I was injured while working last week and was told I can't work in the field for ten days. I will be able to return to my normal work duties on the 23rd. This week has been extremely slow since I can't do much to help out right now.
I am grateful that I am only temporarily out of the field and didn't have to go home to have my injury cared for. Last week my team had finished the house we were working on, so we decided we would pick up structures at the manufacturer to bring to our warehouse. While we were loading the metal structures into the trucks, a beam slipped and sliced my hand. At first I thought I would just need a band aid, but when I washed away the blood I realized the gash was much deeper than I thought.
We went to the government hospital, but the wait was too long, so we headed to a local private hospital instead. I had the wound cleaned and stitched. When I sent pictures of the wound to my family, my mother became worried that it hadn't been cared for properly. The stitches didn't seem to have been done well, and my mother was concerned about possible nerve or tendon damage from the depth of the cut. There was some talk of bringing me home for at least long enough to have a different doctor take a look at it.
Instead, I went to the United Nations hospital of KTM to get a second opinion the next day. I saw a western doctor, and he said there was no nerve or tendon damage, but that I would have a larger scar on my hand than necessary due to the poor stitching job the first doctor had done. He could have restitched the wound, but he chose not to because he felt reopening the wound wasn't worth the risk of infection. I have seen that doctor all week to get my hand cleaned and rewrapped. Today I had two of the five stitches removed, and the rest will be removed tomorrow. I am looking forward to returning to work in the field.
This Saturday was Maike's last day. We went shopping all day so she could buy gifts for her family. Last week our friend Max went to Melamchi, a satellite project All Hands is running. He joined a demolition team that backpacks up into the mountains for a week at a time to take down houses in the remote villages of Nepal. I had planned on joining, but I decided I am enjoying Kathmandu too much to leave for that long.