This is my friend Isa:
She is adorable. She is 29 years old and barely taller than 5 foot. I stumbled upon her house on a random walk through the village to meet people when we first moved here. She has three beautiful daughters and lives next to her mother-in-law. I liked them both right away. They live in a quiet, shady area on the edge of the village that makes a peaceful get-a-way but still makes me feel like I am putting in the time and effort to integrate. Isa keeps a clean, cute little Saramaccan house (the same style as mine). She also seems to enjoy her children which I do not see in every household.
Something else that stood out about Isa was that she was about 6 ½ months pregnant when I first met here. She is very thin and so was all belly. Last week I was sewing at her house and she told me that her due date was that very day but the baby had not come. Ever since then I have checked on her every couple of days and asked other people if she was still pregnant. A few months ago she went to see a doctor in Paramaribo and they were debating whether she should stay in the city to have the baby or go back to our village and give birth at the poli clinic with a nurse. They sent her back. I was glad I got to hang out with her the past couple of months but I was nervous. I know nurses and mid-wives have brought children into this world by the hundreds but what if something went wrong?
So, yesterday I am making lunch for Ryan and I when our neighbor comes over and tells me that Isa is at the policlinic but something is wrong and they are going to air-vac her to the city. We just discovered last week that if there is an emergency out here that the patient is taken on a boat up the river 1 hour to another village where they have a landing strip so a plane can meet him/her and fly to Paramaribo (who pays for this?!). I rushed over to the poli to see her before she left. At least…that was my intention. Somehow about an hour later, I ended up in the boat with Isa, her mother-in-law and the policlinic nurse heading upriver. The father was down river working.
As we are in the boat fighting the rapids up river and I stare at my friend’s back wondering how bad her labor pains are, I think about pregnant women in the U.S. – about the preferential treatment they are given during pregnancy and the comfortable, clean hospitals they have for delivery. The contrast is dumbfounding.
When we finally arrived, the visiting doctor from Cuba (the same one who looked at my ear months ago) examined her. They decided she would have the baby there and not go to the city so they induced her. The room she was in was so hot (obviously no air conditioning). No one offered her ice chips or anything. I sat in there with her awhile having no idea what was culturally appropriate to say and not say.
After a couple of hours the nurse from my poli said we were heading back, so I left Isa with her mother-in-law. The best part? As I was leaving she told me she would see me back in our village tomorrow. Tomorrow?!
This morning I stopped by the poli before church and asked the nurse for news. She told me that Isa had the baby at 9pm last night. A little boy, as predicted. Around 1pm today Isa’s 3 daughters came running up to our house to tell us that Isa and the baby had arrived. Yep, back down the rapids- a woman who just gave birth and her 1 day old child. Completely normal.
Here is the cutie patootie- Julius Darwin. I think Julius is a family name and Darwin is after the Cuban doctor who delivered him.
Here are the proud big sisters.
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