Tourism, Temples and Tonle Sap

Our trip is coming to an end! For the past few days we have been tourists in Siem Reap - a great way to finish our dental volunteering trip. I visited Siem Reap two years ago on my dental elective, so it was nice to come back and see some familiar surroundings.

I have been feeling quite poorly since we've been here, having come down with a nasty cold since finishing our dental volunteering (typical!) So I was very un-energetic when it came to sightseeing (although I could probably win a competition for the loudest and most frequent nose blowing).

During our stay in Siem Reap, we visited the markets and invested in some much needed souvenirs. The markets are a funny place, you don't have to say a single word for the seller to just have a monologue conversation and immediately offer you a discounted price.

We also visited the floating villages on Tonle Sap lake, where our boat driver did a good job of non-stop talking. Quite educational though I guess. In the evening we climbed a massive hill at the Angkor temples (well it seemed massive because I was struggling a bit), to watch the sunset over Cambodia.

This morning we woke up at 4.30am to catch the sun rising over Ta Prohm, the "tomb raider" temple, where the jungle is regaining control of the land (the trees are interwoven between and around the stone temple walls, as their branches and roots begin to take over the man-made feature). This remains my favourite temple and today the surreal tranquillity made it the perfect place to watch the sunrise. The light glistening through the trees and over the towers was most beautiful. Most tourists go to Angkor Wat to watch the sunrise, but I think we made the right choice going somewhere much quieter, with only a few other people around. We then went on to Angkor Thom, the elephant terrace and Bayon. And finally Angkor Wat, where we hired a tour guide to drone on at us with his monotone speech - no he was good really, just funny because you could tell he had said the same thing about five times already that morning. We finished at around midday, by which time we were all exhausted and in need of some lunch. Having been to pub street (quite famous if you've ever been to Siem Reap) for some lunch, half of the group returned to the makets whilst a few of us visited a massage and spa parlour. The massage was a-mazing, feeling very relaxed now and a little bit better since this morning (also very drugged up on cold remedies).

Tomorrow we are heading home, so this will probably be my last blog post. Can I just say another very big and sincere thank you to everyone who donated to this trip, it really has made a huge difference to the lives of Cambodian children and adults in need of dental treatment.

Over and out, for now ;-)

Kampongcham dental outreach

For the past few days we have been in Kampongcham, a peaceful Cambodian province where we met the adorable Dr Nhep and her equally adorable husband.  Dr Nhep runs dental outreach clinics in rural villages about an hour car drive outside Kampongcham. I was surprised when she told me she normally runs these clinics single handedly, with only a few students to assist her (whom she teaches at the same time), working all day with no lunch break. AND she does it out of her own kind will, she doesn't get paid for it. What an amazing woman! I hope we have eased her work load during our visit. It has been an exciting contrast from the clinics in Phnom Penh.

Here we were working outside houses on stilts, and the heat was very noticeable even in the shade. The patient dental chairs were constructed from a plastic chair with a broom handle tied to the back of it, and a sponge on the broom for a headrest. The decon room was set up "round the back", with multiple washing up bowls and a pressure cooker.

Despite the very basic set up, we managed to do all the necessary treatment. Most patients arrived in pain and required either extractions or fillings. We had no drill, so fillings were limited to ART with GIC or IRM*. As soon as one patient left the chair, another one leaped into it, like children waiting for their turn at the swing park.

We rattled through about 55 patients on the first morning and had another non-stop session today. Dr Nhep seems very grateful for our help, continually thanking us for coming to help the Cambodian people. Taking team photos was a feat in itself - we must have stood with a dozen different combinations of people, whilst everyone took a photo on each camera (the Cambodian team were very "snap-happy").

Dr Nhep and her husband are very hospitable and have shown us the best places for lunch and dinner during our stay. (I'm just not too keen on chicken feet floating around in the soup, but hey what do I know?!) No, really we have been treated like kings and queens during our visit to Kampongcham.

So although it has been a fleeting visit, we are all very tired from the heavy work load and......interesting conditions (with the chairs so low down I adopted a 'lunge' type position for upper extractions - although today just gave in and knelt down to extract upper 6 roots.)

Tomorrow we are travelling to Siem Reap for the last part of our trip. It will be great going back there (the last time I went was two years ago - you can check out my other blog). But for this evening, we will be eating out with the lovely Dr Nhep and husband for the last time.

*ART - atraumatic restorative technique - partial removal of caries followed by restoration with GIC
GIC - glass iomomer cement
IRM - intermediate restorive material - a zinc oxide eugenol based material

Makeshift dental chair

Coconut water

Looking quizzically at todays lunch

Activity of the day: feeding the children in the slums. Feeling of the day: happy. Food of the week: rice.

Please no more rice! It's good but i think we're getting a bit rice-d out. I've managed to avoid it today, but no doubt I'll find some on my plate tomorrow.

Anyway on with the update. This week the dentaid team having been working alongside one-2-one, a charity based in Phnom Penh, offering medical and dental treatment to local Cambodians. This week we have volunteered in their mobile dental clinic, which was temporarily set up in a local church. They had an efficient triage system where the Cambodian dentists examined the patients on arrival, before sending them to us for their treatment. Last time I was in Cambodia, I enjoyed learning the local language. This time, I have learned many more phrases, and have been practising on everyone I see, at the expense of being laughed at - although I am reassured they are laughing because my "accent is so good". We treated about 50-60 patients each day. Fillings, fissure sealants, extractions and applying SDF* was carried out. There are four dentists, one dental therapist and one dental nurse in team dentaid.

Today we had the opportunity to assist one-2-one with their daily food distribution at one of the slums. I dished out a large container of rice to dozens of hungry children, who took it to their picnic area along with their meat and vegetables. It was like the feeding of the five thousand!

This afternoon we experienced some Cambodian culture and visited the local markets, getting our bartering skills up to scratch.

The Cambodian traffic is something to be reckoned with - every time we go out, it's like playing crazy taxi. There doesn't seem to be any rules, people drive on whatever side of the road they fancy, and there are no right of ways. However, it seems that everyone has a mutual respect for fellow drivers, and amazingly the traffic merges and blends in harmony, like a large scale ants nest.

Tomorrow we are visiting two universities to deliver lectures and help in clinics. My lecture is on the basic techniques of oral surgery.

My feeling of the day is happy. This appears a boring and unimaginative emotion to choose. On the whole, 2015 has been a very happy year for me. But happiness is not always readily available, so I might as well embrace it whilst I can, hence it being the feeling of the day. Spending time with an extraordinary team of people who are passionate about the same thing, really makes me happy. Ordinarily that applies to being with my friends at church.  But this week it applies to the dentaid team in Cambodia.  Thanks team dentaid-cambodia-nov2015 :-)

Happy Friday :-) xx

*SDF - silver diamine fluoride. Applied to unrestorable carious teeth to arrest caries, when extractions are contraindicated.

Activity of the day: long haul flight. Feeling of the day: jet lag. Moment of the day: dancing in the rain. Food of the day: jackfruit.

Hello. I have safely arrived in Phnom Penh, Cambodia! Along with six other jet lagged dentaid volunteers. An early start on Saturday morning quickly merged into a new day as we crossed over time barriers and into new parts of the world. The flight went surprisly quickly despite the lack of sleep. We are staying in a family home of the charity "one-2-one" whom we'll be working with out here.

We decided to go for a little walk to stay awake during the afternoon, which ended up with us getting caught in a very heavy rain/lightening/thunderstorm. We were all drenched on returning.

Jackfruit is my food of the day. I don't think I've ever tried it before. It was a lovely sweet finish to a delicious meal cooked by our hosts.

Half way through writing this I fell asleep, so we are now into Monday! Today is a national holiday, so we start work tomorrow. This morning we visited the killing fields. I won't say much because it was a very harrowing experience, and just thinking about it saddens me.

So this afternoon we are having a break for lunch, whilst making the most of any WiFi we can find - to keep in touch wiyh family and friends. And then exploring the city some more.

Bye for now!