Thursday, July 30, 2009
Clinic
I'm always challenged each week at our medical clinic. When I think I've seen the "norms" of what I'm going to see, along comes a new thing. Today we had many "normal" things - such as colds, ear infections, lots of parasites, etc. However, today I saw a few things I've not dealth with in Armenia Bonito, but was able to assist! God is equipping me everyday! Amen! One of the things I find really rewarding is health teaching. Things that are so obvious to us - covering your mouth when you cough, wash your hands after you sneeze into them, etc. are not things that kids hear growing up. I did some teaching on diabetes, hypertension, and general health today. I am also starting to have return visits - every 6 months we give anti-parasitic meds, and am now on 2nd rounds with many people. So AWESOME to know that for 6 months at a time I can keep a kid (mostly) parasitic free! All this and pray with them, give out Christian literature, and show them Christ's love! What more could I want?
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4 comments:
Hey Erin, Pat Havener here from Cristo Salva. I whole heartedly agree with you, with God's help and guidance you are making a difference. Between the vitamins and parasite meds, and actually seeing folks every three months we are monitoring chronic illnesses while dare I say, educating? I hope to start midwife education in the fall for our parteras. I love the education! Thanks for making a difference... praying for you!
Pat
Hi Erin:
This is off topic, but I thought I'd mention it. I remember last year you asked for donations of school supplies. I'm not sure if you will be doing this again, but if you are, you might want to mention it now. Here in the "States" the stores are having back-to-school sales and it's a good time to stock on on these things at excellent prices. This week Target has six packs of glue sticks for $1. I know that next week (beginning Aug. 2) Staples will have filler paper for .01 per package. I think there is a limit of five packages. I'm not sure what the other stores will be having.
I know the Honduran school calendar is different than the US.
I know getting things to Honduras is a whole other (major) part of this.
Just something for you to consider.
Blessings to you and your ministry.
Cindy - that's a GREAT idea! We will be doing it again - but our big "problem" this time is we won't be going back to the States this Christmas like we did last year - so we don't really have a way of getting stuff down to us - it would all have to be shipped. So, something to add to the equation. Thanks for the idea!
I recognize it is a problem to deal with the shipping. You might encourage people to purchase items that are lighter in weight (pens, pencils, markers, highlighters, glue sticks, rulers, erasers, etc.) that could be shipped.
For the heavier items (especially paper, notebooks, construction paper, etc.) there may be some people who would want to give money and those items could be purchased in Honduras. Crayons are tricky...I know how expensive they are in Honduras but they are also heavy. I restrain myself and get a dozen or so when I see them on sale for about a quarter, wishing I could get cases of them down there. :-)
I tend to be pretty practical. I try to balance logistics with cost. I love to get bargains but often the money saved in puchasing something on sale in the US is lost (and then some) with the cost of getting them to Honduras. If I that wasn't such an issue my garage would probably be more like a warehouse (instead of a big corner in my office.)
I'd love to do the shoebox Christmas gifts for the church I work with in Tegus but cannot justify the cost of shipping them there. Our church does it for Mexico but we actually bring them to a church we partner with down there. Someday I need to check on how the whole shipping container thing works...cost, customs, etc.
I hope you are able to come up with an practical and economical way to get the items to La Ceiba.
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