Brazil Feb/March 2007 Day 7

We were in  the clinic all day again today fitting completed work for the patients we saw earlier in the course.  All went well in the morning but in the afternoon there was a problem with the delivery of lab work so there was a lot of hanging around.  To be fair the technicians have turned around the work incredibly quickly so it's not surprising that one or two jobs have been slightly late.

Margaret prepares an implant bridge to be fitted

In this picture Deirdre is placing an implant retained bridge.  There are screws which retain the bridge which are accessed through these holes.  These are later filled with a white filling material.  Its a very fiddly business

This is me with Primo.  I never thought I would have a pal from Bolivia !

Marcelo waiting for lab work.  (He's only posing, he's much more cheerful that that really)

There is a plan to spend the last day in Sao Paulo.  I spent yesterday relaxing in the hotel so it would be good to spend a day seeing the city.  The flight isn't until 10 in the evening so the plan is to finish on Tuesday night but then stay in Sao Paulo on Tuesday night instead of Pindamonhangaba as planned.  There is no problem with safety in Sao Paulo city.  It is Rio where there is a lot of street violence.  Arianne tells me she has never had a problem and never seen a gangster in her life......just in case you were wondering.

Waiting around does strange things to people.  We had a long discussion with Arianne about our countries. On this drawing is her map of South America, her elephant, Raj's elephant and my pig with circles.

Whilst waiting for lab work we sat around in the clinic talking and comparing cultural notes.  Junior from the Titanium Fox company had shown me a tongue twister in Portuguese which goes, "O rato roeu a roupa de Rei de Roma"  each "r" is pronounced with a sound similar to our "h" so its not easy.  It means "The rat nibbled the clothes of the King of Rome".  I responded with "Around the rugged rocks the ragged rascal ran". Raj pointed out that I couldn't actually say that one myself which is a fair point. Then he continued by teaching these very charming Brazilian people, er... "I'm not a pheasant plucker I'm a pheasant plucker's son, etc. etc.".  I explained the significance of this quietly to Marcelo and he still thought it was funny so it looks like we got away with it.

Marcelo isn't in the clinic tomorrow so we won't see him again.  Thanks for everything Marcelo.

Mohammed has now appointed himself as driver

I shouldn't have gloated about not having any mosquito bites.  I've picked up a few yesterday, probably sitting by the pool again as the sun went down.

My favourite photograph of my favourite Egyptian

We had dinner in the hotel tonight.  Everyone was a bit too tired to make the effort to go out anywhere.  It's the last day in the clinic tomorrow.  More then.