Land mine victim   

A little while ago while visiting the village we were introduced to a young man who had been a victim of a land mine only 11 days previously.  The explosion had caused damage to his face and primarily his eyes.  The accident took place away from the village at the border of Cambodia and Thailand where he was working on his cousin's farm.  His cousin took him to the local hospital and pretty much just left him there.  In Cambodia, when you stay in hospital you need a relative or friend to stay with you to provide you with food and buy your medicine, as the hospital doesn't provide these things.  Because he had no-one looking after him the hospital sent him to the Siem Reap hospital.  At the time the eye doctor was out of the country so the Siem Reap hospital simply sent him back to the village.  

Both of his eyes were extremely damaged by the explosion and he couldn't see at all, yet he was sent home without having any consultation whatsoever with an eye doctor!  I was horrified when I heard this and we immediately arranged to get him back to the hospital to see an eye surgeon.  Obviously I was hoping that with proper treatment he might not end up completely blind.  Fortunately, the day we took him to the hospital there were two foreign eye surgeons visiting and they examined him.  Unfortunately, they said his eyes were irreparably damaged and he is completely blind.  We also spoke to the Red Cross about him and they also followed up (via the Jesuit Service).  They ended up organising for him to go to a hospital in Phnom Penh where he underwent surgery, so now he is at least no longer in pain.   He will also receive follow up care and will be helped to adjust to being blind.      

My own visit to an eye clinic

I have been having problems with one of my eyes so decided to take myself to see the only eye doctor in Siem Reap.  He works at the Provincial Hospital, which is an extremely basic facility by Western standards.  I had phoned the doctor the day before and he told me to turn up at 9.00 am.  I thought this meant I had an appointment, but alas, it was just a matter of sitting in the crowded waiting area with all the locals and waiting my turn.  The locals found it fascinating that a foreigner was waiting with them and studied me with great interest.

At last it was my turn, and the doctor's assistant wanted me to do an eye test before I went in to see the doctor.  This takes place in the crowded waiting room where you have to look at an eye chart and indicate which way the symbols on the chart are pointing.  I tried to tell him, through my "right hand man" Mr Chanti, that I didn't need to do an eye test I simply wanted the doctor to examine my eye, but he insisted that it must be done.  Now I have extremely bad eyesight, without contact lenses or glasses I can't see a thing.  It is so bad that I could barely see the eye chart let alone make out any of the symbols on it.  The doctor's assistant had obviously not known of a foreigner with such bad eyesight as it took a huge amount of explaining by Chanti to finally get him to understand that I couldn't see any of the symbols!  Meanwhile the locals all watched this exchange with a mixture of amazement and amusement.  I find that quite often they assume that we, in the richer countries, don't have any health problems and have magic cures for everything so I think its very helpful for them to see that this is not the case.  (As it turns out I have a calcium build up on my eyelid - apparently no big deal.)