Working Girl
Trip Start
Jul 01, 2005
1
15
26
Trip End
Aug 28, 2005
Antigua, Guatemala
Friday, August 5, 2005
Monday, was my first day of work, and I was ready to cry and give up. I officially started work at El Hermano Pedro Public Hospital. Keep in mind that this is public hospital in a poor country which is rare and nothing like the hospitals as we know them in Canada. Most of the people who live in the hospital are both mentally and physically disabled and extremely malnourished. I get to see the effects of this starting from newborns to 12 years old. I am working the Nutritional protection ward where babies who would probably die if not helped, are taken from their families in the surrounding villages to receive free nutrition. Most kids are disabled, and the majority are born with a palalet (their upper lips are parted). I had the experience of trying to feed one of these babies. And you don't know what it feels like when this baby cannot get a good grip on the nipple of the bottle and you just want to tell it, please drink! It will keep you alive. But with a little perseverance, I managed to learn little by little how to get used to each baby and how they each like to be fed.
I got to see how they are bathed and changed also. And it was really shocking to see a giant belly with tiny arms and legs just coming out of it, and to be told that when Maria came in she was much skinner than this. Sometimes I feel like I´m going to break the babies. And everyday I am more and more shocked to find out the real ages of the kids. Some look one, and they´re really 4 years old. Its tough emotionally...and I still got a long way to go.
I have found myself spending afternoons in the physiotherapy ward with Tyler who is doing physiotherapy in school and learning a lot of physical disabilities and just the ways of human anatomy in general. We get to work with older kids, some of which are able to walk and ones that can´t, we try to build their strength and straighten out their limbs and spines so that maybe one day they can walk. Afternoons are even harder because the kids are older and little more conscience of what´s going on. And there are so many of them that have grown beyond getting better, we can only prevent them from getting worse.
So yeah, those are my weekdays, I´m still being worked to the bone in Karate and Salsa is coming along quite well, I think I can dance to a whole song and follow a lead accurately....i don't know if I´ll ever used this skill though.
Bad news, is a hotel in Antigua was robbed by 6 men with shot guns who pointed guns at kids heads and stole everything from the people in there. It is really scary walking around here at night, but if I got robbed, the one thing I would want, are the pictures...nothing can replace the pictures from the last 2 and half months of traveling....I gotta get them out of my digicam...
Well Im off again....this weekend were going to rest ourselves from all of our hardships at the beach up at the pacific coast. Life is so much more beautiful when you have seen the worst of it. I feel guilty, but if we dont relax, were going to all cry. Its tough on all of us, and i´m glad all the people i have met are so warm hearted.
