What a Week!

Well, my week started off on a great track...I saw a birth at the Posta. I was working on Monday morning when one of the nursing interns told me a woman had just arrived and was in labor. So I went back to the birthing room and introduced myself. I was able to feel the baby's position and find the heart beat using the Doppler machine. We thought she was going to give birth relatively soon due to the time in between contractions and the position of the baby, but hours passed. The poor thing was in so much pain, but these Peruvian women sure are troopers. She breathed through it and walked around. There are no epidurals here!

So finally at 3pm, she started pushing. There is no crying or screaming involved with these women. They are told to close their mouths, put their chins to their chest and push, push, push! By screaming or crying out, you lose strength in your pushing, so that is why they close their mouths and buckle down. I was right there as the baby crowned and out he came into the world. Little Sebastian was born at 3:25pm! We waited about 20 minutes for the placenta to follow. The woman, Flora, was from a neighboring mountain community. She is 20 years old and this was her second baby. Unfortunately, her first child, who was born only a year ago, died after three weeks due to a respiratory infection. I hope that little Sebastian is able to thrive.

What a high to feel for the rest of the day. I loved every minute of it and am soooo excited to start my midwifery program now. Births here are just so different than ours in the States. There are no gowns or comfortable beds. The parents-to-be have to buy a piece of plastic, plastic bags, sanitary napkins, blankets and things to clean the baby, etc. They are not provided. The woman wears her clothes and they just put the piece of plastic under her rear and then drape it down into a trash can to catch all of the blood and birthing fluids. Luckily, she does get to spend the next couple of nights in the clinic, but not in her own room. The family has to bring her food. So very different from our amazing birthing suites or even the comfort of your own home!

Tuesday was a fun day as well. I can happily say that I have access to my money again as my debit card finally arrived. I have been 6 weeks without a debit card! I was actually on my way to Urubamba to exchange some US Dollars that Kaitlyn had given me to pay her portion of our tickets to the beach when I stopped in the Serpost shop on the off chance the envelope had arrived. And it had! The Serpost woman and I did a little happy dance. We have become friends over the past 2 weeks as I have been waiting for my envelope to arrive.

I went to teach my health class to the kiddies at the Telecentro after-school program that evening, but the director had totally forgotten I was teaching that night and the kids were not prepared. So I spent the hour helping with homework and playing games with the kids. We will try again next week!

That night we had Laya's birthday party/Kristi's going-away party at the bar. Everyone had a grand time chatting and hanging out. Porfi ran some good happy hour specials for us and Kaitlyn had bought lots of bar snacks. We were all psyched to have some pretzels!

After working out on Wednesday morning, Jess, Amos, Bricia and myself headed out to Rumira to the school there for our cleaning day. We were all more than a little shocked and dismayed to see the absolute mess the room we were supposed to clean out was. Words do not do it justice. You need to see the photos. The room is a large rectangle and it was full of stuff -- eucalyptus trunks, branches and leaves (the director makes herbal medicines), other trunks and leaves of herbs, desks, tables, broken chairs, paint cans, buckets, metal rebar, trash, trash cans, etc. Well, we jumped right in and started clearing it all out. As not one of us are fans of spiders or other creepy crawlies, we were a bit on edge carrying all of the stuff out. Gradually other health volunteers came to help as well. It was amazing that in less than 4 hours, we cleared out the room, distinguished what furniture was salvageable, cleaned that furniture, swept/mopped out the room, and put the good desks/tables/chairs back in. All in all, we saw 3 tarantulas (yes, lots of hopping around and "Oh my Gods" were said in high pitched voices), lots of little spiders, tons of roly poly bugs and 1 scorpion.

The school kids were adorable and helped us with the mopping and cleaning of the desks and furniture. Or next task is to go back with paint and decorations to get the room in order. We had to walk back to Ollanta from Rumira as no combi (communal vans) were available. The walk isn't a bad one, only about 25 minutes but unfortunately it had been raining all morning so the road was pure mud. I made it home absolutely exhausted and completely covered in mud! My shower was heaven!

In the afternoon, I met Santiago at the Posta to clean his leg wound and then did some data collection. I made plans to eat lunch with my favorite nurse intern, Andrea, since she is leaving tomorrow.

I had a great time in the Posta this morning. For some reason they were fully staffed even though Thursdays are slow days. We all just sat around in the reception area talking and laughing. One of the administrative workers who I had been friends with last year just came back from her month of vacation so it was really nice to catch up with her. It is mornings like today that make me feel good about what I am doing. To know that I have built a great relationship with the workers in the clinic is an accomplishment I am proud of. Then Andrea and I spent 2 hours doing data collection. What am I going to do without her helping me read the horrible handwriting in that darn book??? She says she will come back and help me on the weekends but I can't allow that. She has a young son in Cusco and she has to find a job.

Anyway, Andrea and I went out for lunch at a local restaurant and enjoyed each others company. I really am going to miss her. She is very good at her job. She really cares about the patients. The Ollanta Posta needs more nurses and staff like her. Our volunteers and the community wouldn't have such a negative view of the Posta if it was staffed with more people like her. I just had one of those "light bulb over the head" moments -- Andrea would be amazing as our Peruvian health coordinator. I wish we had the funds right now. She has to wait a year before she can sit for her nursing license and is just going to be looking for a job in Cusco to pay the bills. She loves it here. I wish we could work something out. Of course, I would never say anything to her about this until I knew we had money to pay. Something to keep in mind though!

Okay, time to get back to the Posta and back to the snail pace of data collection.

An Amazing Weekend

Well look at this, two posts within days of each other! However, this was such a great weekend, I just had to get back on the blog. Saturday was such a great day with the medical campaign. So last year around this time, a big group of doctors, NPs, PAs, dentists and med students from Idaho came through for a campaign. Well, this was the same group as last year. They had about 20 practitioners in all but had about 50 other students/helpers with them. I had been told to be there around 8:30am to help translate. Of course, I should have known that in Peruvian time, this really meant 9:30am. So, I made a second trip back to the municipality building at 9:30am. At this point, they were set up in their stations -- Dentistry on one side of the room and Medicine on the other. My job was to help a undergrad kid who didn't speak Spanish to go through the lines and "triage" the patients. There was a huge line of elderly patients and then a second huge line of non-elderly patients. The dental patients were on the other side of the building in their own line. What we did was go through and get the name, age and ailment of the patients. We would hand them their paper with either GM (General Medicine), Ortho (Orthopedist), or GYN (gynecology) on it. Then this guy would help them through to the next available practitioner. Bricia was with me and she went to go translate for a doctor. I spent most of the day helping to translate.

We got some good photocopies of stretches and therapy exercises we could do with our disabilities patients from the occupational therapist who was there. The majority of the patients seen (unfortunately not all were seen due to time) were the elderly with joint and back pain due to arthritis. The people here spend their lives walking up and down mountainsides with sacks of produce/agriculture on their backs that weigh a ton. The women carry the babies on their backs for the first few years. So it is no wonder they all have back, knee, shoulder, foot, etc pain. They all also have constant headaches due to dehydration and the arthritis. The people here just do not drink enough water throughout the day. Because they believe that cold water is really bad for your health, they will drink tea but that is really it. Only a few cups a day.

Anyway, at one point I had to run out and when I came back, I saw a man named Santiago in the line. I had gotten to know Santiago last year while I was here. Santiago is probably in his late sixties. He has venostasis really badly in his right leg. Well, for those non-medical people reading my blog, a basic description is that blood will travel down his leg to his ankle, but it cannot travel back up his leg well. So he started getting an ulcer on his ankle due to this issue about 4 years ago. Over the past four years, more and more tissue has become ulcerous and his whole bottom half of his leg is just an open sore that looks like Freddy Krueger's face. I was happy to see him in line because the doctor that had been treating him for this at the Posta was Dr. Arnaldo. He left to pursue a specialty degree last year. So Santiago has been having his dressings changed regularly, but no one at the Posta really had been following him anymore.

Santiago asked me to go into see the doctor with him once it was his turn since I knew his history. We got really lucky in that the Nurse Practitioner who was free at the time had worked in vascular surgery for two years. He knew exactly what was wrong and was very positive about actually healing Santiago over time. We drew quite a crowd around Santiago's leg as the NP was cleaning the wound. Most people could not believe that he had been living with that for four years. They all saw it and immediately said, "he is going to lose his leg". When I said he had been doing okay for the past four years, they were all in disbelief.

The NP cleaned the wound, showed me how to do all the things that would be necessary for continuing the cleaning and treatment. He stressed the importance of elevation of the leg, using a compression stocking (which the NP actually took off his own and gave to Santiago), and taking some antibiotics. So now I am in charge of Santiago's care. The group loaded me up with gauze and antibiotic ointment. I am meeting Santiago every day in the Posta to clean and debride the wound and redress it. Good practice for nursing school!!

Anyway, Santiago was so thankful to everyone and I really believe that we will be able to heal this horrible wound of his as long as he is good about elevating it and coming in for the new dressing changes and cleanings.

Overall, the campaign was quite a success but I couldn't help to think of the ways they could have been more organized and increased the success. Since they come every year, I talked to the guy who is the head coordinator about the possibility of starting up charts for the patients with their information and a picture so it is easier for continuity of care. We exchanged information so that we can get back in touch for next year's campaign. Awamaki can do some more organizing on the local end before they get here. It was just really cool to help out and think about being able to be the practitioner on campaigns like this in the future!

After the campaign, I had some lunch with the family and then went in search of some friends. Kaitlyn and I had a lovely dinner of pizza at Puka Rumi and then watched Disney's Beauty and the Beast. I am such a sucker for Disney movies.

This morning, I met up with Kaitlyn and we went to Jess's to do our P90x since we couldn't yesterday. After an invigorating morning of Kenpo Karate, I headed home to shower and chill with the family. At 2:30, I met up with Kaitlyn, Will, Jessica and Blair to go to the Chicheria in Yanahaura called Descanso. Now, chicha is the local beer made with corn here. I have had some really horrible chicha but also some decent chicha. I have to say, the chicha at Descanso was pretty darn delicious. It was by far the best chicha I have ever had. The greatest thing about chicherias is the size of the glass that they serve the chicha in. It is enormous!! I have pictures I will post. Descanso is in a gorgeous location with a great view of the valley from the roof. We had a fun time playing the "frog game". You try to toss these metal coins into this bronze frog's mouth. Then we just stood up on the roof enjoying the beautiful afternoon sunshine and the views.

I am now caught up in this. We are sick of the Core exercise video on Mondays for P90x so we are hiking tomorrow morning instead. After that, it is to the Posta with me. I teach on Tuesday night. We are going to the Rumira school on Wednesday morning to clean out a big room so we can start the after school program for disabled people in the surrounding communities. Tuesday is also the birthday of Laya and going away party for Kristi. So we will be at the bar, of course. I don't think I have anything planned for Thursday and Friday other than working in the Posta.

What an exhausting week!

Well, I know I haven't written anything of substance in the last two weeks or so. Time is just flying by. My days have been spent trying to read the handwriting of whoever enters patient information in the book at the reception area of the Posta. There is such a wealth of information, however, trying to not only read the handwriting but then understand what the translation of the diagnosis and treatment has proven to be very challenging. I have gotten lucky and had some of the Posta workers help if they have down time. They read and I enter the data, but that doesn't happen every day. As of now, I have finished with January of 2010 (about 200 patients), but knowing I have 11 more months to try to get through in the next 6 weeks is extremely daunting. Plus, my best helper, one of the nurse interns, is leaving on Friday since her placement is finished then. The data is so important that I just keep trying. It is boring but very informative.

I am absolutely exhausted due to my little host-brother's first birthday. Fabricio turned one yesterday. This last week leading up to the party has been crazy. We've been putting together treat bags, cake boxes, blowing up balloons (I believe that I single-handedly blew up at least 125 balloons over a two day span), decorating, buying things, cooking, etc. Anyone who knows me well, knows that I REALLY value my sleep. So this whole week I have been going to bed after midnight and getting up to workout at 6:05am like normal. Now that it is Friday, I am dead tired. My goal is to go to bed at 8pm tonight!

However, the party was a success! Now, I must say, I am a little perplexed as to why my host family would want to spend upwards of 1000 soles (about $360) on this party. Remember, the average income here is only 600 soles a month. I will post the photos today if I can, but definitely by the weekend. You will see just how elaborate the cake was. There was a giant Winnie the Pooh piñata. They had a clown who danced and joked around with the kids for 2 hours. So here is how it all works. Everyone comes in and sits on benches around the walls of the locale. We then go around and serve them popcorn, chips, cheese curls, jello, arroz con leche (rice pudding), massamora (think goopy purple syrupy stuff), cookies, animal crackers, hard candy, etc. All of these things are on little round trays that we walk around with. Then the clown did his thing. All the while, kids are running around jacked up on all the sugar they have been fed. After a couple hours, we finally blew out the candle then the kids smashed the pinata. Imagine my surprise when even adults were fighting their way through the crowds to get candy and stuff. The party started around 5pm and finally around 9pm we served beer and real food to the adults (but to the adults only -- kids are still hyped on sugar). Around 10pm most everyone had left. Then for the next 2 hours, those of us in the immediate family sat around and drank beer and chatted. I was so tired that I had to leave around midnight. Shura and I carried a big box of gifts back to the house.

I really have not done justice to the craziness of the party. The kids were running around helter-skelter. There was a Tigger suit that one of the teenage cousins put on to help the clown. Of course when Fabricio first saw it, he screamed bloody murder. I spent most of my time passing out food, handling the video camera, dancing with the little cousins or making sure Fabricio was happy. All I can say is that I am happy it is over. Although, we have to go back and clean everything up. There are cups and wrappers and popped balloons everywhere!

I have quite a bit of administrative work that I am trying to get organized and finished for Awamaki right now. We are writing up detailed work plans for the projects. I just really worry about the sustainability of some of our disabilities projects and want to make sure that whoever comes in as the next health coordinator can continue these things. Sunny is leaving in June. We need to get some recruiting done. Lord knows I wish I could stay, but nursing school awaits. My old Epidemiology adviser at IU wants me to come and do some presentations to his classes. I am hoping I might pique someone's interest.

The weather is changing here now. We are definitely moving into the dry season. Rain has been rare even though clouds hang in the sky. But the sun is winning right now. Luckily the mountains and valley are still all green. I was awestruck on my drive back from Cusco on Wednesday by the beauty of the valley. The snow-capped mountains were so clear, the fields were lush and green in the sunshine. It was gorgeous. Times like those make me sit back and smile and love my life.

Kaitlyn and I have booked our tickets to head back up to the beach in Punta Sal right before we both go home in May. She is only home for a couple weeks as a vacation (she is here through December). However, we are both looking forward to the beach trip. I think Amos and Bricia are joining us as well. Hopefully Gian can find us a good beach house to rent for the four days for cheap. That would be ideal.

Tomorrow the municipality has organized this gigantic medical campaign with upwards of 70 doctors from the States. We will be there to help translate. I am really interested to see how this goes.

Anyway, my mornings and afternoons for the most part are spent doing data collection. We have started up the health classes again at the Telecentro after-school program. I have those to teach on Tuesday nights. We still do all of our fun social events each week. The volunteer numbers are growing steadily as we head into high season.

I hope all is well with everyone. All my love and talk to you soon! Pictures are coming, I promise. I even will try to post a little video of the bashing of the pinata.

It's Definitely Fleas

Well, I have been besieged with bug bites since I returned to Ollanta. At first, they seemed to like my ankles, then my right leg, then my shoulder/armpit area, then my back and stomach. Now, they just seem to like anywhere they can sink their teeth in. I was perplexed though, because they are not really looking like flea bites. They look like mosquito bites and itch like crazy. So I have been trying to figure out what kind of bug could be eating me alive. I thought maybe it was some kind of fly, but last night, I came to know the truth.

I was sitting on my bed checking my email when I felt something tickling on my chest. So I lifted up my shirt and lo and behold, a flea jumps right off my boob to my pants and then to God knows where. So, it is fleas. I must have some different reaction than other people to their bites to make them swollen. I regularly wake up in the middle of the night scratching the crap out of my ankles and legs due to the itchiness of the bites. I can't even count how many I have. I am now very paranoid about fleas in my clothes. I put my workout pants on the other day before doing my exercise and as I was doing the warm-up, I felt all little bites on my right thigh. So I dropped my pants right there and sure enough, I had been bitten about 12 times in that short amount of time. Ugggghhh, I hate bug bites that itch!!

Yesterday was a really fun family day. We all slept in a bit and it was nice and sunny when we woke up. Celestino cooked pancakes for us (more like crepes) and we had a good breakfast. After breakfast, Shura, Celestino and I bathed our dog, Sando. As we were finishing up with the bath, Celestino turned the hose onto Shura and I so the games began. Remember, it is the end of Carnavales right now so the water games are at a peak. Shura, Ana and I ran to get our buckets and we proceeded to douse Celestino time and time again. He was able to get some good ones on us, so we were all a bit wet, but he was drenched. He never stood a chance with 3 against 1.

I went for a nice hike after changing out of my wet clothes. After a shower, we had a great lunch and then just chilled out. I read for awhile and then we watched the movie 127 Hours. After dinner, I did some reading and then hit the sack. We really all had a great day just playing and chatting and laughing. It was a lot of fun. Shura and I finished up the invitations and envelopes for Fabricio's birthday party. We also made the list of all the things we need to buy for the party. I can't believe they are about to spend over 800 soles on this party. Considering minimum wage for a month's work is 600 soles, that should let you know what they are spending. I plan on helping out with the party.

Today I am heading out to the Yanahaura posta to see how the last day of a dental campaign with US dentists is going. I've been trying to round up Peruvians to go, but no one is interested. They don't really like the dentist here. Probably because they only go when they need a tooth pulled due to decay.

Hope everyone has a good week. Sunny is back so I will be able to focus on the Posta. I have a birthday party to attend for Hallie's old host brother Alex, on Friday. He is turning 11. I bought him a soccer ball. Now he won't have to share with his brother, Luis!

Where has the week gone?

Wow! It is already Friday. I don't know where this week has gone. But the scary thing is, as I am trying to remember what I did on Monday, I really have to dig deep. Oh, yes, I had meetings all day on Monday. My 9am meeting was supposed to be with the woman who is a liaison to the disabilities office here. Unfortunately, she did not show so that was a bust. I had been told on Friday that there was to be a mass for an Intern at the Posta who had died in a car accident. This mass was supposedly on Monday morning, but when I was walking to Jess's house early in the morning for P90X, I saw Eloy (who works at the Posta) and he said that the mass is on Thursday. I love how things are just so disorganized here!

Anyway, we had a brunch for Margo's despidida (going-away). It was delicious, as always. We had bagels courtesy of Jess, crepes, fruit salad, banana bread, yogurt and juice. Yummy! After the brunch, we had our health meeting for the week. Sunny is out of town so I ran the meeting. We have some help from some of Leander's volunteers this week so we planned another toy-making day for Tuesday. I had some lunch with the fam and then it was back to the office for more meetings. I had some Skype dates that day too.

I ended up talking to a 3rd year midwifery student from Yale. She was great and was really able to give me an honest view of the program at Yale. She pretty much told me to go with my gut feelings. I had not gotten a good feeling from Yale when I had my interview. I had some serious reservations about their faculty. Morgan was able to tell me that yes, the Yale program has had tons of faculty turnover recently and that although the faculty are leaders in the field, they are just not good teachers. So, I have decided to follow my instincts and go to Vanderbilt. I am sad that I will not be near my bro, sis-in-law and cutest nephew in the world, as well as near my good girlfriends. But, I have to make the best decision for my future, and Vanderbilt is it!

Then, after dinner, I went over to the volunteer house to watch Inception with Katilyn and Carrie. What a great movie. That was my second time seeing it and I still would like to watch it again to try to figure it all out!

Tuesday's toy making day was a success. My Small Help's volunteers got really into it and made some great toys. Matt is going to be helping Laya build a scooter for Natividad. Natividad cannot walk so they are hoping this scooter will help her be more mobile. We have been on the search for wheels and wood for the past few days.

I slept horribly on Monday night so by the afternoon, I was pooped. I spent the afternoon doing administrative stuff for the health program. Shura and I went to Cusco on a shopping run on Wednesday. We are holding a t-shirt contest for past and present Awa volunteers. Lillie, Emma and I are the T-shirt Contest Committee members. Our job is to decide on the rules of the contest and choose the winners. As I am not creative at all, I jumped at the chance of being on the committee! We had a quick meeting to get the email ready and then Shura and I were off.

We had a great lunch and then shopped and shopped. We had to buy lots of stuff for both Awamaki, other volunteers, her mom and things for Fabricio's birthday party. So it was a very long day, but also very productive. We didn't get back until about 6:30pm. We had some chow and then hit the sack pretty early. I am psyched though because we bought some DVDs. You can get DVDs for $1 here really easily. I just hope they are of good quality. Now I have something to watch if I am bored at night.

P90X is still rocking. I need to add some hikes into my routine, but it is still pretty rainy on and off all day. We have actually had some torrential downpours at night. On the drive to Cusco, I got to finally see the place in the road that fell away into the river. It is pretty freaky to see the road just dropped away. Luckily no one was on the road when it happened. On our way to Urubamba yesterday, there had been a landslide within the last hour so that was freaky too. Huge boulders covered one side of the road.

Yesterday was another long day. I went to the mass at the Posta for Ana Gloria, the Intern who passed away. Then I met up with Kaitlyn and we walked to Rumira to meet up with Leander and the Director of the school in Rumira. He is also a doctor who currently runs his own naturopathic medical clinic. So we talked to him a bit and then went to his clinic in Urubamba. Sunny wants to start up an after school rehab center in the school in Rumira two days a week to allow the disabled children in the surrounding communities some time with peers and to get some rehab. We needed to ask Mariano if we could use the school.

Leander, Matt and I left Mariano to his patients, and then went in search of lunch. After lunch, we went in search of wood for Natividad's scooter. Where is the Home Depot when you need it??? Trying to find wood is extremely difficult. We went to a couple of places but they will only sell you the entire huge piece of wood. We need one that is 50cm x 75cm. We were told to search for Carpinteria Valentin. They should have smaller pieces. But we had no luck finding it. It was starting to rain and we were tired, so we just decided to head home. They are going to search again today.

I have been looking for housing in Nashville, now that I know I am going there. It is exciting! I really like Nashville, so I think I will be quite happy there.

I was up early to get the chocolatada ready today. It was a successful chocolatada. I was able to serve it all up -- no leftovers! The patient numbers have been quite low lately due to the rains. Many people cannot make it down from the mountains due to road closures and landslides. As I walked into the Posta at 7:15am this morning, I saw a huge puddle of blood and a man laying in the Topico room. I later learned there had been a car accident and a woman had died. The man had some head injuries, but he ultimately left later that morning. The scary thing here isn't the actual car accident, although no one uses seatbelts, but the fact that you are screwed for medical treatment in many ways.

After the chocolatada, I have been catching up on this stuff. So it has been a productive week. I am excited because I have date night tonight with Will and Jess. We are going to eat at Puka Rumi and then watch a movie at their house. I like to ingratiate myself in their relationship! They don't mind because they are the greatest. Then on Saturday night, a group of us are going to dinner at the Polleria. That means rotisserie chicken. Yummy!

Well, I hope you all have had good weeks. Starting next week, I am planting myself in the Posta and that is it!!

Drunken Proposals by a 5 ft tall Peruvian

Well, I haven't written since Tuesday, so I apologize, but life just seems to be zipping by here. The P90x workouts have been a great way to start the morning. Shura has managed to get out of bed for every other one. Kaitlyn, Jess and I have moved indoors in Jess's house. We move all of the furniture out of the living room and use that space. It is much more comfortable (other than the really low ceiling so some of the overhead stretches are hard). Plus, we can hook the laptop up to speakers and can hear much better. I think we are starting to get the feel for all of the exercises.

Our toy making day was a big success. So much so that we are going to do it again on Tuesday. I made a jigsaw puzzle by coloring a sheet from the Madagascar 2 coloring book we have, gluing it to a piece of cardboard and then covering it in clear tape to seal it in. Then I drew out the puzzle pieces and cut them out. Worked like a charm and now some of our kids can try to do a puzzle. We also made play-doh, a texture book for the blind women, weights, rattles, stress reliever/squeeze balls from flour and balloons, etc. One of the other NGOs that we are partnering with for raising funds and resources for the disabilities campaign has some volunteers with nothing to do right now. So these Swedes are going to make more toys and try to build a scooter that one of the women needs.

My team won the pub quiz on Tuesday so that was great. We got a free beer out of it! I had a number of meetings on Thursday and again on Friday. The chocolatada on Friday was pretty slow considering this is the rainy season and many of the families from the mountain communities cannot make it down into town due to mudslides and flooding. I was able to catch up with the obstetrics nurse, Charo as well as the children's health nurse, Enrique. They are on board for me to start my data collection in the afternoons. Also, there is a mass on Monday in memory of one of the interns who died in a car accident while doing a health visit to one of the mountain communities. So I will be going to represent Awamaki (and try to round up some other health volunteers).

We are having a good bye brunch for Margo on Monday as well. I will most likely be late since the mass starts at 10am and the brunch is at 10:30am. I have a 9am meeting with Lenny, a woman who is a liaison between Lima and Ollanta's disability office. She also happens to be the mayor of Ollanta's daughter. She is a bundle of energy though and is very good at getting things done (which is kind of rare here). So there is a huge group of American doctors coming down for one day at the end of the month. I guess there are upwards of 8 specialties and as many as 70 doctors coming. She wants help with organizing the program for the day. So I will meet with her about this.

I also have an invitation to eat lunch at Hallie's old host family's house at 2pm. So I will be a fat pig on Monday between the brunch and lunch at Lucy and Ivan's.

Friday night was our pizza party since we had 2 new volunteers arrive last week. I finally got to meet Miguel's little baby, Noah. He is adorable! A good mix of Miguel and Zoneida, I believe. After the party, Kaitly, Lauren and Kristi and I went for a drink at the pub. By 9:45, I was ready to go to bed so it was an early night. But I had wanted to go out for a celebratory drink since I found out on Thursday night that I got accepted to Yale's Nursing School! Now I have a very tough decision to make -- Vanderbilt or Yale???

Yesterday was a crazy day. Celestino is the president of the dance group the Majeños this year. So we had all of the dancers and some of their spouses and other people over for a party. Not all of the dancers could make it, but Ana and her sisters and parents were in fine form all morning preparing all of the food. I had peeled about 25 carrots so at least I felt like I did something. The menu was ricotto relleno (stuffed peppers), papas al horno (oven baked potatoes), tallarine (a baked noodle dish with eggs, cheese, onions and olives), and chuleta de cerdo (pork chops). Of course there were cases of beer, a big tent in the yard, and bottles of pisco and anis. People started coming over around 4:30. They didn't leave until 2:30am! I was enjoying myself just talking to people, when at one point, I returned to the table and two new guys had showed up. They were both already really drunk and one took an immediate liking to me.

What I missed during the next time I got up for a minute, was that the one guy said to all the others sitting around, "watch and see how you can fall in love in six minutes". So as I sat back down, everyone was very interested in our conversation. The guy kept asking me about love and why I was single. He kept calling me his "esposa" and "amor" (wife and love). Luckily I have years of experience dealing with drunken men who like to profess their love to me from working at the pub in England and at Old Town in Carmel. This was no big deal. Of course, I didn't understand why Graham kept saying "cinco minutos, cuatro minutos, dos minutos" (five minutes, four minutes, two minutes). It wasn't until later that he told me the whole six minutes thing.

Once we were finished eating, people started dancing. So my new love wanted to dance too. When we got out on the dance area I, along with everyone else, couldn't help but laugh. I was a good 8 inches taller than him! He was like, you are so big!! I was like, you are so short!! He couldn't even reach his hand up high enough to spin me around. It was hysterical. We managed to dance and then I was asked to dance with tons of other guys. So it was quite fun. One of the guys here, his nickname is Wow, cornered me for quite awhile talking about energy and reasons for life, etc. Yes, he was quite drunk. But he was fun to dance with.

I was getting really tired by 11pm so I said my goodbyes to whoever was downstairs and headed up to my room to hang with the cousins. Ana's family reminds me of my mom's family. Ana is the 3rd of 6 daughters. The ages range from 42 to 20. The family is very close. I love having the extended family here since it makes me feel like I am home with my aunts, uncles and cousins. The cousins ages range from 22 to 11 months. They were making the invitations for Fabricio's 1st birthday party. Finally they all left and Shura and I hung out and chatted until we fell asleep.

The party was still going on, but we were both pretty tired so we were able to sleep through it. I had woken up at 5:30am on Saturday morning and couldn't fall back asleep so I was pretty dead after eating, drinking and dancing for hours.

I had hidden out in the kitchen with the women when I wanted to get away from my short suitor. Emma, my friend who is dating one of the dancers, had followed me in so we all had a good time just chilling in the kitchen. It is so funny that regardless of the country or culture, the women-folk always gather to socialize in the kitchen! Once I found out my suitor had left, I felt safe to leave the sanctuary of the kitchen.

Anyway, today we have been cleaning up and just relaxing. Today marks the first day of Carnavales. So we will most likely be getting drenched with water for the next week anytime we try to walk through town. Boys chase after girls and drench them and girls chase after boys. I try to hide behind groups of old people because they don't get wet.

All in all, a good week. I will be spending most of my time in the Posta from now on, so I will hopefully have some good stories to tell about that. The goal is to collect as much data as possible so we can start to write some grant proposals for programs that target the real needs of the patients.

Wow, what a day!

Today began the official start of my P90X workout regime. Luckily I have rounded up a few game volunteers to try this out with me. We met this morning at Jess's house to pop in our first video. It was just Kaitlyn, Jess and I, but we had a good time. Jess has this area up on their roof that we used. The only issue was that we couldn't hear the video due to the river rushing by us right next door. We also had problems seeing the video because every time the exercise was something on the floor, we would have to move the computer screen so we could see. All in all though, I think we did amazingly well considering we didn't have yoga mats, weights or a big screen tv! Tomorrow is Cardio X. I think we may have a few more people. We have also decided to try to move it indoors in Jess's living room so we can actually hear the instructions. My host sister says she is going to join us, but when the alarm went off at 6:10am this morning, she chose to stay in bed. We will see about tomorrow. I have had to change up my routine from morning hikes to morning P90x and afternoon hikes. I told the girls that if we really do go through with the full program, I am going to take some photos of our surroundings and send them into the P90x people. I doubt they have ever had anyone do their program at almost 10,000 feet altitude in the Andes on a roof!

I ran home and showered and ate some breakfast before meeting Sunny at the combi stand at 9am. We were going to a small town nearby called Piri to do some physical therapy exercises with a man named Mario who has polio. We hopped in a combi and off we went. Mario is 55 years old and got polio when he was 5. His right side is affected. His right hand is curled inward and is very hard to keep straightened. His right leg is extremely weak and his right foot curls downward. So we just did some stretching and then some strength exercises for his arms, hands, legs and core.

After that I went home to play with Fabricio and all the people who were at the house at the time. At 1pm, I met up with Sunny and another volunteer named Susan to do a home visit for a 19 year old (who actually just lives right down the road from me) with cerebral palsy. Jose is a happy guy whose family is very devoted to his care. We just did more exercises with him to work on his dexterity and to try to stretch out his legs. He spends all day in a wheel chair so his legs are tight and in a knees-up position at all times.

A quick lunch and family time and then it was back out to meet up with Leya and Susan to go to a mountain community across the river -- I don't know how to spell the name so I won't even try to butcher it. We waited in the combi for about 20min but since no other passengers were showing up, the combi won't leave with just 3 of us. We decided to walk. We headed down to the train tracks and walked along them until we came upon the bridge over the river and up to the town. We were looking for a blind woman named Albertina. She became blind about 6 years ago and our role is to help her walk better with her walking stick, help her learn braille, and also try to find her a job. She used to be a cook, but can't do that now. Unfortunately, we didn't head up there until 3pm and by that time, the town was in "Chicha Time". We went to Albertina's house but no one was there. So we went to a neighboring relative's house. There we found 3 drunk men and 2 drunk women. Of course they wouldn't let us just leave once they told us where Albertina was. We had to sit and listen to their drunken talk. One of the men was going on an on about the villages that he is President of up high in the mountains. How they were so poor and the children were malnourished and needed education assistance. Throughout his whole speech, which he made multiple times, he would apologize for his drunkenness. Then the mom started speaking directly at me, calling me "mamacita linda" (pretty woman)and asking me to help her youngest son who had been studying tourism in Cusco at the university but recently had a fall and is now unable to finish his schooling. In the midst of her pleas, she starting crying and I was just staring at her like a deer in headlights. This poor woman is crying to me and I can't really do a thing to help her. Luckily her other sons stepped in and came to my rescue. It was just sad. Too many people think that because we are foreigners, we have tons of money to give and can just solve all of their problems.

We finally were able to make it out of that little family reunion with only drinking a tiny amount of beer. They pointed us in the direction of the house where Albertina supposedly was. We had to make our way down the mountainside, jumping over little creeks, all the while thinking, "How in the heck did a blind woman get down here?". We found Albertina with a group of drunk people. She, too was quite drunk. Of course the children were all around as well. We got Albertina out to talk to her and she proceeds to start crying and telling us how her husband has been treating her horribly (we have heard that he beats her). That made us worried about her safety and her small girls. She gets herself together enough to tell us to come back on Thursday morning and how we can all go "camping" and she will make choclo con queso (big ears of corn with cheese). I tell you, the whole town -- which only has about 30 people in it -- gets drunk in the afternoons. You wonder why there is such poverty and domestic violence and the kids run around dirty as all get out.

We made our way out of town and back down to the river and the train tracks. I think we were all a little shell-shocked. The question really is, what do we have the ability to do about the domestic abuse situation? We had just heard one of the earlier drunk men railing about this man in his village who is a known abuser yet nothing is done about it. It is the ethical dilemas that make you really sit and think about what we can do as an outside organization. There is a boy here with cerebral palsy whose family does not care for him well. He lays in his bed all day and his mom only changes his diaper once a day. He lays there in his urine and feces. When Awamaki organized his consultation at a local NGO clinic, they found horrible bed sores all over his backside. The doctors said that if these bed sores get worse, he could get such a bad infection that it could lead to death. His family has said they would like to institutionalize him. There are actually some really great institutions in Cusco, but one of our volunteers who works with him, is staunchly against institutionalization. Ultimately, whose decision is this? What does Awamaki do in this situation? We don't want to be known as the group that takes kids from families, but at the same time, it is a bad situation.

Anyway, as you can see, it was quite a day. Tomorrow, the health volunteers are getting together to make some physical therapy toys to use in the home visits. We really need quite a few things, so I will put together a wish list and try to get some items organized.

Tonight is the pub quiz at Porfi's. Tomorrow morning is day 2 of P90x. I am already exhausted from today, but a little socializing would do me good. We have quite a bit on the social calendar this week, so it should be a fun week.