Doc's

unusual

Haiday

Dr. Harris
Mainster:
Summer
medical
missions.

doctors, had been killed by
the Pol Pot regime in the
1970s. Remaining are 20 sur-
geons — 10 of whom Dr. Main-
ster regarded skilled enough
to perform complex surgery
— to care for a population of 8
million.
Mrs. Mainster is an inte-
gral part of the team. While
her husband is practicing
medicine, she puts her tal-
ents toward whatever in-
struction or planning or
assisting is needed. Her agen-
da: "I get there and say,
`What would you like me to
do?' "
Often times, that means
giving English lessons to the
local residents — especially
physicians, as the vast ma-
jority of modern medical text-
books are in English. It's a
skill with which she is quite
familiar: at WSU, Mrs. Main-
ster teaches courses in Eng-
lish as a second language.
"In Ethiopia, I taught a
class of 70 that included a
gardener, a carpenter, a cook
and doctors — some of the best
students I ever had," she
said. "The carpenter was the
most brilliant student." Her
teaching tools were a "chalk-
board and scraps of paper."
Organization is another of
Mrs. Mainster's strengths.
Just ask workers at the Unit-
ed Mission Hospitals of
Nepal.
In Nepal, Mrs. Mainster
explains, residents' names
are based on one's birth place
in the family and the town
where he lives. But all that
changes when a sibling dies
or a villager moves. If his old-
er brother passes away, John
the Second Son from Village
X becomes John the First Son
from Village X. And if he
moves, he becomes John the
First Son from Village Y.
Sound confusing? Try follow-
ing John's medical records.
"TB was rampant there,"

Mrs. Mainster says, and
keeping track of individuals
with the disease was difficult
because the files were in com-
plete disarray. "There were
stacks of medical records
from the floor to the ceiling.
When I came, workers said
to me, We can never find our
files. Do you think you can or-
ganize this?'
"It took me six weeks to get
through all the stuff, and I
worked at least eight hours
every day," Mrs. Mainster
says. "I was hellbent to put it
all in order."
As if just getting to the fa-
cility wasn't enough. The hos-
pital was in the Himalayan
Mountains, perched high on
a peak. The family arrived
there only with the assis-
tance of Sherpas, Tibetan
porters famous for their
mountain climbing abilities.
On more than one occa-
sion, Dr. and Mrs. Mainster
say their respective surgical
operations and English class-
es have been accompanied by
the sharp smack of a gun-

shot nearby. Not that they
were on the front lines, Dr.
Mainster says. Not that they
felt their lives endangered,
"because we always thought
we were a valuable enough
resource they wouldn't let us
die so quickly."
His wife is a bit less non-
chalant. "Well, we did have a

certain sense of anxi-
ety in the Sudan," she
says. The family was
there in 1982, when
the Palestine Libera-
tion Organization set
up shop in the coun-
try.
Sometimes the
Mainsters witness
anti-Semitism, as in
Pakistan where they
saw posters "depict-
ing 'Israeli atrocities'
against Muslims — an
effort to whip up anti-
Semitic sentiments,"
Dr. Mainster says.
Even more loathed
are the Seventh Day
Adventists, who are
in charge of many of
the hospitals where
the Mainsters volun-
teer. Dr. Mainster re-
calls • that Arab
princes regularly flew
in to one such hospi-
tal, known to offer the
best care in the area.
"But they still hated the Sev-
enth Day Adventists; they
thought Christians were
worse than the Jews."

he last step on the
Mainsters' adventur-
ous vacation is coming
home. This, too, is no
ordinary journey.
The family brings home a
souvenir from each country
visited. The larger items are
shipped; the smaller, more
delicate ones they carry on
the plane. It isn't unusual to
see Mrs. Mainster with a
suitcase in one hand, a pup-
pet with flaring nostrils in
the other. She has lugged
baskets, terrifying masks
from Bhutan, elegant por-
traits — made from butterfly
wings — of African women.
The souvenirs fill the
Mainsters' home, giving it the
appearance of an exotic mu-
seum. Mrs. Mainster is the

tour guide.
"What I'm looking for is the
local craft," she says. "I'll
spend weeks looking for the
country's master craftsman."
She points to a large, jade
screen from China; it stands
beside a dining room table,
atop which sits a finely
carved wooden figure from
Indonesia. It's made from
driftwood, a god — searching
for the elixir of life — in bat-
tle with a dragon.
From Thailand, Mrs.
Mainster brought back a teak
elephant; their red-and-green
carpet is from Nepal. A wall
hanging in the hallway is a
mixture of cultures: a local
artist created the design, us-
ing pennies from Liberia. The
pennies are long, narrow
metal shapes with a circular
base.
Among Mrs. Mainster's
greatest finds is a collection
of puppets and masks. They
come from the Sudan, In-

donesia, Liberia. Some have
bulging eyes and sequined
clothes and devilish horns.
Others have comical buck
teeth, pointed foreheads and
banana-like noses.
Many of the puppets' eyes
look downward — a deliberate
design as the theater is high-
er than the audience. Some
puppet shows can last up to
eight hours.
Mrs. Mainster also has a
drum and a basket collection,
one of the most unusual
pieces in the latter being a
brown-and-black container —
resembling a backpack —
from Indonesia.Though the
house is overflowing, albeit
tastefully, with their foreign
treasures, Mrs. Mainster has
no plans to curtail her col-
lecting. Her husband also is
eager for more relics, though
he does at times admit, "I
guess we are running out of
space here." ❑

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