Timor Leste

The days are flying by! We set sail from Timor after I participated in what I felt like two very productive, three-day clinics (A.K.A. MEDCAP #1 & 2). Well, I only worked one day at MEDCAP #2, but we saw almost six hundred people in half a day, so it felt like I served the three days. We had to stop seeing patients and start tearing down all of the tents and packing up at noon that last day to allow everything time for transport back to the ship for the long sail to Micronesia.
Of the thirty thousand or so patients seen so far by Pacific Partnership 2011 (the greater mission that Project HOPE is a part of), I’ve heard the Timor sites saw somewhere between five and ten thousand patients! And working on these sites is not the air conditioned, padded floor, community pharmacy or clinic of back home in the States. I saw the sun come up every morning, and we didn’t make it back to the ship until well after dark most nights. We work under a tent or canopy, with a few tables set on a dirt floor to hold the limited medications we have give. It is hot, sweaty, dusty, and all around uncomfortable work. But it is was a great experience etched forever into my mind, one I could never forget, nor would I trade it for anything.

The people of Timor were gracious, our interpreters were amazing, caring people, and all of the U.S. and partner-nations we worked with made the whole operation very satisfying. I hope things continue as such, and that our efforts made Timorese lives better.

Now, back on ship, we will prepare as best we can for our next set of clinics in the Federated States of Micronesia, specifically on the islands of Chuuk, Yap, Kosrae and Pohnpei. It will take us about a week of sailing to reach those islands, so we will have plenty of preparation time it seems. Ship life is still slow, and relaxing, but my fellow Project HOPE’ers and I are making the most of it. We get to spend a lot of time talking with Navy and partner-nation health professionals, and we get to learn more and more about the amazing sacrifices our military and others make serving around the world. We also are getting to see some amazing feats of United States Navy logistics in their RAS OPS (Resupply At Sea Operations). We watched as a Navy helicopter picked up pallet after pallet from the resupply ship, carried them over to our ship’s flight deck, and dropped them off, while never touching down once. Then, the resupply ship pulled alongside ours, and the two leviathans were attached with lines so that a zip-line of sorts could be strung up and used to transfer goods, which would fuel the ship, feed its personnel, and support all of the missions to come. It was amazing! Now that’s logistics. I heard from a Navy officer, during the operation that the ability to perform a RAS set us apart during World War II, and helped us win the Pacific campaign. If you watched the skillfully orchestrated operation I did, you would see why, in this single and small, yet incredibly complex piece of Navy life, we have the best military in the world.

Later today, I’m off to get a tour of the helicopters, the ship’s bridge (command center), and possibly later this week we’ll make it down to engineering to see what drives this great steel beast. It’s hard to believe that we are already in the second half of the mission, yet there is still so much left to do. Until next time…