I saw him and his mother when they were on the way to the clinic to get his vacinations. I have to confess that I got excited when I saw his face peeking out from the blanket tying him to his mother's back: he had about a half-inch gap running vertically from the bottom of his nose to where the bottom of his top lip should start. I got excited because I had heard about an Operation Smile (you know, the ones with the TV commercials about saving kids' lives) mission just a couple of hours from my site. I knew that if I could convince this family to make the journey that we could make a huge difference in this child's life.
The day after I saw them in the clinic, I asked one of the nurses if she knew anything about Operation Smile, an organization that provided free surgeries to people with cleft palates and hare lips. She hadn't heard of it and didn't seem all that interested-she hadn't even taken note of the name or duwar (village) of the little boy or his mother. I headed to Rabat later that week and was quite excited to find a flier
in Arabic for the Operation Smile mission. I brought this information into the clinic when I got back and immediately, the other nurse said "we have one of these!" I was so excited-"I know," I said, "do you know his name or where his family lives? I want to take them for the operation. He told me he would call the mother and have her come back into the clinic so I could talk with her.
I got the call on the morning of our training for the Gnaoua festival and left 12 people in my house to bike quickly to the clinic in order to meet the little boy's (Omar) mother, Fatima. I sat with her for a few minutes and explained that we could take Omar and that they would do a free operation for him. I showed her the fliers (on which there was a before/after picture) and she asked me if Omar would look like that afterwards. I was so happy to be able to tell her that he would. Before then, she hadn't even realized that there was anything to be done for him. I told her I wanted to come to their village to sit and talk with them more and get them on the phone with someone from Peace Corps who could explain much more clearly to them what would be happening. She gave me her husband's phone number and we parted ways, with me promising to call them and arrange a visit the next week.
I didn't end up making the trip to their village but did meet with Rachid, Omar's father, explained everything to him and put him on the phone with someone from Peace Corps just to make sure everything was abundantly clear. We decided on a meeting place and time for the following Monday, the first day of the OS mission. I showed up lugging my backpack and Rachid and Fatima were dressed in their djlabas (an outfit people wear for both traveling and special occasions) carrying a plastic bag of diapers and milk; Omar was tied on Fatima's back, in the common Moroccan fashion. We traveled first by truck, then car. I figured out that there was going to be a problem pretty early on. I was emasculating Rachid and making him seem weak by paying directly for our food and transportation. In Morocco, men take a great deal of pride in being able to provide for their families, and though we had agreed that I would be paying for things, me doing it directly was embarrassing for him. It took me quite a few hours to work out a strategy, but I finally figured out that I could
just give the money subtely to Fatima and she could give it to him.
We got to the hospital at about 11:30 and walked around and asked 4 or 5 people before we finally found the place for Operation Smile. Once we finally found it, I realized that we should have left about
2 hours before we did...there were hundreds of people waiting, with everything from cleft palates to burn scars. I finally got us a number (196) and we settled down to wait. When we got our number, they were calling 80...so we had some time to kill. They would call about 5 numbers at a time, bring
people into the gate and then close it. I had no idea what we would meet when we got inside, whether or not they would be able to help Omar or if they would send us right home. We chatted up the people around us; one of the babies had a repaired hare lip and I could tell that Fatima was excited about the
prospect for her own son.
We took a break from waiting at 2 to grab lunch. Now comes the part where I tell an embarrassing story about myself. By the time we got back from lunch, it had been about 7 hours since I had used the restroom...and things were becoming urgent. I quietly asked one of the women next to me if she
knew where I might find a bathroom; she asked another woman who pointed behind the tent they had set up for the people waiting. I assumed there must be some kind of toilet or outhouse back there, but all I saw were some trees. I asked another woman who grabbed me by the hand and took me behind the tent to the trees. She asked a man if he would leave and then pulled me behind there where I saw
lots of evidence of all who had been there before me. I balked...there was no way I was going to pee in the bushes outside of a hospital...talk about hygienic. I told her I couldn't do it, she said "no, no it's fine, my daughter came here earlier." I said that really, no I couldn't and started to walk away. She laughed at me and followed. I began to walk around trying to find some place. I asked a guard who pointed me into one of the buildings. It did have a bathroom, but it was locked. I realized as this was going on, that I was being rather ridiculous. I refused to pee in the bushes even though all these worried parents and family members seemed to be able to suck it up and do it just fine. I realized that I was using my position as a foreigner to get things that others couldn't get. However, what kind of public hospital doesn't have a freaking bathroom for people to use?! Finally, an old man dragged me to the gate and told the guard to let me in to use the bathroom. I did, it was fine, and I even got to catch a glimpse of what was to come...there were tons of people and stations to go to, starting with medical records. It was busy, but there seemed to be an order to the chaos.
Our number got called at about 5pm. I went through the gate with Fatima and Omar while Rachid waited outside. I realized later that each patient was only allowed 1 family member, but I again shamelessly exploited my position as a foreigner to be able to stay with Fatima and Omar, and boy am I glad I did. We got through station 4 before someone finally said that we wouldn't be getting an operation. It was too difficult and there was too much construction that would need to be done. We were told to wait with a few other patients until someone could come talk to us and tell us what our options were. We waited for over an hour; Fatima was being to get antsy. She didn't understand why we were waiting or what the problem was. She had heard the doctors talking about us having to make a trip to Marrakech or Casablanca, so I could tell that she was worried. Finally, at 7:15, the vice president and co-founder of Operation Smile Morocco took a few minutes to tell us what was up. Omar's condition was too complicated to be dealt with during the mission. She told us we would need to come up to Casa in order to have the operation done at the large hospital there. We would need to come on the first Monday of the month; but they were all going to be on vacation in August so we would need to come in September. She asked me if I would be able to sponsor their travel; she said she could pay for it out of her own pocket if she had to, but I insisted that I could pay. My dad donated some money so that I wouldn't have to use my Peace Corps allowance to do so.
So that was that. I sent off Omar, Fatima and Rachid at the bus station. They said that they wanted to go back home that night, instead of staying over. I shoved a few bills in Fatima's bag, she "hashuma-ed" me (said shame on you), they God-blessed-my parents (one of my favorite phrases here) and we went our separate ways. I'll be meeting back up with them on the first Sunday of September in order to make it up to Casa in time for Omar's 12:30 appointment on Monday. This time, I take lots of pictures and you can see Omar's beautiful new smile for yourselves.
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