Before surgery he could not move
the Hand at all.
This is just an update. For more complete information please read the annual report of September 2001 and the reports that are linked from there.
(To be read from bottom to top!)
19.2.2002: Yesterday I finally arrived back in Nepal. I had spent a nice (though short) night at a 4-star Hotel in Abu Dhabi (which was included in the flight ticket) and landed at Kathmandu at 4.40 p.m. Immigration was quick and I reached my room about 6 p.m.
Now once again I am looking forward to 10 interesting weeks and hopefully my reports here will be as interesting to you as my work is for myself. - But please give me a few days to get myself organised before I shall start writing here more interesting news.
1.1.2002: To all of you my Best Wishes!!! for the new year of 2002!
Finally I received an e-mail from Indonesia today: Good news and "good?" news:
- Emis has returned from working on Sulawesi, she is well, and willing to go to school again.
- Mardin has finished his education at the tourism academy, and managed to find employment already.
- - and then Mardin wrote: "... another good news ... Jürgen has become grandfather once again ...". - Amir has another child; it's a boy and his name is Gilang Ramadhan - and I am not too sure whether I should be happy that this handicapped unemployed young man, 2½ years after the first one, has another child already... - ?
20.12.2001: I shall stay in Germany up to the middle of February (and enjoy the good food and excellent baking of my mother!) I shall spend most of the time at the computer - and will definitely not write weekly updates about this.
If I get any email from Nepal or Indonesia, I shall publish important news on this page. Otherwise I beg you to come back here as a regular visitor from about 20. February 2002.
Today I wish all of you
19.12.2001: I finally returned back home yesterday evening. Since between the flights I spent a whole night sitting in the transit-restaurant of Delhi airport, I was pretty exhausted - but now I am feeling fine again.
Should I try a little - and far from complete - summary of these 76 days in Nepal?:
>>> Many friends came to visit me! Colleague tour leaders, former members of tourist groups, private friends ... - I enjoyed each of these visits!
>>> A first brief look at my bank account makes me rejoice! So many friends have helped in various ways to ensure the continuation of my / our / YOUR endeavour to help these children!!!
>>> Two big surgeries that I was so sure to have planned well in advance, I could not have performed. Both these children during the many festival-holidays went to their families in the villages somewhere - and returned to Kathmandu too late. - But this is only some delay: I already requested new dates with the plastic surgeon for the end of February. (And two more surgeries - one plastic, one orthopaedic - are nearly certain.)
>>> "Self-praise stinks"??? That's what we say in German... - I want to tell you anyway what made me soo happy:
- The former leader of the (free) dispensary of the German Nepal Help Association happened to visit me at the same time as some reporter who was researching for the Child's Rights Day. And he told her "This Jürgen actually is more like a Nepali; he was just - by chance or by mistake - born in Germany..."
- 40 children, between October 2000 and March 2001, had received the first two injections on the way to a Tetanus immunisation. ALL of them I met again (or had them called from their homes or their villages). One refused because he is so afraid of injections; three brothers had to go back to their village on short notice because their father was seriously ill. To 36 children I could have the third injection given and they are immunised against Tetanus for ten years now. (This much to the question of the continuity of my work for these children...)
13.12.2001: I should have arrived back in Germany today...
I had packed nearly through the night and was having breakfast yesterday morning, when I was called by the reception to the telephone. I was informed that the flight that would bring me to Delhi in the evening, was cancelled.
Only later in their office I found out what that really meant: Because Kathmandu - Delhi - Kuwait - Frankfurt is not available daily, I am delayed for 5 (!) days and can fly only on 17. December and reach home on Tuesday evening.
5.12.2001: Lots of good news!!!:
>>> One group of street children - partly because of the strict controls at night these days - had rented a room for themselves about two weeks ago. I had not seen any of them since, and was really afraid that in this seclusion they would drown in drugs and glue-sniffing.
Two days ago finally I found one child that knew where this room was; and yesterday I visited them: A small, dark, cheap room hardly big enough to sleep all of them. - But they have a kerosene lamp, a stove (and they served me tea!) and clean bandages - and I did not smell any glue and did not see any empty tubes in the vicinity. They were proud to tell me that they had quit "because you don't remember anything after taking it". (And whoever would use it again, would be beaten by all of them!)
>>> Some groups of German boy scouts decided that half of the gains of this year's Christmas-campaigns should go towards our children in Kathmandu. If you understand any German, please have a look at their internet pages, click on "Lager" and see what they (i.e. one of their leaders who has been to Kathmandu several times) have to tell about us.
2.12.2001: Sorry! - I did not find the time to write...
Besides all the other things, I was invited for a wedding - for three days! (Good friends; so I was not only guest at the party but took part in all the ceremonies in the house and at the temple.)
- Recently I learned a lesson - once again. And I would like to tell you:
One often wonders, why these children are out in the streets... Most often there are drinking fathers or thrashing stepfathers. But sometimes explanation does not come that easy: One boy has a friendly mother and a well-dressed father who works as a waiter in a tourist restaurant - but does not go to school and spends most nights in the streets.
Maybe now I know the answer: (?)
That boy of 13 years gulped some glasses of cheap local spirit. Coming to dinner he was totally drunk and close to fainting. We tried in vain to make him vomit, fed him water and held him until after a lot of noise he finally slept.
After dinner I calledwent to call the boys father. - And he looked at his son who slept on a mattress on the floor in amusement like it was any stranger.
We woke him up; but he could not stand even with our support. - The father did not touch him.
Some people lifted the boy and wanted to put him on his father's back - but he refused to carry him.
Meanwhile I had to leave for some urgent reason and heard the full story only next morning: The father wanted to leave his son in the restaurant for the night, until he would be sober. - Finally the owner of the restaurant with a friend carried the boy home, while the father walked ahead and showed them the way to his flat.
22.11.2001: Since yesterday all children are back at school.
During the two big religious festivals of Dasain and Tihar some schools closed for a full month, while others opened for just a few days in-between. So from now on the students come to my place not before late in the afternoon; at "opening time" from 1 p.m. onwards only the street children come and the small ones who don't go to shool yet.
We have a lot of trouble and many discussions these days because of fights between individual children as well as between rival groups. And I am very much worried because of the glue-sniffing that becomes increasingly popular among the kids. This stuff is so cheap and makes so "happy" - I cannot convince the children not to use it. Some of those children who stay with me every day really want to quit it - and still return every other day totally "stoned". For me it is really nerve-racking and I lose a lot of concentration on the other things that I should do ...
13.11.2001: Time is running...; There is so much I have to write; updating all the files, checking all the accounts ...
Today I went to a former high-ranking chest-specialist to get information about one of our children: That boy has been sick "on and off" for years; and this doctor took time over the weekend to work through bags full of X-rays and lab-reports - and took two hours off today to explain to me: Pericarditis - and far too many white blood cells. In Europe this would be done by surgery; in India it would be possible as well - though with higher risk and at a price of more than 6000 US-Dollars. In Nepal they do it as well - but only about half of the patients survive.
Treatment by medicines is possible and he explained to me what to do next.
For a change we have some good news as well: Two of the street children who stay with me all the time really want to get themselves free from the drug of sniffing glue. This problem is quite new to Nepal - yet most of the street children and garbage collectors are already addicted.
These two have been "clean" for more than one week now - and we are really proud!
7.11.2001: It's not always happy news ...
A boy of 15 whose schooling (together with his younger brothers) we had paid for some years has given up school. His parents had not sent him to school as a child; he started late and was only in 5th grade now. Two days ago I heard rumours that he was to go to work in India with his father and uncle. I tried to convince them that he should at least complete this year, because after 5th grade in Nepal there is a centralised exam that would have given him at least a small certificate.
Nevertheless, yesterday he departed.
5.11.2001: Time is running, there is always so much to be done. - Though this time there was nothing really important that I should have reported immediately...
- Some of the children finished their school holidays by spending their savings on an excursion to Sundarijal into a beautiful countryside with an ice cold lake.
- Some German tourists came to visit me at the end of their group tour and brought us clothes, colour pens, medicines, and other useful things and left quite some money with me to be used for the children. - Thank you!
- Last week a whole group of street children was rounded up by the police - just because they were sitting there; and because "they're all thieves anyway". They spent the whole day at the police station. By the time I was informed and went there to free them, they had just been released.
- Saturday I was invited to the family of one of our youths to attend a religious ceremony.
- Yesterday the cupboard was delivered that I had made. Now finally I can have cameras, computer equipment, X-rays and medicines properly sorted and securely locked.
Medical tasks I had more than enough. Hardly a day that I didn't go to the doctor's or to the hospital:
- Yesterday the plaster was removed from the boy's arm. He still needs some exercise, but should be fine.
- A two year old boy fell from his parents' bed and broke his collarbone.
- A girl of ten years playing beneath a Riksha had her arm twisted around the axle and broken it thrice.
- The boy with the deep wound in his calf is doing very well. Since Oct.31st he can stretch his leg far enough to walk - so we do not have to carry him any longer. I took him to the hospital once to have him checked: Some dead skin was removed, the deep hole is closed by now and the wound starts to build skin from the edges.
- The two boys for whose burns I planned the big surgeries have "disappeared": One has gone to see his relatives in a village and will not return until the end of November; the other one has not reported to me for three weeks, and that indicates that he still suffers from the weakness after his rabies. - Maybe I have to postpone both surgeries to spring 2002.
- Two days ago the worm medicine was eventually delivered that I had ordered some time ago. Already more than 50 children received their dose.
29.10.2001: The Dasain-celebrations are drawing towards an end. For one week all offices, banks, the out-patient department of the hospital and most shops and restaurants were closed for the most important of the religious festivals of Nepal.
For me this meant limited activities, few visits at the family doctor, hospital visits only at the emergency department. From tomorrow onwards I shall be busy again planning the surgeries, visiting schools, extending my visa, etc.
I spent most of the week - if not invited to friends for feasts and the Tika blessing - at the hotel to translate some of these pages into English after all.
Our patients are doing pretty well: The hole in the thigh after removing the abscess has grown closed; the plaster is very soft and worn, but the arm is without pain and seems to be fine. On the calf of this boy who fell onto that fence I wanted to do the daily change of dressing - when on the second day I was so shocked that I took him to emergency again: The skin around the stitches was black, the thigh heavily swollen. A surgeon took time to really care for us, made another local anaesthesia, removed some of the stitches and cleaned the wound very deeply and thoroughly. After putting a tampon deep into this hole he told me that from now on I would have to do this daily, as the hospital would be closed for days and the emergency department would not do ordinary dressing. Whow! I have cleaned a lot of wounds and removed many stitches; but never done a tampon this deep! So the next day I really needed half an hour of "mental preparations"; but then it went pretty smooth, did not cause too much pain. I did it totally sterile and now the leg is not swollen any more and the wound looks quite good.
I don't want to put a photo of this leg on this page. If you want to see it, please click here.
23.10.2001: There are so many things that I would like to write about - they just don't leave me the time to writ it.
Last Saturday I visited the boy with the burned hands and his foster parents. At first sight I was a bit shocked to see his hand: After 3 months in hospital with 6 surgeries I had hoped for some more improvement.
Before surgery he could not move
the Hand at all.
On the wrist of the stretched hand
you can clearly see the dark skin
that was transplanted from the thigh.
After talking to he boy and his foster father I relaxed quite a bit. They both were absolutely happy with the results and told me about the big advantages to be able to move this hand, to stretch it and to bend it - even if it is only half a hand with no fingers. (Everyone was teasing the boy for being quite a champion at playing marbles now - which he was not able to do before the surgeries.)
Yesterday I wanted to write today's update - and was phoned from the hospital to come there immediately. The father of three of our students who had been in hospital for some time because of kidney failure was to have a second dialysis. For this we had been ready for days. But now the physicians had planned for a different kind of dialysis that will last for 48 hours. They would need some 100 bottles of the dialysis fluid. For the ordinary dialysis the dispensary of the German-Nepalese Help Association would have provided most items free of charge; but for this kind they did not have the required materials. - And the family already spent all of their savings on the first dialysis.
For me it is always a difficult decision to spend our money that was collected for the children, on some adult; usually I refuse. But in this matter of life and death of the father, I think the money spent indirectly helps the children very well.
(I am really afraid of the possibility that the kidneys will not - as is hoped at the moment - resume functioning after 2-3 dialyses: Lifelong dialysis would cost from 500 up to 1000 US-$ per month; and this family will never be able to pay it. Then the father will be discharged from hospital to die at home.)
While preparing everything and buying the materials, I happened to walk through the Emergency - and was surprised to see some of our children and a whole group of street children. At the same time two of the children had already gone to call me from the hotel: One 12-year-old boy whom I had known for years, but who rarely comes to see us, while playing had fallen from some roof on to one of the spikes of some fence that cut through his left calf. I myself had never before seen such a gaping wound; sinews and bone were visible. Only after confirming that he could move his leg and his toes, and after an X-ray had proved that the bone was not damaged, were the doctors ready to apply the stitches first to the flesh and then to the skin, to close this wound.
To make sure that all the others would be given their dinner I had already sent two of the children with the vouchers to the restaurant where we eat twice daily. I myself with the injured boy and some helping children arrived there not until 8 p.m.
13.10.2001: What a day! Yesterday morning I woke up and could hardly move. Something was wrong with one of the discs in my backbone.
During the day it got worse; but this morning I felt a bit better. So I went to one of the little Internet offices to upload the new design of these pages.
After 10 days the plaster does not
look that "fresh" any more.
Two hours on that wooden stool were not the best medicine for my back, and I was looking forward to an afternoon at the hotel. At 1 p.m. I arrived at my room, just the time when the first children should come. They came - and carried little Krishna: One youth had cut him with a sharp knife right over the top of his foot (!) to "punish" him for some not yet paid dept. The already dirty legs were smeared with blood, but still I could easily see that this needed some surgical stitches. So I started to clean him a bit and wanted to take him to the hospital immediately - when some more children came, returning from the soccer field; one of them with a heavily swollen elbow.
"Convenient", isn't it? - So I had to go to the hospital only once to have both of them treated...!
The foot got five stitches; the arm a plaster for three weeks; and both children some medicines. Some time after 4 p.m. I was back at the hotel.
9.10.2001: One of the street children had the glad in his groin heavily swollen without any obvious reason. (When they come like this, first of all I check the leg for any infected wounds; but he did not have any.) On our "family doctor's" advice we had tried antibiotics, but after 4 days there was no improvement. This morning I took him to the hospital, and in the afternoon under light anaesthesia it was cut open and cleaned and filled with a tampon. - He is fine and has hardly any pain now.
8.10.2001: My luggage arrived! - Actually it arrived in Kathmandu one day before me. So they put it in a store room, and wrote it in some file. And they searched for it from Frankfurt to Kuwait - only to discover today that it had been here all the time!
7.10.2001: Today I took Anjana to the new Eye Hospital: After we had sent her to South India in spring for the surgery on one of her eyes, this was much better now and nearly all right. Some spots that are still bleeding occasionally are controlled by medicine at the moment and will by closed by laser next sunday.
News about some individual children:
>>> The Sherpa-youth, whose boarding school and hostel had been paid for years by some special sponsors has not disappeared as I mentioned in my yearly report. He is back at school since last June! (One of Mukeshs e-mails with this and other important information never arrived.)
>>> The 12-year-old boy with old burn injuries "from navel to knees" was bitten by a monkey last August; got his vaccination too late; fell sick with rabies and nearly died. - Even now he is weak; and as long as he is not fully recovered we cannot plan for his surgeries.
Mahesh did have a daughter... - In spite of regular medical check-ups and the doctor's saying that everything was nearly fine, 6 hours after a difficult delivery she had to be put into an incubator, and died shortly after. The exact reason is not known.
Some German friends on holiday in Nepal came to visit me. I had not met them for years and enjoyed it very much!
For the increasing number of children who stay at my room - some nearly permanent, some for the duration of a medical treatment, some as visitors who like to have a change from the little rooms of their parents - I bought two pieces of carpet and some blankets. Now we can accommodate up to 10 children.
2.-5.10.2001: I arrived in Nepal nearly on time. But due to long queues at the immigration and the reporting of my missing luggage I reached the hotel four hours later than expected. Still there were some ten children waiting for me. - And till evening nearly 30 had already visited me.
They really seem to enjoy it and to be very happy. Right from the start my room was full; on the 3rd day already I paid the lunch for more than 50 children.
In the evening of Oct.5th I went through my file where I always had taken a note of the children who came: Out of the 203 children (and some grown-up former children) in this file two have died; about 10 live in homes and hostels and cannot come to see me. Out of the remaining ca. 190 children during these first 3½ days I met 72 children. Adding those whose brothers, sisters or mothers I met, I already have the up-to-date first-hand information on a total of 105 of our children!!! (During one day in my bathroom they finished nearly two pieces of soap!)
30.9. - 2.10.2001: From this September on Nepal Airlines does not fly to Europe any more. - And for sure that was the airline I was booked on. Now all the other airlines are fully (over)booked and I had to fly later than originally planned. - And instead of the usual 11 hours from Frankfurt to Kathmandu, it took nearly two days! After a night at a hotel in Kuwait, and half a night in the transit room of the Delhi airport, I reached Kathmandu on Tuesday afternoon - without my big bag!!!
The wheelchair (a donation) arrived; and my two pieces and hand baggage with the expensive equipment (computer, cameras). Most of the things of daily use (from clothes to alarm clock), I had left in Kathmandu anyway. But 30 kg incl. new medicines, children's clothes, books, video cassettes, etc., are missing.
Most upsetting: All the expensive technical equipment I brought in my handbags; but all the chargers, adapters and connecting wires are in the lost luggage. - So even the nicest video camera is useless without charger and cassettes!
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