The Amazon Woman and other Evolved Species of Homo nerdicus

Diane McTurk must have been quite the vibrant beauty. Even now, the sparkle in her eyes betrays the intense passion that was responsible for the existence of Karanambu. As the Jane Goodall of giant otters (see picture), she refers to her “water dogs”, Benouni, named after the river, and Peche as “my heart, my love, my prides”. With a mischievous pet racoon nicknamed “The Bandit”, she is a most extraordinary lady. Nestled at the confluence of the Amazon and Essequibo Rivers, the eco-lodge also attracts an array of avid nature lovers: ornithologists, entomologists, caiman experts, and fish enthusiasts. These visitors are as interesting as the species that they study.

Donald, a professor from Syracuse, was on a 2-month expedition with his grad student studying the largest freshwater fish in the world, the Arapaima. At an adult length of 3m, the Arapaima is an obligate breather with ineffective gills; this particular feature makes population counting very easy because every 20 minutes, these fish must travel to the surface to breath. After showing us his slideshow and video presentation after dinner, Donald excitedly explained, “And so, we’re here to look for a species that might resemble the 1830s specimen at the Paris Museum of Natural History. The British Museum of course also had a different sample, but this was lost in storage – imagine! Such an important display lost forever!” He face was aghast before he continued, “And this paper published in the early 1900s that refuted the original paper that purported 4 different Arapaima species was based solely on the opinion of one biologist who felt that there was only 1 species – that’s it, no evidence, just an opinion! Well, clearly from the specimens that we’ve found here, there are even more than 4.” This man badly needs a T-shirt that says: Carolus Linnaeus is my Hero!

As a fellow Canadian from Waterloo, it was comforting to talk with Mike about Canuck matters, but it was really his Black Caiman project that got our attention. In order to monitor the population of caiman, much of the tagging occurs at night because the red eyes of these alligator cousins are easily visible with a flashlight glowing in the dark. We can attest to this since we travelled along the river well after the sunset and experienced the surprise of seeing 2 pairs of red eyes glowing by the shoreline. Indeed, a flashlight can also revel the green eyes of Anaconda hidden in the trees. In order to tag the caiman, the team would approach the caiman and with a metal lasso device, they would reign in the caiman beside the boat. After 20 minutes, the caiman would tire and the team would bring the caiman in the boat to be tagged before returning it to the water. The biologists would then be able to monitor movement of the population the following season. These real-life Crocodile Hunters take biology from the controlled lab environment and turn it into a thrill-seeking activity in the heart of the Amazon.

Aside from the fascinating species of human that we encountered, we were fortunate enough to see some truly beautiful animals, worthy of Natural Geographic documentaries. We saw the black-bearded saki monkey, the Amazon kingfisher, the blue heron, the pied plover, the red-shouldered macaw, vultures, and countless other birds, but the truly unusual animal was the Giant Anteater (see picture), which galloped at an astonishing pace across the Savannah. For us, this last adventure of our trip satisfied the childhood fascination that began in Grade 4 biology class when we learned about the ecosystems on different canopy layers and the highly adaptive wildlife that exists in this magical place.

Despite enjoying our time in Guyana, we are both glad to be coming home to the land of beaver, snow and café mochas. For all those in Toronto, we can’t wait to see you!

Diabetes/Hypertension Workshop Weekend

All the Community Health Workers of Region 9 and one from Region 8 congregated at the Bina Hill Institute for the weekend. Some arrived on Friday, but the majority had an early start to their Saturday to join us for eggs and delicious fresh-baked bread. We had a fun educating everyone with some of the knowledge that we had gained from medical school and residency. You realize that you did learn something worth imparting to others after the near decade of education! Unlike our own training though, we made the lectures as interactive as possible without the “pimping” and everyone seemed happy to participate.

In turn, we learned about some of the interesting differences in Guyana’s healthcare. Since patients do not have glucometers, one method of diagnosing/regulating diabetes is to see if ants are attracted to a patient’s urine because of the excess sugar spilling out of the kidneys. Fortunately, Pro-Natura was able to supply glucometers, lancets, and Accucheck sticks, which should improve the abilities of CHWs to diagnose diabetes more accurately! We were glad that we were able to help people for at least a short while, but struggled in responding to valid concerns raised about limited supplies. It is Pro-Natura’s hope to be able to replenish these supplies periodically, but sustainability and introduction of technology appropriate for that country is always an issue. It was heartbreaking to hear one of the CHWs say optimistically, “Once the battery runs out for the glucometer, perhaps we could fundraise to get new ones.”

Overall, the workshop was well received, and it was our pleasure to host this event. The CHWs complimented our simple explanations for complex concepts, and they were very grateful, as most had never had formal teaching on either topic. They expressed the hope that other doctors could come to Guyana do more education on topics like parasites, obstetrics, and anemia. We hope so, too; however, when presented with a quarter-sized lesion about 3mm deep on the heel of girl, who casually informed us that this had been inflicted by a piranha during a school picnic yesterday, we must admit that we have limited experience on certain endemic problems!

NB We're off to Karanambu for a couple of days, stay tuned for what I imagine will be some pretty awesome photos when we return.

Workshop tomorrow!

Between the hours of 2-4pm, it’s uncomfortably hot even if you’re just sitting. You pray for rain to relieve the stifling heat. You try to distract yourself by focusing on other tasks or dream of immersing yourself in an ice glacier. Everything slows down and crowds are often seen at the picnic table trying to find some relief from the occasional breeze. Today, everyone was momentarily atwitter when Alphonso brought the head and tail of a rattlesnake in a jar containing alcohol. Apparently, it was hiding in the brush near where I child was playing and luckily, someone had prevented a terrible accident.

As for work, we’ve got into the habit of completing more demanding tasks in the morning. This isn’t difficult since we go to bed at 8:30pm and are usually wide awake by 6am or earlier! Today was particularly tedious printing out our handouts on an ink-jet printer circa 1988. We were just happy in the end to have something to give our Community Health Workers.

Nick left for the Rupununi Expo in Lethem yesterday. It’s a 2-day festival showcasing the local arts and crafts of Region 9. Interestingly, there’s another festival in May called the Rupununi Rodeo, which sound very much like the Calgary Stampede. It’s a family event where ranchers show of their skill and there’s generally a lot of partying. It would be fun to survey the local goods this weekend, but we don’t mind that we will be missing the event, because we will FINALLY host our workshop. Everything is ready (see picture of radioing in lieu of a phoning), and we hope that it will go smoothly. There’s been so much anticipation for this that we can hardly believe it’s tomorrow.

Frames of Reference and Shifting Perspectives

“Back at home, we have a machine that cleans your clothing for you. How do you know when it’s done? Well, you hear a BEEP. Yeah, and we have another machine to dry your clothes.” We could hear the girl giggle incredulously as Nick offered this explanation for laundry in North America. At the same time, we could hear one of the students singing a Christmas Medley of Jingle Bells and Silent Night as we woke up to another typical day in tropical heat.

When you’ve been in Bina Hill or any isolated community in a developing country long enough, you find it incredible that this world can exist concurrently with the sphere that you just left. You wonder: How could this be? How can you have thirty different flavours of cereal at Loblaw’s and none here because there isn’t even any milk? How can people complain about slightly bruised oranges at the local market while people here have virtually no source of citrus and it’s a wonder that they don’t develop scurvy? People in Canada have numerous concerns about the healthcare system, yet people here have zero access to healthcare in rural areas and even in Lethem, there are no physicians in-house on the weekend. How is this possible? We can remember spending hundreds of dollars on textbooks for school and here, classes are taught on the blackboard alone and are dependent on the expertise of the inevitable foreign visiting teacher, who can realistically only teach a few very basic subjects for a limited time.

Even so, you catch yourself missing things from home like chocolate milk, movie theatres, and sushi. All of our stomachs gurgled when we watched a movie on the laptop that featured a Ben and Jerry’s. You vow that you will never ever take these things for granted again, knowing that you will, but hoping that you will remember this important lesson.

Funnily enough, Nick replied to the girl after she completed what had become an uproarious laugh over the washing machine description, “Well, you should come see it one day.” She replied, "Yes. I would very much like to visit your country some day." When faced with this type of conversation on cultural exchange and despite knowing better, you can’t help but think, “Yes, yes! Come to Canada, we can take you to Raptors Game. You can get almost any type of fruit no matter what time of year. There are streetcars for the public to use. There's a Tim Horton's every other block to serve you coffee and donuts practically whenever you want. You’d love it!”

More adventures on the way...

We’re pretty excited since we were able to secure 2 days next Monday after our week-end workshop at Karanambu, an incredible eco-lodge along the Rupununi River founded by Diane McTurk. Diane is one of the world’s experts on giant sea otters and truly an inspiration. She saves orphaned sea otters and nurtures them at Karanambu before they can be re-released into the wild. The lodge’s mandate is to preserve the Rupununi ecosystem and the Amerindian way of life. We should be able to fully appreciate the minimally disturbed wildlife at this rustic locale.

You wouldn’t think making reservations would be a problem, but since there are no ATMs and VISA is not accepted out here, we actually did not bring enough cash to entirely cover this expense. We’ve already been a little paranoid walking around with a big wad of 1000 Guyanese Dollar bank notes (the exchange rate is 200 GYD to 1 US)! Diane was kind enough to let us send her money at a later point.

Today has otherwise been a pretty ordinary work day. There’s a conference hosted at Bina Hill for WWF (World Wildlife Fund) and as a result, Tracey, the chef, has been preparing more elaborate meals. We actually had egg for breakfast and this pastry called bake – it’s deep-fried flour/water/salt. We’ve become something like Pavlovian dogs because every time the kitchen door opens, it’s a sure signal that the meal is ready and our mouths are inevitably salivating as we make our way to the dining area.

And then there were three

Things at Bina Hill are incredibly quiet since the Frenchmen left on Monday to continue their journey to Brazil. In typical fashion, they left their share of broken hearts among some of the girls. As with any isolated community, there are the usual relationship entanglements and a sort of social bubble forms where small ripples tend to become larger waves. Kathleen had to join Linzii in Georgetown to sort out their working VISAs. Consequently, some of the classes are cancelled, and the Bina Hill Institute students are having a decidedly lighter schedule. Among the foreigners, only Nick remains to eat with us at the dining table along with the many dogs that run around the complex – one actually delivered 8 adorable pups last week.

Since arriving, we have become something like the local medical experts. Medex Bartholomew, the other foreign visitors, and lots of students have approached us with medical questions on topics ranging from urinary tract infections to questions like “how can you tell if you have breast cancer?” It’s been fun for us to educate people informally, but without access to certain medications, our ability to treat is somewhat limited. This afternoon, Medex approached us about a young patient with 1 day of non-specific symptoms like feeling hot, muscle aches, and headache. In Canada, most doctors would attribute this to a common cold or flu, but here, malaria, typhoid, and dengue are also possibilities. There are illnesses here that we would only rarely encounter in Toronto, and they definitely require a modified approach.

It continues to be extremely hot, making it difficult to even think sometimes - a cool breeze is such a gift! The project seems to be going as planned, as we continue to develop our handouts, etc. We are glad that we picked some star fruit from the trees in Rock View to supplement our starch diet here.

One People, One Nation, One Destiny (Guyana's motto)

Today was thankfully much less eventful than yesterday. One of the nice things about living in a country for an extended period is the opportunity to have a more in-depth appreciation of the culture and history. At a population of 750 000, Guyana is the only English-speaking country in South America with a culture that has been more largely influenced by their Caribbean rather than Latin American neighbours. The country has changed hands between the French, Dutch, and finally the British. Here, Sir Walter Raleigh claimed that he found the famous lost city of gold, El Dorado.

In Amerindian, Guyana means “Land of Many Waters”; with its many tributaries including the Rupununi River, the Essequibo River is the third largest in South America. Unlike other regions of the Amazon rainforest, Guyana boasts a largely untouched natural environment, which has been minimally damaged by tourist activities. Guyana is known as the land of giants: the giant otter, anteater, armadillo, centipede, and of course the jaguar, one of the largest feline in the world and the national mascot.

When we visited a secondary school as part of our tour at Rock View, the children sang (see picture), “Living in Aranaputa in the Rupununi basin…we can be hungry….life can be hard.” Obviously, life in the rainforest can be unforgiving, and the song contrasted markedly with tranquil Cape Breton lullabies that we would sing in our Canadian secondary schools. Children as young as six years old walk to school by themselves and if they’re lucky, two or three might be able to simultaneously share a single bicycle for transportation.

Beside the school, there is also a small plant (see picture) producing peanut butter, a source of pride for those in the Rupununi. The peanut butter is exquisitely smooth and simply delicious. The children would eat this on cassava bread, which has a very thin crunchy texture, as their lunch. Despite these brief insights into Guyanese life, we must admit that the actual pulse of the country remains elusive to us.