REFLECTIONS : Travel , The Great Educator
Post WWII , the Philippines : the war was over , parents sent their children back to university in Manila in pursuit of higher education . In medical school then , I was thought to have a brain tumor and was sent to Montreal , Canada to be treated by Dr . Wilder Penfield , one of the fathers of neurosurgery . Thus began the out-of-country travels that would shape my views on life .
Onboard a cargo ship with 10 other missionary passengers , for cheap travel , we docked in Hong Kong , through post-war Tokyo , on the way to Vancouver , Canada . From there , a plane trip to Montreal . On that trip , I learned that Hong Kong dock hands talked rough to a travelling single young woman , that the missionary American children were happily surprised when I put sugar in their milk ( a no-no ), and that the returning religious brother could eat a whole stack of crackers in one sitting . And of course , that people in Hong Kong were carried on rickshaws pulled by men ( not horses ) and that Tokyo was a quiet post-war city with castles and flowers , instead of an army of butchering soldiers .
At the Montreal hospital , the team decided it was a skull osteoma instead of a brain tumor that I had , and having scraped the offending bone and replaced it with a metal shield , I was let go .
by TERESITA BACANI-OROPILLA , MD
I was then treated by family friends to a tour of Quebec City , a view of the Laurentian Mountains , apple orchards , a family concert ; all this after an exploration of the modern city of Montreal . They offered to let me finish medical school at Laval University , but it was taught in French , which I didn ’ t know . So it was back to Manila , having lost half my hair but with brain intact , to finish the school year . Lesson : people were so friendly to a brown girl from the East !
Three years later , having graduated from medical school , I came to the U . S . for a residency in pediatrics . Then I went home to the Philippines for a stint of fifteen years treating rural folks and townspeople of my hometown . This was the most satisfying part of my career as a physician . Lesson : helping others was worth getting little monetary recompense .
These back-and-forth travels by way of Europe and Thailand ( then called Siam ) were filled with eye-opening adventures of different cultures , religions , customs , food and architectures ! So was the short stint in Guatemala in 1976 during the great earthquake , to help the people stranded in mountain villages .
The fortitude and strength of character of a people can be experienced by being with them , not in books nor documentaries . Travel indeed , by design or by accident , is the best teacher of life .
Dr . Bacani-Oropilla is a retired pediatrician and psychiatrist .
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