Hospital Visit

I have been told that Argentines never visit the doctor alone ... it is always nicer to have a friend with you while sitting in the waiting room.

So when I received a phonecall from Norma asking me to do a hospital visit, I was not surprised. From the quick muffled mobile phonecall I understood that the mother of one of the young adults from church was having a significant surgery. The young woman was already accompanied by some girlfriends, however there was no-one older to be present as she waited. Would I mind going?

Of course I would go. But I was anxious as I drove in to the hospital. For a start, I had never met the young woman (though facebook helped me recall what she looked like!). I also did not know her mother's surname, so I had no idea of how to locate them once I arrived at the hospital.

Thankfully God had it all under control. I found a park right at the front door of the hospital, and as I alighted, who should be appearing at the door but the young woman in question! The surgery had apparently been postponed until the following day, so I was able to offer them a lift home.

On the return trip I made the embarrassing and painful discovery that I had been mistaken, for it was the young woman who faced surgery, not her mum.

On confessing my folly, the mother was only grateful for my concern. And hopefully I will be able to get to know this young lady more as we meet together in the young adults bible study groups this year.

Posted by Julie

Not sounding so good

Julie and I had our first 'pronunciation' class today...

It was quite a reality check. He picked up on lots of sounds that we don't say properly. A little deflating really but it should be good for us.

One of the things we need to do is to tape ourselves speaking and then listen to it...mmm, that's not that pleasant even in English!

Some new classes

Julie and I are off to classes again. I have just lined up for us to start some classes, especially helping us with our Spanish pronunciation.

We feel like we can communicate ok with people, but we would like to sound better! I don't think we are being vain- connecting with people is really helped if the accent isn't too strong. And Argentines generally are too kind to correct us so some classes are called for.

Will let you know how they go- start on Monday.

Where are all the doctors?

An article in one of Cordoba's papers today about a shortage of doctors in the province.

Well, its a kind of a shortage. In actual fact there are lots of doctors in the province- 18,418 are registered. That amounts to one doctor for every 179 inhabitants, which is way better than the 1 per 600 recommended by the WHO.

Part of the problem is distribution- 70% are in Cordoba capital.

And part of the problem is that there is a shortage of specialists. The paper reports that only about one third are specialists. And of those, 90% are in the capital.

One of the problems seems to be that there aren't enough 'residency' places for recent graduates to be trained in a specialty. And another is encouraging doctors to live in the interior of the province. I imagine it may be much worse in some of the other provinces. Some of these problems no doubt sound familiar to Australians in rural areas.

It's all over...

The Copa America is all over- well for Argentina at least.

They lost tonight to arch rivals Uruguay. Uruguay scored early but then Argentina equalised. At full time it was 1-1 so they went to extra time. Argentina pushed Uruguay to the limit with lots of chances but they just couldn't put one into the net.

The game went to a penalty shoot out and we lost 5-4. Ahhhhhhhhhhh.

So now the competition goes on but without the hosts and without the same interest for us. But it has been a fun ride. And now maybe there will be some posts on other topics.

PS. If you are a football fan, it really is a game worth watching. See if you can find it on you tube or something. Intense, skilful- quite amazing.

Football fun...

On Wednesday night we went to the football as a family- all six of us. Brazil versus Ecuador. We sat in the 'populares', which means we were just on concrete steps and found our own spots.

It was great fun. Brazil scored early, but then Ecuador equalised. Brazil scored again in the second half but Ecuador equalised again. Then Brazil took it way with two more goals.

There were some groups of Brazilians and Ecuadorians but most of the crowd was Argentine. They really got behind the Ecuador team when they scored- Argentines love to see Brazil get beaten. It is a bit like the relationship between Australia and the US- having a successful older brother.

We made our way home through the traffic and got home around 1am (the game had started at 9.45pm). Quite a night.

This Saturday we have some tickets for the quarter final here in Cordoba. It was supposed to be the quarter final featuring Argentina- unfortunately they didn't win their group and so are playing elsewhere. We get to see Colombia against Peru. I'm hoping it will go to a penalty shoot- out at least!

A day of culture

First big cultural event... Lachlan and I went to our first game of football (soccer) in Argentina. We didn't see Argentina play (couldn't get tickets for that) but we watched a great game between Brazil and Paraguay. It was quite an experience- lots of Paraguayans, lots of noise and some good goals (2-2 was the score). Argentina plays tomorrow night against Costa Rica and has to win, si o si.



Second cultural event... Julie and I finally managed to get to see a show at the Teatro del Libertador in Cordoba. Twice we have tried to go to see something there- once there was a musician's strike and the second time the Governor or some official had also booked the performers for some official function, and he won. So we didn't go with much confidence- once again it was Independence Day (9 of July) and the tickets were free.

But it was on... we heard a wonderful performance by the Cordoba Symphonic Orchestra and the Cordoba Polyphonic Choir. Top notch. And the theatre is really interesting- one of those steep European style theatres with three levels of boxes and the plebs high up in the rafters on benches.