Hotel Los Portales Piura

... snuggle with Felix- one of the chubbiest and cutest babies I've ever seen, the son of one of the patients and spent time talking with the recovery nurses and family members I had gotten to know. all of our patients have great stories, some have traveled for days to get to us, no doubt their lives have changed. They've recieved something from the team here but we have also gained so much ...

... he froze and tried to tell us (after the doc had left) that he felt better and was going to go home. Around here a smile and a pat on the knee can go a long way in making people feel less anxious so I'm trying to do that as I scurry by 500 times a day. Think of him and his daughter on Monday- they are from a small mountain town and this whole experience is quite overwhelming for them. Fun sidenote, he has a CAT hat that he's been ...

... to Miguel who was delivered via c-section this afternoon.<br><br>the Sierra team got in late last night-they suffered two flat tires on the way back down from the mountains and only had one spare tire...yikes. They are troopers and were bright eyed and ready to head back out this morning. They'll be back on Saturday and then will be taking one day treks next week so I hope to go with them at least once. <br><br>As we started entering the ...

... br><br>Heartbreaking but I look forward to hearing their stories next year. I will try to post more pictures tomorrow, the internet is very slow so it takes a while. That, and most of the pictures are from surgery and are not for the faint of heart or stomach. <br><br>Tomorrow things should really get rolling in the pharmacy as most of today's patients will be moved from the hospital to the recovery building (via mototaxi).

... time I got there it was already 10am and we needed to be at the bus terminal by 11am so that we wouldn't miss our 1pm connection to Peru from Loja. If we missed that one we would have to wait until 11pm and that was just not going to happen. So as soon as I arrived at the bookstore I was encouraging everyone we should go back right away. Unfortunately it was a very interesting and large bookstore with plenty of English books so it was difficult. After about 15 minutes my troupe ...

... given us waterproof towels because when you try and dry yourself you simply end up spreading it about rather than soaking it up. It hardly matters here though, it's so hot all you need do is stand in front of the fan for a minute or 2 and you're done.<br><br>We've had our lunch, crab soup, followed by fried fish with rice and beans, and tamarind juice, all for the princely sum of S/5. now that we've left Mancora we're back to sensible prices for food. <br><br>laters

... walking from Tumbes to Piura. A couple of the groups were quite large, 40 or 50 people, carrying 3 large crosses, others were in groups of 3 or 4. They carried drums and guitars, and the children were strapped to backs when they couldn't walk any further. We bade them Bon Camino as we passed them and made a donation of food to a couple when we stopped for lunch.<br><br>The buses today were a right pain in the proverbial ****, particularly towards the end of the ride ...

... at the response of 'doctor'. Deceided to write down student, which was obviously a much more fitting occupation for the bearded, floppy hair scruff in front of him. However I then felt a little offended (as the youngest baby of the group) when in response to my answer he just wrote it down. Think he must have seen the mature responsible captain sensible (Phil) behind me and i'll blame that! Anyway talking of the ginger one, in his usual autistic way, he wishes to ...

... we have - they had never seen anything like them before.<br><br>We finished lunch and drove into the city of Piura. This is a town at the edge of the vast Sechura Desert and there we saw the huge inegalities in the social classes. On the outskirts of town are sprawling shanty towns set in the desert and in the middle of that was a big Home Depot like store with just about everything you would find in a Home Depot in the US ...

... lady seemed to be wary of gringos who can't speak Spanish, because she didn't ask us a single question besides how long we would like to stay in the country. Again, no one bothered to check our packs, which always speeds up the crossing.<br><br>We could tell we were in a new country almost immediately. There were tourists everywhere (it's officially high season, folks), a lack of a good garbage disposal ...