Life here has been rolling on as usual. Kate and I have a
pretty normal routine with work, tutoring and other things we do in our
afternoons. Clinic has been really busy so we haven’t had much free time in the
afternoons and most evenings I’m beat, so we have been resting and just hanging
out. We have made some really fantastic friends here and its been fun to live
in community and share/learn from one another. Several times a week we have
people over to the house for supper and we usually end up all cooking together!
It’s fun to learn how to make other peoples favorite dishes and to teach them
how to make ours.. we have quite a following for our layered nacho dip! Lol. I’m
more of a baker than a cook and I’ve been baking up a storm! I’m having fun
experimenting with the local ingredients and substitutions. Plus it’s fun to
bake all the desserts I used to love making with mom when I was little.. and
share them with my friends here because many of them have never heard of them.
Nanaimo squares, O’henry squares and carrot cake have been among my latest
attempts.. and my usual: brownies and ice cream. So I’m constantly hosting the
other volunteers over for dessert because I need to eat up what I’ve made to
free up the pans to make more! Our house has been full of people and I’ve
really enjoyed getting to know and working with so many great people! I’m
getting to share life with some beautiful new friends and really being blessed
by the outcomes!
Kate and I recently learned what ‘May day’ is. May day is
celebrated the first of May and is a local holiday here, so we got a day off
clinic! However, apparently in the US, some people celebrate May day by giving
their friends and loved ones secret gifts.. usually you would leave a gift on
your friend’s porch, ring the bell and run… if the recipient catches you, then
they have to give you a kiss. Kate and I were just settling in for the night
when we heard our doorbell ring. I went down to get it but had to kill a
cockroach before I could get the door open.. and when I did, there was no one
to be found.. there was however, two ice cold pop (our fav flavors too!) with
little ribbons tied to them!! We were a bit bewildered until we googled ‘may day
traditions’ and realized that our American friends must be playing a little ‘May
day’ mischief!! :) It certainly made my day!! And although I was technically too late to catch the
culprit and give them a kiss … we politely reciprocated with a few of the Hershey’s
kind today! :)
We have such a great group of friends here and seem to turn everything
into an adventure! Hitchhiking into town to get groceries, liquados
(milkshakes) in the market, going to trivia at a local resort on Tuesday nights,
bartering with shopkeepers as we buying goods/souvenirs, and riding in sketchy
taxis/buses (sometimes the back door flies open or we lose our spare tire in
the road..etc). We are always up to something fun and crazy!
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| Camilla the birthday girl! |
Clinic has been
super busy recently so we’ve been working super hard, but also playing hard
during our downtime! We got to experience a typical local birthday party on
Sunday. The clinic administrator’s daughter, Camilla turned one and she invited
us all to the party! They hosted the party in the lawn at the clinic because
there is a fun swing set for the kids to play on and they set up the waiting
room chairs for the adults to socialize too. There was a bunch of typical
Honduran snack foods and tacos for the meal!
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| little Krista taking a whack (Raul in background) |
And a beautiful Dora the Explorer
cake and piñata!! We had a hoot watching all the kids take their turn at the piñata.
Raul, our security guard at the clinic (who happens to be very ‘grandfatherly’)
was the one holding/pulling up the piñata and it seemed to me that he was
having more fun than the kids were!! We had such a blast and it was fun to be
treated like family and welcomed into their celebration! Feliz Cumpleanos
Camilla!! And in typical clinic style, we had a random patient stumble upon us
at the party who had a fresh machete wound that needed attention. So a few of
us slipped away from the festivities to clean, stitch and dress his wound, and
give him a quick tetanus shot before we sent him on his way again! Then back to
the party we went, as if we hadn’t missed a thing! :)
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| nasty pneumonia Xray |
We have certainly been busy bees at the clinic recently! We
have had a couple births in the last few weeks ( all of which Kate & I
didn’t get called to! Unfortunately! ) and several pediatric inpatients (some who only needed IVs during the day and
others stayed overnight). I have been taking the overnight shifts because I
really don’t mind nights (after lots of practice during my time on Unit1) and
my body seems to adapt to them fairly well. So that has been a new adventure,
doing night shifts at clinic and sleeping during the day (which is way harder
here where it is always over 30 degrees in our room! And everyone else is doing
fun stuff outdoors!) It’s a bit trickier here than home because we are always
kind of ‘on call’ and never know when we might need to keep an inpatient.. both
the last two weekends we have had to take shifts in the inpatient unit.
This
last weekend, we had a really sick 8yr old girl with a bad pneumonia. We took
really good care of her for days but it ended up that the island just can’t
provide the level of care she needed ( her respiratory status was
deterioriating and they can’t do ABG’s here.. and she started bradying down to
the 60’s with the occasional PVC.. which is not a good scene!) so we
transferred her to a hospital on the mainland. I just love watching God provide
the people we need at the right times though! We have a new volunteer, Doreen, in
for just two weeks who is an old Peds ICU nurse, and she was such a valuable
resource and help during this girl’s admission!! And God has been really
faithful to provide donation-wise too! We are getting low on some really
essential things in the pharmacy like children’s liquid acetaminophen.. but we
always get a few more bottles, just as we are about to run completely out! And
we just got 10 bottles yesterday, and that same day we had a baby come in having
febrile seizures!! (so the liquid Tylenol and the box of acetaminophen
suppositories we just had donated last week.. were essential in that baby’s
care!J) Clinic
is so blessed with God’s favor in donations of supplies, money and people’s
time! When I sit back and think about all that people are investing in the
ministry of the clinic it AMAZES me!! We have a full scale medical facility! We
provide a great learning opportunity for many students while simultaneously
serving a large and diverse client population!! How cool is that!!
Emily - you're not only a FANTASTIC nurse but you're also one very interesting writer!! Thanks for such a newsy, interesting post! Looking forward to seeing you soon! xoxo
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