Travel Inspirations: My Time in South Africa
Andi, from My Beautiful Adventures , tells us one of her most memorable and inspirational travel experiences in South Africa when attending a delegation on medicine. Enjoy reading about her adventure.
Welcome Andi!!
Welcome Andi!!
In 2006, I was invited by the International Scholar Laureate Society to attend a delegation on
medicine in South Africa for 3 weeks. While the group I was traveling with was composed of all
medical students, I however, was a medical student myself except the medicine I was studying at
the time was Traditional Chinese Medicine. Thus, my interest on this trip was uniquely geared
towards learning more about Traditional South African Medicine, rather than what influence
Western Medicine had/has on South African culture.
The delegation on medicine started with lectures educating us on South Africa's medical system
and the current health problems the country is facing. These were the frightening facts we
learned at the time: of the 44 million people inhabiting South Africa 6 million of those have
been diagnosed with AIDS (the largest group of people in the world), 57% of those infected are
female, and by the year 2010 2 million children will have been orphaned due to the virus. Also,
South Africa possesses the highest rate of violence against women in any country not involved in
war and 50% of the population has TB.
We then made a site visit to the Valley Trust Rural Medical Center, which also had a school
attached to it. There we met with the head nurse to discuss rural health care issues. Because
of the shortage of doctors in South Africa, most nurses have to act as doctors, while still only
getting paid a nurse's salary. That particular nurse saw 300-400 patients a day. I cannot
imagine a more emotionally draining job. She lamented that at her clinic they actually have
enough medication to give to the patients, but that no one will take it, because then the other
people in their community will know that they are sick. The saddest story was that of the milk
formula that spoils with time due to the lack of mothers that will accept it. Instead of risking the
chance of people in the community finding out that they have AIDS, they would rather breast
feed their infants and risk the chance of infecting them with AIDS.
The rest of my time in South Africa was equally as informative and heartbreaking. It was life
changing to see country posses such a dichotomy of extreme ugliness mixed with extreme
beauty. On one hand the nation was being destroyed by disease and death and on the other
hand the nation was filled with gorgeous scenery and some of the nicest people on this planet.
South African Flag Photo Credit Andi Perullo
I thought a lot about my time in South Africa on my way back to the States, which was a 2 day
journey in itself. I had heard a quote by the President of the country, Thabo Mbeki, that really
resonated with me. He said, "I am like a cosmic wanderer, driven by the winds to
land where they will." The winds took me to Africa and now I could not get her out of my
mind. Is it possible that the reason why she touched me so deeply is that she is the birthplace
of humankind or is it because I am a healer and I was touched by all the illness I witnessed?
Is she in my DNA and I am forever connected to her? As I walked along Africa's earth, I walked
along my roots. Mother Africa. I will surely miss her, but I know that I will return...many, many
times.
Andrea Perullo is a Chinese Medicine Doctor by day, travel addict by night. When she is not treating patients, she is exploring the world or dreaming of the next place to visit. She also writes travel features for MNUI Travel Insurance and blogs at My Beautiful Adventures.
Posted by katerinafiore at 22 Sep 2010 
Categories: guest blogging, Travel Inspirations
Tags: Travel guest post
Categories: guest blogging, Travel Inspirations
Tags: Travel guest post
Wow, Andi. I'm almost speechless (yes, yes, it can happen!) ;-0 This is an amazing story and even more astonishingly sad facts about the AIDS cases, violence against women and the high number of orphans. It is tragic. I'd of course, heard of the high number of AIDS cases, but I'd never heard of how they are unwilling to take medicine and the lengths they go to to hide their illness. I'd love to hear more stories about your trip there and more about what you learned about traditional African medicine.
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Nice tips so far I agree with some of you and beautiful site I like the header.
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Thank you!
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