Act 19 | Guyana

Guyana was a wealthy country when big buildings were made of wood, so Georgetown (the capital city) is full of grand old wooden buildings.

The biggest and best example is the Anglican Church which was the tallest wooden building built in its day.

Since gaining independence from Britain some forty-odd years ago, the country has been in serious & rapid decline (despite remaining rich in natural resources).

The streets are littered with garbage and many of the wooden homes (that still house families) appear derelict.

I discovered Guyana when researching the poorest English speaking countries outside Africa: Guyana is at the very top of that list.

I was in Guyana as a volunteer with the International Centre for Eyecare Education (ICEE), a non-government organisation (NGO) who had organised for me to do some work with a local NGO, the Caribbean Council for the Blind: Eyecare Guyana.

I was hoping to help out at the school that Eyecare Guyana has developed to train student to do a simple eye examination; But school was out when I was in Guyana, so I didn’t get to attend or deliver any classes.

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Week 1 :: Bartica

Not all the towns in Guyana are connected by roads because: the jungle is thick; the rivers are wide; and the boats are speedy.

I was on a boat destined for Bartica along with a graduating student and a vision rehabilitation officer, we were going to set up a temporary clinic in the small regional hospital which lacks a resident eye specialist.

The waiting room was full to overflowing when we arrived for our first day of work.

Because of the large number of patients, and at the request of the student (who I thought I was going to be simply supervising), I was put to work - and worked hard. (I didn’t have all the equipment I usually have while working in this kind of setting, as such, I think my first day of practicing here would rate as my worst ever – and I mean worst in terms of difficult circumstances, performance, attitude and results.)

A lot of people were getting their first ever eye exam; One young boy remained silent after I tried three different ways to get him to read the chart because he ‘couldn’t pronounce the word at the top of the chart, or any of the ‘words’ beneath it.’ (You forget that not everyone in the world is familiar with what is required of them in an eye examination.)

The most enjoyable part of this week for me was the novelty of telling people how much their glasses were going to cost them, as the inexpensive option was ‘a thousand dollars’ (one thousand just happens to be my favourite number) due to the weakness of the Guyanese currency (one Guyanese dollar is worth less than one New Zealand cent). (The guy pictured below could afford glasses thanks to his golden smile (sponsored by Nike); He was a lot happier to see me than I was to see the swoosh between his teeth.)

We saw about 250 patients that week (mostly women and girls) split pretty evenly between the graduating student and myself.

Accommodation in Bartica is basic in the most picturesque ways.

Either Guyana have worked out how to produce ‘mango nuggets’ or my hands have grown huge – its hard to tell from the photo below, isn’t it .?.!.?.

It’s hard to be impressed with beaches around the world when you’ve lived in Australia (& NZ) – the Bartican ‘beach’ was amongst the most unimpressive.

I was torn between hiding from the rain (like all the locals) and sneaking a look at the soggy sights on the boat ride back to Georgetown.

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The Weekend Days :: Exploring Georgetown

I spent most of my weekend days wandering the wide shady streets of Georgetown.

I also spent some non-work time having a recurrent ear infection looked into.

Below is the wall that keeps the ocean out of the city which is built beneath sea level.

The other water feature of note in Georgetown is the long floating bridge – which closes at low tide each day.

It was good to be in country that valued cricket highly enough to put it on the front of their daily devotional booklet.

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Week 2 :: Georgetown & Suddie

In the second week I travelled to several different locations to observe and assist recent graduands in their permanent clinics.

The first clinic I visited was in the Georgetown public hospital.

I am sure the above offer doesn’t include recreational drugs (though you might have them on a technicality).

Another speed boat was required to get me to Suddie where I spent most of the second week with a new eye specialist who was working out of the little rural hospital there.

The graduand that I was coaching here was in the later stages of her first pregnancy; As such, in addition to offering her a little advice, I was also able to provide cover for her while she attended medical appointments and had her final ultrasound.

(Again) the accommodation here was beautifully simple.

The ocean is brown for as far as the eye can see from the shoreline. (Oddly, Guyana is included as one of the Caribbean nations despite having no coastline that borders the Caribbean Sea, probably because it was part of the old British Empire.)

Come the end of the second week I was back on the boat in order to return to Georgetown in time for a debriefing session with Charles (Director of Eyecare Guyana) and Petra (who has done an enormous amount of work in setting up the training program).

The very last thing I did in Georgetown was to visit the local university’s campus.

Eyecare Guyana currently has a proposal before the local university to establish a new school of optometry that will offer a four year long degree in optometry to its students.

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Once the proposal is formally approved by the university, Eyecare Guyana will require the services of at least two more optometrists to establish the school and teach the courses. These teaching/administrative positions represent the best opportunities I have turned up in my travels to do something significant in the region. The task is an order of magnitude (or two) larger than what I was preparing myself for (I was considering committing myself to a year or two assisting with an established program), and is therefore both more significant and costly than I had anticipated. I am still considering whether I am prepared to make the necessary social and financial sacrifices. So please be praying for me as I continue to think through these issues. I won't need to decide anything until early next year when the positions are actually advertised.