitement to be able to do work in the office today. I apologize in advance for the dopey lovestruck schoolgirl tone of this post but I'm all emotions right now.

My boyfriend lands in Durban tomorrow and I already can't sit still. Do you know how hard it is to sit and enter numbers into an excel spreadsheet when you know that in 24 hours you'll be reunited with someone you love whom you haven't seen in 5 months?

When he told me that this was the window of time he'd be taking off to come see me, my first words were, "Wow! This means you'll be be here with me for Valentine's Day! The gods love us, our stars are aligned and we were meant to be together, its fate!"

His response? "Or...I know my girlfriend and picked my vacation dates accordingly."

I think this exchange exemplifies two important points: 1) I'm hopelessly romantically ridiculous to put so much stock in a made-up holiday but alas that's who I am; and 2) I have a wonderful boyfriend. I've decided this second point is much more important than any star-alignment.

And on that note, I think it's time to stop this corny gushing and get back to work. Again, I apologize for any gagging, eye-rolling or embarrassment to said boyfriend this post might induce. But in the words of my favorite Will Ferrell movie, "I'm in love, I'm in love and I don't care who knows it!" (Any guesses as to which movie? Daniela, hush your mouth.)



I have one more cheesy thing to say and then I promise I'm done. I hope everyone has a lovely Valentine's Day and spends it with someone who makes them happy....even if that someone is yourself. After all, YOU should be the first person in the world who can make you happy.

And I hope you feel the love radiating to each and every one of you, my faithful readers, from all the way over here in this corner of the world.

FINALLY.

This will be a short post and really more of an explanation.

Work is incredibly busy these days. One of the projects I've been working on is a large chart review. This means we've been combing through the clinic charts of hundreds of children who were started on antiretroviral therapy back in the days when ARVs first became available to children here, the so-called "roll-out" period. These days we're pushing to make an "abstract deadline." This is a familiar phrase for those of you in the research world. For the rest of you, I'm going to get very basic so please don't be offended. Abstracts are short summaries of a research project. If one wants to present a project at a research conference, then first you must submit the abstract months in advance and get selected to present. So that's we're trying to do...submit an abstract for the chart review in order to get selected to present at a conference in Italy.

Alas, no I will not be going to Italy if we make this deadline. Only my bosses. But suffice it to say that there is a lot of work to be done for the preparation of this abstract, the least of which is actually writing the darn thing. We're trying to get through as many files as possible, input those files into our electronic database, analyze said data with a statistician and THEN we'll write the abstract. Of course, we're trying to data collect until the last minute in order to get as large a sample size as possible. Hectic? You bet.

Also, of course, when it rains, it pours. I finally, finally received permission to touch patients (thus permission to data collect or even just practice drawing blood) about two weeks ago. Then last week, the last step of approval for my own study finally came through. Five months after I first submitted my application.

So now, I have all the permission in the world to work on my study and practice my clinical skills while at the same time furiously working to capture data for the chart review.

Suffice it to say, I'm busy these days. I spent about 12 hours over the weekend, working at an excel database. And now as I write this, I realize I really have to run downstairs to check on my very first subject! I recruited her to my study yesterday. She's this severely malnourished little girl, weighing in at about 13 pounds even though she's 15 months old! She's sickly, has scabies and her parents don't bathe her very well at all so she's stinky on top of it all.

BUT...I love her. She's my very own first subject in my very first self-designed pediatric study. After all the hoops I had to jump through, the countless emails and phone calls pushing for approval, she represents to me the culmination of my efforts this year. She's my reward for fighting through the dense thicket of South African clinical research bureaucracy.

Don't worry though, I haven't forgotten to write about Cape Town. I just decided I'm going to put it on hold until my next trip there..in two weeks! With my boyfriend! So stay tuned. :)

New Year, New Travels

Happy New Year everyone! I hope everyone had a wonderful, blessed holiday season. I have much to tell. As you might remember from my last post, my parents and little sister came to visit me here. They were here for a whole two and a half weeks and we saw so much together. While in Africa, I of course wanted them to go on safari, but given the nice length of time they had, I got ambitious and planned a safari for them…in Namibia. So not only did we get to go on safari, but we also got to see a great deal of the many other things that beautiful little country has to offer. Then of course, we went to Cape Town. It was my first time in Cape Town and let’s just say, I fell in love instantly. It is hands down, one of the single most gorgeous places I’ve ever seen in the world. And I’ve been fortunate enough to do a bit of traveling in my young day, so that’s a big compliment.

So let’s begin. This post will be about Namibia only, but the Cape Town post should soon follow.

My parents arrived a few days before Christmas Eve. Their arrival was unfortunately coupled with one of the worst thunderstorms I’ve ever seen in Durban in my four months here. That night was like a horror movie set up, but with a happy ending. As my car crawled to the airport at 35 kilometers per hour, I made two interesting realizations: 1) Lily (my car) leaks in really bad storms. At first, I didn’t even feel the small stream of water coursing down my tense arms as I gripped the steering wheel for dear life, but as a small puddle formed in my lap it was hard not to notice. And 2) Lightning is really beautiful up close. That night I had a love-hate relationship with the lightning. On the one hand, it was hitting the fields around me so often I felt like I was driving through a strobe-lit club. On the other hand, I could only see the road clearly when it hit. I call these realizations interesting because at the time they were extremely unsettling, but now they’re sort of funny because….well, I survived. My driving nightmare was paralleled by my family’s flying nightmare. Suffice it to say that after an hour of terrifying turbulence and a missed landing attempt, they thankfully made it to ground safely. Later as we all huddled in a teary group hug, I offered up one of the most heartfelt prayers of thanksgiving I have prayed in a long time. It was an emotional start to the trip to say the least.

Thankfully, the rest of the holiday was all sunshine and blue skies. Our flight to Namibia wasn’t until December 26, so I had a few days to show my family Durban. I got to take my family to my favorite open air arts and food market and of course my favorite beach. We went to church on Christmas Eve (which earned me massive brownie points with my mother) and they got to meet the infectious disease team I work with at a holiday potluck dinner that my boss hosted at her house. However, the moment that will be forever imprinted in my memory, is when my sister first unzipped her suitcase. She had not mentioned this to me at all, but had simply shown up here with half a suitcase full of our old toys. She had packed up all our old Barbies, as well as a collection of stuffed bears and then some store bought toy cars and trucks (because “What about the boys?” she told me. “We only had girl toys.”) We spent the morning of Christmas Eve distributing toys in the pediatric ward at King Edwards Hospital. As I watched her let one of the patients stick playdough on her face, I realized I’ve never been prouder of my baby sister.

On Christmas Day, we drove through the famous Midlands Meander. Though famous, I’d never myself done this trip. The Midlands Meander consists of about five to six routes that weave through the beautiful Kwazulu-Natal Midlands. Each route is dotted with quiet tea gardens and family-owned restaurants set against the mountain backdrops. There are also myriad local craft shops featuring the work of weavers, potters, woodcrafters, leather workers, artists, metalworkers, box makers, herb growers, cheese makers, beer brewers…the list goes on. In the morning, we stopped to have tea in the Valley of 1000 Hills. Only a half hour outside Durban, this area of Kwazulu Natal is a lovely start to a day of mountain driving and definitely lives up to its descriptive name. Our coffee and teas were served with freshly baked scones and some of the most decadent butter I’ve ever eaten. It almost felt like cream, but it was whipped thick like butter. After this mid morning snack, we meandered some more. Since we were driving through on Christmas day, most of the quaint curio and art shops were closed, so our trip was mostly to marvel at the natural landscape on our way to the cozy Italian restaurant where we had our Christmas meal.

The next day we boarded a plane to Windhoek. A word about Namibia. It is a country of extremely diverse landscapes and rich cultural history. We spent seven days driving through the country and every day our surroundings were completely different than they’d been 24 hours earlier. We were picked up at the airport by Ronnie, quite possibly the best tour guide in the history of tour guides. His sweet kindness and easygoing nature was made only more endearing by the occasional mild stutter that crept in when he was shyly sharing some adorable joke about baby baboon or mother cheetah. Needless to say, my sister and I fell head over heels in love with the man.

Our first stop in Namibia was Etosha National Park, an enormous game reserve situated in the north of the country and purportedly one of Africa’s main wildlife sanctuaries. Etosha means “place of dry water” and is named for the large dry calcrete depression or “pan” in the center of the park. It is usually dry year-round but occasionally gets moist enough to fill with blue-green algae which attracts hundreds of flamingoes. (Our trip did not coincide with flamingo season unfortunately.) We spent two nights here, at different rest camps within the park. Our first night we were welcomed by one of the most breathtaking scenes I’ve seen thus far in Africa. The Okaukuejo rest camp has a floodlit watering hole on the premises with a small bleacher of seats set up for viewing. On that first night, I was busy shampooing my hair when my sister pounded on the bathroom door excitedly babbling about baby rhinos and sunsets. I ran out of the shower perplexed and barely had time to throw a t-shirt on before she was literally pulling me out of the room and over to the viewing area near the watering hole. As we approached, I realized why. My parents and her had decided to take a quick walk before showering and had come upon a mother and baby rhino taking a bath and sipping water at the watering hole. They were 50 meters away and backlit by a stunning sunset that would have been worth the trip on its own. It was a breathtaking view. As I sat there with shampoo in my hair and my arms crossed in front of my chest to hide the fact that I was literally wearing ONLY a t-shirt (and shorts), I marveled at the beauty of nature and the blessing of being able to share that beauty with the three most important people in my life.

The next two days of game drives were also spectacular. At one point, we came upon a watering hole surrounded by zebras and watched a baby and mother zebra frolic and nuzzle each other. (Have you guys noticed a trend of how happy I get when I see baby animals in the wild?) Then at a different point, we sat with bated breath and binoculars pressed hard against our eyes as a herd of zebra munched its way through a field where we’d just seen three to four female lions crouch into invisibility. All five of us in the car barely moved a muscle for fifteen minutes but for some reasons, the zebra gods were happy with the zebras that day for there was no hunt and the lionesses let them pass by unharmed. It’s amazing how quickly I developed safari bloodlust. Although my sister was preparing herself to cry if a zebra got killed, I wanted to see a lioness in action. My consolation prize came later when we passed by a zebra that must have been brought down the day before. The main hunters were clearly done with it as the only carnivores around were small foxes and a few vultures. My anatomical mind kicked in and I zoomed in with my parents’ phenomenal camera, trying to identify organs but don’t worry, I’ll spare you those graphic shots. I know. I’m weird.

After two days of game driving through arid savannahs, we moved on to Damaraland, the northwest corner of the Namib Desert. We spent the night sleeping in the shadow of Brandberg Mountain, the tallest mountain in Namibia. Despite its height, this mountain is more famous for being home to thousands of Bushmen rock art paintings and in particular the famous “White Lady” painting. Our safari description had mentioned a few hikes, nothing too strenuous so I was infinitely proud of my family because going to see the White Lady was more like a 10 km hike over rough rocky terrain. Named for a human figure that most archaeologists now believe to be a man, the White Lady painting and other rock art paintings around it are thought to date back at least 2000 years. Some of the leading theories about who this “White Lady” was supposed to represent, is that it is either a depiction of a medicine man painted in white and engaged in ritual dancing or a hunter in a hunting ritual. Regardless, it was painted 2000 years ago and is still visible despite the elements and the tourists who used to throw water on the paintings in order to make them appear brighter in pictures. (You can't go up there without a guide now in order to prevent this.)

What I found interesting about the Brandberg Mountain, besides its beauty and archaeological value, was its name. Brandberg is an Afrikaans, Dutch and German word meaning “Fire Mountain.” The co-existence of those three languages (and thus cultures) in one name perfectly symbolizes the feel of our next stop in Namibia: Swakopmund. Known as a seaside resort town, the Dutch and German influences in this small African city are incredibly visible. The architecture is German colonial, the promenades palm-lined and the beaches rocky, which makes it feel like you’ve taken a little German town, plunked it outside Miami, then lined it with a seaside a la Maine, lighthouses and all. Very interesting and quite charming.

The morning after arriving in Swakopmund, our guide drove us to Wolvis Bay where we spent two hours on a catamaran. Our energetic captain pointed out seals and the large mola-mola fish which the area is known for, then fed seagulls right over our heads. She also showed us the area’s oyster farms and ended the ride by presenting us with large juicy freshly harvested oysters, which we ate the Swakopmund way: with a squeeze of lime juice, some black pepper, a touch of Tabasco sauce and a swig of champagne. Not bad, I decided. Not bad at all.

Having champagne before lunch reminded us to stock up on similar refreshments before heading out of Swakopmund. Seeing as how we were spending New Year’s in a tiny town with a population of 12, we weren’t sure if they’d be able to supply us with champagne and my family is nothing if not prepared when it comes to our spirits. Once properly stocked, we were on our way into the heart of the Namib desert to see what I was most excited about: the famed sand dunes of Sossusvlei. Some of the dunes stand at a height of over 300 meters, and are thus famous for being the tallest sand dunes in the world. As the tourists that we were, we were taken to the most famous one, Dune 45, so named because it sits at the 45^th kilometer that connects the Sesriem gate and Sossusvlei, and attempted to climb it. Dune climbing, as it turns out, is one of the hardest types of climbing I’ve ever done in my life. It really takes the whole “two steps forward, one step back” business to a very literal level. It was…exhausting. But the smoothness of the golden sand, swept in place over 5 million years and the quiet tranquility that my sister and I enjoyed at the top was worth the effort, in my opinion. Now. Had it actually been sunny vs. slightly overcast that day, I may have been singing a different tune. I cannot imagine climbing that thing with a true desert sunny sky beating down on us, no matter how tranquil the top. I mean, how tranquil can you be when you have heat stroke?

But in all seriousness, the desert was lovely. I could not stop taking the pictures and experimenting with the black & white function on my camera. I swear Africa turns people into amateur photographers. And as it turns out, celebrating New Year’s in a microscopic town in the middle of an African desert is an incredible experience. How many other people can say they rode a camel three hours before they were popping bottles of champagne?

Wrapping Up. (Christmas pun intended.)

Ok so now its time to return to my epic, incredibly whirlwind East African trip and talk about Tanzania.

After spending seven hours in the Nairobi airport reading and falling asleep on the chairs with my bags’ straps wound tightly around my arms, I arrived in Dar es Salaam. I was momentarily held up at customs when I was informed that I needed $100 USD for my entrance visa. However, after getting escorted out of the airport doors to withdraw Tanzanian shillings at the ATM right outside the arrivals gate, then getting said shillings converted to American dollars, I was free to go. (Note to self and all other world travelers: carry at least 100 USD wherever you go. I had to pay entrance visas and fare everywhere and prices are often better when you pay in dollars.)

It was dinner time so after dropping off my bags, we went off to have some barbecued meat for dinner. Mmmm, even now as I think of those delicious shish kebabs, my stomach grumbles, though it’s definitely 8:00 AM right now and I just had breakfast. After dinner, we went back to my friend’s place, opened a bottle of wine and talked for hours. I’m going to digress to say that my absolute favorite aspect of this year has been the people I’ve gotten to meet. Coming to Durban has opened me up to whole new world of people. There are those who live in South Africa and who I will definitely come visit again one day. Then there are those whose paths have crossed mine whether through medicine, HIV care or just service in resource-poor areas. The friend I visited in Tanzania is exactly one of those friendships. We met in September, when all the Africa-based international fellows came to Durban for an international HIV/AIDS conference and we hit it off immediately. I promised to visit her and I’m infinitely glad I did; one more link in an already incredibly strong friendship. It’s a friendship I would have never made had I not come here. It’s also one that will undoubtedly remain strong even after I go home, given that she lives a mere few hours away in Boston. Even as I write this, I get that warm happy feeling you get when you realize your world has been made a happier place because of a new truly amazing friend.

Aaanways, less gush, more story-telling. On Thursday, we made our way to the ferry landing near my friend’s flat super circa 7 AM to catch the first ferry to Zanzibar! A little bit about Zanzibar. Although it technically belongs to the Republic of Tanzania, it is a semi-autonomous group of islands, the largest of which is referred to as Zanzibar itself. An interesting thing about Zanzibar (to me at least) is that while it is a hot island with absolutely gorgeous beaches, it is 99.9% Muslim and thus one needs to dress conservatively while there. It was my first time in a predominantly Muslim region and I have to say, I was super impressed with how the women manage to show only their faces despite the blistering heat.

It was a gorgeous, gorgeous island. We took a 2 hour ferry ride where we managed to sneak into first class. (I’m convinced this was simply because a) my friend had friends who had legitimately bought first class tickets and waved us in and b)we are light-skinned.) I felt momentarily guilty, but as the AC kicked in, I simply uttered a prayer of thanksgiving and settled in happily. Upon arriving at Stonetown, the town where the ferries port, we immediately went to go get coffee and some breakfast at Zanzibar Coffeehouse. Stonetown is a bustling little town with large open-air markets, many delicious coffeehouses and lots of charm. The cobbled stoned streets are narrow and windy, with merchants vying for your attention at every turn. After breakfast, off we went in search of a dala dala with the number “101” on it. Dala dalas are just the name of the Zanzibarian version of the public transport minibuses. They are more open aired than Kenyan and South African minibuses and thank God, for the hot weather combined with lots of conservative clothing makes for very…colorful sights and smells.

After about two hours of starting and stopping, we finally made it to the northern beach town of Kendwa. Otherwise known as heaven of earth. Literally. Pristine white sandy beaches, Eden-like gardens and palm trees and an ocean sporting at least six different shades of blue by my count. Our cabin, complete with its own hammock was literally in the sand itself. We hurriedly changed into bikinis and ran to the water. Thus commenced our 24 hours of complete and utter beach relaxation. The lodge provided these adorable huts with mattresses that one could commandeer for the day. We alternated between lying out on beach chairs made of twine, then giving our skin a break under the huts. Whenever the heat would get to be too much, we’d go for a dip in the crystal clear waters.

The ocean was like a pool with only the slightest ripple every now and then; it was so calm in fact, that I started doing some yoga poses inthe water. (I’m crazy I know, but I’d missed two sessions of my beloved Bikram class for this trip.) The trips to the water and to the bar for some ice-cold Kilimanjaro beer were the only times I moved from my lounge chair that day. A good female friend, my Kindle when said friend was napping and a cold drink…those were my only companions for those 24 hours and I could not have asked for more.

The next day we went back to Stonetown for some sightseeing and food market eating. The food market held every Friday night is huge and slightly overwhelming; there are rows and rows of every type of food on sticks: meat, chicken, shrimp, fish, vegetables, you name it, they’d stuck it on a stick and grilled it. I discovered that Zanzibarian pizza is delicious and that my new favorite drink in the whole word is called a “Dawa.” It’s the Tanzanian national liquor konyagi mixed with lime and honey. For the Colombian readers out there (read: my family), it tasted like spiked aguapanela con limon. Mm, mm good. That night, my friend and I drank Dawas as we watched the sun set from one rooftop hotel bar, then drank another pair at a bar that extended right into the beach. I dug my feet into the sand to protect them from the mosquitoes and savored my drink.

The next morning, we went on a dolphin excursion. Now, this may sound like one of those things you can do at Sea World or on some cruise destination, where you pay 500 dollars or something ridiculous to jump in a pool and pet a dolphin for 20 minutes. What we did was not that. Not that at all. We were picked up outside our hostel and drove an hour and a half outside Stonetown to a beach known for its school of dolphins. Our guide gave us flippers and snorkeling gear, and we walked out a long sand bank, barely covered in water to a small dhow-like boat. After a 10-minute ride, our guide suddenly sat up straight, stared at the water, then sharply commanded us to dive in. “What? Where?” was my initial thought before he nearly pushed me out. That was how the next hour proceeded. We’d ride around for a few minutes until someone would see a school of dolphins, then my friend and I would literally just jump out of the boat and into the water. Sometimes I’d manage to get my fins on, sometimes I’d just jump. It was surreal. The dolphins were so much bigger than I expected and almost always in pairs, at least. And they were oh, so close! It was exhilarating and…I must admit…slightly frightening. They’re not violent, but man if one of them sorta swam into me by accident…I’d definitely lose that battle. I guess that’s silly because a sleek, fast dolphin wouldn’t just accidentally run into a slowly, splashing around human. In any case, it was an incredible life experience. I mentally smacked myself several times when I thought about my waterproof camera sitting uselessly back in my closet in Durban. “Oh well,” I thought to myself, “I guess I just have to do this again one day.”

That night, we went back to Dar. After a quick nap, we were off to a big party that’s thrown once a month at a bar on the beach in a suburb of Dar called Mediterraneo. It was a crazy dance party, and the perfect end to a crazy, whirlwind 10 days in Kenya and Tanzania. The next day, I said goodbye to my friend and flew back “home” to Durban, where my surrogate mother/best friend Lee picked me up from the airport. I use quotes because Durban will never be home in the way that the United States is. That being said, the more I travel, the more I realize that for me, “home” is just a concept to describe where my heart feels at ease. Funny isn’t it? How you start realizing the truth in old adages as you get older? Growing up, I lived in Florida and I will always feel at home there. But nowadays, my family spends part of the year in Boston so that’s home too. Stepping on Colombian ground and seeing my extended family has ALWAYS felt like “going home.” And then there’s my beloved New York... I’m already picturing my homecoming in May and jumping into a certain man’s arms. Maybe that’s why it’s always so hard to decide on an answer when people ask me, “Where’s home?” “I don’t know,” I should say, “I have to check to see where my people are right now.”

Speaking of my people, tomorrow my parents and little sister land in Durban. I am busy making them a poster that will read, “Welcome home.” It’s an old Montoya-Fontalvo tradition to make posters to welcome whomever’s been away from home. And since they’ll be here with me for Christmas and New Year’s, here is where home will be.

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Merry Christmas, my dear readers, and Happy New Year! I will be back to the blogging world in 2011.