Yesterday was a fun day. I got to go back out with Dr. Garcia in the afternoon to the bateyes, like I did this fall. In the morning, I worked here cleaning my room (surprise it needed done I know), and then I logged patients from our clinic this spring. On Day #1, in Jicome we saw 221 patients, at least that got recorded! Not too shabby for 4 providers.
After lunch I spent some time hanging out with Luz Maria. She found one of the pieces from L,R,C in the dirt on the ground that apparently got lost last week sometime. Then I reviewed the hospital tour video that Bryson has put together. Looks pretty cool. If I can I'll post a link at some point.
So the Batey was an interesting excursion. When we arrived there were only about 3 people sitting around, but this was the sight we came upon. A lady was plucking this chicken to prepare for dinner! How disgusting! If I had to do that to eat chicken, I'm pretty sure I'd quickly become a vegetarian! Look how big his feet are without his feathers! Poor guy! :)
After lunch I spent some time hanging out with Luz Maria. She found one of the pieces from L,R,C in the dirt on the ground that apparently got lost last week sometime. Then I reviewed the hospital tour video that Bryson has put together. Looks pretty cool. If I can I'll post a link at some point.
So the Batey was an interesting excursion. When we arrived there were only about 3 people sitting around, but this was the sight we came upon. A lady was plucking this chicken to prepare for dinner! How disgusting! If I had to do that to eat chicken, I'm pretty sure I'd quickly become a vegetarian! Look how big his feet are without his feathers! Poor guy! :)
Inside her home was a sight also. I wanted to take pictures but felt intrusive. In the room we were in was a pile of unripe bananas sitting in dirty water on the cement floor. In another room, which I assume was the kitchen area, was a bottle of Crisol vegetable oil opened with a funnel sitting in it, and probably a few critters and dirt! And in the bedroom was a double sized mattress with sheets, propped on cans or something to hold it up above the ground and a moto without a front tire with clothes stacked up on it. I wish I could reproduce this with solid images because it is just amazing to see how these people live, but always have a smile on their face and continue to survive!
The rest of the afternoon I helped out the nurse by vaccinating and taking blood pressures. One guy had a convenient shirt on. It had a huge rip on the side right where his deltoid was, so all Lucia (her made up Dominican name because her Korean name is too difficult to pronounce) had to do was slip the needle through the huge slit and give the shot!
Another great image for the afternoon, not typical in the states was a lady breastfeeding out in the open. There were easily 20-30 people hanging out waiting to see the doctor or get shots, etc and she just popped out her huge boob and starting feeding him. At one point I think her milk wasn’t coming out well so she pulled the baby off, squeezed her nipple some, and then put him back to feed again! No modesty here!
There were two girls, one age 11 and the other age 6 that came by and got shots and just hung out. Angelina, the 6 year old, loved seeing my pictures so she would tell me to keep taking pictures so that she could look at them. She started with her arm in her mouth, to a picture with no smile, to finally this! A HUGE SMILE!
When I got back I hung out with the kids for a little while before dinner. I sat down with Jennifer on the patio to tickle her upon her request and quickly got attacked by Nena, Joanni and Franchesca, all climbing on my neck. Jennifer and I went over to the basketball court where we played a game that she made up. She placed three sticks down spaced apart. One marked where the “chicken” had to stand in front of, and the other two were where the other person had to walk into, the unsafe zone. The chicken was turned around and the other person would walk up and then the chicken would turn around and chase the other person. The best part is the first time I did it, I didn’t use my chicken arms and had to do it again with my arms under my armpits to look like a chicken!
After dinner I hung out with Jennifer again. I taught her how to say I Love You in English and she went around to several of the kids and a couple of the leaders saying “I Lub You”. It was cute! Then later I pretended to be a monster and chase her around. Right before the movie bell rang we were walking on a dirt path that she had created with her hands.
The kids watched Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs. While they were watching the movie, Heather, Christine, Bryson and I were in the almacen (storage area) sorting the donations this team brought down. I heard several good laughs so I think they liked the movie.
Today I’ve been quite unproductive and unmotivated. The only thing I’ve done is inventory scrubs after lunch with a couple of volunteers’ help! Maybe I’ll go log some more patients from our clinic my first week back!
Here are my most recent pictures. I have a couple of videos of Luz Maria singing that I’ll try to upload soon, they just take a little longer!
http://picasaweb.google.com/Geedz913/KidsPizzaAndJuliana?feat=directlink
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