...I am back!
Ok, so now that I have slept a proper amount of hours for the first time in the past ten days, I can think straight enough to remember that I forgot to put some things in my last blog post and have more things to say.
First of all, I am done!!!! I mean I still have a 40-page paper to write in Spanish, but besides that, I am done with classes, finals, presentations, group trips and most of all, way too many hours in the all white rooms of ISALUD (where we go to school). It is a beautiful feeling and as the second sentence of my blog post alluded to, I slept like a baby last night. I can tell you that trying to finalize your ISP, get ethical approval from Argentina and Vermont (the program's headquarters), write your interview guides, meet with your advisor, write a 20-page proposal, take five finals, do your PBL (problem-based learning -- basically, a group final), plan a final presentation, do the final presentation, write your cultural journal, write your informed consent form, and find a place for your ISP leads to a very long ten days. Think about finals week on steroids. Oh and then, we had to dash over to Uruguay in the midst of all that so we didn't get deported. Lots of stuff. However, today is finally the first official day of ISP (yesterday was supposed to be, but that didn't happen) and things are calming down a little bit...or for now, they are! I went for a run this morning for the first time in way too long (we always have class during all the daylight hours which leads to too little exercise outside in my opinion) and I can tell the next month is going to be hard, but good! I'd also like to send a HUGE shout-out to all who have helped me to get through the past ten days....that includes those who have skyped in for much-needed venting sessions!
Ok, so, what is my ISP going to be about? Well, something a little different than what I had originally thought. Now, I am looking at the expectations of patient-doctor communication during prenatal care and gauging interest in the introduction of cell-phone programs as a way to improve this communication. Still related to my first issue, but kind of the other side of the same issue! I am going to be working at a local hospital in the maternity ward (hopefully!) and interviewing both doctors and patients.
Second of all, I realized that, in my summary blog post, I forgot to mention a major highlight of Tucuman! Our hotel in Tucuman was next to a dance studio. One night, we went by and saw all these people dancing so we went in and got a schedule. We decided to go to a Carribean rhythms dance class the next night. So funny. Try mixing some white, American girls who can't dance for their lives with Argentine girls who have so much motion in their hips and you have an interesting, but hilarious class. It was so great and such a great workout and we learned several routines!
Final, and I apologize for this blog post being a mixture of lots of things, but our program, or more our group, has experienced lots of changes in the past couple days. Some smaller, such as several people deciding to change homestays or travel for ISP period. Some bigger, such as a girl on my program deciding to go home. To that girl, you know who you are, as Ana Rita said, I just wanted to tell you that I think you are such a strong person for realizing that you need to go home and that that is the best decision and place for you right now. Our small group will not be the same without you. From day one, you came in with such a happy and bubbly attitude and strutted off the plane to meet us all. That has continued throughout the program. You sing at the top of your lungs on long bus rides. You buy enough food for everyone in the group and continue to feed us all. You check in constantly to see how everyone is doing. You challenge yourself and in doing so, challenge others. You maintained such a positive attitude even when the program got tough. You made everyone laugh until they were peeing their pants. And, finally, you experienced this amazing, inspiring, self-reflecting but difficult journey with all of us for the past few months and for that, I want to say thank you. We will all miss you greatly or let me rephrase that, it has only been one day and we already miss you!
Ok, I think that wraps up "Rebecca's Tuesday Summary." Chao (bye) and besos (kisses) to all from Argentina!
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