Failure

My intentional and unintentional meditations of late have been on the subject of failure. Failure is probably my biggest fear... it has at times, especially in the past two years, paralyzed me and therefore prevented me from taking the steps to actually prevent another perceived failure. I think I also have a tendency to subconciously think, "If I know I haven't put in 100% effort then it isn't really a failure, because I know I could have done better." This pseudo-logic of my subconcious, in the light of day, is the dumbest thing I've ever heard. But I think I've been letting it influence me anyway. So, as of last night, I'm going to try to stop the cycle. I'm going to try to welcome failures as an opportunity to improve, and opportunity to really give something a 100% effort... the second time.

Help for Friends

My friend, Sera's organization, Circle of Health International (COHI), is trying to win a cash award from American Express Members Project.
YOU DO NOT NEED TO BE AN AMEX CARD HOLDER to nominate COHI. Anyone can go to the link below, and nominate the project that we are seeking funding for.
It's called, "Nurses Deliver, One Mother and Baby at a Time." It will fund the training of nurses and midwives in COHI's current field sites: Israel, Palestine, Sudan, and Pakistan. Here is all you have to do:
1. Click here: http://www.membersproject.com/project/view/VCIESL
2. Nominate the project, "Nurses Deliver, One Mother and Baby at a Time".
3. Send this message to everyone you know, and ask them to do the same.
There will be another step on September 1, when we all have to VOTE for COHI. Don't worry, I will remind you~Thanks so much, and lets go win COHI some much needed funding!

Olympic Disappointment

It's hot here in the Negev Desert. Hit 98.9 F today. And while I would like to write about something more profound, the basic truth is that it is terrible that NBC blocked international IP addresses from access to their Olympic coverage. We can't watch. I'm sure there is Israeli coverage but I don't suscribe to cable, let alone own a television. It's a sad day when an American girl can't cheer her country on because she happens not to live in her native land at this moment.

Back to the Holy Land

Today I leave Seattle and return to Israel, via a weeks vacation in NYC. I'm excited to go. I'm ready for my third year of med school. For learning in a more practical way, for being mostly done with lecture-format education. Based on the last two years, I am sure the next two will have a lot of ups and downs but I'm also pretty sure it will fly by!

Links to some newer pictures!

So loading pictures to Facebook is much easier than to this site... so here are the links to the albums that don't require you to sign up for Facebook!

http://bgu.facebook.com/album.php?aid=41198&l=e2ee2&id=549681281

and

http://bgu.facebook.com/album.php?aid=41199&l=1981b&id=549681281

Bombing in Dimona

Most importantly, I am fine. While Dimona is only a half hour from Beer Sheva, it is a whole half hour away from Beer Sheva. It's strange to finally have this come to pass... I am living in Israel when there was a suicide bombing. I suppose, in some ways, it was only a matter of time. I think I expected to be more frightened or... something... On the other hand, more people died this week in a random shooting in an American mall... so random violence really doesn't seem more frequent here than at home.
Apparently med school has sucked the rest of my will to write out of me... Just thought family and friends should know I'm safe...
K

Newsletter #6 - J.

Dear Family and Friends,

Today I met J. My Hebrew T.A., Omri, a sixth year Israeli medical student, brought J. to our small Hebrew class because J. speaks some English. Omri's hope was that we could practice our interview skills in English so we could learn the rhythm of asking questions without the complexity of trying to remember the questions in Hebrew. I think Omri also hoped to remind us that patients' stories are far more interesting than we sometimes can imagine....Here's what I learned about J.

J. is 24 years old man who reported to his family health clinic a month ago with chest and throat pain. After an initial blood test revealed a previously undiagnosed HIV infection, J. was referred to Saroka Hospital in Be'er Sheva, a three hour bus ride from his current home. In the hospital where I go to school, it was discovered that J. had cystic thymus. Cystic thymus has only ever been re ported in four other HIV patients world-wide. Actually, the thymus is an organ that J. shouldn't need anymore because, while the thymus is relatively large and important immunity-maturing organ in infants, it generally grows smaller with age and disappears in later adulthood. So J.'s thymus regrew and became full of cysts and, from what I understand, started pressing on his heart and J. had to undergo surgery to remove the thymus a week ago. This is a incredibly story to witness... such a unique medical history... but it is not the reason I am telling you about J.

J. is a devoted husband and father of two children, a four year old daughter and a six-month old son. He is a shy man, softly spoken but quick to laugh. In the five days he has been taking HIV antiretrovirals (since his surgery) his white blood cell count (CD4 count) has gone from 5 to 64. This is an amazing increase and is also important because a normal CD4 counts in adults ranges from 500 to 1500. One is usually considered to have AIDS with a CD4 count of 200 or less because this is the point where the immune system cannot protect itself against opportunistic infections. I honestly didn't think people survived with a CD4 count of 5! But this is also not why I am telling you about J.

J. is a Sudanese Christian from southern Sudan. In April of 2004 his parents and all but one of his siblings were killed and J. was thrown in prison for unknown reasons. In prison, J., a fisherman by trade, was tortured as a spy. They beat him and repeatedly pierced his hands with needles and injected him with unknown substances. They were not hygienic with their torture devices... and J. can only guess that he contracted HIV from the blood of another torture victim. He escaped prison and with his wife, who has also lost her entire family, hid aboard a boat bound for Egypt.

In Egypt they made a meager life for themselves. J. couldn't work because he was increasingly ill, but his wife was able to scrape together enough doing odd jobs for them to have a small flat and food. J. went to the doctor in Egypt and was told that he had Tuberculosis but was not told he had HIV. They gave him the standard six months of Tb treatment but he didn't get better. The situation in Egypt started worsening. J., his family and the rest of the Sudanese refugee community there came under increasing scrutiny from the larger Egyptian society. They weren't Muslim and they weren't Egyptian and they were poor. There were threats to send them back to Sudan. So last April, with his wife eight months pregnant with their second child, J. led his family on an eight day walk across the Sinai Desert in hopes of sneaking into Israel.

Almost immediately after crossing the border they were captured by the Israeli Defense Forces and put in jail for illegal immigration. J. said that the Israeli jail was nice. It was clean and they were given good food. And, after two months in jail, they were tentatively allowed to go free as refugees. J. and his wife found housing and jobs, as part of the the housecleaning staff, in one of the large hotels in Eilat, the sunbathing/partying capitol of Israel. They don't know what their status is and whether they will be allowed to stay. Israel's laws are very unclear about non-Jewish refugees. But in the meantime J. is receiving good treatment that will hopefully bring his CD4 count up above 200. His wife and children have all been tested and they are not infected with HIV. J. is eager to go back to work tomorrow, eager to get stronger and thankful for every day that God has given him.

This is what I learned about J. today.

Love and Blessings,
K.

P.S. Please excuse bad grammer and spelling in the above. I haven't much time to edit this. I am well. I still love medicine, I am learning to be more at home in Be'er Sheva, and I am looking forward to a two week vacation in the Northwest starting this Friday! Happy (Belated) Hanukkah and Merry Christmas!

Time passes...

Everyone knows what is said about time and fun... but I've found that time often flies whether there is specifically fun involved or not. It's been more than five months since I've written. This is part due to the relative ease of posting pictures on Facebook in comparison to this blog but also because I haven't felt particularly eloquent. I had a wonderful but whirlwind summer with weddings and visiting and meeting Jon's awesome family, but I'm glad to be back in Be'er Sheva and settled.

School rumbles on at an alarming pace. I have another exam in five days and I'm sure I don't know it all but I'm also pretty sure I'll know enough by then. It's terrifying realizing how much my patiens will one day rely on my remembering all of this.

Jon and I just got back from a wonderful twelve day vacation in Romania. We both needed it. We did study over that time but we also took it really easy. With not particular itinerary we were able to stay somewhere when we liked it and move on when we were done and not worry too much about the details. It was lovely. Neither of us had much of a vacation this summer as we were both very busy, him studying for the USMLE and me rushing around seeing everyone I missed, so this was nice.








In front of the Opera House in Bucharest...















In the Black Sea (Brrrr!)










The Fall Festival in Sinia!














View from the King's Summer Palace...
















Waiting to go on a tour of the Palace...















Getting into the Transylvania spirit!

A hike above Brasov...

Enjoying a real autumn!

A little studying on the train...

An African Woman that Gives Me Hope...

** Mauritania's fiery singing senator **

One of Mauritania's best-known singers, Malouma, hopes to continue her fight for women's rights as a senator.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/em/fr/-/2/hi/africa/6599701.stm

I think she plays a Kora-like harp... similar to the one I brought back from The Gambia!

The Look

My friend Jon and I were recently talking about wearing the white coat and trying to differentiate between the possibility of pride and simple satisfaction that it symbolizes what we both want to do with our lives... in any case I thought I would post a couple of pictures from one of our clinical days last fall...


From left to right, classmates, Bryanna, Claire, Anna, Katy, Helen, myself, Ivona, Amber and Adam, ready to start interviewing patients!





Behind me is the hospital laundry!

Pictures from Egypt - As Promised

Here are just a few highlight pictures from my trip to Egypt! There are more posted on Facebook if you are so inclined. Amber, Ivona and I had a fantastic trip. Egypt was diverse and bustling, full of markets and ruins, mosques and churches, buses, trains and water buffalo.

The view from our Cairo hotel...

Amber and I in front of the Egyptian Museum.

The Great Pyramid.

Amber and I with five pyramids... can you find them all?

Far south in Aswan my travel companions and I had henna tattoos done in a Nubian village...

Grand Mosque in Aswan, as viewed from our hotel...

Sailing on the Nile!

Ivona and Amber as we leave Aswan on our way to Luxor....

A close-up of my henna tattoo from the night before....

We ran into some friends from school while sailing!

Check out the stark difference between the palms right next to the Nile and the desert beyond...

A self portait...

The beginning of the ancient temples we expolored. This one is at Kom Ombo.

My favorite photo from inside the the Kom Ombo temple...

And the end of my temple touring on the West Bank of Luxor outside the embalming Temple of Hatshepsut

Exodus to Egypt

Really I just love the irony of this post title! Today I leave for Cairo to spend the Pesach (Passover) Break exploring the wonders of Egypt. While about a third of my school is also going to Egypt, I am traveling in a small group of three including my friends Amber and Ivona and myself. I am very excited as Egypt was the second place I ever conceived of traveling to as a child! (The first was Scotland, to which I still have not gone.) Our plan is to explore Cairo for a couple of days, see the pyramids, the sphinx, and the national museum, take a small boat up the Nile for a couple of nights, visit the Valley of the Kings in Luxor and perhaps the Valley of the Dead and head back home after nine days. I'll be sure to post pictures when I get back!

K

Ridiculous But Fun Quizzes

You scored as Emma Woodhouse. Emma is possibly one of the most loyal characters of Austen, always wanting better for those around her and doing all she possibly can to make it happen. Her motives sometimes get in the way of her good intentions and her own opinions can end up ruling her actions, but she has a good heart. She loves to be social and is welcoming to most, unless they are too silly to tolerate. While she some- times changes her behavior to make others feel comfortable, she knows who she is and is always bettering herself. Emma Woodhouse 84% Marianne Dashwood 78% Elizabeth Bennet 59% Jane Bennet 47% Elinor Dashwood 47% Lady Catherine 38% Charlotte Lucas 34%

Music Help

OK. So I do understand that there are sites out there that will do this for me... but I'm a little slow with this kind of thing so I thought I would call upon the possible kindness of friends and family... I've grown tired of my present music collection and I need help. But what to buy? There is so much out there and so little time to wade through it all! So, if you have a favorite, please send it to me! Things I already love are as diverse as Pachelbel, The Black Eyed Peas, Dixie Chicks, The Eagles, Dido, Nora Jones, Usher, Bach, Jars of Clay, Keith Urban, Ben Harper and anything Bluegrass or A Capella...

Please help!

K

Still Weird

I remember reaching this point in West Africa where I felt as if I hadn't anything more to write about. I was sure that my everyday life would still be a surprise to all of my family and friends at home, but since I was no longer surprised by it, I couldn't think of what to tell everyone. I feel a bit that way now.

Yesterday late afternoon I hopped on a bus to Jerusalem to attend a once-a-month worship service with third-year students Amy and Olivia. These two women are awesome. Not only are they both about my age and have birthdays within a week of mine but they also share my faith in a very real way. They are really trying to live the path that God has laid before their feet. The worship service was also very, very cool... but in the midst of all of this relatively normal sounding "me" stuff there were the following:

As usual the bus was full of soldiers on their way home for the weekend... carrying their guns and a weeks worth of dirty laundry in giant hiking packs. They are mostly all a lot younger than me...

The desert is blooming. Literally. Where there was dust and... well, dust there are now wild flowers. My favorite are the small blood red poppies. They are more rare than the other wildflowers but they are so dramatic.

Jerusalem continues to be this bewildering mix of Holy Center of the World and modern city where you can buy high fashion clothing on every corner and old men tease the girls behind the counter at the pizza shop. Every time I go there I wish more that I lived there and not in Beer Sheva, which is sadly a little bit of a backwater.

On the bus back home last night I spent 45 minutes fending off the advances of a very friendly young Jewish man. He wasn't out-of-line particularly... just not easily discouraged by my "I'm not Jewish" and "I cannot live in Israel after I finish school" and "I don't have a lot of time for a social life outside of my studies" comments. Those of you who have been reading my posts and newsletters for a while will know that I don't actually see this as something to brag about... but simply a huge irritant. I'm not especially fond of being complimented on the color of my eyes by someone that knows nothing of my soul.

Today, back in Beer Sheva, it is supposed to be sunny and 82 degrees. I need to study for my upcoming physiology quiz and Cell and Molecular Biology Final.

Exciting, isn't it?

Too much!

Have you ever been told you were "too much"? Too sarcastic? Too focused? Too serious? Too laid-back? Too sensitive? Too passive? Too aggressive? It turns out I've been told I was "too much" a lot in my life... and I just realized it today. What's worse, I've been told this by a lot of people that really love me. Family, friends, several exes... I've spent days, months, years, toning myself down because other people are overwhelmed. I've stayed me... just a more "handlable" version of me. And here's the catch... God made me just as I am. On purpose. He made me the worried, sensitive, serious, exuberant person that I now only let out with people I know love me. And even they are concerned. They don't want me to be so sensitive that I get hurt, so serious that I forget to laugh... but the truth is that God can protect me from those concerns because He made me, me.

Yes, I know. This isn't about Israel. And is a bit more personal that I ever thought I would put on a blog... but I'm betting on two things... 1) No one actually reads this blog except my best friend and 2) Sometimes my life isn't all about living in Israel.

K

Unlikely...

Have you ever been sitting at the Paris Cafe on the beach in Ashkelon, Israel, eating pizza and hummus with your American friends, listening to Russian karaoke and watched a man walk by in a kilt? I have. I did it today after five glorious hours of laying on the beach, getting mildly pinked by the warmish January sun. Then, as we drove through the rolling green hills of the Negev in winter, wondering at the fields planted in wheat, we saw the anti-missile blimp lazily turning circles over Gaza to the south. Finally we detoured through the recognized Bedouin village of Rahat to see the clinic there and watched the green lights of the mosque towers blink on as a huge fuchsia sun set on this small Arab city.

I live a surreal life.

K

Ethiopian "Bar"

After one of our finals a big group of us decended on this small market in a mostly Ethiopian neighborhood and bought them out of beer and snackfood...we love this place!

The whole group

Artsy shot of Melissa, Colin, Ezra and Reena... I'm sure Ryan took this picture...

Katy and Olga!

My First Israeli Chanukah

Just a couple of pictures from a wonderful night at Adam, Sera and Colin's Home...

Anna, Sonia, Reena and Bryanna
















Myself, Melissa, Carolyn and Adam....

From the upstairs balcony, I put my white elephant gift to good use...

The whole gang...

The Beginning of Several Holiday-Related Posts

So I admit that the last post was lengthy and a little serious so this is the first of several posts highlighting some of my holiday fun...

First was Thanksgiving, attended by most of my class and generously hosted by Ezra and Chris, two other Northwesterners. Ezra is from Vashon and Chris from Montana...
-K



Chris deep fried one of the turkeys!



















Sonia and Bryanna










Katy and I

Nima reads an original Thanksgiving poem

Thirty-five plus hungry first year med students dig in....

Receiving a little love from our class dog, Jed.

We're so full! Can we stay the night? Chika, myself, Carolyn and Sonia snuggle on the couch.