CQU Nursing students set up remote village health camps

COUNTRY: Nepal
PROGRAM: UniBreak Groups
PROJECT: Nursing
WRITTEN BY: Central Queensland University Nursing Group

Today was an amazing, eventful and inspirational day for both group A and B as we travelled 5 hours uphill squished together in four jeeps travelling a distance of 45kms to a little Nepali village named Gilung for the weekend. Travelling this road was like experiencing an extreme sport as it was treacherous. Luckily everybody in the groups travelled very lightly this weekend I don't think we could have possibly fitted anything more into these jeeps!

On arrival to Gilung, we were greeting, along with the Nepal Lions Club, by the locals with beautiful handcrafted flower garlands and song. The villages were so welcoming everybody came from near and far, even a man who was unable to use his legs had crawled over miles of rock, dirt and rubble to greet us. We then trekked a small uphill distance to the village Monestary kitchen which we donated money so it could be sufficiently rebuilt. The village elder ladies greeted us again with beautiful garlands and a rice mixture that was placed on our foreheads as a holy blessing into their community. We were then welcomed and Professor Kerry Reid-Searl and Penny Heidke were asked to open the kitchen for the very first time during this ceremony. We were then fed a fantastic snack made from the Monestary which was fantastic!

Following this ceremony, we were finally allocated to our host families, this was so exciting. For the next two nights we were going to sleep, eat and live the village life of a Nepali. The host family houses ranged greatly from small traditional clay houses to much larger clay houses, many were filled with cows, goats and chickens. This experience was already off to a fantastic start and it was only going to get better! The first night we were invited to a welcome song and dance festival where the community celebrated our arrival in traditional dance and we sang a few Aussie songs without any hassle. This was fabulous fun!

Saturday we walked 10 minutes to the high school where the remote village health camp was held. Nepali doctors also visited to donate their time and expertise to the villagers for 8 hours. Us students were able to perform vital signs on the villagers before they saw the doctors to help with the docotr's patient assessments. We were also granted the opportunity to observe some clinics such as surgical, gynaecological, medical, optometry and many more that we're available. This health camp allowed us all to really appreciate the Australian health care system much more as this health camp in Gilung was the only medical attention these lovely villagers will get for another year. The children were given knitted gifts in forms of beanies and scarves that were made from the grandmothers of our Australian nursing students which was a fantastic donation! CQU also donated a number of exercise books for the students along with other medical and school supplies required to enhance their program's in Gilung.

The following day we were far welled by our families and given more excitingly garlands and blessings with red powder and then we hopped in the jeeps for another 5hour bumpy ride back to Pokhara.

The overall experience in Gilung was exceptional! The general outlook of this program was that we felt there was immense responsibility and pressure that was placed on us nursing students due to the desperate need of basic medical resources however the demonstration of community, togetherness, family and strength was inspirational as it is clear that determination overpowers illness in these remote villagers and hard work is the only option to survive. This sense of love and motivation was moving and something all of the students would like to add to their lives and take back and practice in Australia. This weekend has really enforced how lucky we are to be living in such a fantastic and free country.