Elevator Entertainment

Yesterday a fellow missionary and I spent half a day in Santiago at the most modern clinic and hospital in the country, HOMS (www.homshosptial.com). In the DR consultations and most medical tests are not scheduled ahead of time. Patients are seen on a first come, first serve basis.  Doctors take whatever time needed with each patient.  This can be as brief as five minutes when a patient is returning to have test results reviewed or as long as 45 minutes for a complete history and exam for a new patient. Procedures, surgeries, chemotherapy, and more complicated tests are scheduled.  So Phyllis and I left Jarabacoa early and arrived before our doctors to put our names on the list for the day.  Our names were on or near the top of each list.

I rode the elevator many times as each of our doctors were on different floors and I had to retrieve some test results.  As any world traveler can tell you, riding an elevator in another country is a new and interesting experience.  The US has rigid, unspoken rules for elevator use.  Everyone faces the door, strangers do not talk to one another and rarely make eye contact.  People traveling together or those who encounter an acquaintance on the elevator speak briefly and in hushed tones. No physical contact allowed unless there is child or disabled person who needs assistance.

Not so in the Dominican Republic.  Entering riders give a generalized greeting to those already aboard and acquaintances greet each other in typical latino fashion.  Eye contact is made! Dominicans are courteous to one another giving preference to mothers with infants and toddlers, pregnant women, the elderly, and anyone with a disability. The elevator is a sardine can and must be packed until the overload buzzer sounds and the last person in steps back out.  Thus physical touch, or should I say squishing, is the norm.  Floor numbers are called out so an attendant or someone who is smashed near the button panel can order the right stops.  Stops are made on nearly every floor!

Sometimes though, unusual and amusing things happen.

1.  I followed a woman onto the elevator who was playing a game on her android phone at full volume and continued to play on the ride up until she walked off still playing her game. Maybe that happens in the US a lot, but here it was just strange.  She didn't even look up to greet her fellow passengers!

2. I got in an elevator where three male employees were talking.  Two were young and the other over 60.  The older man was saying, "I have more sex appeal than either of you.  You can never have my sex appeal because it comes with age."  It was hard not to laugh.  I didn't think any of them had sex appeal.

3.  I got on an apparently empty elevator to find a woman cowering by the button panel.  She was extremely please to see me.  "Oh good, I am not alone on this elevator.  It is very bad to ride alone.  What could happen?! So scary."

4.  After squishing into to a full elevator, a man in back began to serenade the elevator and probably continued long after I left.

The week before, I was on an elevator that was taking on more people with each floor.  There was a very pregnant lady who ended up in the back and was trying not to be squished.  She called out, "Be careful I have a belly to protect."  Then someone in front repeated it, "Make more room! There is a belly on the elevator."  Everyone squished toward the front to give her more room.

Now, if I could just ring the neck of the architect who planned three small elevators to service an 11 story medical clinic with about 18 consulting offices on each floor!!  Remember that Dominicans don't go to the doctor alone, so for each patient there is at least one friend or relative along for support.

Phyllis and I complete three consultations by lunch time and left with treatment plans and prescriptions in hand.  It was a good day.