I was walking home tonight and I saw 5 men dancing. They were on a part of the sidewalk that opens up to the university entrance, so they were out of the way of everyone save the couples smooching in the darkness around them. Nobody was really watching the men though. They were dressed in business suits and dancing in a line, coordinated moves, Latino music with a hint of Andean flute playing from a stereo somewhere. There is dancing almost every night in the plaza by my building... not like the business men, but men and women dancing in a group, Rennaissance-like. The temperature drops a lot after dark, so the women are bundled up on top and underneath their skirts. The skirts are often all the same color and they twirl all at the same time. It makes me want to reach for Michael's hand and go home together, which is strange because there isn't much dancing in the streets in the states.
Today was a long day. I saw the full patient load in the clinic in the morning and then I stayed in El Alto to see births. I saw one all the way through, and the end of another (they were about to move her from the emergency room to the birthing room when she pushed the kid out... I ran in just after). Both of the women were younger than me, but I only knew that because I read their charts. There was a lot of blood for one of the women, and she was in a lot of pain. It was exhausting just to watch.
I took some photos on the way up to El Alto today... the one below was taken near the top. There are better vistas, but they are hard to catch in a rapidly moving minibus.
1 comments:
It sounds so beautiful-- your experience of the people, the streets, the culture, and the vistas from your commuter van--I'm so glad you've written about and shot some pictures of what is startling or unusual or unnerving, so that at the very least these thoughts and sights will preserve Bolivia as you felt it, as close to the moment as possible without pointing a video camera at the birthing canal.
Post a Comment