Laryngitis, McCafe, the Running of the Sheep, and other stuff

It is Sunday midday, and I am muted by laryngitis, which I exacerbated by lecturing and running a long meeting on Friday, so I am voiceless this weekend, and trying to rest. It seems my respiratory tract is about the same, whatever country we're in...it has been pretty good; this is the first bad cold in a year. They say that this area is particularly bad for asthma and allergies, but they've said that everywhere I've ever lived. They do have different (and fewer) drugs here, though...pharmacies are small affairs, without the bewildering rows of options that Walgreens has, but also without the options I used to thing helped...oh well. When I asked for Zinc lozenges, they mused, and gazed at their (small) shelf of remedies, and said vaguely that they used to have those, but hadn't seen them in a while...Bendryl has been banned for some reason. Sudafed has been adapted, as it is in the US, because of the meth potential. There is tea and honey. and codeine is readily available, over the counter, oddly enough. it stops the cough so I can sleep.

Our doctor here just had twins, and is working part time, so Joseph saw someone else to evaluate his wrist...story below--but we like the doctor, who is a 40-ish guy who wears jeans and running shoes, and has Simpsons stuff in his office. There are nurses around, but the doctor comes and gets you, and does not make you sit in a cold examining room and wait for him. His office is his examining room, and he does it all, and then you're done. There is a big doctor shortage here, as well as a nurse shortage, but at least the primary care docs don't seem overworked and overwhelmed. They see people of all ages--pediatricians are specialists for really sick kids--and some deliver babies. Most people (at least in Hamilton, which has more and better birth centres than most places) have a midwife as their primary provider for childbirth, and the midwife makes home visits before and after the baby is born. If you use a midwife or GP, or if you have complications that require an OB (they are generally reserved for complications), all your maternity care is paid for by the government. I visited the hospital's maternity wards this week, and they are awfully hospitalish, but are being remodelled to be more user-friendly--but the birthing centres are "posh," as they say here, and very pleasant. NO, I'm not thinking of having another baby--don't worry--just trying to understand the childbirth and parental support systems here. I may do some research on the women in the antenatal ward, who are at high risk of perinatal anxiety and depression.

McCafe: I had successfully avoided going to McDonald's (or Burger King) for the many months we've been here, but one day last month found myself late and hungry (it was 2:00) and near a McDonald's with this "McCafe" thing--someone had said it wasn't bad. So I went in, not expecting much, and was pleasantly shocked. I sat in a big leather chair, drank my organic lemonaide, and had a chicken and plum sauce panini (deciding against the risotto). It was not the best panini I ever had, but it was the best McDonald's I ever had. As I sat in my comfy chair and sipped, I could see through an opening to the regular McDonald's, complete with Playspace, just like every other McDonald's in the world--well, not fancy like the Rock 'n' Roll McDonald's on Wanamaker, or the Jungle McDonald's on Gage, just ordinary McD. And I was grateful. I haven't been back--I prefer the multicultural sushi I can grab on the run--but I'd consider it.

Joseph's wrist: He fell out of a tree at the Wanganui Quaker Settlement--or, he might arge, the tree dropped him, when the branch broke under the weight of this boy, who is taller and taller every time I look, and was playing "Spotlight," a tradition and highlight of these Easter Family gatherings, a version of hide and seek, played after dark with "torches" (flashlights). Emily got spooked the first night, so she and I were in our room reading peacefully when Joseph crashed to the ground, scratching up one arm, and landing on his wrist. One of the people there was an osteopath, and he said he might have broken some little bone in the wrist, but it doesn't show up on an x-ray for at least a week, so he nursed it (except when he was playing cricket in PE, even after we wrote a note excusing him...) and it seems to be better.

We all had a good time in Wanganui, a nice small city about five hours south of here, where the Whanganui river meets the ocean. The Quaker Settlement has 16 houses, and a conference center, and "bush" and gardens and chickens. Some very nice people, from all over the world (e.g., Northern Ireland, South Africa, England, Massachusetts. And New Zealand). We drove back up a slightly different way, seeing a bit more of the coast, and spending the night in New Plymouth, in the shadow of Mount Taranaki, a Fuji-like mountain/volcano that Manford read has a 50% chance of erupting in the next some-number of years...don't tell Emily. On the way down we saw Mount Ruapehu, with snow on the ragged peak--last winter, it did erupt, in a relatively minor way, injuring one skier who was spending the night in a cottage on the mountainside. That's our local ski-run.

And then, last weekend, Manford and Emily and I went to the Running of the Sheep (Joseph declined). It was a moderately amusing small-town event, where the main street was blocked off, and there were various booths and rides, and then at the appointed time, 1900 sheep came running through town, and then we went home. No one ran in front of the sheep. Well, there were people on four-wheelers. kind of unfair, really. We got to sit on the cart, pulled by Clydesdales, to watch, because we were the last group before the big event.

And this weekend, I am resting, and Manford spent the day yesterday at a photography workshop in Tauranga (an hour and a half East, on the coast).

Carrie