Wednesday, July 7, 2010

Body Damage in Haiti

Here's the game. See how much damage one can do to his body over a 2 and a half week period in Haiti.

Haiti Injury Count:

-Cuts in shoulder from my heavy backpack. Painless but pretty clearly there when I finally notice them.
-Really bad sunburn all over my entire back, pretty early on my second day out there from the beach expedition. I could've sworn I covered myself with sunblock but practically that doesnt make sense if I applied it myself. Painful.
-Mosquito bites like mad. Covered. So itchy, especially my feet. The first few nights I slept outside I didn't use any repellent or even have a net so I suffered, got very little sleep.
-Cement Burn. Dude cement burns. Did you know that? I didn't. Apparently the lime in the concrete mix does something chemically that causes it to be acidic or basic, on eof those two, it eats flesh. So you get open wounds and then your foot swells. Oh and the cement binds to your skin so it gets rashy and irritated.
-Swollen Hands. It's either what naturally happens when your body tries to retain heat or the cement again.
-Diarrhea. I introduced bacteria into my digestive system I think when I first ate the Haitian BBQ from a street vendor. And then again when I had the fish and fried plantains at the beach. Again from the corn. Again with the calamari. All of which were delicious and well worth the uncomfortable bathroom situation. Plus I had prescribed Ciphro (antibiotics - oh the wonders of med technology).
-Got a cut about 2 inches below my right knee I forget exactly how but during the construction process somewhere.
-One of the mosquito bites on my elbow got infected.
-Got my big toe smashed during a game of soccer. Came home to find my sock bloody and a cut beneath a broken toe nail.
-Bloody blisters on both of my palms from bashing walls with a sledgehammer without gloves.
-Massive migrane that put me down for an hour. Probably from dehydration or a mild case of food poisoning.






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