Alfred Mahotu lost a leg six months earlier. After a life as an electrician in Tahiti, he returned to his native atoll, Takapoto, in the Tuamotu archipelago. At 66, this athletic retiree appreciated the simple life of the islands, particularly lobster fishing. But he will no longer fish: while driving his Vespa, he was hit by a drunk motorcyclist. “When I had my accident, the nurse treated me at the clinic and my foot swelled the same day, but I was only transported to Tahiti four days later”regrets Alfred Mahotu, who thinks he remembers bad weather, then a plane occupied by another relief mission in the Marquesas, to explain these delays.
When he arrives at the Tahiti hospital, it is too late. “They didn’t take my leg off right away, I was in pain, but I couldn’t do anything”he remembers. “I have had the same leg amputated four times, piece by piece, every two weeks”, he says without losing a frank smile. Alfred Mahotu doesn’t hold a grudge against anyone: “I called the doctor a butcher, but he still did his job well. And the nurse who kept me for four days, he came to apologize when he found out that my leg had been cut off, so that’s fine, it’s forgotten. » The other patients approve, between fatalism and Christian forgiveness.
“And what happened to the biker? Did you file a complaint against him? »asks a neighbor at the table. “He got nothing and he came to me to beg me not to do anything. So I didn’t do anything, but I told him: “Be careful, it won’t be the same next time”. » ” Ah good ? Do you think he’s going to crash into you a second time? »jokes his neighbor.
After the first weeks of astonishment, the patients of Te Tiare (the name of the white flower emblematic of this overseas region) settle into a routine where humor and self-deprecation help heal the wounds. Located in Tahiti, the only Polynesian inpatient rehabilitation center is also a place for observing the specific health problems of the territory and the difficulties of accessing care for the population. In Polynesia, life expectancy is five years lower than that of mainland France.
The knee prosthesis, a great classic
Fifty-year-old Vaimeho (the people whose first name only appears requested anonymity) broke her leg, hip and arm in a fall, but she never lost her smile . His wheelchair is bulky, with a long footrest for his leg. “You take the whole hallway, you want me to jump over you? », laughs a septuagenarian who has just been fitted with a knee prosthesis. This prosthesis is the great classic of “matahiapo” (“elderly people”, in Tahitian). After five years of suffering, Jacques was convinced by his wife’s successful operation two months earlier.
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