From Stavanger to Kathmandu

On our last day in Norway, we returned to Laerdal to hear some of their ideas for potential project areas to collaborate on and heard the preterm team present some of the projects that intrigued them at the Saving Lives at Birth conference in Washington, DC last Friday. We then did some breakout sessions to discuss the topics of kangaroo mother care and preterm management, training for complicated births, especially those that involve the vacuum, and the implementation and infrastructure around the partograph and ePartogram, one of the projects that has come out of our joint work with Jhpiego in the past. All three of these sessions led to some promising ideas, all of which we will be investigating on our immersion trips!

We are very thankful for the hospitality of Laerdal and are excited to continue working with them as the year continues and we delve into the needs in the realm of global healthcare. Tore and his team have been an amazing resource, and we will not hesitate to reach out to them with our ideas, even while we are still here in Nepal.

Tore Laerdal with Team Nepal, holding 

NeoNatalie and the MamaBreast trainer

 

Tore was kind enough to send us out to Pulpit Rock for a fantastic hike overlooking the fjord,  and some of the Laerdal team joined us, including Sunny (Hopkins alumnus), Helge, Ida, Carolyn (Hopkins alumna), and Paulina. As I hiked up the large slabs of stone that comprised the steps along the mountain, Helge told me that it was actually sherpas from Nepal who had placed the stones and built the entire trail over the years. He said they had come to Norway for a few months each year to work--fitting that we learned this the day before we embarked for Nepal!

View in Stavanger on our way to the hike

Looking down from the first leg of the hike

 

Sign at the halfway point to Pulpit Rock

The trail up to Pulpit Rock was beautiful--Norway's bright blue skies above us and some nice clear weather to go along with them. It was also one of the busiest trails I have ever seen--Helge told me that every year, 250,000 people come out to the trail. I also got the chance to speak with Ida about her travels and past work, and can confirm that Laerdal really does have some of the best people working for them--it's quite the family and it was a privilege to get to know them.

Once we made it to Pulpit Rock, the view was breathtaking. Hundreds of people stood, sat, and ran around. Families, couples, even pets made the trek to look down over the fjord, and we gladly joined them, leaning back onto our nice blue backpacks (thank you Laerdal!) and eating our packed lunches. Some chose to look over the edge and pose for pictures leaning over or flying (Aaron), while others chose to sit back and enjoy the view. Some of us even went up above Pulpit Rock for an even better vantage point!

 View from most of the way up the trail looking down to the fjord

Pulpit Rock from above

Team Nepal on Pulpit Rock

On the way down, Aaron and I led the way and ended up hanging out with Sunny and some of our CBID classmates at the lodge. We got the chance to explore and sat down at a picnic table to take it all in. After a long hike, we were all content to relax and enjoy Norway--we couldn't have asked for better weather!

Swimming hole on the way back down

Nepal, here we come!

 

Sunrise in Delhi, India

After a great experience in Norway with Laerdal, it was time for us to leave--we got a preview of monsoon season when we woke up to pouring rain in Stavanger, and hopped on a bus to the airport at 5:45 AM. Even then, it still hadn't hit me that we were going to Nepal...

The Stavanger airport was just like the rest of Norway--everyone was kind and helpful, and above all, accommodation and efficiency were clearly their goal. Outside the gate, they had chairs and toys for children and even a screen for them to watch movies on, and provided an air hockey table and 3 foosball tables right next to the area for the older kids while they waited to board. Naturally, Aaron and I played some foosball, even at 6:30 in the morning (Aaron won, but it was still the best airport gate experience for me in a while).

Flying Air France was much the same, accommodating and comfortable. Although we only spent a couple of hours in the Paris airport, Allie managed to see the Eiffel Tower out the window. That counts, right?

Anyway, once we landed in Delhi, explored a little, and took a nap, it was suddenly time to board. We snapped a few pictures of the sunrise and boarded Jet Airways for Kathmandu (still hadn't hit me yet).

Once we finally arrived in Kathmandu, it hit me--we had made it to Nepal! A car from the Kathmandu Guest House was there to pick us up, and we were on our way to the hotel. With no lines to divide the street and cars and motorcycles everywhere, it was pretty impressive how our driver wove through traffic and got us to Thamel. It was strange for me to get used to driving on opposite side of the street too--Nepal driving really is either crazy or impressive, it just depends on your perspective. Once we had made it to the hotel, we met up with Aakash, a student interning with Jhpiego who will be working with us on our trip, and our group was ready to go.

The square in Thamel

Naturally, as soon as we were settled, we ventured out in search of lunch and exploration. After walking for fifteen minutes, a local art student started talking to us and showing us the temples and the marketplaces in the area. We were so overwhelmed by all of the sights we were taking in that we didn't think to realize that he was probably after getting some money out of us...but nonetheless his tour was very interesting and he gave us some good advice as well as a brief history of Nepal. After a while, he took us to his art studio and he and his friends showed us some of their work--which was amazing! Unfortunately, at that point they kept trying to sell us their art, and our guide finally relented and told us he would take us to a good place for momos, Nepali food which we were all excited to try. Earlier on, he had told us that he wouldn't take cash, but instead asked for us to buy him food for his family (Yes, again, we should have realized...), so at this point we stopped at a small storefront and he picked up some rice and flour and a few other items. Once this was rung up by the cashier to a total of what amounted to $70USD, we were astonished, but trapped.

Lesson learned: Guides on  the street aren't free


Luckily, he brought us to the momo place directly after and told us how to get back to Thamel, so we moved past our unfortunate first experience in Nepal and got ready to eat. Since each order of momos was only 60 Rupees (roughly 100 to 1 USD conversion), we assumed we would get one or two per order, so we each ordered 2 orders for ourselves. The first plate came with 10 momos, and so we thought that was our entire order and dug in--they were like dumplings but even better! Five or so minutes later, they brought out 9 more plates...each plate was one order, and each order was 9 momos. We had ordered 90!

Lesson learned: Find out how many momos there are in an order BEFORE ordering

After a brief return to the hotel to shower and get ready for our meeting, we took a cab to Jhpiego in Patan, a district within Kathmandu. We met Chandra Rai, the country director, Dr. Kusum Thapa, our main technical advisor and guide for the trip, as well as many others in the local Jhpiego staff, including Sheetal, Jona, and Sanjay. We were briefed about the logistics of our trip and the status of healthcare in Nepal, and we will be meeting again next week after our first week of immersion. We are excited to collaborate with them, and ready to get to work!

Delicious momos at the Small Star

P.S. Fun fact: Buff Fried Momos are water buffalo--now we know