Available

Hi all,
Swell really wanted me to inform all of you that she is available to receive calls. Although our headphone/microphone combination broke (mic doesn't work anymore) I was able to get her computer up and running on our home internet connection. She has a built in camera and microphone so contact away.

Other than that we're just doing some house work today so that we are free to work on school stuff the next couple of days.

Sweet, sweet, sweetness

My wonderful, beautiful, mouth-watering, life-changing, tear-inducing Jelly Tots arrived today. Oh, the wonder. Oh, joy. The sour jelly tots were awe inspiring.

We have a three day weekend this weekend. There is some type of religious feast on Saturday. We'll spend Saturday at home working and playing Yahtzee (which was also trapped in our luggage until today). We'll also spend time imagining what I would look like with a hair cut.

Swell is having no luck with classes. Her class was partly canceled today due to some event. The students were quite surprised when she told them they would make up that class after the event was over. She had to. They are behind.

Tomorrow she loses another class because our dean wants the students to attend an event for blind people. The university is adding blind services to their library - braille books, braille printers, etc. I think it's good that they go but I feel bad for poor lil' Swell. She's having a tough week. It's been cold and she hasn't been very happy. Poor ol' Swell. She'll get better but I think she's tired of being here. Only 9 more weeks to go and then she'll have a month with her family in Romania. That will be fun.

Tomorrow we also need to hit the grocery store to load up on food for this weekend.

Not much else going on here. You can start phoning us again because we got our head set back (although broken slightly) from our luggage.

Sorry for the lack of goodness in this update but we're really not doing much these days.

My Kingdom

My kingdom for Jelly Tots!

While Swell and I were in Durban we came across a store selling Jelly Tots. You crazy Americans might not know what Jelly Tots are. Let's just say they are a candy created by the holy hands of God himself.

I love me some Jelly Tots. I ate me a good amount of Jelly Tots while in Durban. Before leaving I bought me some more Jelly Tots. I bought me some.... (for those just tuning in I know that the use of the pronoun "me" is incorrect so keep yer' comments to yourselves)... anyway, I bought me some regular Jelly Tots and some Sour Jelly Tots. I've never had sour ones before.
At the hotel Swell transferred MY jelly tots from a carry on bag to our suitcase.

WE STILL DO NOT HAVE OUR LUGGAGE! I STILL DO NOT HAVE MY JELLY TOTS.

Curses on you Air France!

Our dean didn't bring our luggage out to Nablus today because it was too heavy for her to carry and her husband was otherwise occupied.

CURSES!

I WANT my jelly tots.

Most of you are probably thinking I've lost it. My brother, Jill, knows what I'm talking about. We love us some Jelly Tots. I haven't had Jelly Tots in years. Now that I've had them again I need them.

Give me my Jelly Tots!

That is all. Continue on with your lives now.

I did it...

So we decided to be good little workers this weekend and do as much as we could. I wrote up 15 pages of notes and made a 109 slide, slide show on the first 7 of those pages. That should easily get me through this week. I was also informed on Wednesday that I messed up in one of my classes - I didn't give a midterm. I thought that this class was simply the lab part of another class. I was told, however, that because it has a separate class number that it requires a midterm. I, therefore, made up a practical exam that will be conducted tomorrow. It is quite easy and I hope that the students do well.

I also finished working on my paper this weekend and decided "what-the-heck" and submitted it to a journal. It was probably a mistake as I only had Swell read it over. I think it is too long and will expect a complete rejection in 6 weeks. I'd be happy if they just sent it back requiring revisions but I'm not sure it's a topic that the journal I submitted to will be interested in (although they have a public health section). If they don't want it I'll send it to a couple of people to read over and then submit it elsewhere.

In response to some of the previous comments:

Jenn - we check your myspace, and your journal religiously. I see that we feel that you are more important, more worthy of our love, and a higher priority in our very busy lives than we are in yours. We are very disappointed in you!

MauiGirl - Our safari group consisted of 7 people including us, plus the driver. We went very quickly (40km/h) until the driver or one of the group members saw something at which point the driver stopped for as long as we wanted. He talked a little bit about the animals we were looking at while we took pictures. We, too, were surprised at how close the animal were. I had the wrong lens on my camera as I thought we were going to be taking distant photos. We were so close to some of them that I was unable to take pictures as they wouldn't fit into the frame. Some of the pictures are misleading though because I zoomed in from a great distance - the rhinos for example. It was a lot of fun. You should take an extended vacation somewhere after your next trip to Liberia (i.e. do a safari in Liberia or fly elsewhere).

Jill - Re: reading my slides. You get nothing. You tell me nothing I give you nothing. I will say, however, that when I took the pictures of the chips I was thinking of you and heard you in my head say "you can really taste the chutney". I will also say that you have no business looking at my rack... of ribs.

Ma - Re: my presentation. I did 17 slides in 10 minutes by talking far too fast and probably taking a bit longer than 10 minutes. Job offer was a joke. One of the presentations after my presentation happened to be the CEO/Founder of the International Center for Eyecare Education (ICEE) which was the group that held the conference. I was asked a question from someone in the audience (maybe 100 people??? more for the discussion that followed which brought up some later questions - What did you say to bring on that!?). The CEO dude decided it would be prudent at that point to say: "If I received your survey [which he has never seen] I would have said: 'Who is this wanker?' and thrown it away." This was in response to my acknowledgment that I had a terrible response rate. I said something in return at which point he said: "I agree with you [or something like that] why don't you come do research for us?" (He said some other stuff as well which led people to say that he slapped me around, that he was difficult, that I brought out a reaction in him, that he is an a-hole... I wasn't bothered by anything he said. Whatever) The next day I gave him a copy of my CV (although I said I wasn't really looking for a job. I figured it's a good way to have him remember me later). They are based in Australia and Durban. I could live in either of those places. Thailand - we met a couple of American ODs working in Thailand and thought it might be fun to visit them and look at their interesting work... then we looked at our bank account.

We heard lots of interesting stuff. lots of boring stuff. All in all a good time - maybe some people will recognize my name in the future. It was a good first exposure to a congress of this type.

I don't really want to sell our place until we move. Perhaps rent it out? I don't know what the university would offer. I think that two round trip tickets each year for both of us is out of the question but well within reach if we become Fellows of the World Council of Optometry. I will be hopeful and look for flights plus a stipend from WCO (they are giving money to a Fellow who is not developing optometry so I think we should be able to get some as well) plus continued pay and housing from the University. It doesn't hurt to ask.

Don't want to be normal especially if normal is working in an office 9 hours a day five days a week telling 40 year olds they need reading glasses only for them to shoot me death stares because they couldn't possibly be getting old(er). Don't want to be normal if that requires me to talk to 13 year old girls about colour contact lenses (I REALLY don't care if you pick hazel or honey). Don't want to be normal if I have to deal with contact lens wearers who don't understand responsibility. Don't want to be normal if it doesn't allow me to try to make a difference at a community level rather than an individual level.

JL - It is true. Your life sucks. Get a new one! Sorry about your house and car. Haven't listened to your student yet but will as it sounds neat. Good to hear from you. Didn't know you were still alive.


All - In case you didn't understand one of our previous posts, yes Air France lost our luggage on our way home. Actually, they didn't lose it as they were standing outside of our airplane door upon arrival in Tel Aviv with a sign saying our luggage didn't make the flight. In it were both of my dress pair of shoes - so I'm casual these days, and our mic for our computer as well as a lot of clothes and toiletries. They offered to reimburse us for some things so we bought new toiletries and will submit the receipt. Our luggage made it to Jerusalem on Thursday and we'll get it when we see our dean on Monday. Swell gets mad about it every two or three hours. I don't really care.

Tomorrow is another week. Yippee!

Back to the grind

So we were back at work today - molding young minds to better the visual health of the Palestinian people. It was a good day. A short day. I should start by wishing all the ladies out there a Happy Mother's Day. It is mother's day here today and just like An-Najah University I'll be all inclusive and wish all women a happy day - all women but Swell that is. The school had some sort of lunch for the women today and all were invited but Swell, instead we were sent home. Fine by us as we were quite tired and ready for a relaxing afternoon.

We had an interesting week away.

A long trip found us arriving in Durban with not much to do on a Tuesday afternoon. We hoped to change money but were promptly forbidden by the hotel staff from leaving the hotel on our own. It seems that the entire tourist industry discourages tourists from going out on their own - fearing theft and bodily harm (it is South Africa after all). The hotel folks changed money for us instead. We were given our hotel room early so we were happy to have showers and then caught a taxi to the congress center to pick up our registration packages.

It was upon our arrival at the congress center and that we got the first inkling that this might be a big deal. All along the streets leading up to the center were light posts with signs advertising the World Congress on Refractive Error and Service Development. The congress center was large and nice and we had very little trouble getting our packages and heading back to the hotel.

We are not big meat eaters but when one is trapped away from normal restaurants and grocery stores one tends to desire things that would not normally be eaten. Our dinner for the first day were really tasty ribs from the hotel restaurant. So good that we actually had them on another day. It was a nice treat - albeit a messy one.

I won't go much into the details of the congress but suffice it to say that it was designed to share epidemiology and success/failures of refractive error care and the distribution of affordable and sustainable spectacles.

Many organizations were represented including Helen Keller International, Christian Blind Mission, Sight Savers International. It was not a conference for the types of organizations that conduct rapid vision camps distributing recycled spectacles and not worrying about long term care, although some were there - and their methods were questioned.

The congress was made up of many 10-15 minute presentations followed by discussion time. At the end the organizers presented the Durban Decleration (www.icee.org) which will become a reference document for refractive care in developing countries.

It was an experience to say the least. It was quite fun and educational. It led Swell and I to think a lot about what we're doing here. I believe that we are doing good but what happens when we leave? They are still without educators. Where will the students work? Will they have equipment, money, opportunity to open practices? A lot of questions that are, hopefully, being considered by someone, somewhere. We were also encouraged by some folks to do some research while we're here. We really don't have a lot of time remaining so we'll see if we can put something together.

One thing I am going to work on is raising funds for someone(s) to remain here until they graduate the first class of students. From that class I would hope the school could find and hire a couple of kids to become instructors. From our time here and the time someone is here next year there will be large amounts of notes and teaching materials created. All the new educators would need to do is review and understand it more. The negative is that these educators will have little to no patient experience. I would hope that we could raise enough money to allow someone with patient experience to come once or twice a semester to add that experience to the education.

If the money is raised who will come? We were told by numerous people in Durban that they were amazed that the dean of the optometry school here in Nablus was able to find people to come and lend a hand. Will they be able to find someone else? Do we want them to find someone else? What is another two semesters for us? Going home and working like dogs in commercial optometry for 2 months this summer and then having our flights/living expenses/and pay covered for a semester and then going home for Christmas/conferences only to return for 3 and a half more months. Sounds good to me but finances really stand in the way. We'll see. But we're looking forward to the next 10 weeks and then our time in Romania.

Check out pictures of our trip here:

http://picasaweb.google.com/xmattodx/

Home

Well we made it home.
Not going to say much now as it was a miserable 24 hours.
We had a lot of fun on our last few days in Durban.
Had fun on the safari. Had fun eating out. Had fun looking at souvenirs.
Upon departure the no-fun started.
Overly hot planes.
Overly stinky fellow passengers.
Overly disgusting food.
Overly cramped seating.
Overly missing luggage.
Surprisingly the only good thing about the trip home was the ease through which we passed through passport control here in Israel.
Now we're sitting at home in misery because of the overly cold home we live in.
Sorry for all the complaining. Hopefully we'll have something more fun to say tomorrow.

I'll leave you with a single picture of our safari. We have many more but I thought my Ma might like to see this one:

Well that's over

So as all y'all know my little talk is now over. Ten minutes is not really enough time to say anything but I tore through my little talk (probably speaking far too fast and making very little sense). I was the first to speak in the group so a couple of hours later we had a panel "discussion". I received a couple of questions which were not terribly difficult nor surprising. Following the discussion I received a number of comments from others attending.

I heard things about my anatomy. (Good things? - Think about it.)
I heard a lot of people who agreed with what I had to say.
I heard that a lot of people felt that the director of the organization that is putting the conference on slapped me around a little bit. (I didn't think he did - but I'm not easily intimidated nor do I much care what people think about me. If he did slap me around a little bit it was in the desire to be politcally correct).
I was offered a job?

Anyway what could create such a stir? Apparently me. If you care this is what caused the stir:


"It is interesting that despite decades of encouragement from the WHO and various optometric professionals for Voluntter based vision NGOs (VBVNGOs) to change their priorities [See (20-23)], their strategies have remained virtually unchanged for blindness and low vision treatment and prevention.

With the adoption of VISION 2020 as the guiding document for blindness prevention now is the time for a dramatic shift in the work of VBVNGOs. If the strategies outlined in VISION 2020 are considered the gold standard strategies in the prevention and treatment of low vision and blindness it becomes apparent from the survey that VBVNGOs in their current form are not acceptable as they are unaware of the initiative and use strategies contrary to VISION 2020.
The following recommendations will allow VBVNGOs to add greater value to the global visual impairment prevention community.

Discontinue VBVNGOs in their current form
The work that current VBVNGOs do is not in line with VISION 2020 priorities and does not treat ocular disease in a sustainable manner. It is, therefore, imperative that these VBVNGOs discontinue their work until they have been integrated into the broader blindness prevention community and meet the minimum indicators discussed previously

Determine Burden of Visual Impairment
It is important that epidemiological data are collected prior to the implementation of projects and programs. If this has not been completed by the national VISION 2020 program it must be conducted by the VBVNGO prior to the coordinated implementation of projects and programs.

Train Mid-Level Eye Health Care Practitioners
It is apparent from the surveys that human resource development occurs sporadically but is not a priority for most of the VBVNGOs. They work alongside local practitioners at times - when they are able and it is convenient - but they do not make the training or the creation of a cadre of local eye health care workers an objective.

Education
Members of the VBVNGOs are encouraged to band together to form a cadre of educators and to provide resources for the creation of education facilities. This is an entirely different strategy for these organizations and requires them to accept a new responsibility.


Formation of Partnerships
Volunteer based NGOs are encouraged to make contact with the national VISION 2020 program in the countries they work in, as well as making contact with the organizations that are part of the IAPB active in the countries of interest. With these partnerships a coordinated effort can take place, thereby putting both financial and human resources to best use.

Use of Recycled Spectacles and Expired Medications
All organizations working in the prevention of visual impairment are encouraged to immediately discontinue the use of recycled spectacles and expired medications. It is important to simultaneously develop a local, cost effective, and sustainable ophthalmic laboratory, spectacle and ocular medication distribution network and a cadre of mid-level practitioners [See (8, 9, 13, 16, 20, 23, 24, 26-32). In addition, VBVNGOs are encouraged to understand and follow the WHO guidelines on the use of donated pharmaceuticals [See (33)].

Evaluation of Outcomes
Most VBVNGOs currently judge their success with a subjective analysis. If the majority of the recipients of their care smile, or if the team is invited back for a future visit the vision camp is deemed successful (34-36). No objective evaluation is conducted. For a VBVNGO to consider itself part of the solution to global visual impairment it must continually seek to improve the work that it does. Improvement can only come from monitoring and evaluating the work being conducted.

Focus on Public Health
These organizations should focus on public health rather than their own professional development or personal fulfillment. While there is nothing wrong with gaining a sense of fulfillment from working in a developing country, when vision camps are advertised as a means to develop professional skills and see a developing country, motives for involvement can hinder the development of a local eye health care system. The reason to become involved in blindness and low vision prevention is not to develop one’s professional skills or to see poverty rather it is to help people obtain their right to the highest attainable standard of health.

If you read all of that congratulations. You just read what they all heard from 2 of my 17 slides. It was fun. I'm sure I'll get a few more people talking to me tomorrow. One more day for the conference and then we're off to safari.

Very brief update

Here.
Safe.
Having fun.
Learning a lot.
Being jealous of some US Optometrists who have been successful in the leap from an OD degree to being in the public health world full time.
Speak tomorrow.
Might be more than 3 people in the room as there are 600 people here. (But will be divided amongst 3 sessions).
Scheduled to speak just prior to VOSH which is the main group I put down in my paper (but won't do so by name tomorrow).
Looking forward to it.
Anyone know anything about Thailand. (What could that mean?)

Later

I'm Excited!

I'm excited we had zero problems so far! AND we're sitting next to a McDonalds that has a McCafe where I can get a cappucciono! I made Sheepie go get me a cheeseburger Happy Meal for now. It's gonna be a good Monday after all...

swell

Edit by Sheepie,

No happy meals. No cheese. She has to suffer with a hamburger and a regular size meal (and no toy). I, in turn, have to suffer with the wrong meal. I don't feel like going back to explain how it is wrong as their English was as good as my Hebrew.

On our way

So we're sitting in Ben Guiron International Airport in Tel Aviv on our way to Durban (via Paris). Our flight is delayed by about 15 or 20 minutes. We're very, very early. Swell was very nervours because she thought that we left school too late but we ended up getting to the airport and through all three security checks with no problems. (We're looking at you G. and laughing. You must have done/said something wrong.) We didn't even have to have our luggage checked beyond the x-ray machine. Very exciting.

We'll be in Durban at about 1pm tomorrow and then the conference starts the next day. Looking forward to it.

Its the WEEKEND!!

Tomorrow is the start of our one day weekend. You might ask yourself; "Self, didn't they have Thursdays and Fridays off for the weekend?"

You can answer to self that yes in fact we normally do have Thursdays and Fridays off for the weekend. Today, however, we were required to come in as they held classes today. So today, Thursay, which is normally our Saturday, was used as a replica Sunday. Confused? Well I'll clear it up. The first day of our non-natural Snow Days was a Sunday. We had class that Saturday and then Sunday and Monday were curfew days. We had class on the Tuesday and then had the curfew re-imposed on Wednesday. So today was the make-up day for the Sunday. All teachers and students were required to be here. Support staff still had the day off. Sundays are easy for us - one non-credit lab to teach - so that meant that today, Thursday, was also easy. So easy in fact that Swell left me by myself.

As I write this she is off somewhere in Nablus getting her hair done. So much for my never letting her out of my sight. She is with the secretary of the optometry program so she will be fine. She may get hepatitis but she'll be fine. (I say she may get hepatitis because an un-named coworker of Swell's mum warned us against getting haircuts while in Egypt because we would end up with hepatitis if we did. Our thoughts were "1. Why would we get our hair cut in Egypt? 2. That would have to be a pretty close cut to infect was with Hepatitis and 3. Why would we get our hair cut during our 10 days in Egypt?")

I held the lab, I kept it short because it is a no-credit lab and the students wanted to study for their exams. Short but informative if I do say so myself.

So we got paid today so I can tell the story of what happened while G was here. As you may recall a few weeks ago we were informed by the vice-president of the University that our salary would be $X. We were shocked as it was substantially less than what we were told it would be before we came. While we thought we got that all straightened out but when G. was here we were called to the old campus to meet with the University accountant.

Upon arrival he basically said: "How little will you work for?"

I was dumbfounded and taken aback. I thought we had this all taken care of. I was speechless. Swell immediately went on the offensive and yelled and screamed that we would work for what we were promised.

The accountant: "You know that we are in a very bad situation. We have not been receiving money from the government because they have no money. We have 16,000 students who don't make much money to pay for their education so we extend them loans. These are bad loans."

Basically he was saying that because of the international siege (which had not changed from the time we were offered what we were offered) that they couldn't pay us what they promised. On top of that he was a master of guilt. Saying that the University has to front loans to the students of which many will never be repaid - mostly because the opportunity for economic advancement is very limited even for educated students.

He proceeded to outline that we would need to consider that our wage was not just money. We also received housing and transportation.

When I indicated that we were very grateful for all of these things but they were already promised on top of the money we were promised he didn't care. He said that we would sit in his office until we reached a compromise. He turned to our dean to try to get her to help him convince us of the University's need to pay us less to avoid bankruptcy. She would have no part in it. Eventually he let us go promising to speak to the president and then let us know. He was very unhappy that we wouldn't compromise. He made it a point to indicate that we were used to a lavish lifestyle and that that lifestyle wasn't something they were willing to pay us for.

It was funny. I have no bad feelings toward him. He is just doing his job. Little does he realize that we took a monster pay cut to come here. If we were to be paid this wage for an entire year combined we would make about half of what Swell was paid by herself last year. I'll admit that we do have a lavish lifestyle. We drive a used car that was a gift and has over 100,000 miles on it (we love the car by the way), we have a lot of bills - what with having to pay our student loans and all - our most extravagant purchase of our lives was our condo. We were paying a small fortune in rent and could buy a place for just a bit more. Seemed wise to me. Anyway, he obviously has no idea who we are.

We were paid the right amount today. We'll be mailing the cheques to our bank next week. He did indicate that we owe the school 500 sheckels though. Apparently they paid the driver who takes us to Israel too much and we owe him for some of the legs.

G. we're looking in your direction. They say that we owe him for the trip to and from the airport. You'll be getting a bill! (j/k)

On another note. I found a proposer for my fellowship (thanks anyway CWH). It is the chief of VT at Pacific. I was his student and then worked under him when I was a VT attending after graduation. Really nice guy. So I'm filling out the paper work and then will have 3 years to collect 50 points. I should get some points for my Master's degree and hopefully will get this paper published which will give me some more. If I had done a residency I'd be done now(it is amazing to me that people can be fellows 1 year after graduation. They do it so quickly by getting points for doing a residency. Part of the residency requirement is to do a poster presentation or publication so just by finishing a residency you are over half way there. Seems odd to me. It seems like something you should have to work a bit harder for.) Hopefully I'll have all my points in time for the 2008 exam. 2007 is too soon as all materials have to be in by June.

Well that's enough rambling. Our students are sufficiently worried about next weeks exams that they should be studying all day today and tomorrow and then on Saturday we'll see.

Later,

Two down

Before I talk about the two exams that we've given out already I thought I'd take a moment to ask all of the lovely students to stop walking by my office door. I know that our floor is relatively quiet as the faculty of optometry is small but that doesn't give you the freedom to "date" in front of our door.

I realize that you're not really supposed to date. I realize that it is a big deal to walk back and forth down our hall with your girl or boy (or who you hope/wish will/could be your girl or boy). After I see you for the fifth time it kind of gets old. I could keep time with your passing. Every 23 seconds there you go again. You see it wasn't so bad when it was just a few of you sporadically but some others have seen what you do and apparently thought that our floor was magical. You see now that it is exam time I not only have to put up with you and your keep-at-least-50-cm-between-us-at-all-times-romantic-walk-down-the-hall but now I have to put up with students pacing in the hall muttering to themselves.

You hopeful couples I could deal with to some extent but the single students walking up and down reading their notes aloud. That's too much. I'm going to snap. I don't know who told you that our floor was the floor to date or study on but its not. Please stop. I beg of you.

As those of you who have been following along at home know I gave my first exam to the students on Monday. They did fine. I purposefully kept it short to make sure they would be able to understand the questions and finish on time. They had 45 minutes to do it. After 10 minutes the first student handed their exam in after 20 minutes they were all done. I made it too short and too easy (Mean 94.23% Median 100% Max 100% Min 83.33%)

Swell on the other hand, brutalized them with her contact lens exam. The 45 minute exam took 90 minutes and she still had to tell some of them that they needed to stop. With my VERY generous grading the average was somewhere around 80% with some pretty low scores. I did some analysis of her questions and on one question only 2 people got it right. Normally one would throw that question out as there must have been something wrong with it. Not Swell she's keeping it in (in fairness it was well written the students just forgot a step so most of them got it wrong. We know that they were taught the step because they had to make use of it in other questions where everyone got it right.)

So now hopefully they like me better. I have two more tests for this group of students. These tests are longer, and harder. The first exam was for a useless 1 credit class so I didn't care much that it was an easy exam.

The students are bright just on the lazy side. They are young. We need to motivate them to practice more of the skills we're teaching them. They have limited equipment so it is difficult to find the time to allow all of them to practice. For the week we're gone the only thing I'm asking for them to do is a series of practice eye exams. Hopefully Swell's exam also motivated them that they need to put in a little more study time as well. We'll see how the next two go.

Oh. Not only did Swell hurt her students today with the exam she tore my paper apart and made me cry. She's really quite mean these days.

It pays

So it pays to write a thesis on a topic that no one finds interesting. It seems like one of the reasons my abstract was accepted for the World Congress on Refractive Error is because they are seriously lacking in the area that my paper is on (Role of NGDOS and professional bodies). I speak for 10 whole minutes on March 15 starting at 16:10. Directly before me is someone speaking on "Strategies supported by SightSavers in India" (Good thing I don't have anything bad to say about SightSavers). Right after me is "The Role of the Private Sector in Nigeria". My competition (someone speaking at the same time as me) is "Factors Influencing Spectacle Wear in Indian Children." I suspect that there will be 4 people in the room when I give my talk. Me, Swell, the guy before me and the guy who goes after me. It at least gives me the chance to write one more small thing on my CV.

Tomorrow is the first exam for our students. We'll see how that goes. 9 multiple choice questions and one short answer question. I went low on the number of questions because I'm not sure how fast they can read. If they finish in 10 minutes the next test will be longer. I'm really hoping it is a very short test. If they take the whole time I don't know what I'll do.

A week from tomorrow we leave for Durban via Johannesburg via Paris. It takes us about 24 hours to get to Durban at which point we will register for the conference and hopefully meet up with people we know. The conference will run from March 14-16 and we go on a Safari on March 17. The 18th we'll find something to do and then we leave on the 19th. A quick trip but we're looking forward to it.

I've condensed my thesis to a submittable length. I'm thinking of trying an American Optometric Journal first and see what they have to say. If they like it (after I work on it for the next few days) it should be published within the year. (It takes like 4 months for the peer review and then they try their hardest to publish it within six months from final acceptance). If they outright reject me due to the topic I have some other places I can send it to. We'll see. I just need to get Swell to read it over and make sure it makes sense and maybe one or two other people. I should have done this months ago but I'm lazy.

My next professional goal is to get what's called a Fellowship. It's basically just a way to show that you've continued your studies. You collect points by submitting case reports to the oversight body, or by publishing things, or by getting another degree, etc. Once you collect a certain number of points you have an oral exam and then if you pass you are a Fellow of the American Academy of Optometry. It doesn't mean much outside of academic circles. You don't get to charge more for your exams, patients have no idea what it is but its something to do. (It's either that or law school)The only problem - you need a current fellow to be your "proposer" (whatever that is). The problem is that I don't know any fellows. I wrote and asked one of my old profs but he isn't a fellow. He gave me the names of some others so I need to write them and ask if they'll "propose" me (sorry Swell).

We've also written an organization called the World Congress of Optometry to see if what we are doing here will qualify us for a Fellow of the World Congress of Optometry. I wrote them a fair number of weeks ago but they're ignoring me. I guess it's time to write again.

Well that was boring. No gunshots or mayhem to tell you about. That is basically our lives here though. A lot of boredom interrupted by short periods of fear.

An ending note though I can't believe they killed Mrs. Laningham at the end of the second season of the West Wing! Yes, we're watching the entire West Wing series to combat boredom. I never got into it when it was on TV even though when I did watch I really liked it. We're through season 2 and will start the third season soon. We've already polished off Freaks and Geeks and the first two seasons of Veronica Mars since we've left Atlanta. That's a lot of TV!

This sign just struck me as funny. Apparently they are expecting that aliens are going to want to know where the bathroom is in Jaffa.

The coming week

Much to our surprise "Operation Hot Winter" is not over. In fact just today 40 plus Israeli military vehicles and bulldozers entered Nablus. They didn't impose a curfew, however, so school occurred as regularly scheduled.

Our students are starting to get concerned about the coming week. A look at our schedule will indicate why they are concerned.

On Monday the third years have the first of four exams in the classes we teach. Monday first thing is the first midterm for a class called Environmental optometry. The next day they have their first contact lens midterm and then on Saturday they have their ocular disease midterm and then on Monday the 12th they have their clinical exam.

We keep trying to reassure them that the exams won't be overly difficult but they are concerned none-the-less. My philosophy when it comes to exams is that they should be a learning experience, that is, they should allow you to leave the exam knowing more than when you went into the exam. If the exam does nothing but leave you stumped or feeling like the examiner tricked you that is a problem.

So my exams are basic concepts and reminders of what I mentioned was important from a clinical stand point. I won't test on the minutiae as that doesn't benefit patients. What is important is what the students will use when they graduate. The rest is just to make you sound smart when you're interacting with other optometrists.

This weekend I worked on my curriculum vitae so I would have something available on the off chance that there is someone to give it to when we're in Durban next week. (We leave in the evening on the 12th). While updating my CV I was struck by how poor it is. It's poor in a couple of ways.

From a public health standpoint I really don't have much going for me. A few short-term things, my degree, and my thesis. That's about it. Hard to get a public health job that will pay the bills with a CV so short on experience. Unfortunately I wasn't able to do a practicum while in public health school so I'm missing that experience as well as experience a lot of my colleagues gained while in undergrad. I was too busy in the department of science to gain experience in the realm of social issues, and volunteering or going on a long term peace corps type thing.

The second way my CV is poor is that in the four and a half years since I graduated OD school I have held way too many jobs. It is crazy how many places I've worked. It was beneficial in that I gained a lot of different experiences but it doesn't show much dedication to specific practices. For the first two years I was out of OD school I worked a lot of part-time jobs. Two days a week one place, one day another, two days at a third. It was difficult and not a fun way to be an optometrist. That's the price you pay living in a city that has an OD school.

Swell is pretty much ready to settle down and start becoming a full-time fixture in a community. She wants to purchase or start a practice. I hope to stop practicing optometry all together. Not because it's a bad profession or because I don't like it. I just have other interests now. I dislike the optometry I've been exposed to over the past four years ($29 eye exams and seeing 25 patients in a day - I think my record was 30 in a day plus checks and follow-ups) but I think there is a better optometry out there. Hopefully I'll be able to put my MPH to use in an organization that has at least some interest in vision services in developing countries. That is my hope but as I tell most people - I'll probably be doing optometry until I die. I'll have to find a different way to use my MPH if that's the case.

Anyway I don't know what the point of the preceding was. I do know that swell wanted me to tell all y'all that she has posted a bunch of pictures. She didn't take the time to label them specifically but they are divided into folders based on the location they were taken.

You can see them at: http://picasaweb.google.com/xmattodx

My Turn

I haven't posted in a LONG time. It really hasn't been too boring though. I've actually enjoyed the days off this week as it allowed us to catch up on work (G was here last week so we didn't do much). And it allowed me to cook, talk Sheepie into playing games with me (I beat him badly at Canasta, but he beat me at Yahtzee). We finished Veronica Mars Season 1 AND Season 2 now! We're watching a couple of movies on TV right now, but I must get to work soon... Work meaning laundry, little bit of cleaning, and hopefully baking cookies. I have most of the ingredients, but couldn't find chocolate chips; I bought a chocolate bar and will make sheepie try to get it into chips. I also don't have any brown sugar. And I found baking powder, not baking soda. Oh yeah, and I'm not sure if I bought butter or margarine (can't understand the package). But it'll be fun to try and it will be nice to have cookies if they actually turn out. I made up my exams for my two classes, but I'll have to look them over again to make sure they are not too hard. Multiple choice mainly, just a couple of short answer. It's also been pretty cold again... hard to get motivation to do anything but sit here and watch movies next to the heater when it's cold.

Last week when G was here we (G and I) decided to go for a short walk to take some pic's from around our place. We ended up meeting lots of kids (G even played soccer with them) and it was fun cuz the kids kept following us around. We were all just staring at the big dog (Max) and then the owner came out and asked us if we want to go on a walk with her and Max. We were both thrilled and I ran back into the house to tell Sheepie we're going on a walk with our neighbor and her dog. So we started off, but about 5 kids ended up coming with us. She said she could never get them to come walk with her, but since we were there they really wanted to come. Apparently everybody knows about us and where we live and the little kids tell their parents, "Oh, I saw Swell and Sheepie come home today!" It was fun to interact with them and they were excited to show us around the hills where they live. We got some amazing views and kinda lost track of time. We decided to watch the sunset before heading back and the kids picked red poppy flowers for us. It was so much fun, probably the best time I've had since we've come here. Unfortunately, we were gone for way too long and sheepie was getting worried (he didn't come cuz he was actually doing school work). Some other kids ran to us and told us he was outside looking for us. We went home and boy, was Sheepie mad at us. He didn't think we'd be gone for so long and he was worried (just the day before the 3 Americans were kidnapped). I felt very safe on our walk, it was mostly just through the hills (with olive trees) and next to some houses that were still in construction. So next time Sheepie just better come with us cuz the next sunny day we get, I wanna go back! Here's some pic's form our walk:











Our home

The end?

So is this the end or is it just the beginning?

It was a miserable weak to say the least. We struggled with being trapped in our home, struggled with writing our first exams for our students knowing that even the simplest questions may be too difficult, we struggled with being lonely. We survived to learn today that the Israelis departed and claimed that "Operation Warm Winter" was completed.

Six hours later I read:

"Defense Minister Amir Peretz on Thursday ordered a full closure to be imposed on the West Bank and the Gaza Strip from Thursday night until Monday at midnight.

Army Radio reported that the decision was made due to the large amount of terror attack warnings received annually during the Purim holiday, which commences on Saturday night." Source

We don't really know what this means but it could mean that our students - who probably went home for the weekend won't be able to make it back until Tuesday. I guess we'll find out over the next two days.

Happy Friday to all y'all.