Down to the last week

Well I can't believe it. I only have 4 more days here in Chicacao (the village where I have been living). I am going to Guatemala City on Friday night to catch my flight out on Saturday morning. What a bitter sweet thing. I am excited to see my family and friends at home (and get a warm shower and be in air conditioning), but I am also sad to leave my family and friends here. Clinica Ezell is the best work environment I have ever had, and I am sad to leave the other nurses, staff, and doctors. I feel like I really fit in with this crew and played a crucial role (especially when the Surgical teams came through). I think it helped the Guatemalan staff to have me here as a kind of liason between them and the new North American nurses because I could communicate to both and understood how things should flow. I was blessed by the honor of turning into the charge nurse on multiple shifts as many of the North Americans came to me with questions....and they weren't new nurses either, but ones with many more years in nursing than me. It was quite an honor.

We ended up doing 63 surgeries, and I think so far all the patients left with good outcomes. One little boy, Douglas, was in for a circumcision....bad thing to happen to a 9 year old. He was beside himself at first, but we got him calmed down, and I even had time to play some Uno with him and give him some lovely stick on tattoos. The other patient who stood out to me was a sweet grandma who had a hernia fixed. She started crying and blessing me as I helped her sit up and take a tylenol. She was just tearing up saying how caring the nurses and doctors are at the clinic. It was one of those moments where you know that your life and the life of a stranger are intertwined so closely for a brief moment in time that it feels like all other time stands still.

The other Americans all left last Saturday to go home after a fun 24hr in Antigua. (I got a pedicure, went swimming, and picked up a few more souvenirs.) Once I got back to Chicacao, I was so exhausted I took 2 naps on Saturday and Sunday! The family was so sweet when I got back. The dad, Jose, wasn't home when I got in, but he woke me up from my nap just to give me a hug, kiss, and a chocolate cupcake. I got up with the family on Sunday morning at 5:00am to sell bread and ended up making the chocolate cupcakes that the dad always gives me. Then, I carried a big basket of bread on my head with one of the sisters to the tienda to sell. After, I went with them to the market to buy our food for a few days. I really cherish that time with them.

So, today I went on a mobile clinic with Doctor Walter and helped in the lab/pharmacy area. I'm not sure what I will be doing the rest of the week, but I think the families have some little parties planned for me that I'm not supposed to know about. :)

Other crazy stories from Guatemala:
-So a mouse lives in the bookshelf right next to the head of my bed. Just to recap, I have few little geckos who live in my room, the occassional roach who I usually kick out, and a mouse. I kept hearing something when I was sleeping the other night so I turned on my flashlight to find myself nose to nose with a little blonde mouse. She scurried away, and I went back to sleep.....I've learned just to let things go!
-The other happening was that last night, the power went out in all of the village. And when the power goes out in the only little village in the area, it gets dark, really dark. But it was a fun bonding experience as me and all the other squealing sisters tried to find our way home from church over the cobble stone road with the just the light from our cell phones!
A 4yr old boy successfully french kissed me on Sunday too. Now, just to make it clear, this was unwanted on my part! Some random family member was at the house with her son, and he was like a magnet to my face. I kept pushing him away and the kid was like a spider monkey to my face everytime I sat down or layed down. So, I ended up standing up, dodging a 4yr old all day Sunday.