A New Perspective...

Lance, Chelcy's boyfriend, came down to Nicaragua for the weekend and this is his experience...

In the pouring rain the plane arrived in Managua and it soon became evident how far out of America I was. As the plane touched down safely, everyone on the plane applauded for the successful flight. The evening flight had shown the passengers a heavenly sunset from above the clouds and they began to pray. They were thanking God for their safe journey. This was a place of very thankful people. They did not pray out of necessity, they prayed because they knew they had been permitted a safe journey back to their homes and families. I looked at them and they looked at me. This trip would help me understand who they were looking at.

I made my way off the plane, and through Customs, past the drivers with security clearance, and on to baggage claim. There stood a man holding one of my several bags. "perdon senior" "yes" he replied. I knew I had dodged another opportunity to wish I had studied more Spanish. "You have my bag" "my mistake sir" he responded from below the Yankees hat. So I collected the four checked items and proceeded outside to be met by Chelcy, Molly, and the driver, Eduardo. The night’s air was a hot fog from the recent rain. Someone grabbed my luggage cart and took it to Eduardo’s small truck. The man jumped into the back of the truck and another bag boy handed the bags to him. The man hopped down from the truck and I tipped him $5 American dollars. He walked off. The other man stood in front of me with his hand out. They were not a team. They had no intentions of sharing the tip. I was an American and they were to get every dollar they could. Two dollars and a stern "si, go!" later, the second man left. I was loving Nicaragua already.

We all crammed in the small truck. I remember Chelcy rubbing my shoulders for a moment. I had managed almost 200lbs of supplies and her touch reminded me why I had come so far. It was for people I had never met, it was for everyone who donated to this cause, it was for the doctors who needed gloves, for the patience who needed care, and for me - to see why Chelcy and I have been apart.

The hour commute to Granada was very interesting. The stop signs said "alto" (which I thought to be tall). The horn was used hundreds of times to move pedestrians, automobiles, bicyclists, and animals. Using the horn here doesn't replace expletives like in America; it simply says "here I am." Horses were nearly as common as the as the dozens of motorcyclist we passed. We cut through a small town about half way there and I thought to myself "please don't let this be the place". It was not our destination. It was raining again when we stopped on a street corner in the middle of a town. "Aqui", Eduardo said. I looked out my window. The American car horn in my head honked at the site. Down every street there was a wall, a sidewalk, and a few windows scattered between the entrances to the buildings. This place seemed no different. I could hear the noise coming from inside. “here we go” I thought.

The place was actually Dutch. The bar was packed and as they celebrated the queens birth in the Netherlands. The Orange Party it was called. Room 11 was small about, 12 by 12 with a shower, toilet and sink. I looked up at the fan, dropped my bags, "where's the A/C?" With the flip of a switch, Chelcy brought cool, air back into my life.

After showers, we sorted the supplies and settled in. As I held Chelcy, I thought, "aqui".

The next morning was a day that has changed my life. The driver didn't come to pick us up so I said "let's just carry the stuff." The fifteen minute-8 block walk was only up hill during the second half. I wore a back pack filled with baseball gloves. Each strap of the backpack had a bag hanging from it that was filled with medicines. The rolling suitcase had another bag on top of it and I carried the bat for the baseball donation. Chelcy was carrying quite a load too so we were both anxious to deliver the goods. We loaded it in Eduardo’s truck with the construction supplies Chelcy, Molly, and doctor Moises had purchased the dia before and away we went. Twenty minutes later we turned right. The road was dirt. The road was long. I would return a rich man.

The previous night’s rain had damaged the road. In some places the mud was deep and it reminded me of driving through soft sand at the beach. We got to the clinic and I was impressed by the building. I entered to find the building had nearly no supplies. The delivery room was empty, no equipo. Moises' desk was a curtain away from the exam table which was also the surgery room. We opened the suitcase and he was taken back by the supplies that Chelcy and Molly had provided him with. He finally had what he needed. He could were scrubs now. He could help the people of Santa Ana. It was... an extreme makeover, doctor edition. The home edition was still to come.

On our journey to la casa with the construction material, we passed a farm with a tractor. It was a private peanut farm and the plants were just sprouting. Last week the ground was dust, but today the dark, moist soil was sprinkled with fresh growth. And I was about to be too. Vercidad! I said trying to tell Eduardo to go faster through the mud. It was too late. The engine revved but the back left tire just spun. Moises and I got behind the truck to push it through the muck. Our success was followed quickly by laughter as everyone looked at me. I was now a Dalmatian with mud from the tire thrown all over my white shirt, shorts, leg, neck, shoes, and forehead. The next obstacle was much worse. A 4x4 truck had tried to cross part of the road which had been washed away from the rain. It was now literally between a rock and a hard place.

After realizing we could not move the truck, the tractor soon came to the rescue. After the other truck had been pulled back, it crossed the gap in the road and proceeded on. Now it was our turn. Stuck! He backed up for another try. Moises and I got in position to push the truck. I was just behind the cab. We pushed hard. Our efforts made just enough difference to get the truck through the mud, but they came at a price. As the truck tires gripped, I fell. I was partially under the truck and don't know how I was not crushed. Bloody, muddy, and thankful, I got in the back of the truck to keep going. Normally Chelcy and Molly walk from that point to the houses near where we were going. It was probably 2 miles before… Alto! Aqui!

When I was a kid we would take my friends to what they thought was my house. We'd stop at the ugliest house in the county and tell them we are here. The chickens ran around and the pigs were in pens. That house was a mansion compared to this one, the animals were similar, but this pig was out of the pen.

The house was 15 x 12 (the same size of el hotel room if you include the bathroom) they family had been using some cardboard for a wall where the wind would hit the house for a year. It actually wasn't that bad because the sun would dry it completely when it got wet. We came with sheets of aluminum to replace the cardboard. We pulled away the card board to reveal a house for seven people. The chickens ran from under the plywood mattress, a litter of puppies was awoken by the light coming into the house. One of the girls in the house lay on a plywood mattress just inside the wall. She was coloring in a book with the ink cartridge of a black pen. There was a Bible next to the bed. The floor was dirt and the roof was rusted.

Moises asked if I was "a construction man or a business man" I thought of my French door that didn't close for two months after I installed it and picked up a hammer. We didn't replace a wall. We replaced half of the house. The owner was cutting trees with his machete to use for studs. He was amazingly precise. We started with the main wall. We nailed holes in the metal to perforate it so we could bend it and then hammer it in half. We tore out the rotting, bug infested bamboo that was the wall next to the parent’s bed and replaced it with aluminum. We offset the sheets of aluminum so the wind would blow up into the house but the rain would stay out. We did the same on the other side of the house. It took about 6 hours. We didn't build a home. A home was already made by the smiles of the daughters that watched us work and washed the dishes in the contaminated well water, the father was who had spent his life working with the machete, the mother who had sent the boys to the store to get ice and Pepsi for us as a thank you. Ice. Ice, several miles down a dirt road that was nearly impassable by car. Ice, for strangers that the doctor brought to fix our home. Ice, a luxury that this family dreamt not of. Ice, that had been returned so quickly it had not melted. Ice, as a thank you for the Doctor, the “gringas” and me.

When the construction was completed, Chelcy and Molly talked to Dr. Moises and they decided that they should hand out some of the clothes to the family. The shoes came out as quickly as the smiles on the children’s faces. Each child was placed on the tailgate and the doctor measured their feet for shoes (this made the doctor was approachable for the children). Then came the shirts, then came more children and the giving continued until every child had shoes, even the babies, each child had clothes that would fit them. I gave a baseball hat to the father and then two of his sons. I had brought the baseball gloves thinking I could get enough boys to make a team. I started with the brothers and gave them each a glove and then a ball. His cousins came by so they got one too. Then two more boys came and then two more. They were all so polite. Soon I walked over to the boys and gave them a bat. And said "lets play!" they made bases out of tree leaves. There was a dirt spot for home plate. They all played together. For 15 minutes I was coaching again. Outs were hard to come by because if you hit the ball in the tree it was hard to catch. A few minutes later we said “adios” to smiles and farewells more genuine than I had ever seen someone give a stranger.

Eduardo was the only person in the cab on the trip back. The sun was now behind very dark clouds that covered the closest volcano. Molly, Chelcy, Moises, and myself were in the bed of the truck talking about the job when it started to rain. The rain was washing Nicaragua away from my legs. A strange feeling came over me, as I watched the rain reveal my light skin. I was hoping it wouldn’t all go away. The rain was revealing our scrapes and cuts.

By the time we reached the farm, we were wet. By the time we reached the clinic, we were soaked, we watch the trickle on the side of the road become a stream, then a river, until behind the truck there was no road. But the time we reached the paved road, we were laughing hysterically. We had become the people the people riding the motorcycles in the rain that we saw the night before. We felt alive. We were riding in the bed of a truck absolutely soaked with cool rain water, we were going to eat rice and beans for dinner, we were going to sleep in an air conditioned room, we had water from a faucet, we were wearing shoes, we were tired from helping others. We had given up everything that typical Americans take for granted.

I realized. We were kings....

Clinic days...

This week has been very eye-opening and I have learned tons!!

On Tuesday, Chelcy and I went with Dr. Moises to Santa Ana. It had rained a lot over this past weekend and the land over here doesn´t take very well to the rain. We took a motor-taxi to Santa Ana but the roads were too muddy for the motor-taxi, so we had to walk a good ways through the mud!! We started going house to house and realized that a lot of people were really sick. The majority of people in this community don´t have running water and use water from this well type of thing. What happened was when it rained, it flooded and washed all the dirt from the roads (which includes all sorts of animal secretions) into where there water is stored! So the whole community didn´t have any clean water. The water was the color of coffee and they have no choice but to drink it anyways. So almost everyone in the community was getting sick. It was so emotionally standing there with these families that literally have no clean water and i couldn´t do anything about it. We sat around one man´s porch as they discussed how they could clean the water. After literally hours of discussion, they figured out that they could borrow this bomb, as they called it, that could get all the dirty water out and they they could clean the tank...It then took another hour to find someone that either had money for gas or gas they would lend to make this bomb thing run. So when we left I think that the problem was in the process to be solved, hopefully. It was so hard to believe that they literally had NO clean water at all!

On Weds, I went to San Blas and met up with Dr. Moises. We did quite a few consults in the morning, mostly babies and some old people. We then headed to the outskirts of San Blas on motorcycle to do house visits for the people that cant make it to the clinic. It was a really rough ride because the roads had been basically wiped away with the rain and it took us quite a while to make it over there. The houses back here were very poor and most of the people who live back there never leave their houses because it´s so far. We started on foot going house to house. All of the people we were checking on were really old and frail. A lot of the women have problems with circulation in their feet and it makes it very hard for them to walk. So I took blood pressures, listened to their lungs, the whole sha-bang. Most of the experience I have is with children so it was good for me to work with the complete opposite side of the spectrum, especially because the sounds are different and you need to look for different things. It´s amazing because these people are so poor and barely have enough to feed themselves, but EVERY house we stopped at gave us glasses of refrescos (fresh juice drinks) and bread. I was so full after the first house, but I had no choice to accept because these people have nothing and were so giving and grateful for us going out to them. It is truly amazing what the doctors do here to treat their paitents, and they don´t make that much money at all. So we walked around in the scorching heat for hours and then head back towards the main part of San Blas. We started stopping at houses and I would do interviews with the women about some medical history and about the importance of Pap Smears. I had made a bunch of poster in the morning about the Pap smear and mamogram project we are having next week. Next Weds and Thursday, Chelcy and I and literally going to do Pap Smears and breast exams all day! I´m really excited but a lot of the women here have never had pap smears and are really scared. So thats why Moises and I had to go around and talk to the women. We answered all of there questions and explains the importance of the exam and exactly how it is going to go down. It was really amazing to be able to talk to these women and educate them on what they can do to maintain their health. When we were visiting one of the houses, the wife was very nervous about the exam and we spent about an hour explaining everything to her. Finally her husband spoke up and told her that he never wants anything to happen to her and that he will go with her to get the exam. He said that he knew she was scared but that he was going to be with her the whole time and hold her hand through out the whole exam so nothing would happen to her. That was one of the sweetest things I´ve heard in such a long time. It was truly amazing to see her husband supporting her so much.

Today was another amazing day! I´m getting really good at giving the kids their injections. They never like it, and usually cry even before I give them to them, which makes me feel really bad. We spent about half of the day in the clinic doing consults and then we made the trek back out to Santa Ana to do some more promoting and interviews about the pap smears. I also spent a long time today talking to Maria Luisa, who seems to manage most of the things in the clinic and the comedor. She explained to me about how everything is funded and it really hit me how much they are struggling. I´m starting to brainstorm ways I can help fundraise for them. They only have enough to pay the doctor for half of the day and that sometimes other organizations will help out and pay for the afternoons. It´s so hard because they are all doing what they can to help people, but they dont even have enough money to get all the meds they need for the pharmacy!

So everyday I learn something new and learn to appreciate life and everything I have even more. I think that everyone needs to see these types of living conditions for themselves. It´s very different seeing things in pictures or on the news and actually spending days in the middle of it.

Molly and Chelcy go to Ometepe and San Juan del Sur!!

What started as a weekend excursion quickly turned into a weekend full of adventure...

Day 1:Saturday

Our adventure began with a 5 am stroll to the bus stop. It was still a little dark out and I was still pretty much asleep until I took one wrong step, slipped in the mud and before I knew it I was sprawled out in the middle of the nasty muddy curb grim in the middle of Granada. I got up covered in nasty, probably disease invested, mug all over my legs and a bleeding knee! We quickly laughed in off and tried not to call to but attention to the little incident. Luckily a taxi driver came around the next corner, and took us to the bus stop, and he cleaned up my knee with a little rag he had! The best part was that the bus stop is directly in front of the clinic that Chelcy is based out of, so the snuck me in and cleaned up my knee and bandaged me up before the bus came!

One thing about Nicaraguans is that they can fit an incredible amount of people and things in one very small space. They packed SO many people into our bus to Rivas, Chelcy had to stand for about 30 mins before she got to sit down. It was a very pretty bus ride through the countryside of Nicaragua! From Rivas, we got in another Taxi to the ferry, took the ferry to Ometepe and another taxi to our hotel! The whole trip took about 5hrs! Ometepe is a beautiful but very isolated island made up of two really big volcanoes in the middle of Lake Nicaragua. So finally after a very very bumpy ride, which is an understatement, from the ferry we made it to our hotel!

We had a quick snack we headed to Ojos del Aqua, which is a amazing natural spring with crystal clear, 70 degree water! Oh, I should mention that we got to the spring on horse back, wearing flipflops and shorts! We rode through fields of plantains, rice, corn and wheat, and through the forest to Ojos del Aqua! We swam around for a while, as our horses waited for us, and tried to soak up as much of the cold water as we could! It was a very nice change since it has been in the 90s since we got here! Of course all the locals stared at us, as always, and the little kids ask their parents why our skin looks so weird! It think they are referring to our freckles, because they dont really have freckles here! After enjoy the cold, clean water we jumped back on our horses and headed to the beach!

As soon as we hit the sand of the beach the horses took off running as fast as they could! It was such a rush! The sand was beautiful and the volcano was directly in front of us! I tried to slow down a little for Chelcy and her horse to catch up, but every time my horse got a glimpse of them getting closer she would get a burst of energy and run even harder. It was so amazing because we were literally flying down the beach! Once we got back, I could barely get off the horse! Shorts, wet legs and leather do not do very well rubbing together for long periods of time! So up to this point my injuries include: busted up knee, skin-leather chaffing on legs and ankles, blisters on the hands from trying to not lose my camera on the ride, and back pain from my backpack full of 3 liters of water smacking down on me the whole time...but Chelcy and I both had the biggest smiles on our faces! We were a mess but we were so happy! We went back to our hotel an laid out on the beach overlooking the volcano thinking about how lucky we are to be there!

We finally got up the energy to walk down the beach to his little vegetarian restaurant we spotted! It was the cutest little beach cabana and the food/smoothes were absolutely AMAZING! There was this parrot there that talked to us in spanish throughout dinner! He was awesome!

After relaxing and eating we went back to our hotel to sleep and recover from our day...

Day 2: Sunday

We started our adventure on Sunday at 7 am, so we got to sleep in!! We met up with our guide and headed by truck to the base of one of the volcanoes! We drive about 5 miles an hour because the roads were SO rough, it was literally chuncks of rocks we were driving on! We drove through lots of little towns on a road lined with mango trees. Our guide talked to us about all the different types of plants and trees and about the lifestyle of the families there. He noticed that Chelcy and I would get really excited every time we saw a pig, so he explained that every pig has it{s purpose...one is the birthday pig, ones the Christmas pig, the independence day pig and so on...We didnt really like hearing that! I try to forget that the reason why they have so many animals is because they are dinner! :(

So we finally made it to the base of the volcano and started our hike!! Ive done my fair share of mountain climbing before and this one was pretty intense! It was a very interesting hike through the forest and around dried up rivers. When we first started we heard these loud howling, yelling noises! It sounded like huge gorilla noises! Luckily they were not gorillas, but they were howler monkeys! When we were hiking we looked up into this tree and there was a whole pack of them sitting in the tree above us just watching us. They were very relaxed and seemed to just be trying to figure out what we were! Theres just something about monkeys thats always really cool, especially when you run into then in the wild! We also saw lots of colorful birds, and we saw this big line of army ants moving together in this big unit! It was pretty neat! After our pretty intense hike we finally made it to the waterfall in San Ramon! It was a pretty high waterfall, but unfortunately the pool at the bottom wasnt very big, since were in the dry season, so no swimming for us! We probably sat up there for about an hour admiring its natural beauty and it was so calming up there, I never wanted to leave! I didnt realize how steep the hike was until we started down. Chelcy only had a slight slip and fall on the way down, which is pretty good considering the steepness.

After an exhausting day we collapsed on the beach as soon as we got back to the hotel! I probably should have mentioned earlier that we had a slight dilemma...on the way to the island we got completely ripped off and ended up paying 30 US dollars for a taxi! The problem is that that was pretty much more than half of the money we brought, since everything in Nicaragua has been so cheap so far. We were not prepared to spend 30 bucks on a taxi! And this island only has one ATM machine on the complete opposite side of the island, and theres probably a good chance it doesnt work. So we figured out that we had exactly enough money to get back to Granada, but we werent allowed to eat out or get the amazing smoothies we were craving! Luckily we could eat at the hotel because we could put it on the room which we paid for by credit card.

So we decided we were going to wake up at 4 am, catch the 4:45 am bus and head home...

Day 3: Monday

So apparently while we were off on our hike, swarms of ants decided to infest our room! So we tried to sleep but we keep getting covered by ants and it was horribly hot, with only a single fan trying to circulate air in the whole room...I think I probably only got maybe 2 hrs of sleep. Ive never been so excited for the alarm to go off meaning we can get out of there! So there we were excited to get out of our room, waiting in the dark, listening to howler monkeys, waiting for the 4:45 am bus. So...we come to find out that the 4:45 bus only comes SOMETIMES and we had to now wait for the 5:30 am bus. I m not one to complain but I was absolutely exhausted, ants were climbing out of my backpack, we had no money, bugs kept flying into me and Ive never wanted to get off an island so bad! This negative attitude only lasted about 10 minutes because as soon as we got on the school bus there were of course no seats. So there we stand hanging on to the bar in the middle of the bus, full of Nicaraguans staring at us and we were literally swinging back and forth because the road was insanely bumpy! Chelcy and I both looked at each other and couldnt help but to start laughing hysterically at the situation. It felt like we were on a disney ride the whole way back to the ferry!

So we were sitting on the ferry and I swore that I kept hearing chicken noises. So finally I located the sound and realized 1. yes those were chicken noises 2. and the sound was coming from a potato sack an the ground next to me...this was one of those moments that i just laughed and couldnt believe that im are still surprised by these things!!

So we were definitely being watched over this weekend, because as soon as we got to Rivas we were able to find a working ATM machine! I have never been so happy to see money in my life! Since it was only about 8:30 am and we now have money, we jumped back in the cab and headed to San Juan del Sur!

San Juan del Sur is a cute little surfer town right on the beach about 45mins from Rivas. So we spent the day walking around, laying on the beach, eating Italian food and ice cream! After a rather stressful morning we ended our mini vacation on a good note!

But our adventure was not yet over! As soon as we got back to Rivas, we had to literally run and jump in the back of a moving bus back to Granada! We were all settled in when the bus stopped and was the driver told us that we were at Granada and we needed to get off. We looked around, realized that the bus had stopped on the side of the road in the middle of nowhere. We both looked at each other confused and made it clear that we live in Granada and this was NOT Granada. They assured us that this was Granada and made us get off the bus. We saw some motortaxis on the side of the street and after negotiating prices between two drivers we were now on a motortaxi headed home! We keep laughing about how we had no idea where exactly we were and then we realize that we are getting pulled over by a police man on foot! So we sat in the back as the police officer talked to our driver and then asked us a whole bunch of questions about who we were, what we were doing in Granada, where we were living and so on...I{m not exactly sure why we got pulled over, but I think our driver got a fine for driving a motortaxi into the city? So the police let us go and we finally made it back home!!

It was a very eventful weekend and we literally looked like dirty hippies as we walked back to our houses! It was one of the most exciting and fun weekends Ive had!!

And Ive never been so happy that we had running water when I got home!

Chelcy is putting up pictures on her blog, since my computer shuts down every time I try! The link to her site is in the top right corner!

Time is flying!!

My day started as i watched my 5 cordobas coin drop from my hand, roll down the side walk, jump two loose stones and then jump the curb into a huge puddle of greenish stagnant water...it was actually rather impressive, so instead of getting disappointed that I lost a bus trip worth of money, I knew it was going to be a great day!

I was at the clinic in San Blas again today with Moises! It started off slow and we just hung around talked for awhile. We didn´t do any consults today, but a lot of people were coming in to get some tests and treatments done! The lady with the fungus and open wound came back in today, so I got to clean up her foot and get a fresh bandage on for her! She´s such a sweet little lady, she started to talk to be a little bit more today! I think Moises is getting more confident with my abilities to do things, because today he made me do everyhting and just watched or a lot of the times just left me to do it by self. I did some glucose tests, took some blood pressure, and got to give this little boy his medicine through an injection. I felt sooo bad because he started crying when I gave it to him, but he assured me that it wasn´t because of me, he said it always hurts!

Moises and I spent most of our day doing the inventory of the meds in the pharmacy....so i literally counted every little tablet we had! He said that I really need to practice my proununciation of my numbers, so if anyone walked by they would have thought we were crazy because we keep shouting out numbers back and forth with eachother. He has a 4 yr old so he was making me sing the number song that he is teaching his son! It was very entertaining! He also made me practice rolling my R´s! So it was a day full of learning medicine and spanish!

After we finished with the inventory, which we found out that we have run out of most of the meds, I jumped on the back of his motorcycle with med bags in hand and we went to this families farm. We walked in and there was the cutest little old lady sitting up in her bed. We were there because we needed to change her IV and give her some vitamins. This was probably the most creative practice of medicince I have seen so far! Moises tied the bottle of fluids from the ceiling with a rope so it hangs over her bed, he had to inject the vitamins so he stabbed a hole in the top if the bottle, and then we wrapped the bottle of fluids in a paper bag so the light comming in won´t affect the absorption of the vitamins. I really should have taken a piture! It was so funny looking up and seeing a bottle of fluids with a syringe sticking out of the top of it hanging from the ceiling! I have such a great respect for the doctors here, because they are very limited on supplies but still manage to make what they have work and give the best care they can to their paitients!

I´m starting to put a list together of random thoughts:

1.I have an opened mind on modes of transportation and how many people can really fit
2.A rush of excitment comes when you turn the focet and theres actually water
3.I don´t fit anywhere (feet hang off the bed, head hits the ceiling, knees don´t fit under things)
4.It´s ALWAYS hot!!!
5.Creatures are always in my room (I have this mouse who makes noises at me eveyrtime I turn off the lights)
6.They value family more than anything else here
7.Who ever invented the fan is my hero
8.Everything I´ve eaten has been amazing
9.Either little kids are mezmorized by me or just terrified
10.The doctors down here are amazing and work in very difficult conditions
11. The internet cafe has lady gaga, keisha and pitbull on a constant replay
12.Working outside all day is exhausting
13.Many people live without running water,electricity, clean clothes, real beds
14.Being able to educate these people is such an amazing experience
15. Listening to a fetal heart beat still makes me unbelievibly excited (especially when we have to listen to it here with a normal stethoscope!)
16.Being here and helping these people is the best experience I´ve ever had
17.I might not be able to change the world, but I can definitely do my part!

Amazing days in Santa Ana and San Blas!

The past two days have both been amazing work days!

Yesterday, Chelcy and I went with Dr. Moises to Santa Ana, the extremely poor community I worked in a little last week. Unfortunately I didn´t get to ride on the back of a motorcycle this time, but we did take the mototaxi and then had to walk a good ways through the mud. The night before it rained a lot and it flooded all the streets so the mototaxi couldn´t pass! So we walked through the flooded fields, through herds of cattle and horses until we reached Santa Ana!

We hung around a little talking to the locals and waited at the little community center where we were going to have our lecture. We made a powerpoint, but of course the electricity went out!! So we gave our presentation on the importance of brushing your teeth and washing your hands to about 25 children and their families! It was really an amazing experience being able to educate this people, especially in things that can help prevent serious illnesses! They were very receptive of our little lecture and I think we were really able to get through to them. This things seem so simple to us but to them a lot of this information is new! Hopefully, this next generation will be able to help educate others and the future generation of this community!!

Today I was at the clinic in San Blas with Dr. Moises! He is such an amazing person to watch and learn from, all of his patients absolutely love him and he spends so much time with each individual! We had a lot of interesting patients come in today! I really love working with the little babies the best, it breaks my heart every time I hear one with an awful cough or see a malnourished child. And I realize that I can´t waste my energy being upset by this and instead realize that I am doing all I can to get them healthy and stay healthy!

I got to re-dress the woman´s foot with the fungus and open flesh wound again today!! I think the people I work with think its funny when I get excited to do those things so they just let me do it now! They taught me today how to give injections in the veins, so I´m super excited because I get to do it by myself tomorrow! Yay!!

Dr. Moises is so good at explaining everything and putting me on the spot about what should be done in certain situations. So far I think I´m doing pretty well with responding even in spanish! Everytime he sends me to go work on a patient by myself he calls after me to try not to faint! Haha they make fun of me everyday, I don´t think I´m going to ever live that one down!

We are working on a list of medical supplies and medication, for donations!! They really need anything and everything here! Lance, Chelcy´s boyfriend, is coming to Nicaragua next weekend and is going to fill up his suitcases with donations! Once we figure out more of the logistics of getting donation here I´m going to ask for everyone´s help!! There are so many people here that would be so grateful for any help that you could give!

Las Isletas y Volcano Mombacho!!!

What a weekend Chelcy and I had!!!

We started out yesterday on our adventure to Las Isletas! We got a ride from Chelcy´s host mother´s boyfriends´friend/coworker? lol to this little dock where we could get a boat for the day! The ¨dock¨ was made out of rice bags filled with sand!! And as the water got deeper there were planks of wood held up by other smaller planks of wood! It was a really funny set up!! I took some pictures but I left my camera cord at home :(

So we got on this little boat and started our trip across Lake Nicaragua! Lake Nicaragua, i´m pretty sure is the only lake that has sharks (bull sharks) and the water is so murky and gross looking, so no swimming for us! There are about 300 islands that make up las isletas and some have gorgeous mansion like houses on them! They were saying that you can buy an island for about 100,000 US dollars, which is no a bad deal at all! So our boat driver pulled up to this tiny tiny tiny island with a little shack and a tiny pool...and asked us what time we wanted to get picked up...we took one look at the island and were like...ummm No we want to go see the other ones, so he hesitated and then agreed. We think that his families or friends owned that island so he was trying to get them business. So we went to some other islands! Saw some monkeys!!!! And then spotted this really nice island with hammocks and a little restaurant! So our boat driver was hesitant but dropped us off and we literally laid in a hammock from 9 in the morning to about 4 pm!! It was the most relaxing day ever!!

We literally just laid in the hammocks watched these little kids jump/throw rocks and sticks at a tree trying to get mangoes down!! It was so adorable! We helped a little but once we finally got some down they weren´t ripe! It was very disappointing!

So luckily our boat driver came back for us, which was a good thing because he didn´t seem too happy about our choice of island..lol

So yesterday was probably the most relaxing day I have ever had! It was amazing just laying in a hammock admiring the islands and volcanoes all around me!

This morning we met up with a tour group to start our adventure up Volcano Mombacho!! We started out with a tour of a coffee plantation which sits on the side of the volcano. We walked around the plantation and I had the best coffee I have EVER had! It was soooooo amazing!! Instantly we had way too much energy from the caffeine and starting hiking! We are talking about a pretty much vertical incline up this volcano and it was soooo hot!! So about 2 mins up we were all completely exhausted, out of breath, legs like jello, and completely DRENCHed in sweat!! And that was only 2mins up...we had a longgg way to go!! hahaha I thought that eventually it would flatten out maybe just for a bit..but no! They whole way up was pretty much vertical!! I´ve done some pretty intense mountain climbing but I think this was the most intense! We finally reached pretty much to the top, where they have a little conservatory center. It literally looked like we just stepped out of the shower!

So once we rested up for a bit, we continued our hike through the cloud forest (not rain forest because the vegetation gets its moisture from the clouds, since we were up so high) towards the crater of the volcano! So my biology nerdyness came out as we trekked through this cloud forest! It was absolutely amazing!! There were orchids, bromilliades, trees, scrubs EVERYWHERE!! Up until this point everything we have seen in Nicaragua has been dry and very dusty. This forest was so lush and flourishing! My mom would have been amazing with all the wild orchids!! There was this really cool naturally made tunnel, which was awesome!! This tunnel was made when there was an earthquake years and years ago, and it felt like it had AC in it! I decided that I could totally live in this tunnel! It was so amazing!! We saw lots of butterflies, birds, reptiles and of course cool little insects. We were walking through the forest when all of a sudden our tour guide stopped in his tracks and said he just saw something really big move in the bushes. We all stopped and were trying to listen and were really quiet. All of a sudden we heard this loud purring noise!! It sounded like a huge cat purr!! It was so exciting! They only big cats that live up there are pumas! We didn´t see it again, but it was still awesome!

I figured out today, that I´m happiest when I´m either in the middle of the ocean or in the middle of a forest. It´s so hard to explain but I just get the most amazing feeling when I´m out surrounded by nothing but nature! I keep thinking today about all of the amazing research projects I could do about all the plants, specifically about plants that could be used for medical reasons. I´ve never had the urge to do research before today! But I saw so many things today and it just made me wonder so much about the logistics of this forest. I´ve always had an interest in alternative medicine, so who knows maybe I´ll end up focusing my studies on that!

The treacherous hike was definitely worth experiencing this adventure through the cloud forest! Once we got to the top of the crater there were fields of orchids over looking all over the surounding lakes and cities! It was gorgeous! There are holes coming out of the volcano releasing the pressure of the volcano and they felt like a steam bath! So I got a little sulfur facial today...lol

So what I leaned today is that I´m a complete nerd because I can´t stop thinking about all the trees, animals, different habitats and all the medicines that could probably be made from all the plants..lol!

Luckily it started raining, like downpour, so we get a ride down from the top!! Except it was like a roller coaster riding down because it was sooo steep and twisty! At some points I wasn´t quite sure if we were going to make it down. It was such a crazy adventure just getting down!!

It seems like everything we do here turns into an adventure, or for my brothers sake I´ll call it an expedition (cause that´s safer)!!

So it´s back to work tomorrow!! And on tuesday Chelcy and I are doing a presentation about the importance of brushing teeth and washing hands for the children and hopefully some of the parents at Santa Ana! I´m a little nervous about my spanish skills but I´m sure I´ll manage pretty well!

I´ll try to get some pics up tomoorrow!!