At 5:30am on Tuesday, Graham and I crammed in a small Chinese van with Jin Shu, a doctor, a nurse, a driver, two staff members, and a reporter and cameraman from the Jilin TV station. We spent the day traveling to the rural towns, speeding by flattened corn fields and rice paddies, dilapidated and mud-filled cinderblock homes, wide-eyed farmers, and distressed families. We delivered supplies and performed a few minor procedures for a small clinic that had been devastated by the recent flooding. Although my purpose here is public health education—and I have no emergency medical skills—I was grateful for the invitation to join the team, even if the most that I could do was carry a few boxes and offer condolences in shaky Chinese.
Unfortunately, after a five day reprieve, heavy rains came again on Thursday. The bridges closed, and Jin Shu allowed many staff members to leave after lunch. However, we were awakened by sunny, cloudless skies on Friday morning, and everyone is optimistic that the worst is over.
In two days, we will fly to Shenzhen and cross the bridge to Hong Kong, where we will spend our last few hours in China (or perhaps I should say Asia, since few mainlanders or Hong Kongers say the city is truly Chinese).Yesterday, I spent the morning writing notes and preparing the American pins, pens, yoyos, books, candies, Beanie Babies, and other trinkets that we bought for the staff at the Clinton Museum store in May.
As we shopped for these goods in Little Rock and have collected gifts for family members back in the States, Graham and I have discovered that it is truly more blessed to give than to receive. We are well aware that the “perfect” watches, tea sets, mugs, and wallets that we are so sure that our family will love may be discarded as souvenir junk in a few months. After months of laughing at awkward translations on advertisements, warning signs, purses, and clothing, the matching t-shirts with cutesy creatures and sappy sayings will remind us of nightly walks through the city, trips to the crowded market, and dinners with friends from Bo Hua. Our friends back home, however, will probably just think that they are ridiculous.
The departure from Jilin will be bittersweet—with much to miss, yet much to look forward to in the months ahead. Although there is little that we can do to aid the flood victims, something seems wrong about leaving before the crisis has been resolved. The “I’ll probably never see you again” goodbyes are always clumsy, yet we sincerely anticipate returning someday (once Graham has finished his residency and I have a real job).
We have been blessed by the kindnesses here. While I hope that I have contributed to the systems of public health education and the planning for the new diabetes center, I am well-aware of the hours of work that have been done by Jin Shu, Li Wen Gu, and Ms. Wang just to make life possible for us. I won’t simplify or exaggerate the experience by trying to identify the impact that the past 10 weeks will have on my life in the years to come. But I know that I will always be grateful that these few months were a part of the journey.
