Random Ramblings

Have you ever seen the show 'Lost' where it seems the island is literally trying to kill the people on it? Sometimes I think that island is Grenada, whose flora and fauna have schemed to erradicate SGU students off this rock. For example, my classmates organized a class hike up to 7 Sisters waterfalls. While my classmates were playing and frolicking in the waterfall on a beautiful Saturday morning, there was a flash flood. A spontaneous wall of water threw people off the waterfall and left others stranded clutching rocks for their lives (Barry and Gina down on the right) until help could be called for miles away. Thankfully no one was seriously hurt, but there were quite a few ouchies and the hike back to campus was a long one.


On the other side of the island, myself and a few other people went to an equine colic lecture that could have been disasterous too. We were learning how to shove nasogastric tubes down a horse's noses when two horses got into a fight and the loser came galloping into us like a bowling ball hell bent on knocking over pins. One again thankfully no one was hurt, but my poor little brain that is already going through an academic blender cannot take the extra shot of adrenaline. Whoever said the Caribbean is relaxing was lying!! I would not be suprised if a polar bear to come out of the trees!!


In other news, I am in the beginning stages of writing a textbook with one of the professors down here. I just got a huge volume of notes yesterday from him that I need to start rifling through and all of my additional resources have been mailed to Matt in the US. It will be a busy Christmas break to see how much I can get done. Coming home in 30 days!!!

Off to the Races!

Hermit crab races that is. The epitome of entertainment. After our physiology test we headed to the Owl restaurant for a night of drinks and sketchy betting on these adorable little crustaceans. When you think 'hermit crabs' do not think of the cute little stinkers you find at Petsmart with little paintings on their little shells. The Grenadian hermit crabs are the size of apples and could scurry your rear end up a coconut tree with a single icy glare. The races were awesome and well worth the 4EC I lost




Here I am giving my little crab Node of Ranvier a pep talk.
He lost, but he is still a winner in my heart



Oh my goodness, chaos on the race track!! Go Node of Ranvier!!

One Health One Medicine

Just got back from an awesome morning at the SGU One Health One Medicine Clinic. It is a yearly event where medical students give free health exams to the local Grenadians and the veterinary students give free health exams and vaccinations to their pets. My job was to travel (not by myself Mom!) to some of the poorer areas around Grande Anse giving out flyers to the population of people who cannot afford to see a doctor. I wish I had known beforehand whether or not the med students had HIV testing...that seemed to be the most common question I received. When I was finished talking to 50-80 people I was reaking of pot smoke and rum... not bad for 10 am on a Saturday morning.
When I got back to the SGU tents I tried to do little jobs here and there for the vet students who were examining pets. We saw dogs all over the spectrum for possibly mangy to a temperature over 107 degrees. Most just had some tick problems and nails clipped. Having free vaccinations and dewormer was phenomental, if we can save a few dogs from rabies and intestinal parasites, than standing out in the heat for a few hours was well worth it. After that I went food shopping (since I was right next to the mall) and they totally had french vanilla coffee creamer!!!!!! I stocked up on 4 bottles and did a little jig with my prized creamers.
<-- My life is now complete

Working Hard of Hardly Working

I apologize that I have not taken the time to update this blog for some time. Academia kicked it up a notch and I had a string of four tests in a short time period. However I have been kicking back and my lowest grade so far is a 96. Let us see how long we can keep that up! Midterms are in 2 weeks (I cannot believe how fast time is flying). Some of the clubs in the vet school have been doing some really neat wet labs to give 1st termers some hands-on experience and a much needed reminder that eventually we will be practicing medicine. Last Saturday we had some dead pigs and got to practice tracheostomys, thoracostomy, thoracocentesis, spinal taps, and trans tracheal aspirations. This first picture is the chinese finger trap suture where you shove a tube through the ribs and then make a beautiful tie from the skin down the tube. That was an awesome morning! Later on this week we have suture and bandage wet labs.


In other exciting news, the Union workers here went on strike! The school sent out a rather miffed e-mail to the students and faculty explaining that 400 out of the 600 Grenadians working on campus were part of a Union and that services would be affected until a deal could be reached. Well, turns out only 50 people did not show up for work and they sat out on lawn chairs outside the school gates. I had to get through them to go to the farm on Wednesday and it was completely anticlimactic. I am not 100% sure why they went on strike other than it was money-related, but I did see the pamphlet the Union was passing out to motivate the Grenadians and it had a picture of a white man beating a black slave.... awkward? We received another updated e-mail last night and looks like the Ministry did a good job of settling everyone down so life will get back to normal.

I also received financial aid so my tuition is paid for- no more free school :o(

Fish Friday

Last night several of my classmates and I went to the town of Gouyave for their popular Fish Friday celebrations. We called up a 10 person reggae bus (taxi service) and the driver gave us a great deal of $20 EC/person for the trip up and back. This island destroys personal bubbles. If you do not like people within a two foot radius of you at all times, this is not the island for you. We managed to shove 18 people into this bus (we have some very aggressive people in my class- they wanted fish really badly) and went screaming down a windy road at 70 mph in the dark. It was rather terrifying, but the reggae bus is the only way to get around the island and everyone drives like a crazy old woman...makes driving in the US seem awfully dull and noncreative. Anyway, so we reach the fishing village where the fishy streets are lined with fishermen and fisherwomen cooking fish for fish lovers. Oh my goodness it was like heaven! The food was so incredibly delicious and after a few drinks I was dancing my little heart out to the reggae. I wish it had been light out so I could get some pictures of the village, it was really neat with tiny streets and incredibly old buildings. Our bus driver ended up being kind of a jackass because I KNOW I asked him prior to us heading to the festivle what time he wanted to leave and I got a 'dunna worry white girl you go have a great time' and then an hourish later he said 'gather your friends so we can go or I will up the charge to $25 EC.' Well that was rather annoying, but we gathered up all 18 and wedged ourselves back into the reggae bus and headed out on the long/terrifying drive home. All in all it was a really neat trip and I will definitely have to do that again sometime.

Funny side note: I absolutely love having a diverse faculty. The professors I have this semester include 2 from Germany, 2 from India, 1 from Scotland, 1 from the US, 1 from Spain, and 1 not of this world. Everyone is incredibly caring for the students and all of them do a fantastic job of teaching. However, this is a slight humerous drawback of having professors all over the world, teaching us technical terms with their thick accents. Here is a sample of some of the words I hear during lecture and have to translate in my mind.

Professor Language - English

Injimes-------------- enzymes
Schlendary---------- secondary
Imblicus------------- umbilical cord
Calshum------------- Calcium
Beetah Blunkers----- beta blockers


Ahh good times!

Hurricane Season

I have had a couple inquiries regarding whether or not I have been affected by the hurricane. Thankfully, Grenada is just a little too far south for the common hurricane tracks. The island has only experienced two in the last 50 years (granted the one in 2004 was pretty epic in a bad way). No worries though, I have already paid for my emergency evacuation insurance so if anything comes this way I am good to go. If you removed the St. George's tag you just might be able to see the island... it feels that small when you live on it too. Clicky for clearer picture if you would like. Sidenote: Still do not have my financial aid yet! Free school!

Yay Agriculture!!!

So I have some very exciting news that I would love to share. Today we had a little 45 minute lecture regarding programs for students who are interested in pursuing a masters degree while working on a doctorate in veterinary medicine. This usually requires an additional $24,000 added to the overall 6-figure pothole of tuition debt and a sacrifice of three summers on the island. Though some of the degrees offered seem very tempting (marine science, wildlife science, public health, etc), I forbade myself from looking further into it. During the talk, the head of the research department had a random power point slide talking about the School of Veterinary Medicine Outreach Program. "Outreach" tends to be one of those trigger words that make me salivate comparable to "beer." Turns out SGU has a volunteer program geared towards educating schools and farmers on agriculture....holy shit that is what my Masters is in!! A few interested students and professors travel to different villages in Grenada and simply teach a class or seminar about veterinary medicine in agriculture. I get goosebumps just thinking about it. I gave my information to an elated professor and will hear from the coordinator of the Outreach program on Monday. I also sent an e-mail to my old grad adviser at Tech letting him know that I did not completely abandon the field of agricultural education...but merely brought it to my island.