San Carlos Río San Juan

So this town just struck me as a nice place immediately:

Some locals sat around playing guitar in the street, I loved the sound of Mexican style guitar playing everywhere, so much vibrance and culture

The Main Street outside the dock in San Carlos 

Colorful steps leading up to the park 

A cows head at the local butchers!!(I didn't buy meat from there)

Another beautiful sunset from the dock, I love the reflections of the sky in the water, and the sky looks like it's on fire over the islands and Volcanoes in the middle of the lake!

Considering how close Nicaragua is to Costa Rica, its a whole other world. I felt that the second I stepped out of immigration into the streets. Just an overwhelming feeling of poverty, yet amazing and special. It felt like being back in India. Loads of small street stalls selling everything from fruit to fajitas, water to watermelon. Lots of dogs running around. Street hairdressers, shoe shiners, beggars. The bus station was full of old Simpsons Style school buses with ticket sellers everywhere trying to get you on their bus to wherever...anazing, varied, cultural but you could see the poverty.

Heidi, the first woman I met there who worked in the Bakery, told me they have a serious problem with sanitation in the town. They just flush sewage into the lake (I saw atleast one woman defecating into the lake) and as a result the water is full of pathogens that can cause serious health problems if you drink it. However they had good public Wifi! Lol! As if the mayor had deemed that a bigger priority over clean water.

The hospital

So wandering around in the morning, I accidentally bumped into a nurse. So I asked where the hospital was, as I had been bitten to death by mosquitoes in the jungle of Costa Rica, and the previous evening while eating dinner I seemed to have been consumed by Nicaraguan mozzies too! ( big red spots on my feet and the palms of my feet too!) As it turns out, according to Luke, Nicaragua has a drug resistant strand of malaria called Plasmodium Falciparum! So I felt it was in my interests to get hold of some anti-malarial tablets. I didn't realize how big a hassle or an experience that was going to be!

So I get to the hospital, eventually persuade the doctor to give me the anti- malarials. But they don't stock them in the hospital pharmacy. So I went back into town to look for a pharmacy where I could get the drugs. No one stocked any. But one pharmacy said the health centre had them...so they put me back in a taxi to the hospital to get the drugs...although this time I was dropped at the health centre round the back (the hospital pharmacy never told me about this), they had everything I needed, phew!

So then I walk back into town only to discover when I get to my hotel room I've lost the drugs! Doh! So I walk back to the hospital tell the doctor 'me perdió le medicación, no sé donde!' - basically I've lost the drugs. He laughs and writes me another prescription then I take it back to the health centre but they refuse to give me any! They think I'm trying to get high on anti-malarials! Yeah right as if I actually enjoy the side effects of Primiquino and Cloroquino!(nausea, rash, nightmares etc) I dunno why they didn't understand my Spanish, maybe it's my accent?!? Anyway eventually we found a translator and everything was ok!

I also tried to ask the Malarone, the much better anti- malarial but unfortunately no one in San Jose (hospital or pharmacy) had any...see they are kinda expensive and unfortunately the hospitals there are basically extremely poor. I asked a doctor a had a beer with that evening about their opinion if the state of the hospital, and they said it was very unclean and basically a bit of a health risk, it makes me feel lucky to have the access to health care we have in UK and Europe. 

Still I felt the doctors and nurses tried to do the best they could in the circumstances and were excellent towards me. They tried to speak English, saw me very quickly and it was totally free. Also they gave me lunch (Someone just popped his head out from a doorway and pointed a tray at me!) I was like, is this for me!? Ok sure! 

Also I loved their hand drawn warning signs about Dengue fever: 

The waiting room area in the hospital

Hospital courtyard, where you can get coffee for 30 cents!

I think to be fair, all health care services in the world are stretched, obviously some more than others as some countries atleast have the money for basic medicine and sanitation, but everywhere around the world doctors and nurses try to look after the health of their people, and even though it's hard at times, they do their best to keep everyone healthy.