HW 22 - Illness & Dying Book Part 1

I am reading Mountains Beyond Mountains by Tracy Kidder. Random House Inc. published it in 2003, but excerpts from the book were originally published in the New York Times. It is a New York Times Bestseller and a winner of the Pulitzer Prize.

Précis of Chapter 10:

Paul Farmer and his lover and friend, Ophelia, had a rocky albeit passionate and lovely relationship in the 1980’s. In order to get him alone for several hours, she would have to find him a task, such as driving to another Haitian city, which still somehow served the purpose of healing.  Even when they were alone together, Paul’s focus was never entirely on her; his foremost passion was the overwhelming need of Haiti, and Ophelia sometimes wished that she could be first on his list of priorities. She knew she could never compete with his love for Haiti, and this led to her need to say “No” when he proposed to her. He had trouble forgiving her for a time, but eventually their friendship prevailed even when their romance did not.

                During this time, Paul also formed Partners In Health, a public charity in Boston. Its sister organization, Zanmi Lasante, served to provide medical care in Haiti. Tom White provided the majority of the donations at first, and consistently gave money to the cause. The board of advisers included Tom White, Paul Farmer, Todd McCormack and Jim Yong Kim. Tom, Paul, Jim and Ophelia often lived together in Tom’s home, and constantly discussed issues like the snobby and silly nature of political correctness, the significance of cultural barriers, the foolishness of radical thinkers, changes taking place in Haiti’s political economics, and the certainty of Areas of Moral Clarity (AMC’s).  

 “The goofiness of radicals thinking they have to dress in Guatemalan peasant clothes. The poor don’t want you to look like them. They want you to dress in a suit and go get them food and water. Comma” (page 100).  Appearance is a superficial aspect of “political correctness”; to Paul farmer and his companions, it does not deserve the attention and energy people spend discussing and forming ideas about it. People want to help the needy and raise awareness, but they shouldn’t do so by dressing like the needy. They should ACT. There is too much thinking and discussing about those who need help. In Paul Farmer’s humble opinion, the deciding action of whether or not you are an “asshole” is if you actually desire to help and act upon that desire. Indifference or nothing but talk about helping equate to being an “asshole”.

“I felt as though, in Farmer, I’d been offered another way of thinking about a place like Haiti. But his way would be hard to share, because it implied such an extreme definition of a term like ‘doing one’s best’” (page 8).  I feel similarly to Tracy Kidder. I agree with Farmer’s views that Haiti is worth figuring out, helping, and sacrificing time, money and effort. Believing this is difficult, because it makes it so easy to be a hypocrite of empty words. If someone does not believe that Haiti’s problems are worth saving, then they are not being hypocritical by looking out for their own needs.  If someone has high moral values, they risk either guilt or sacrificing themselves to live by those values. Not everyone wants to “do their best” when it requires so much.

“Can you believe it? Only in Haiti would a child cry out that she’s hungry during a spinal tap” (Page 32). Because Haiti is so destitute and poor, children do not have enough food or clean states of living, which results in sickness. Haiti is so poor, that even the pain of inserting a needle between two vertebrae in the spine cannot outweigh the discomfort of hunger.  I’m surprised by Farmer’s constant raw reaction to this fact. Usually people get used to suffering if they see it constantly, but Farmer is always horrified and angry by these sights. Perhaps this receptiveness to suffering is the cause for his motivation to dedicate his life to Haiti.

                It seems that sickness and dying are horrible, no matter where it occurs, and regardless of how common it is. Evan and his mother experienced acute suffering, even scarring from the loss of death and the discomfort of sickness.  Even though they are in a relatively politically stable country, and they had enough money to make end’s meat, Erik Wood was a valuable person who they could not cure, and his death was terrible. They struggled to make sure that he was treated like a human, and not like his cancer. Similarly, a woman in the book suffered loss when her sister died in a Haitian clinic. The woman who died was pregnant, and had 5 children at home. She only needed a blood donation, and despite the desperate efforts of Farmer and the woman’s sister, her death ensued. Farmer is scarred by the sister incessantly repeating that we are all humans, as if that should be enough to ensure health care for all. Even though death is common in Haiti, it is still commonly horrible. I sometimes used to see poor countries like Haiti as one, gigantic series of deaths and illnesses – a monstrous endeavor to fix. I now see that every person’s suffering is terrible in itself, and that helping just one person is hugely valuable. Hurt is hurt, whether in a hungry Haitian girl, an American boy in 7th grade, a worried mother, a desperate sister, an artist, an educated doctor. Once this is realized, I see no valid excuses for ignoring it.