My new “home”

I am so happy to report that my travels are now complete and I am settling in at my home for the next 6 months in beautiful rural Bangladesh.  My hospital is on a small mission compound and my living quarters are at the guesthouse within that compound.  There are other foreigners (“Budeshis”) living here as well.  At the moment it is mostly other members of my “Gyne” team living in the house and as I write this we are all lounging on the couches in the common room.  We eat at a dining room table breakfast, lunch, and dinner.  I am so amazed that we take a break every day from the hospital to go home and eat lunch.  Since it’s a small compound, it only takes approximately 3 minutes to walk from the guesthouse to the hospital. 

The hospital has a strong British influence so the pace is much different from the “American way”.  For example, the anesthesiologist suggested we break for tea briefly before bringing the next patient into the OR (called Operating Theatre here).  I love tea breaks!  Why was I born in America? J

I am also truly enjoying being a member of an international community of believers.  We had a prayer meeting last night after work and there were so many countries represented.  It has been both exhilarating and challenging to learn all of the differences between all the different cultures.  For example, I learned that Tylenol is called acetaminophen in America and Canada but paracetamol pretty much everywhere else.  I was looked at strangely when I said I didn’t know what drug paracetamol was!  We eventually figured out what it was but my Swiss department head had never heard of acetaminophen.   It’s the little things.

Despite my language barrier they are keeping me busy: putting in and taking out Implanon (a long term contraceptive placed in the arm), and doing ultrasound.  Our Gyne team is all women. We have 3 senior Bangladeshi doctors and 4 juniors.  At the moment we have five international “consultants” but two are leaving this week, one is leaving next month and the other is leaving early October.  Then it will just be me with the Bangladeshi doctors.  Thank God they all speak English so it works even with a language barrier, and they are all lovely people with good attitudes.  We have a very nice daily routine of meeting for handover at 9AM then we read a passage of the bible together and pray together.  

I got permission from all of the team members to post this picture of our team. 

Our department head was off for a long weekend holiday today and one of the senior Bangladeshi is preparing for her board exam, so they are not pictured.

I know this was a bit long, but thank you for taking the time to read this and for supporting me with your prayers.

Specifically pray for:

• me to quickly learn the differences in practice management
• continued language skills
• my first “on call” : I’m terrified of things I just haven’t experienced first hand thus far in the US (eclampsia, etc.)

Angela