Yesterday we got up at 
While we were at the beach we arranged to have a big boat come to pick us up and take us for a cruise along the coast. During the little ride the driver stopped and let us jump off the top of the boat. It was probably only about a 15 foot drop, but it took us a while to convince almost everyone to dive off. I was flattered cause all the girls were asking me if I was a diver in school because I dove so “gracefully”. Surprising right?
After warding off (and occasionally humoring) a few salesmen at the ocean we went to a nice hotel for a fancy buffet paid for by the Junta (the organization that sponsors us and manages funding for hospitals). The food was delicious so we all had a tad too much to eat.
When we got back to Guayaquil we had a whole half hour to get ready for our health fair, so I had to go shower-less, salty, and curly haired (yeah, I’ve got shabby curls here). The health fair was at a stake center in the middle of a really scary looking neighborhood. We had a good turn out of probably more than 150 people. We taught classes about CPR, first aid, nutrition, and diabetes/hypertension. We also screened at the end by taking blood pressures and blood glucoses. I found a few women with blood sugars over 300! That’s a big number and probably means they have diabetes. They definitely like their food here, especially fried food and cola. Our teaching hopefully helps a few people realize that they’re lives are at risk if they don’t clean up their act with health and nutrition. It’s not worse than it is in the states of course, but they have their own problems here. None of the people at the health fair were the very poor people who live out in the community. Those people suffer more from severe malnutrition (especially the children) and diseases from the water and soil, as well as the common stuff like diabetes. It’s a lot of work to provide meaningful education about nutrition that can apply to those who don’t have much money. 
So yesterday was a long busy day. We left the hotel at
Today was church. We had a poor nasty little diseased dog follow us the whole way there. We had to keep a close eye on him so he wouldn’t touch us. It was sad.
Church is still a little long when I can’t understand about ¾ of it. The members are still amazingly nice and insist on hugging all of us every week. It’s a great little ward and it’s fun to get to know them.
Since it was mother’s day today, the kids all got up to sing. They were so adorable! Then they ran around and gave all the moms some roses and handmade fans (because it’s really hot here). It was cute.
We convinced a future catholic priest to come to church with us today. I don’t know how well he thought of it all, but it was interesting that he even came. He works with Hogar de Cristo, who put us to work in the community. He has a bit of a crush on a girl in our group (who is putting in her mission papers this week), so I’m sure that had something to do with it.
This afternoon my roommates and I took a long nap. Man, they wear us out down here! It’s going to be another busy week. My group will be working in the community mostly. They have tons of schools that need to be screen and have their information recorded so that their nutritional progress can be tracked. They also have adult groups that get taught and encouraged to join support-like groups that will help with fighting malnutrition and disease. It should be fun!
This is a picture of a few of us in class/devotional/meeting tonight
Ok everyone, be good!
1 comment:
I love it that you were able to swim and have some fun this weekend! That poor little dog, I bet they are everywhere down there. And hopefully your work educating people about nutrition benefits some of them. I tell Erik all the time that fried food and cola will catch up with those who consume it later in life!
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