heather in ecuador

waiting

2011-07-07T19:42:00.000-07:00

April 4 is the date on the last post I wrote. Wow. Only 3 months have passed, but feels like a lifetime.

I'm back in Canada now, as anybody who knows me will know by now! And although I've been back for 2 months I'm feeling the need to do what should be (but might not be) a final installment on this blog, which was intended to be all about my life and ministry and adventures in the 3 years I spent in Ecuador. By rights this should have been written long before this, but.... well.... it wasn't. That last month there passed by in a blur of activity and heat and "lasts" (last time to do this or that, last time to go here or there) and goodbyes. And recovering from a crazy final couple of weeks of camp. My daughter Kathryn came down mid April to help me with the packing up of my life in Guayaquil and give me moral support as I said all those difficult goodbyes. And make sure I actually got on that plane! There were goodbye lunches, and get-togethers. I seemed to do much of my grieving over leaving in February for some reason, and by the time I got to the last weeks I had arrived at a very helpful anesthetized state, and tears were mostly left in storage until I got to the airport. The pace picked up dramatically in the last week before departure day, as I did the sorting and distributing of household stuff which was staying, and packing of stuff that was going. And just when it was all good and busy, first Janna, then Nikki came down with dengue fever. Really, I think it was a ploy to get me to stay - get sick and the nurse will change her mind about leaving. Just a theory. No, I'm kidding, of course, it was a fiendish little mosquito.
But somehow it all got done and on April 28 I boarded that plane and through tears said "goodbye for now" to the dirty hot crazy beloved city that was my home for 3 years.

And so back to Canada, to begin my "re-entry" to the North American way of life. Oh, but it was not to be. Within 24 hours of arriving I too got sick with dengue, and for the next 2 weeks was sicker than I've ever been in my life. If there's one way to avoid dealing with the adjustment, it's to retreat to the hospital in a morphine-induced fog! It's been a long gradual recovery, a lot of fatigue to deal with, but I think I'm finally over it, and in a way it's been good - it's been an enforced rest time, time to recover from the incredibly busy and stressful final weeks in Ecuador, and a chance to dwell in a little bubble of being neither here nor there. Also I've been able to spend wonderful time with my family, catching up on lost time. And especially precious times with my grandchildren, getting to know them in person. Grandma Ecuador is finally a person who can dispense hugs and kisses, instead of being a face on a computer screen.

However, this is definitely a strange time, between lives. I'm glad to be here, having a Canadian summer, seeing my family, catching up on crusty bread, and real cheese, and all kinds of other food that couldn't be found in Ecuador (well, I had to get weight back on me after being sick, you know!!). I'm loving the quiet, and safety, and the clean cool air. But I'm missing my life there, and my buddies and my community of Bastion Popular, and my grubby little cement house. (and my hammock!!) I go for walks here and there aren't any little kids to come running, hollering my name, to give and get big hugs. Nobody invites me in for large plates of rice and glasses of "cola". It's a funny place to be in, missing there when I'm here, missing here when I'm there. That's the problem with having one's heart divided between two lands.

I don't know what lies ahead, I don't have a job yet, and am not sure exactly what to pursue. There are days when I'm impatient to know what the next step is and to move forward, but the next step is not clear, and my sense is that God is telling me to wait. He will show me what direction to go in, in His time. And just as I know He led me to Ecuador, I know He led me back and has work for me to do here and will lead me forward when the time is right.

I truly feel that I was blessed to have been allowed this time in Ecuador, it was an incredible gift to me that I feel so privileged to have been given. It wasn't always easy, but it was a blessing. Every bit of it.

2011-04-04T15:57:00.000-07:00

Wow, I just saw the date on the last post I did - 2 months ago. So much has gone on in those 2 months that it feels more like 6 months. So much that I hardly know where to begin. The big picture is that camp occupied much of those 2 months, the better part of 5 weeks over Feb and March. We had 1 camp for junior youth from Bastion and 1 for the youth from Arenal and Playas, our camp community. And 1 week each for children from both those places. Plus a retreat for senior youth and young leaders from Bastion. There were many memories created in each of those weeks, lots of happy times. I especially treasured those times this year as I was able to spend days with those I'll soon have to say goodbye to. That thought always lurking in the back of my head made the days somewhat bittersweet, but I'm so thankful for those weeks. So much has happened that I've had to go back over my (many) pictures to remind myself of some of the happy days.
One of the highlights for me was the 4 days we spent in Balsapamba, a little ways into the mountains, on the retreat for our older ones. It was a very different experience for me, my usual camp role was gone because we weren't in our own camp. No meals to help with, no dishwashing, minimal medical stuff. They even made me be on a team, although I was a somewhat halfhearted participant, not being much use with soccer or games that involve running or jumping, or much else really. But there I was, a member of the Azul team!

But what made this time so good for me was being there with so many who I have known since they were very young, they have grown up into young adults, many of whom are in leadership roles in the churches and camp. Those 4 days were an opportunity for them to relax, not have to be leaders, and hear some very valuable teaching on God's love, presented to them in a way they may not have heard before. And to laugh and have fun. Such fun, those adults all became kids again for those 4 days, and the simplest activity became a reason to laugh. It gave me such a charge to sit by and watch it all. Does anyone have a sense of humour like this bunch?? I doubt it. There was a pool there, and at first I thought - "A pool. Humph. We're used to the beach and the ocean, what fun is a little pool?" Well, I'm here to tell you that this gang had more fun in and around that pool that I ever dreamed possible. I sat on my perch on a rock beside that pool and laughed more than I have in a long time.

We went for a hike one afternoon, and ended up at the bottom of a waterfall. Well, what are you going to do? Go into that freezing water, of course. God provided it as a reason for more fun, so let's go!

So as I take this chance to look back beyond the events of the last few stressful weeks, and remember that 4 days, I'm very thankful I was able to be there for them.

The final 2 weeks of camp were for the children, and as always it gave me such joy to see those kids at camp, at the beach. There was a lot going on in those weeks, but that's another post! As I look back over these 2 months, I see how God blessed us and cared for us, in so many ways.

Christmas in Hope of Bastion school

2011-02-05T07:20:00.000-08:00

I'm backtracking a bit, going back to Christmas, but I just wanted to share an aspect of the celebrations here that so many Canadians (and others) are a part of.

Every year, on the last day of school before Christmas, there is a party for everyone. And it is a party! It starts off with a program in the gym, where the kids all sit patiently, or not, waiting for the main event. Which is where they go to their classes and out comes the food - chicken, rice, potatoes (as it's Christmas), pop, cake. Yes, it's a little overbalanced by the carbohydrates, thus is life here. But of course, what they're really waiting for is Santa - "Papa Noel". And in due course, Felipe gets his gear on, and makes his way from class to class carrying his bag of presents. It's so much fun to watch the kids' faces as he appears and see the little ones inspecting him from various angles and deciding that it's Felipe. Really, the outfit, especially the beard, has seen better days and it doesn't require much investigating to figure it out! Then the kids are called up one by one and given their gift. The gifts are made possible by the sponsors, who send extra funds each year and Nikki goes out on a very big shopping trip! The presents are carefully chosen for each class, and may very well be the only gift that some kids receive at Christmas. Some kids don't have sponsors, but of course still get a gift.

But there is something that I've noticed and has really struck me. Almost better than the gift is the letter that comes from their sponsor (if they have one, and if the sponsor sends a letter). MANY of the kids will receive their bag and before even looking at the gift will pull out the envelope from the sponsor, and read the letter and look at any photos that may be enclosed. The photos will be passed around to their friends to see, and the letter painstakingly read. If they're not good readers yet, they'll ask me to read it to them. They'll spend ages looking at the photos that come, maybe of the sponsor, of the sponsor's family, of Canada.

Then it's all very carefully folded back up and put in the envelope to take home. This communication from their sponsor, who in most cases is someone they've never met and most likely never will, is SO important. I've been to homes where every letter and every photo that has ever come is carefully stashed, and they'll pull out the box or envelope or album and show them to me. They are treasured possessions, and will last long after the gift has been lost or broken or used up.

2011-01-23T15:56:00.000-08:00

It's been a weird week.
3 years ago, I bought my first ever one way ticket. Toronto to Guayaquil, Feb 6, 2008. (Although due to snowstorms and volcanos, I didn't actually set foot in Ecuador until Feb 8, but that story has already been told!) This week I bought another one way ticket, Guayaquil to Toronto, April 28, 2011. And although this has been talked about, prayed about, and been in my thoughts for many months, buying that ticket and booking that flight made it suddenly real. My time in Ecuador is coming to an end. And I can hardly believe it. Both that I've been here 3 years, and that it's over. When I came I was committed to no less than 1 year, but with no real idea as to how long I would be here. I always said that God would make it clear to me when it was time to return to Canada. And over the last year, that's what He has been doing - putting the idea in my head, giving me little nudges, and eventually making it clear. It's time to go back.

I have very mixed feelings about it all, it's all rather bittersweet. I'm headed home to my family, including 2 precious grandchildren who mostly know me as a face on the computer screen. Home to the familiar, or at least what used to be familiar, after 3 years it all seems a lot less so. Home to what looks to me like a quiet, clean, orderly, and COOL world, where I don't have to struggle to understand and make myself understood. But I'll be leaving so much behind too. A lot of frustrations, life in South America seems to be full of them. The heat, the noise, the chaos, the dirt. And.... many wonderful friends, of all ages, who tell me that they're my family too. Established relationships that have deepened over the time I've been living here, and new ones with people I didn't know before I came to stay. People I've laughed with - so many good laughs! And cried with too. People I've talked to, and listened to. I've seen kids in our school growing up, kids change a lot in 3 years. And it's been such a privilege to be here to see the 2 kids I've sponsored since kindergarten growing up. Ronald, who graduated to high school 2 years ago, and Genesis who will graduate this week at the top of her class, and is becoming a fine young lady. And I'll be leaving behind the best huggers on the planet. When I get back to Burlington, who's going to come running as I walk through the streets - "Heather" ('Jeder' with the unique way of saying that!) and throw little arms around me?! And who is going to care for my patients? Well, the answer to that one is God, who loves those people better than I ever could, and will look after them in ways that I can't imagine.

I am headed back to a life filled with unknowns. A slightly scary prospect. But 3 years ago I arrived here to a life that was also filled with many many unknowns, at the direction of a God who I know loves me, and will never leave me, nor did He. And that same God is taking me back to this next phase of life, and I know I can trust Him. And my prayer is that He will use me in a special way in the 3 months that I have left in this wonderful little country called Ecuador.

pavement & needles

2010-11-26T14:24:00.000-08:00

In October I went home, to my other home, Canada, for 1 month. Just 1 month, only 4 weeks, not very long at all (sure went fast from my end!!). But when I came back to Guayaquil, and ventured forth across the dreaded highway to Bastion, I almost had to pinch myself and

double check where I was. Because this didn't look like the Bastion that

I've known for so many years, not at all. That Bastion had mud streets, lumpy, bumpy and pot-holed. Dry and dusty for half the year, and flowing with mud and giant bottomless

puddles in the rainy season. Always a challenge to negotiate my way about, never able to raise my eyes and look around me for more than a few seconds at a time, lest I fall over or into something, or step on any number of undesirables. But all has changed, or is still changing. Now the streets are being paved, and not just paved, but with sidewalks too!! I can hardly believe it, it looks so different now, all neat and tidy, nice smooth streets, much cleaner. As I walk around I keep losing my bearings, that's how much it's changed. And there are new sewer pipes installed. All going to make living in that community so much better for everyone. Now we're all saying - Bring on the winter, the rainy season!!! Oh, it's going to be so nice.

the street with the school

We've been travelling these new lovely streets recently, the kindergarten class has been doing its annual home visits. The entire class, along with the teacher and helpers, all go out and visit the home of each child in the class. We trundle along with the kids holding onto a rope and the adults herding them along and trying to keep them on course. And one by one we visit their homes. In we all go, and the child has to introduce the family members who are on hand, then they all tour the home, see the kitchen, where the child's eating habits are questioned and everyone applauds if we find out they eat vegetables, then to where they sleep, where we find out if the child keeps their bed and (few) toys tidy. Then most moms serve a snack to us all. Last week we visited 6 or 7 houses one morning, and got back to the school full of assorted crackers and cookies, jello, yogurt, pop and one clever mom served us all big wedges of papaya, a nice nutritious snack (but NOT my favourite tropical fruit). I don't think much lunch was eaten that day.

The living conditions differ a lot between the various houses. Some of the homes clearly represent a huge struggle for survival, while others are in better condition and the families evidently are doing reasonably well.

Yesterday when I arrived at the school, a Ministry of Health team was there, vaccinating some classes. I was so happy to see them and find out that they're doing this - not waiting for parents to bring kids to them for immunizations, but coming to where the kids are. It was strange for us Canadians to see, no consent forms, no info for the parents. It just gets done! I joined the fray when they were about to do the grade 1 class, and it was in an absolute uproar. A nurse and doctor were sitting at the desk calmly drawing up all the syringes, and the kids were sitting watching, a number of them wailing and sobbing, and I found 5 of them hiding under desks at the back of the class. So we got them all out in the hallway, and brought them in one by one, and I held the kids in good big "hugs" while the job was done. I confess it was just a little funny to watch the poor little things come in, some of them crying piteously "I don't want to, I don't want to", and others just swaggered in, no big deal at all. I happened to have a camera with me that day, so we got a few pictures. We felt as though we'd been on the battlefield by the time we were done. But I'm very happy to have these kids immunized.

( I have never had so much trouble laying out a page of this blog before! I'm not happy with the way it is, but I've spent too many frustrating hours on it, and this is the best I could do. They've changed something!!!)

lives in Bastion

2010-10-06T13:31:00.000-07:00

I'm just in from some visits around Bastion this morning. I've been doing quite a bit of visiting in the last few days, spending time with people before I head to Canada next week. And in these visits, sitting and talking, I've had it brought home to me all over again just how tough these peoples' lives are here. Home after home, friend after friend, story after story, each and every one pulling at my heart a little more. Life here in Bastion is not just not easy, it is so difficult, beyond difficult, for many it must feel completely impossible. And it didn't just get hard in the last week or month, a little problem that came along and pretty soon things will get better. These are lives that have been hard for years, and will stay that way, there is no corner to turn and find a marvellous easy life wating.

There are my friends in block 10. Invited me to lunch on Sunday, and pulled out all the stops and served me a wonderful meal, which I enjoyed, all the while feeling so guilty because I know there are days when they can't put 3 basic meals on the table for their family. He's been trying to earn a living collecting recyclables from the garbage that others put out. That involves pushing a big old heavy trike around the city picking through piles of garbage to find the stuff that he can sell for a pittance. Never a great way to try to feed your family. But now he's getting too, umm.....mature (I have to be careful here, he's younger than me and I'm not ready to call myself old!) to be out there doing that all day in the heat. He's been unwell for some months, and I finally got him to a good doctor who told him he just can't do that work anymore. Ok, fine. So now what? His wife is finishing her first year of university, studying to be a teacher, in the hopes of being able to get a job eventually. But that's going to take 4 more years. What happens in the meantime? They have kids in school, there are always costs involved. And how do they eat?

There's a family in block 6. There is no husband or father, hasn't been for many years. There isn't anyone earning any money in that house at all at the moment. 2 of the kids have have been through our Hope of Bastion school, now in high school, and one older daughter with a 2 year old. She sometimes gets work in a shrimp processing plant nearby, but gets laid off frequently. And when she is working she gets paid an absolutely ridiculous pittance for beheading and peeling a pound of shrimp. She could work all day doing that and earn $3 or $4.

Then there's my dear friend, her life has been a never-ending series of griefs. I stopped in there for a few minutes, but we began to talk and then the floodgates opened and she told me part, just part, of the last 10 years' worth. She is a single mother too, 5 kids at home. She has struggled away faithfully doing a fabulous job of rasing her kids alone, finding ways to make ends meet. She has a degenerative kidney disease that we are managing, her meds alone cost over $400 a month. Her latest disaster is that one corner of her bamboo house has rotted and is collapsing. Well, just fix it then. Even if there was lots of money, it's not that simple. There's more to the housing story, that's what came out today. She lives behind her sister's house, with her wall maybe 4 feet away from the back wall of the other house. And her sister has decided that she wants to enlarge her house, build onto the back of it. So, too bad about my friend, the only solution offered is to knock down the front of her place and live in the back part to make way for the addition. Which would reduce her living space by half for her family of 6, including 4 teenage boys. Oh, and the corner that is falling - you have to pass through it to get to the "bathroom". So the kids are skinny so they're doing that with great care. So I asked what my friend is doing about facilities. Oh she's going off up the road to someone's house. Oh, and.... you can hardly make your way along her street right now, it's all dug up, they're putting in sewers and finally fixing things up in Bastion, but at the moment that street is a disaster. As I left she hugged me and thanked me for listening, and apologized for serving me a delicious bowl of soup and rice.

And the red tape and paperwork and level of dificulty in every aspect of life here make for other problems. I was in another home this week (another meal served to me), seems like a nice stable little family. There is a father present, and he has a job. Sometimes. He works in construction which is quite different here to what it is in Canada. Here that usually means getting taken on for little jobs here and there. So he's often out of work. There's a 19 year old son, he's finished high school, but can't get a job because of some long involved delay with getting his papers from his school. And without those he can't work.

I could go on. And on. I'm absolutely reeling today with it all. Why is it bothering me so much now all of a sudden? I think I must have got used to things to some degree and been floating above it, relatively unaffected. I don't want to think of myself as hardened. I guess so much time in the last few days spent listening and observing has re-opened my eyes. And now I'm getting ready to go home to Canada for a month. To a rather different world. The homes I've been in here are furnished with the most basic of items, sometimes not even those, and what they do have are things that by the standards of the world I'm going to are fit only for the dump. How can I ever reconcile what I will find there with the realities I know here?

2010-09-04T19:03:00.000-07:00

Back in July (yes I've fallen a little behind on this blog), I was invited to go to a track and field event that a bunch of the kids in our Hope of Bastion school were a part of. I was asked to go just in case there were any accidents or injuries, being as how I'm the school nurse! So I packed a bag of first aid things that I really hoped would be unnecessary, and climbed on the bus with about 25 kids and some of their parents, and we spent 2 long mornings at the stadium here in Guayaquil, perched on cement bleachers, watching to see how our kids would do. And we saw! And were proud!
They were competing in various track and field events, long jump, a version of shot put, but mostly running. And can our kids run! They were up against other schools in the city, including some expensive private schools and our Hope of Bastion children held their own, and came home with their fair share of medals. It was interesting for me to sit and observe the differences in the kids of these schools, those from the obvious "poor" schools, and those from the wealthy ones. There is a definite and obvious class system here still, it was easy to distinguish between the rich and poor. The parents from the weathier schools were sitting around using Blackberries, and were dressed rather differently to our parents. The kids had spiffy uniforms and, this to me was the biggest deal - good running shoes. Our kids had their little school t-shirts the first day, and the second day wore Tim Horton's shirts that had come from someone in Canada. And shorts that had also been a donation from Canada. But didn't necessarily fit all that well! And their shoes - I felt badly when I saw what all but one were wearing for shoes. You can buy very cheap shoes here, we used to call them $3 shoes, they may have gone up to $4 by now. Canvas and a very thin slice of rubber for the soles, absolutely no support, or cushioning, or built in bounce. I saw huge holes in one little guy's, all kinds of toes poking out! But they took themselves, with their inadequate shoes, out onto the track and showed us all that they knew how to run! And they did so well, we came home with 7 medals in all, a pretty good showing for kids from a little school in a squatter area. I wonder what they could do with proper sports shoes!

And the other good news - my bag of supplies wasn't needed - there were no injuries.

2010-07-17T09:51:00.000-07:00

The last month seem to have passed in a blur of activity. It has been a very full few weeks.

An update on my cataract patient. We did go back to the hospital in Milagro on the Monday, and there was power, and she had her surgery. And it seems to have been successful, she has some lingering cloudiness which will be dealt with by laser next week. It means yet another jaunt to Milagro, but the outlook seems good for greatly improved vision for her.

And an update on another patient who I was also feeling a bit discouraged over. My old friend Julian. I first met him soon after I arrived here 2 1/2 years ago. He had a big leg ulcer that he'd had for a very long time. With daily visits for 3 months, it finally closed. Then when I got back from Canada last year, there he was with another smaller one, which proved to be remarkably stubborn, just didn't want to heal, but we won in the end, and got it closed. Then, wouldn't you know it, a couple of months ago, I discovered he had 2 more new ones!! So, there we were back to the same old routine, but they've been very nasty ones, and after caring for them every day for 3 or 4 weeks, we just didn't seem to be making any progress. I had to put in an SOS request to Janna's mom, who is a wound care nurse in Canada, to send me more supplies that I can't get here. But I'm so pleased to report that this week, all of a sudden, he's beginnning to heal. I can see it progressing each visit.

I've had a small army of people praying for these 2 patients of mine, and I feel so encouraged to see the results.

The big excitement of the last month was the visit of my brother Don and his friend Caleb. They were here for just one week, but what a week it was! We packed a lot of activity into that week, I look back at the time now, and wonder if it was all a dream! We saw the required sights of most of downtown Guayaquil - the Malecon, Las Penas, the artisan market, the iguana park, the Central market, had a great $2 Ecuadorian "almuerzo" or lunch. And all that was on the first day! We spent time in Bastion, toured the school, visited my patients' homes, were fed by my faithful friends whose mission it is to fatten me up. I lost the 2 men one morning, they decided to go exploring Bastion on their own while I was doing a dressing, and got so far away that I began to worry. It's not the best idea for 2 prosperous looking gringos to go wandering these areas alone! But we found them, and all was well.

One day we visited camp, out in Playas, so they could see the new house that was built last year and has been named "Casa Heather Berry", in memory of Don's wife. When she passed away last year memorial funds in her name went into that house, which houses the infirmary, the cooks' quarters and the tuck shop, all downstairs, and a guest house upstairs.

We did all that in just 3 days, and then.....we set out on an adventure - to the Amazonian rainforest. What a trip that was. We flew to Quito, then to the town of Coca, where we were met and taken down the Napo River by motorized canoe. Then a 1/2 hour walk through the forest, to another landing, where we were paddled in little canoes across a beautiful peaceful little lake to our final stop, Sacha Lodge, where we spent the next couple of days soaking up the sights,sounds and smells of the rainforest. It was a wonderful place, and a fabulous time. We were assigned a couple of guides, and taken out on trails through the forest and on canoe rides up silent little creeks, where we saw all kinds of fascinating things - monkeys, frogs, spiders, a boa (!) and many exotic birds. And such plant life! On the property is a "canopy walk", 3 towers that rise up above the forest, joined by suspension walkways. You climb up many stairs, and when you arrive at the top, you're above the canopy and can see way across the jungle, the sea of green just stretches out in every direction as far as you can see. What a place and what an experience. It was the one big area of Ecuador that I had never visited and always hoped I'd be able to some day. Never thought I'd get to do it in such style!

We came back to Guayaquil via Quito and were able to spend a few hours there, we went to the Old Town, the historic part of the city, and once again managed to fit rather a lot into a short time. But it was fun and they got to see a city that is quite different to Guayaquil.

And then they were gone, and life returned to normal, or what passes as normal! This house has been strangely quiet since they left.....

2010-06-18T18:54:00.000-07:00

You know how some days just don't seem to work? The days where it seems it might have been better to have just stayed in bed? Today felt like one of those days.

I had to make a return trip to Milagro, where I've gone a few times with some patients who need eye care. I had a hugely successful day there back in October, and blogged about it. But 3 weeks ago I took a lady who needed cataract surgery, and it was done, but at the time it looked iffy as to whether or not it would be successful. It turned out to have been a traumatic cataract, as a result of a blow to the eye years ago, from an abusive husband. The damage from that blow has been lurking all these years, and has meant that the eye wouldn't support the new lens implant, and it has moved out of position. So we had to go back for a second surgery today, using a different technique. So all the arrangements were made.

It was bad from the outset, my alarm clock somehow got moved ahead by an hour, which meant I got up at 4:30, instead of 5:30. 4:30!! I thought it seemed rather dark, and the cat wasn't waiting outside my door like he usually is, but by the time it all came clear it was too late to go back to bed. Oh well, extra time, doesn't hurt.

Then off out to meet my patient and her daughter in Bastion, and make the trek - get a taxi to the bus terminal, get tickets for the bus, find the bus, get to the city of Milagro, get a taxi to the hospital, and....we got there early. So, find seats, and wait. And wait. And watch staff arriving and trying to punch in on the time clock. Not working. Little by little it began to dawn on us that a number of things weren't lookng right. Ah I see the problem - no power. Oh great! But nobody seems concerned, and we do lose power here fairly often. But finally at 9:15 someone thought to call the electricity company, and guess what - it was a transformer - no power for the foreseeable future. Oh really excellent!! Sorry folks, no light, no doctor, no operations, come back on Monday. NNOOO!!!!!!! I don't want to come back on Monday, I came all the way here, and I'm here now. Please don't make me go home. But what are you going to do, I'm a middle aged senora, and a foreigner, and I just can't throw myself to the floor in a tantrum, even though it's what I most wanted to do.
So, out we went, and reversed the whole process, and came home. And Monday we get to do it all over again!!

Life in Ecuador. Always some adventure lurking around the corner.

I have to add, along with the inconvenience that we all had to deal with, was the disappointment of my patient. She's very nervous about this surgery (can't say as I blame her) and had herself worked up to it, and now she has to live through a weekend before we do it. Please pray that this will be a success this time.

There was a positive to the day, however - we got a clinic scheduled for July, when a team from the hospital there will come with their equipment to Bastion and see anyone with eye problems. The hospital is an MMI (Medical Ministries International) project, and this is part of what they do to serve the poor of Ecuador. So it wasn't all for nought!

another trip up the river

2010-05-27T14:15:00.000-07:00

I'm just back from 11 days away (only 11 days? felt like much longer). This was a trip back to the communities up the Onzole river, this time with a "team" and the purpose was to hold medical clinics. A group came from Canada and together with some of us from Guayaquil and Playas, we were 16 or so - 4 nurses, 1 doctor, some translators, and assorted helpers and administrators. Most of us met up in Quito on Tuesday, and at 11:30 that night all climbed into a van, with every nook and cranny filled with suitcases and bags full of medical supplies, and headed off into the night. 6 bumpy, uncomfortable, carsick (not me - I took 2 gravol and never felt a thing!) hours later, arrived at the edge of the river to wait for the canoes that would take us into the interior to the riverside community of Santo Domingo. That part of the trip was relatively quick this time, the water was high thanks to lots of rain, so we made it in about 3 hours. Last time I was there in December the river was so low it took us 5 hours!

We had a couple of days to put in before the clinics could get underway, we arrived just as the entire community went into party mode, it was a huge fiesta to celebrate the founding of the town. It is a very big deal. Parades, pageants, soccer games, fireworks, and.....music. Or should I say MUSIC. Oh my. 2 years ago when I visited for the first time there was no electricity. And it was peaceful, when night fell, we lit candles and listened to the quiet. Just the many jungle insects to be heard. And you could hang out the window and see thousands of stars and almost as many fireflies. But then electricity came in, and changed everything. Now there are speakers as big as your car, and they were blasting at top volume, all day, and all night. ALL night. We could hear that music everywhere we went. Even way downriver, we went in the canoe one afternoon to visit the "finca" (kind of a farm) of a man from the village, and climbed up the hill where we got a wonderful view, and heard....yes, there it was - the music from Santo Domingo!! Ah yes, Latin America. It carried on pretty much ceaselessly until Monday morning. The North Americans got just a little tetchy!

But it was sort of fun to hang out with the people and be a part of the celebrations, even if our hearts weren't in it quite like theirs were.

We finally got our clinics underway on Saturday morning, packed ourselves and some supplies into the canoe and went to spend the day in the village of Colón, 20 minutes upriver. In a rather small cement building we set up a registration area, a preliminary assessment room, another assessment room, and a pharmacy. And that day were able to see about 60 or 70 people, in a clinic which by the end of the afternoon felt very much like a sauna. But by the time we left, it was raining, a torrential tropical downpour, a specialty in that part of Ecuador. We had to drag all our stuff down the 144 stairs on that hill, load the canoe, and put our wet miserable selves into the canoe and head for home in the dark. But, we did cool off.

The next day we went to church in Santo Domingo, then straight off to Zancudo, 20 minutes downriver, and set up in the school, where we had more space, and more air, and it all went much more smoothly.

I have a sight stashed in my memory from the trip home that evening. Once again we set off after dark, but this time it wasn't raining so I didn't have my head down and could see something special. And all the way along, in the trees beside the river, the whole way home, there were fireflies. Dozens of them, flashing high in the trees and low near us. Such a magical sight,I'll always carry the memory of those little twinkling lights along the river.

The following 3 days were spent in Santo Domingo, holding clinics in the school there. We were able to see more than 100 people, men, women, children, babies, elderly folks who had no idea eactly how old they were (not something they ever felt the need to keep track of!). Part of what we did was annual assessments on all the Compassion sponsored kids in the schools, they were very time consuming, but we were happy to see that these kids are basically quite healhy. We saw many assorted skin infections, most kids and adults had parasitic infections, there were pregnant 15 year olds, people with problems stemming from old serious injuries that were never treated properly or sometimes not at all. Cataracts, sore backs, headaches, the list goes on. I saw so many people with health problems related to issues that we almost never saw in North Burlington Medical Centre! Machete wounds - never. Sore backs from carrying water up a steep riverbank to your home, from bending over doing your laundry in the river, wielding a machete on your finca every day. And the skin and parasite infections. It's a very different world there, even to the world I live in here in Guayaquil, a world apart from southern Ontario. We were able to help many, some we had to say, Sorry, I'm afraid there's nothing we can do to help. We worked from 8am until dark on our last day there, we didn't want to have to turn anyone away who needed attention. And everyone was seen, and treated as best we could with limited facilities.

I had what for me was a bit of a disaster, on my second day there my good camera broke, for no good reason. Thankfully I had put in my little pocket one, so I had that, but had to use it very sparingly, as it charges on the computer. None of those in those villages. But I was able to get a reasonable number of photos. I've posted them, link below:

http://picasaweb.google.ca/heathermoore21/OnzoleClinics?authkey=Gv1sRgCPvJ58uxxJmdbg&feat=directlink

2010-04-15T08:35:00.000-07:00

Well, the "crazy season" is over, and did it ever go fast! Can't believe Feb and March have come and gone already, with all that those months bring to us here. 2 weeks of camp for youth in February, and 2 more in March, for children ages 8 to 11, or so. Those weeks were wonderful too. The time with the children is so special, they are so much fun to spend a week with - so affectionate, love getting hugs (so do I!), and they have so much fun - singing their hearts out, playing, digging on the beach, jumping in the waves. And so good too to see the counsellors, our youth, talking to them about Jesus, and doing all they can to give those kids a good experience at camp. The first of those weeks was for the kids in the neighbourhood of our camp, and as happened last year, up until just before camp started there were only a handful of kids registered to come. But The Lord was faithful again and brought us 80 kids, some had been last year, but it was the first time for many. And on the last night we invited the parents to come for a snack (the empanadas) and a program, including a simple presentation of the gospel. Such an important outreach to that community.

Mid-week the first week I made the trip back into Guayaquil, to the airport again, this time to meet my sister, who came for a month. We headed straight back out to camp the next morning, after a rather short night, and Alison got to know our camp. She had planned on being in the kitchen helping with the making of meals, but for the second week our cook had sort of forgotten who she had invited to come and help, and kept on asking ladies, and by the time they all arrived on the Sunday nght before the second week of camp, there was quite a crowd of them! That didn't leave much room for 2 gringas, so we helped by keeping out of the way, although we did get pressed into service a couple of times to help with making many empanadas. Alison impressed the socks off all the ladies with her quick learning of the technique, and then doing it better than anyone else!

Most of my patients in those weeks were counsellors and visiting Canadians, with assorted ailments. But I did have a girl with a gash in the chin from encountering something big in the ocean, which in an ideal world would have been stitched. But I had remembered to take some wound glue with me, and this was the perfect time to use it. And if I say so myself, the end result is rather good - a nice neat little scar.

Then there was the little girl with a nasty "nacido" - an old fashioned boil, over her eyebrow. It opened and drained, and healed up, but in the meantime there was another huge one brewing on her collarbone. Again, in an ideal world, a doctor would have incised and drained it, but camp isn't the ideal world, and I'm no doctor and wasn't about to get into that! So I had to talk her into hot compresses, which didn't make me popular at all, and sure enough, in due course, it looked after itself. Very nasty, and I have yet to figure out why there are so many of these here, in small children. They're not at all uncommon.

And my favourite patient of that week, a little fellow with a cut on his toe, which I fixed up for him, and while I was doing it, he watched intently and then said quietly to a bystander in an approving voice - "She's a very good nurse". And he was my new best friend after that. I love those moments. On the last evening of camp he came to find me, all spiffed up, and took my hand and pressed a shell into it and folded my fingers over it, as though he was slipping me a $20. And that shell is worth way more to me that any number of $20's.

After camp was all done we had a week in Guayaquil to rest abit and catch up on things at home, and then we headed off to the mountains for a week. To Quito first to get a bus to Mindo, a cloudforest area 2 hours out of Quito. And there we spent 4 wonderful days, relaxing, resting, hiking, birdwatching, and - wait for it - ziplining!! Yes, we did, twice, and had a ball! It rained much of those days, but we learned that we had to just get out there and do things anyway, and don't worry about getting wet. And get wet we did, to the skin, but we did and saw lots, and had a great time. Our hotel was 5 km out of town, which made it harder for getting anywhere, but was also good in that it forced us into just taking it easy, and I sat and read, and had naps, and loved the absolute peace and quiet - nothing to hear but a rushing river and birds.

yes that's me cruising through the cloud forest!

Then to Quito for 2 days to get to know that city a bit, and it was beautiful weather there, sunny, 25 degrees, dry - absolute heaven after these months in the city I call home!

Now Alison has gone home, and the kids start back to school on Monday, and that school has been a flurry of activity all week, as the everyone prepares for the new school year. And I'm back to "normal" life, whatever that means here!! I've been back to hospital and doctor visits, some old problems, some new problems. Always problems. More on those next time.

So as I look back over the last 2 months, I give thanks for many blessings, so many gifts from God. 4 weeks of camp, supported by churches from North America, kids protected from serious illness or injury, times of spiritual growth for campers and counsellors. And family members here to spend time with me, and the chance to see another part of this beautiful little country, safety in all of our travels, and a good time spent together. So many blessings.

Camp 2010

2010-03-05T11:22:00.000-08:00

So, a month ago we were gearing up for camp season, and now here we are already halfway through it. In February there were 2 weeks of back to back camps, both for youth, and on Monday we start 2 more weeks for children.

In spite of heading into those first 2 weeks with everyone feeling less than ready, we all must have been more ready than we thought, because it all went very well, they were 2 good sessions, both different from each other, both good.

The first week was for senior youth, mostly from Bastion, and numbers were down this year, due to a few factors. But that made for a more manageable group in many ways, and it was a good time. All the usual activities - groups, soccer games, crazy fun games, beach time, devotions with the counsellors. There were teaching times in the morning and evening, with a speaker who was so good, talked about who Jesus really was and is, as opposed to the image many have grown up with. The kids listened to him, he speaks from his heart.

We had a walk along the beach one morning, teams were to gather up any unusual finds and when we got back the collections would be judged, see who managed to find the weirdest thing on the beach. We came back with quite a assortment of oddities! Then later that day on the beach, there were 2 more contests (it's all about competition here!), one to get as many team members buried in the sand as possible in a given time, and then the other for each team to build an amazing sand castle. It just does my heart so much good to see these kids, ALL of them, even the big ones who consider themselves the tough guys off the streets of Bastion, down on their hands and knees earnestly working on their part of the sand castle, getting it just right, adding a flower here, a shell there. And then they're so proud of the finished product they need me to take a picture of them in the middle of it.

The second week was livelier, we had 120 or so younger kids, junior youth, and the beginning of the week coincided with the national holiday called Carnival. Which, aside from being a 4 day weekend, means that you are completely free to throw water at anybody at all, anywhere, anytime. You can be walking down the street in Guayaquil, and have a hose turned on you, or a bucket of water thrown at you, or be shot at by a water gun. And consider yourself fortunate that's all it is, because it's also ok to throw other stuff - dirty water, paint, flour followed by water, and it gets worse. So being away at camp seems like a good plan for those days, safer somehow! Not this year. All was calm until Tuesday, still Carnaval, and then it started during dishwashing after lunch. A little water was splashed, then more, then dishpans full, then the hose, then paint was applied to hands to be rubbed into unsuspecting faces. It had rained, leaving a lovely mud puddle, an excellent place to roll someone in. It even extended to the games, the teams had to get as much paint rubbed into each other's faces as possible, they were merciless. Nobody was immune. Except - ME! My advanced years bought me some respect, and also any time anyone looked like they were heading my way with paint, I reminded them that IF they got sick during the week, it was me they'd be needing! Worked every time. I did get hosed once, but water I could deal with, especially in this heat!

Each week there was a campfire time, when kids are invited to share what's been happening through the week, and at each one it was evident that God had been working in hearts. There were testimonies as to what God had done, and commitments made to follow Jesus, and tears were shed. As always, it seems so easy when they're away from the world, in the special world that camp is - these kids face huge challenges when they return to the real world of Bastion, and it is our challenge to be able to offer the support and discipling that they need, and also to offer a warm, accepting, loving church community for them to be part of.

The weeks were without major medical issues, thankfully. We had a couple of viruses do the rounds, but everyone survived those, lots of tylenol was doled out. There were 2 stingray stings in one day, but now I'm an expert in dealing with those. The kids look at me as if I'm crazy when I tell them they have to put the foot into a bucket of very hot water, and I know they have serious doubts about this gringa nurse's methods. But in 1/2 an hour, they've changed their minds, and off they go, happy and painfree.

I was delighted to go back into Guayaquil in the middle of the first week to pick up my niece from the airport, and she spent the rest of that week and all of the next week with me at camp. It was her first time here, and she jumped right in, learning Spanish, and getting into the spirit of things, and adjusting to Ecuadorian ways. It was great to have her here, and be able to show her a little of my life here, and see her make friends with my friends. And now I'm looking forward to my sister arriving in just a few days. She'll be here for 4 weeks, she'll be at camp for the first week and a half, and then we'll spend time here in Guayaquil, and we're hoping to get away for a few days somewhere, too. To the mountains, to find some coolness - the heat and humidity here on the coast have been unrelenting the last few weeks.

2010-02-04T15:13:00.000-08:00

Well, it's been awhile since I updated. I guess it's been a challenging time for me, for a number of reasons. I don't plan to inflict all the details on anybody who is still reading this blog. Suffice it to say that homesickness featured around Christmas time, plus the seemingly endless frustrations in trying to do what I do here, and in trying to do almost anything sometimes. Lineups, delays, patients not following directions, the many trips it has taken me to simply renew my passport and then transfer the visa to the new passport. So far that little project has meant 10 trips, 4 to the Canadian consulate, and 6 to the Ecuadorian gov't. department to do the visa. And it's not done yet. And all is not happiness and joy in the 2 churches that I'm involved with and that is hard to see. And then on top of it all. it's been SO HOT!!!!

So after a particularly bad week, at the beginning of January I seized the chance of an empty house to go to the beach to stay for a couple of days, to have a break from all that frustrates and regroup a bit. It was a wonderful few days, a time to listen to the quiet - nothing to hear but birds and breaking waves, a time to breathe clean air, and do nothing but sit and gaze at the Pacific ocean or walk along beside it. It was also a time to be able to pray in that quietness, and do some listening to God. So it was a very body- and soul-restoring time, and I came back to the city with a few ideas as to how to do things a little differently to reduce the demands a little. It has been dawning on me slowly that I am only one person, and can't sustain the way I've been working, with the patients that I now have.

So it's now the beginning of February, and I have stuck to my new resolutions fairly well, which has reduced the burden a bit. The frustrations of trying to accomplish things are still alive and well. I have just come home having experienced 2 huge ones. And these are things that are almost incomprehensible to the average Canadian. Again, I'll spare you the details but if any of this happened in Canada the uproar and complaints would be heard for miles around. Here, you just have to fight the urge to burst into tears and throw yourself to the floor in a tantrum, and smile as sweetly as you can and say, "Thanks, I'll come back." All the while knowing that coming back the next time involves yet another long, noisy and desperately hot trip by public transit!!

But, of course, it's not all negatives. Last week, I was able to be at the high school graduation ceremony of 6 of our Bastion kids who have made it all the way though the education system to graduate and go on to university. These kids are from the very first class ever in our little Hope of Bastion school, and have overcome many difficulties to get to where they have. The odds are against so many of these Bastion kids: lack of money for uniforms and books, lack of parental support, lack of structure and discipline in the home, the wish to go and get a job to have some pocket money. Pregnancy is another huge issue, many of these kids go off to live with each other, with parental consent, at age 15, 16, 17, and of course, inevitably get pregnant. And that's the end of their education!
So I felt very proud of our kids as I watched them get their diplomas last week. It was an enormous accomplishment.

And now school is out and camp season is upon us. The first of 4 weeks starts on Monday. As always, it seems to have arrived much faster than we somehow expected, and we wonder if we're ready. Last weekend we took about 30 of those who will be leaders and counsellors in the coming weeks to camp for a part work weekend, and part training time. Everybody worked very hard on Saturday morning, getting the place ready - cleaning cabins, windows, mattresses, shifting piles of construction leftovers, painting.... Lots got done. And then there were sessions by a great guy from Quito, teaching some leadership skills. It seemed a very young group, but some of the older ones who were not able to be there for the weekend will be at camp.
So ready or not, it all gets underway on Monday. The first 2 weeks will be youth camps, then there's a 2 week break, followed by 2 weeks for children. We have groups of North Americans coming to be a part 3 of those weeks. And at the same time other groups will be arriving via Quito to go to Onzole to work on projects there. And we look forward to seeing how God will overcome the problems, and work wonders in both places.

And.....I am looking forward to having a couple of my own family members arrive to visit, my niece comes next week for 10 days, and then in March my sister is coming back for a second visit, and she'll be here for a month. And I'm SO looking forward to these visits.

So, please pray for us in these weeks ahead. And I will write about them.

Return to Onzole

2009-12-18T21:00:00.000-08:00

Last week Nikki and I went north to visit the jungle communities on the River Onzole, right up near the Colombian border. This involves an 11 hour night on a bus from Guayaquil, not even a little bit fun, followed by a few hours in a motorized canoe up the river, and that part is a lot of fun, for me anyway. I LOVE being on that river, even though it was 5 hours this time. There hasn't been much rain there in the last few months, so the river was very low in places, meaning a much longer time getting in. But I don't mind at all, there's so much to see along the way - little communities whose lives revolve around that river - it's their "road" in and out, with the canoe being the vehicle, how they transport their produce from the little farms to market, where they bathe, do laundry, get water. Dugout canoes going by, loaded with plantains, or coconuts. And then there's the birds and butterflies. So many brightly coloured birds, and I saw a kingfisher for the first time. And a beautiful bright blue butterfly. It never fails to enthrall me.
When we arrive, we stay in the village of Santo Domingo, a place where life hasn't changed very much over the years. Electricity only arrived in the last year or so, and it's often out. There's no running water anywhere, at this time of the year all water is carried up the steep bank from the river. In the rainy season rainwater is collected for drinking.

Heading out for a day at the office...
This was the first time I've been there when the kids are in class in the school. This school was crumbling badly and last spring 2 groups from Canada came and worked with the villagers to reconstruct much of it. It's a huge improvement.

This is how it used to look.
some of the kids from the primary class were glad of an excuse to escape to greet us and pose happily for photos!

What do you think, could these older kids use some better desks to work on??

I went one afternoon with Yadira, who works for Compassion, to a village further upriver to visit a couple of families. While we were there suddenly the heavens opened and I saw these little guys joyously having a shower under a waterfall pouring off a roof.

Then just as suddenly the rain stopped and the sun came out, giving me this photo. What a beautiful place!

There are some astonishing bugs in that part of the world, this guy showed up inside the house one morning. It was just a little smaller than my hand.

This trip was a nice break for me. I only had a couple of patients with minor issues come to see me, and there was no other work I had to do, so I took the chance that God gave me and let myself rest and enjoy the peace of that place. And take a few (okay, a lot, you're only seeing a few!) pictures, which really is the best way of showing you this different world.

2009-12-05T17:37:00.000-08:00

There's a bit of an empty space in Bastion now that wasn't there a week ago. Richard, a young man who I've had a lot to do with, died suddenly and very unexpectedly on Sunday evening. He would have turned 30 on Dec. 9. He had had epilepsy for many years, poorly controlled, and didn’t do himself any favours in his younger years, using alcohol, and maybe drugs as well. He was somewhat disabled from so many seizures, with partial paralysis on one side, looked like he’d had a stroke. He was well known in the community of block 6 in Bastion, all the youth knew him, and he became part of our lives 3 or 4 years ago, coming to the church, almost never missed and present at all events. He was always the first one to sign up for an outing, of any kind, was always at camp, as a camper or as a maintenance helper. He was usually alone, but that seemed to be okay. But whenever he had a seizure, and they were quite frequent, the boys would be by his side in an instant, lying him down, and holding him until it passed. They were very good to him.
I took him to emergency one night in March, and he was sick enough then that I wondered if he would live, but he did, and we got his meds adjusted and got him back on track, and he’s been doing well, even got a job working in a little restaurant the last few months. But then I got a call early Monday morning to say he was gone. He had what seems to have been a cardiac event of some kind and he was gone by the time they got him to the hospital.

And I was thus introduced to a whole new part of this culture, all that takes place around a death. All of it very very different to what I'm used to in my own culture. It started with the "velorio", much like an old fashioned wake, I think. On Monday evening we went to his home, and the entire front of the house had been cleared and transformed to a mini-funeral parlour, with the coffin at the front and rows of chairs set up. We went in, and sat down, and that seems to be all you do. You don't pay your respects to the family, visit awhile, then leave. You come and sit and stay, some would stay all night. We did sing 3 of Richard's favourite hymns, the idea of a few from the church, but that's all. People came in, went to the coffin, crossed themselves and then went and sat down inside or with the many outside too. Many of the tough street guys came and went. At 10, after 2 hours of this we decided that it was time for us to move on, but Richard's mother wouldn't let us go until we had been fed, the customary "rosca", hard dry breadstick rings, and a piece of cheese. And cola. And then we left.

The burial was the next afternoon. We all met at the house, and in due course the coffin came out on the shoulders of some men and was carried out of Bastion, with all of us following on foot. When we got to the main road outside Bastion most of us got onto pickup trucks, and others, mostly men, with 4 still carrying the coffin on their shoulders, headed off along that busy main highway to the cemetery. It was quite a long way, and it was incredibly hot in a full blazing sun, I just don't know how they did it. This is a custom that the poor have brought with them from the country, and have held onto, carrying their dead to be buried. Walking all the way, doesn't seem to matter how far it is. Along the way I was shocked to see how little respect was shown the procession by passing traffic, they just honked and pushed their way through as though this was just some annoying slow moving traffic. I was really surprised to see that in this very Catholic country, I didn't expect it.

(I have to confess that in the midst of all this, part of me was wishing for my camera and a way to take a few photos invisibly. Here was this procession, a little decrepit pickup truck leading the way, with a middle aged gringa perched up on the side in the back, hanging on tight, followed by the walking men, with the coffin wobbling aloft, followed by another 2 or 3 trucks with the rest of the mourners packed into the back. Accompanied by the ever-present vendors trying to sell bottles of water, and the traffic roaring by us, or at us!)

Finally arrived at the cemetery, where there was a little trouble getting someone to open the gates to let us in, and then we proceeded on foot to the grave. Cemeteries here consist of stacks of cement cubicles, not graves in the ground as we know. When we arrived at the right spot, there was a priest waiting, he put on a gown, got a table organized and got underway. It was a mass (Richard came from a Catholic family and this is how they do it). It took a good hour, with everyone standing there. Lots of rituals, all new to me. He had a message too, about how to try to be better people, and the solution to it all was love. And then the coffin was opened so the family could say a final goodbye, and while that was happening I noticed a guy standing by with a bag of cement and water and trowel and bricks, and I realized what that was about. As soon as the coffin was closed up again and slid into its cubbyhole, he got to work, sealing it in. With everybody still standing there, watching. We saw the job through to the end.

It was a sad day, but I was thinking about the many memories I have of Richard, having seizures, being alone, being so sick, I can remember looking at him as he lay on the stretcher in emergency in March, and wondering what the future looked like for him. And he was apparently depressed, one of the boys told me. And now all that’s over for him. He will never have another seizure, he is out of the poverty and difficulties that he faced in life, and he's at peace and happy, in the presence of his Saviour.

2009-11-12T18:32:00.000-08:00

On Monday we had another trip back to Milagro, to the eye hospital there, this time with 8 patients, 5 kids and 3 adults. The little gray van came all the way here again to get us, everybody showed up on time, and off we went. The rest of the day didn't go quite as smoothly as it had the first time, the place was incredibly busy and both doctors who we were seeing had been away for 2 weeks, and were operating when we got there, so we had to wait our turn with the throngs this time. However, in due course, everybody was seen, diagnoses made, glasses prescribed, and a couple of patients got appointments to go back to see a retinal specialist coming from the States in December.

But the point of this story has to do with how I was struck anew by the realities of some peoples' lives. I know these families, I know their lives, and yet it's easy sometimes to forget about their struggles. But it hit me hard this week, again.
Sonia is an 11 year old, child of a family I know well, goes to our school. I've known that she needs glasses, has had trouble seeing at school, but I didn't know where to take her, until I crossed paths with this ophthalmologist. So she came along with us on Monday and was given a prescription for glasses. Perfect. What I didn't find out until we were all on the bus on our way home, was that she could have got the glasses there for $40. Good deal, eh? Try to find glasses in Canada for $40. But she didn't get them, because $40 for this family might as well have been $4,000. Completely out of the question.
Her father had a good job until a few years ago, earning enough to look after the family well. But then the company closed, and he lost his job. And he has never been able to get another one, he's 50 now, and it's hard enough to find a job if you're in your 20's. So he has been taking out his big tricycle affair, travelling the streets and picking through other people's garbage for anything that is recyclable. It all goes to a depot that pays cash for that stuff, and that's how he has been trying to support his family. These people get paid a pittance for the garbage they collect. And he has a bad knee and back pain. They tried raising chickens to sell, but they were doing it in a very tiny yard area, and the chickens were getting sick and dying. So recently an "opportunity" came their way: someone they knew has a business making almuerzos, the typical Ecuadorian midday meal, for workers, and delivering the meals to the workplace. The food goes in flimsy plastic containers, which they are reusing. That's great, less garbage on these streets. But they all have to be washed. And we apparently are talking several hundred meals. This is not a one person job. So father, mother and teenage son are all going off every day to spend hours, I mean HOURS, washing these things. It's taking 3 of them something like 6 hours to get the job done. And for this they get paid - brace yourselves - $30, no not each, that's what the combined effort earns, per week!! Oh, and deduct bus fare for 3 people. That leaves them with $25.
That's why $40 glasses were out of the question.
They now have the money, and Sonia will see.

2009-10-30T18:13:00.000-07:00

End of October. Fall is in full swing in Canada, winter is looming. Here, it's hard to mark the seasons, not much changes, I have to keep thinking, What month is this now? There's nothing to relate it to. The weather is either hot or hotter, or sometimes, less hot. It wasn't too bad for the first few weeks I was back, but then the clouds all left town, and every day was sunny and clear, with blazing blue skies, and and absolutely scorching sun. Just the idea of going out anywhere was too much to think about. I learned to time my journeys, out in the morning, lurk inside for the afternoon if at all possible, then venture forth again at 5 when the heat subsides a bit. But in the last week or so the clouds have returned with some blessed relief from that fireball in the sky. And the rainy season is getting closer. Not a drop of rain has fallen on this city in months. The months ahead will more than make up for that!

I feel as though most of the last 6 weeks have been spent in 3 hospitals here in the city. I tell people now - If you can't find me at home, check the hospitals, I'll be there! Start with the Solca, the cancer hospital. My friend Lenny has started chemo for ovarian cancer, and at the same time is having treatment for some TB lesions they found during surgery. So all of that means 5 separate trips to that hospital every 3 to 4 weeks. 2 for bloodwork, 2 for doctor visits, and 1 for chemo. All of which involve many hours of waiting. After the oncology visit, we have to launch off on a round of joining other lines to get the chemo in place for the next day - that usually takes 5 to 6 hours. Then the chemo is a 6 hour session. But Lenny is taking it all in very good form. It's even less fun for her! Her hair has all fallen out, and she's acquired a wig from someone, and in private she likes to whip it off and show me her "coco blanco" - white coconut!! And she seems to be coping quite well with the treatment, a couple of days of feeling lousy after the chemo, but then she bounces back. So in the meantime I pray that this is accomplishing what we're hoping for, a recovery for her so she can continue to care for her young family.
Then too, in between all the Solca trips have been waits on benches at the other 2 hospitals I frequent (I am actually known at these places now, they greet me like an old friend!), with other people who need medical attention for one thing or another. I have to remember to pack snacks, water, a book, and a sweater - these hospitals are vigorously air conditioned in places. Sometimes these visits are successful, sometimes hair-pullingly frustrating. Always an education.

In the midst of all these at times discouraging hospital trips, I've had a big positive. Through a Canadian contact, I've been put in touch with a ophthalmologist here, just when I really needed a good one for a couple of people. He has been wonderful, seeing my patients, not accepting payment, and a couple of weeks ago, arranged an expedition for me and a handful of people with eye problems, to a clinic he is associated with in Milagro, a town an hour away. It was founded and is run by MMI (Medical Ministry International), and is there for the poor. So a van came all the way here to collect me and my group, and took us there, where we were treated like royalty. Forms filled in, testing done, then our doctor saw them all in between his OR patients, and then suddenly, my old friend Julian was being taken in to have his cataract removed - just like that!! That day felt like a gift to me. We're saying it was a milagro in Milagro (the word means 'miracle'). We have another trip planned in a week, to take 5 or 6 kids to see the pediatric eye specialist there. All from a "chance" encounter with an old friend while I was in Canada. Any doubt that God is always working away there, out of sight? Not one!

Our Canadian group is now complete again. The last of our number, Nikki, got back from her time in Canada on the weekend. For a couple of weeks in August, Janna was the only one of us here, all the rest had headed back to Canada at various times over the summer. First me, then the Horst family, then Luke, then Nikki. But we're all back now, and getting on with what God has for each of us here.

I'm looking forward to another trip back to the jungle communities up the Onzole river later this month, finally. It's almost a year since I've been there, and I can't wait to go back and see my friends there. Stay tuned for news on that!

2009-09-18T13:16:00.000-07:00

I've been back in Ecuador for a month now, and life here has absorbed me again. I've had some difficult days as I've struggled to adjust to life without the presence of all my family and friends again, there are times of loneliness, but I am adjusting to that and not feeling the gap so badly now.

(I've just been given a huge boost - my internet guy was just here to be paid, haven't seen him since April, and he says my Spanish is MUCH better than it was, in fact he went so far as to say it's good!!! Hey how about that? I think I may have just been having a good moment, but I'll take it!)

As I say, I feel as though I've been re-absorbed into this life. There have been all kinds of happenings, good and bad, fun and not much fun at all. A couple of weeks ago I went to camp for the day with the Kids' Club from Block 6, along with a few of the mothers and the leaders, and we had a great day. The weather was gray and windy and cold - yes, cold - I never had my sweater off all day! But everybody had a fine time anyway. The kids all went into that cold gray pacific ocean, so different to the one I'm used to in February and March when camp is on. They came out little frozen shivering penguins with blue lips, but had a ball of course. Played games, buried each other in the sand, collected the bumper crop of sand dollars, and the mothers welcomed a chance to be away from their usual lives in Bastion, if just for a day. And it was a good chance for me to be able to spend some informal time with them and get to know some of them better.

I've been able to spend time with some of my friends, having chats and catching up, the kids in university have just finished their first semester and done exams, and all the ones that I'm involved with passed and did well. It's hard to get used to the upsidedown-ness of the school year here, in Canada it's all just getting underway, schools, universities and the rest of life that takes a break through July and August, but here it's all in full swing. Universities are on a break between semesters, the kids in school are getting ready for exams. It's now hard to imagine that September life I used to know in Canada.

Our little school is a busy place, lots of activity. This week there was a first ever science fair and open house for the parents. Each class had a display set up, and the kids had speeches all memorized to tell you all you needed to know about whatever project they had. The oldest class divided into pairs and each did their own presentation, we heard all about the workings of the heart, how plants grow to adapt to sources of light, how plants absorb water and nutrients (and food colour) up their stems. One class told us everything we had ever wanted to know about quinoa, complete with samples of what you can do with it. And another class had a display about the nutritional benefits of bananas and plantain, also with samples. The parents came in droves, there were snacks for sale, and the whole affair was a huge success, pretty good for a first time.

And the medical problems are always with me. In the last week alone I have spent 17 hours waiting for medical appointments, that was only 4 separate visits. It is an absolutely crazy system, and everybody is just used to it, and puts up with it patiently. I'm a fairly patient person, but I have to say I've been sorely stretched a couple of times this week. Everybody is given 1 appointment time, everybody arrives then, but that is just the time at which the doctor will start seeing people, or tests will start being done. So somebody is out in an hour, and the rest wait, and somebody will have to wait 4 hours. Or more - yesterday I waited 6 1/2 hours for my patient to see the neurologist - that was a very long time to perch on a bench. The only good part about that wait was that it was at the psychiatric hospital (an experience in itself!), which was built in another age, and is an old fashioned place built around a huge open outside area, that was parklike, even had (unaccountably) swings and slides and all, which was a huge help because my patient was a 9 year old girl. But still!! And of course it's not just me waiting, as I looked along the line of consultorios, I could see dozens and dozens of people, always the poor, waiting and waiting. They are so used to it, it's their life everywhere they go where they have to deal any kind of officialdom.

I've been dealing with leg ulcers, one that I've been trying to close since last December, it's SO slow, and a new one on my old friend Julian's foot. We've caught this one early, so I'm hoping we can heal it quickly. A little girl with epilepsy, my friend Marlene with her ongoing kidney disease which seems to be fairly well under control right now. And the newest most serious issue, my friend who had the enormous ovarian cysts removed in March has been diagnosed with ovarian cancer. She had more surgery while I was in Canada, and has been having tests (that was last week's 4 hour wait, for a CT scan) and after many delays, we go on Monday finally to see the oncologist to get some sort of plan. This lady has some older, grown children but also 4 young ones, the youngest is only 2 or 3. A very needy family. I'd appreciate prayer for her, and for me as I try to help her through this system and diagnosis.

And that's just part of it. Lots to occupy me, and make me wish I had a medical degree. And lots to make me thankful. And I am so appreciative of my community of friends here, when I'm having a bad day, feeling down or lonely, there is only one solution - I take myself across the dreaded road and spend some time visiting in Bastion - a guaranteed cure.

2009-08-23T14:58:00.000-07:00

Oh dear, I've just seen the date on that last blog post - June 16!!! That's quite awhile ago, I think I may be overdue an update!

I'm back on the south side of the equator again, came back a week ago, after 3 1/2 months in Canada. That was a long time to be away, maybe too long. But it was time for me to be there, with my family. As I try to look back at those months now, so many assorted memories are there, so many occasions. Some sad, many happy. I was there for 2 funerals, I said goodbye to my sister-in-law Heather, which is why I went home, and also to my friend John, an unexpected loss. But I was there for some celebrations too, I got to go to 2 weddings, and I was delighted to be there for my grandaughter's first birthday, and make a cake for her. Also got to celebrate my Dad's 80th birthday. And there were so many other wonderful occasions with the family and friends. They were months of a LOT of eating - catching up on food that I miss when I'm here. But that means I have returned with a slight problem, I returned with a few extra pounds, on my person, not in my luggage! All due to a lot of great meals and the use of a car. However, the Ecuadorians don't see this as a problem, they keep saying - Oh you're fatter - you look so nice!!! This is a great culture!

I was able to do a little bit of travelling while I was back, to Muskoka for a weekend, then on to Quebec in the Laurentians to a cottage where some childhood summers were spent. Great times of catching up with friends and relatives. A weekend at my brother's cottage, where we relaxed and watched him work! And 2 days with my sister and daughter at the shores of Lake Huron, where I'd never been before. I can't imagine how I've missed that, it's so beautiful and so unexpected somehow, and so close to home. And above all, I got to spend a lot of time with Elizabeth, my best beautiful grandaughter, and get to know her, and see her start walking and talking. I could take up a great deal of space here, going on and on about how she's the most amazing grandchild ever....but I'll spare you that! But am I ever missing that child already!

And now I'm trying to readjust to life here. It is good to be back, it's been SO good to see my friends, and I've been well hugged and welcomed back to Ecuador. But it is an adjustment, I was in Canada long enough to get used to the ease of life there again. Now I'm back to noise and dirt, and no car (that will get rid of those pounds, I hope). Long lines to do everything. Not being able to understand half of what is being said, or to make myself understood at times. Being without running water (it went off yesterday and has just come back after more than 24 hours). And other minor inconveniences. But probably the hardest has been the return to an empty house, and feeling such a distance between me and the family. But I'm thankful for the technology that we have now, and this "aloneness" causes me to turn to my Father in heaven, who will fill those empty spots better than anyone.

There is work to be done, I've been visiting my patients one by one, catching up, and having new issues to deal with. And I'm realizing once more how inadequate I am for this job, on my own, but remembering that the ability to do this work comes from outside of me, the guidance and help I need every day comes from above. I could not be here doing this without my God.

2009-06-16T07:33:00.000-07:00

I've been back in Canada for 6 weeks now, and am still struggling in some ways to adjust to North American culture. Somehow, although I am Canadian born and bred, and almost all of my life has been spent here, it's more of a "culture shock" to find myself back in Canada than in Ecuador. To be sure, I am enjoying my time here, I'm soaking up the fresh clean air, the cool, the quiet, the times I get to spend with family, visits with friends. It's a happy surprise to have to deal with any kind of officialdom, and find that I don't have to spend 2 hours in line, there aren't 20 pieces of paper to have ready, and arguments to have, and more lines to stand in. It is nice to go out without having to put on a money belt, or clutch my purse with both arms, or leave all valuables behind.

And yet . . .

I am having some trouble reconciling my 2 worlds. There are some things that really bother me about this world, and the one that has prompted me to head for my blog is about garbage.
Yesterday was garbage day here in this part of Burlington. Garbage day has changed since I lived here - now you have an array of bins and boxes to sort your rubbish into, and that's great, there's a lot of stuff that is not taking up space in landfill now, and instead is recycled into another life. But around here it was also "big" garbage day - where you can get rid of stuff that is too big to put out for the usual collection. That can mean odds and ends of all kinds of junk, but now it also seems to be a good chance to get rid of what looks to be perfectly good household items, that we no longer want. I went for a walk the night before the big collection, and took a look at some of the discards, and I was blown away by the things that were out there - chairs, tables, couches, bookcase, a stroller that looked way better than the one my children got pushed around in. These were gently used things, much of it not dead or dying - it looked FINE! Often people cruise about in pickup trucks and help themselves to some of the good useable items, but there were 2 things that got me about all this. One that these things are so easily discarded - that couch looks just fine to me, maybe slightly outdated? Maybe not. That bookcase is in great shape, just a bit of candlewax dripped down the front. Couldn't see anything wrong with the stroller. Do we need to live with everything looking perfect and up to the current trends? And if we do, why can't the things that are no longer perfect and up to our standards be given to people who need them? Because the other part that troubled me was when on Monday morning everything that hadn't been salvaged the night before, was put into the garbage truck and crushed and made to disappear. I watched while a couch with a pull-out bed in it was heaved into the back of the truck, a lever was pulled, there were awful crunching sounds . . . and it was gone. It didn't appear to have anything wrong with it, and it was way nicer than any of my friends in Bastion will ever have, and I think of the household items that they live with, or without, and it somehow seems wrong. I know this is a different world, and even in my other world there are people who live with excess, but not in the part of that world that I know.

. . . one of my struggles and a place where my 2 worlds collide.

May in Canada

2009-05-27T08:25:00.000-07:00

On May 2 I left Guayaquil and came to Canada, 2 weeks earlier than I had planned, and with 24 hours to get ready to leave my home and life for 3 months. My sister-in-law's health suddenly began to deteriorate, and it became clear that my original travel date of May 14 was too far away. So Friday May 1 was a day that passed in a blur of heat, activity, tears, and goodbyes. I had numerous trips to assorted bank machines to try to persuade them to part with some cash, there were meds to buy to be left behind for my patients, 3 months' worth of dressing supplies to be delivered, arrangements for my house and cat......! But the impossible was accomplished and I was able to leave on that plane the next morning.

And then I was plunged immediately into a whole new world, one in which a close and dear family member was coming to the close of her time here on earth, and all of the family drew close to walk this unfamiliar path together. And thus passed 2 weeks, most of that first week spent at the palliative care unit at the Brantford General Hospital, until Heather was transferred to a hospice, where the wonderful people cared so well for her and for all of us. That hospice became our home for just over a week, we took turns sleeping there, had family dinners, and generally took the place over. And were assured by the staff that that's exactly what they want to see. Heather steadily declined over those 2 weeks, but still had some good periods of being alert and able to communicate and be part of some get-togethers in her room. Although she wasn't able to speak, she still managed to communicate with very expressive eyebrows, and a whiteboard. Family and close friends spent some very precious hours together, talking, remembering, crying, and laughing. I am so thankful to have been given these times, that I was able to get back from Ecuador in time. I had prayed so often that God would make it clear when I should go, and He did. Heather left us early in the morning of May 17, and went home to her Saviour. And now we have a big gap in our lives to get used to living with.
The other part of coming home of course has been that I get to spend time with my little grandaughter Elizabeth. That has been such a joy, and has helped to balance the grief. She turned 1 year old yesterday, and I was there to be part of that, and we were remembering how hard it was to be so far away last year when she was trying to arrive, and it wasn't going all that well, and I was dependent on intermittent text messages to know what was going on!!! Yesterday was much better!! She's very cute, very smart and full of personality, and I'm allowed to say that - I'm the Grandma!!

It has been a bonus too, to be here for a Canadian spring. When I arrived the new pale green leaves were just showing, the fruit trees were in bloom, so were the daffodils and tulips, and magnolias. Oh and pansies! And I've been here for the lilacs and lily-of-the-valley. Things I didn't even realize I missed, but so lovely to be here for them. What a beautiful country this is.

But. . . . cold! Will this place ever warm up? Just wondering.

a bend in the road

2009-04-26T19:04:00.000-07:00

The last time I updated this was the evening I was waiting for Kathryn to arrive. She did, and we spent 10 days together, visited old friends, took a trip downtown on the MetroVia, so she could see if it was still as bad as it was last year (it was), we spent 2 days out at Playas at camp, 2 glorious days of rest and relaxing, where I was able to stay on the beach as long as I wanted to, with nobody needing me for anything!! I read, slept, walked and played in the waves - it was wonderful! Then we went to Quito and Otavalo for a few days, and then suddenly the 10 days were all over and she was gone!

And today I booked flights for me to go back to Canada for a time. This is hard for me to write about, but this blog is about the journey I'm on, and this is part of that journey, and those of you who are following my progress need to know about the bends in the road too. While Kathryn was here with me, we got news that my sister-in-law is losing her battle with an aggressive brain tumour, and her time with us here is getting short. And so I'm going home, I need to be with my family now. It's hard to be so far away, with something like this happening, I need my family, and they need me. But at the same time it is hard to leave here, knowing I'll be gone awhile. There are so many thoughts in my head right now - who will do what I've been doing here, who will look after my patients, how will it feel to be in Canada for a few months, how hard will it be to adjust back here when I come back...? But I'm doing what I have learned to do, follow where God leads, and trust Him for all of this. He is faithful, loving, and will be with each of us every step of the way on this dificult road that this family is now walking. He has promised that - "I will never leave you nor forsake you". Never.
"But I trust in your unfailing love" Psalm 13
I am re-reading a book by David Jeremiah - When Your World Falls Apart. It's a good one.

2009-04-13T08:07:00.000-07:00

It's all over, camp season is done, and it's kind of sad. It's a wild and crazy time, these 2 months of camp, people coming, people going, planning, buying huge amounts of food, more planning, groups arriving, groups missing bags, groups leaving....And then there's camp itself - all the kids, games, noise, cooking huge amounts of food, fun, crises both large and small. Serious times, too - devotions, counsellors spending time talking one on one to kids, campfires when kids often make commitments to God and allow Him into their lives, and stand up to tell everyone. Beach time, trying to keep track of all those bodies in the huge waves. And of course, music. We love to sing, and we do it with gusto!
In between those weeks of camp we come back to the city and try to fit in bits of normal life too, whatever normal life here may be! For me that means visits to patients, checking on progress, and going to doctor visits with people, as well as tryng to keep up with email and this blog!!!
So it's been chaotic, but very good. Looking back at it all now from this end of it, it has been a wonderful time, so many kids of all ages spending time at that camp, and being blessed by their time there. And it has been so good to watch the campers from past years now directing and leading and counselling younger kids. They all did a fabulous job, and I'm so proud of them!
The last week was for the older kids, and for me that was the best week, I really enjoyed that time. The whole week went really well, somehow it just all came together and was great. The speaker who came from Quito was excellent, the best we've had, in my humble opinion, he was real, and he geared his messages to his audience. He spoke, and the kids listened, all of them.
Medically, it was a peaceful week, almost nothing but the most minor of problems....until Thursday afternoon. I was at the beach and someone came to get me, a kid back at camp had been doing backflips and landed one badly and injured his arm. Sure enough, it looked pretty broken to me, but we took him into playas and got an x-ray done, and yes, he had broken both bones in his lower arm. Nobody in Playas is able to deal with such a problem, so we splinted it, gave him pain meds, and kept him at camp for the night, and sent him home the next morning. I'll tell the rest of that story another time, it's not over yet!!
When I got back from Playas after getting the x-rays, there was literally a lineup of people with problems - fever, headache, bumps, bruises, sprains - it just all fell apart all at once!
Then Friday at lunchtime, someone told me that Richard, the young guy who suffers from epilepsy, poorly controlled, had been sick since the previous day, not keeping anything down. When I went to see him, he was barely responding to us calling his name. There wasn't much I could do for him, and with his epilepsy I felt he would be better in the city with access to doctors, and we hired a pickup truck to take him back.
But..... on Saturday when we got home, I discovered that he was still very sick, his mother hadn't taken him to a doctor, and he was worse than he had been. I went to see him, and off we went to Emergency, my second trip there in less than 3 weeks - they're getting to know me there! He was stabilized and stayed in until Monday, he's better, but not himself, and we're still working on him, he's getting tests done and I think we may have found us a good neurologist.
So it's always something, and you never know what that something is going to be!! I was very happy to have a doctor from Nova Scotia around this week, he came with a group to work on the new house at camp, and I was able to have a couple of sessions with him, to ask many questions, and gets lots of useful knowledge, and on Saturday we went together to visit a couple of households where I needed some real medical input. What a huge help that was, and don't I wish I had a doctor around here more!!!
As I write this, Kathryn, my daughter is en route here for a visit, for 10 days. We're both looking forward to some time together, it's been awhile. Might even get some rest time in there too.
link to camp photos: http://picasaweb.google.ca/heathermoore21/Camp2009?authkey=Gv1sRgCNvat9iAm-6a8QE&feat=directlink

3 down, 1 to go

2009-03-24T18:19:00.000-07:00

...that's weeks of camp I'm referring to - we've already got the end in sight. Since I last wrote on this blog we've had 2 weeks of camp for children, one for the kids from Bastion, then a week off, and last week was for the children who live in the little community of Arenal, right around our camp. This was a first for us, but it was felt that we've been a presence ( a very noisy presence too!) for 3 or 4 years now, and it was time for some outreach to the community that we're a part of. At Christmas there was a program one Saturday for the kids and parents, and that was a huge success, but how would a week of camp be? It was a bit of a challenge to get registrations at first, up until 2 weeks ago there were still only 20. It was understandable, the parents don't know who we are, it's a very Catholic community, what would they be letting their kids in for?? And to have them stay overnight too?? So here we are, with 20 kids signed up for a camp that holds 150 kids, plus staff. And a team coming from New Jersey, all ready to help out at this camp in Ecuador. It was looking like there would be 2 or 3 staff to each kid! But by the time Saturday rolled around, God had been working and 90 kids in all were welcomed at the gate by drums and Barney and a couple of other characters all dressed up in very warm suits (poor guys inside nearly died of the heat!). There was a group of 26 kids from Arenal, a group from the town of Playas, some boys from Burke Horst's soccer team, and a handful from another community outside of Playas. And a group of kids from another church in Bastion. So with leaders and directors and cooks and a nurse, we had a full camp for the New Jersey group to be part of. And it was a great week! All these kids from an assortment of backgrounds all got on fine, and had a wonderful time, singing, playing, hearing stories from the Bible, learning memory verses with actions! And playing on the beach and eating lots too. There were only a few sick ones, compared to the week for the Bastion kids where we had a virus go through, producing high fevers and very miserable little kids.

I had a delayed start to the week, I was to have left on Sunday morning with the group, but had a message saying that one of the ladies (a school mum who goes to church in block 6) was "mal" and asking for prayer. Turns out she had severe abdominal pain, so I went to see her on my way to church, and then never got to church, or camp either. Her pain was so bad that I felt she should go to hospital, and not wait until Monday to see the doctor. So we rounded up a taxi to come and get her, and took her to emergency, my first experience with emerg here. And really it wasn't a bad experience, other than it taking awhile to get on with it. I had to remind them that she needed an ultrasound, but once it was done, things began to move! She had 2 enormous ovarian cysts, one of which was twisted, and had to come out. So before I knew it, I was signing papers authorizing them to do surgery, and she was up the elevator and into the OR before we had time to get used to the idea. And half an hour later the surgeons called me to the window of the OR suite, and there in a basin were the culprits - one grapefuit sized cyst and the other one even bigger! You've never seen anything like it - poor lady, no wonder she hurt.

So she's much better now, went home after 3 days, and is doing well. And I went to camp the next day, where it was much less exciting, but more fun!

Now this week is off and then we're back to camp next week, with the older youth from Bastion. This is the week that my home church ForestView is sponsoring, I know many will be praying. I'm looking forward to seeing what God will do with this group.

2009-02-24T19:25:00.000-08:00

Once again the weeks have flown by, more than a month has gone by since my last post. So much has happened.....the school year ended, the grade 6 class graduated, although some of those kids look far too small to be heading for high school, but that's where they're going in April!

And the camp season is upon us, with all the work, and lack of sleep, and and happy times that that means! The first week is over already, plus a long weekend of preparation and teaching for all who will be working at camp as counsellors and helpers. We have had 2 groups from Canada come and go, one group came to camp and the other went to Santo Domingo de Onzole, in the jungle, to work on the crumbling school there, fixing it up. An astonishing amount of food has been purchased, transported to camp, and eaten! Last week was for the "adolescentes", junior youth, there were about 150 or 160 there, and can they ever move food!! Carlos and Alex were the directors for the week, and they kept everybody on the move, with a schedule that would have worn out strong men. This included waking everybody up at 3am on the first night, to go out and play games - not the most popular of sports! On Friday morning we all headed off for a VERY long walk along the beach, stopped after 1/2 hour for a picnic breakfast and devotions, then another long walk further along, a stop to play games, and then finally the walk (or run) back to camp. This turned into a race for those who were up for it, first ones back earned a pile of points for their team. I was NOT up for the walk back, so returned by bus and was there with water for the returning victims! There were a few casualties of that morning for this nurse to deal with.

Visiting groups often means missing luggage, which has to be retrieved when it eventually arrives, and both of last weeks' groups arrived without some bags. With everybody who lives here fully occupied last week, I was the one who had to do the retrieving, and I now consider myself the missing bag expert! My experience in not taking "no" for an answer from guards at the hospital served me well at the airport too. All bags were successfully got and sent to their owners, 4 of whom were far away in the jungle.

And I now have an adventure of another kind to add to my list. On my way back to camp after one of my airport trips, I was robbed, thus joining the ranks of the many Ecuadorians who have been robbed. I was waiting for the bus to Playas, at a place that is well known for being dangerous - I wasn't alone, and I've been there before. As the bus arrived, Ivan went to put under the bus the suitcase I had retrieved the night before, and as I headed for the door of the bus, I was surrounded by a bunch of guys who came from nowhere, and they just crowded tight around me, so I couldn't get on. I had no idea what was happening, until I finally got onto the bus, took my backpack off and there were 2 zippers wide open. Oh no, that's not good. So with a sinking feeling I looked at my purse, and it was open too, and with the sinking feeling getting deeper, I put my hand in and of course, my wallet was gone. Not a happy find anywhere, but it felt like a disaster being so far away from home. In my wallet were my credit card, bank card, driver's license, the all important and just renewed Censo (the Ecuadorian ID card I have to carry with me), and assorted other stuff, including cash. So we raised the alarm and were dropped at the police station, and details were taken and we all knew we'd never see any of it again. Ivan went on to camp, and I crossed the road and got a bus home, to deal with my missing stuff. Cancelled my cards, and within an hour of doing so got a call, and the end of a very long story is that most of my cards were returned to me. I paid for the privilege, but I was so glad to have that censo back that it didn't matter. There is cause to think that I may have paid the thieves for my stuff, but hey - I got it back. Problem is I had cancelled my bank card and I was completely unable to pursuade my bank in Canada to reinstate it, so I have a slight cash flow problem until my new one comes, but that's in sight. So I have new experience under my belt, and am now rather more wary than I was, I've learned a new techique for carrying a backpack, and at the end of it all I'm very thankful. I was not threatened at all, didn't even know it was happening, and I'm fine. All I lost was stuff, inconvenient - yes, but not the end of the world. I eventually went back to camp that evening, and went back to many hugs and lots of TLC. And that was a reminder of what is more important than stuff. And although it didn't feel like it at the time, I know that God was still watching over me, and kept me safe.

"The Rain"

2009-01-17T17:35:00.000-08:00

One week ago, it rained hard for the first time in many months. We were ready for rain, looking forward to it, it's been getting hotter and hotter since December began, and so dry and dusty and brown. It needed to rain, it tried to for a few days, and finally last Friday night, the heavens opened. And so arrived "winter" here, the rainy season. It has rained every day since last Friday, and will keep it up for the next 3 or 4 months. Sometimes light rain, sometimes tropical downpours that have to be seen to be believed. Downpours that are like waterfalls from the sky, pouring down onto a city that can't handle that much water arriving at one time. So streets flood, houses flood, streets of Bastion that were dry, hard packed and dusty a week ago, become huge mud puddles.

I have to be honest - I haven't dealt with this first week of the rain very well. It brings major and minor inconveniences with it, and I'm a pampered Canadian, not used to having to deal with these things in my life. The first rain brings out the "grillos", rather large (big ones can be a good 2 inches long) members of the cricket family. I have no problem with crickets, I've always quite liked them, you can't beat the sound of crickets on an August evening. But these are crickets on a whole different scale, they're way bigger than Canadian crickets, they come into the house at night through every little opening they can find, fly up at you from nowhere, chew holes in your clothes, and if one gets into your bedroom, the noise will keep you awake all night. My cat has proven useless at dealing with them, she plays with them for a few minutes, then loses interest. So I think this is the real reason for wearing flip flops here, there's always a weapon ready, pull one off, one quick smack, and that's another one dispatched.

Then there's the river of rainwater that has been flowing through my kitchen from under the door. Someone cleverly designed the bit of concrete that's outside the back door to slope towards the house, so that really only leaves one place for the water to go. The other night there was a mighty thunderstorm, knocked out the power and torrents of rain came down. So I was out the back door, ankle deep, in the pitch dark with a flashlight clasped between my knees, trying to find somewhere else for all that water to go. Then there's the matter of laundry - it's so humid that it won't dry, by the time it does it has that nasty smell. Everything is damp, green slime is already growing in places, I think maybe even on me!! And it's suddenly much hotter, feels that way anyway with the humidity. And the mosquitoes are out in hordes..... It's all made me feel a tad cranky!

But I have absolutely no business complaining, because then I go to visit Bastion. And all the difficulties that I'm dealing with in my comparative luxury, are there in those homes too, only magnified and multiplied. It only took 2 rainfalls to turn the streets into mud, so the water that flows into those homes is muddy, and it comes in the many holes in their roofs, and between the slats of the bamboo walls. They can't get washing dry either, and they don't have an nice empty upstairs room to hang it in. School is almost finished, so that means little kids all underfoot inside tiny houses. Every errand becomes a huge challenge of negotiating your way through all that mud, trying to find the least mucky route. And that stuff is slippery! It's so easy to fall, and you don't really want to go down in that. Really you don't!

So I have nothing but respect for the people who live in Bastion and the many other squatter areas just like it. They don't lie down and give up, like I've been tempted to do, they just get on with it, and do what they have to do to keep on surviving, and I've even seen them smile, yes even laugh about

it. If they can, so can I!!

...and Happy New Year!!

2009-01-06T16:13:00.000-08:00

.....and I thought Christmas in Ecuador was different - then along comes New Year's eve!! Now that was different! I had some inkling of what was to come, I was warned, but I was not quite prepared for the reality of the event. The custom here, all over Ecuador apparently, is to build or buy "viejo's" or old men, which are figures made of papier mache or old clothes stuffed with paper. Around Bastion, all the ones I saw were made. For a week or so before the end of the year, everywhere I went I saw these figures under construction. They are anywhere from little, 2 feet high or so, up to HUGE - where a ladder is required to build it. They represent the old year, and are burned at midnight. Firecrackers are added to the contents, to add to the interest.

if you need a head for your viejo, here's where you can buy one Janna, William & I at Marlene's, where we had our first dinner

So on the 31st, everybody is out and about, visiting and talking, and waiting for midnight. I went over to Bastion and did some visiting, had one full meal of chicken and rice at one home, then went on to another home, where I was given another full meal...of chicken and rice! I was there at that home at midnight, when it all broke loose. We went outside, and the scene was incredible - all the viejo's are put in piles all along the street and set on fire. The fireworks inside explode, everybody tosses in more explosives to make yet more noise. The house I was at was at the top of the hill in block 6, and we were on a balcony upstairs, so could see for miles, over Bastion and much of Guayaquil too. And it is going on everywhere!! Fires, fireworks, explosions...it has to be experienced to be fully grasped! And it went on for a very long time. I got home at 2am and there were still very big bangs around here. Feliz Ano, everybody!!!!

Merry Christmas...

2009-01-04T17:09:00.000-08:00

Christmas has come and gone, I was away from home for it for the very first time ever in my life, and I survived it. It has indeed been strange, it never really felt like Christmas to me, but other than some homesickness in the week before, which is to be expected, it passed happily. I didn't miss a lot of what Christmas involves in Canada, but I surely did miss my family - especially my little grandaughter! But I am so very thankful for Skype, which allowed me to be in touch, and even to open stockings together with some of the family on Christmas morning! But I was busy, out and about, visiting and eating, and experiencing Christmas in another culture.

There were kids' events - one at camp, where there was a program put together by many of the young ones from Bastion for the children of the community around camp, a full house at camp, lots of local kids and parents

a christmas craft - sand dollar ornaments - sand dollars are prolific on that beach

and then the party for all our kids of "Esperanza de Bastion" on the last day of school. Papa Noel made an appearance at both of those events, and a lot of kids had a lot of fun, and Christmas was made a little more special for them than it might have otherwise been.

The big day for Ecuadorians is Christmas eve, that's when families get together, have their gifts, and a special dinner. I was invited to spend that time with the Lucas family in Block 10, along with other "orphaned" Canadians. It's a huge party all over Bastion, firecrackers going off everywhere, music coming out of speakers the size of a car, street parties. "Silent Night" it is not!! Everybody goes outside to countdown to midnight, then it's hugs and "feliz navidad" all 'round, then you go in and have your dinner. Bedtime was somewhere around 2am!

On Christmas day, we 3 Guayaquil Canadians, Janna, Luke and I headed off to Playas to stay with the Horst family, and I am now able to say that I was on the beach on Christmas Day (it's been a goal)!! And much of Boxing day too. And I have to say, if you can't be with your family at Christmas time, then digging your toes into the sand at the Pacific ocean is the next best thing!!! We had a great Christmas dinner and a group of Canadians living in Ecuador had a happy time together.

2008-12-16T17:57:00.000-08:00

Last week I had a flying trip back to Onzole, to the jungle communities there. Well, it was flying in that we were only there a very short day and a half. But we definitely did not fly there! Janna and I got on a bus at 9pm on Wednesday, and didn't get off it until 13 1/2 hours later! Let me tell you, that's a really long time to be sitting on one of those buses, squirming and turning and trying to find a place to put yourself so you can sleep!! There were endless delays, including 2 more police checks - the men all had to get off, police got on, and looked through bags and checked all our documents. I'm told that buses on this route are checked more because of how close the Colombian border is at the end of the trip. And then we were stopped for a very long time, could have been 2 hours, someone said that there had been an accident on the road.

By the time we got off that bus, I was ready to never see one again, EVER! But then there is the canoe trip, which to me makes up for all the preceding miseries. The river was very low this time, only a few inches in places, so it took 3 hours to get in to our villages, with the men having to pull the motor out and paddle and pole in the shallowest spots. But I am still enthralled by being on that river, so I didn't mind it taking longer. I did feel sorry for the men though, having to work so hard to get us upriver, they had left Santo Domingo at 5:30 that morning.

The purpose of the trip this time was to be there for the kids' Christmas program at the school in Santo Domingo. That little school very nearly didn't reopen after the last school year, the funding that had been coming from outside was pulled, and nothing was coming from the government, and when we were there last February it really looked as though school would not be happening for the children of that village. But there was some juggling and talking and someone in Canada took up the cause, and some funds have been raised, and school has gone ahead for this year.

The program was on Friday morning, and such a program it was!! All 140 students, and many of their parents, and a few visiting missionaries. The room was decorated, a stage was set up, practices were held, and it all went without a hitch. Included in the proceedings were a full length nativity play, Joseph, Mary, angels, shepherds, innkeepers, wise men - the lot! And during the play each class had a turn to sing a song. Which they did with great enthusiasm and volume. Now if they could just learn to carry a tune...! There was also a drama of the prodigal son, and one about the 10 virgins. There was a complicated little ceremony involving the "Christmas Princess", which was a very solemn affair. And through it all, these so very cute kids to watch - SO cute!

Then it was outside where they all lined up to receive their gifts. Many of the kids are sponsored by Compassion, who provides gifts for their kids, a very practical gift of a set of sheets. But every child received something.

Finally there was a special lunch for all the teachers back at the mission house, and a talk for them from Lloyd Rogers about being an example, and how much of an example teachers can be.

And that was it. A very long way to go, for a very short time, but worth it. I had a chance to go with my friend Nixon to visit the man who had injured his hand so badly in October with the machete. I went wondering what I would find, remembering the fiasco involved in getting it sutured. But it has healed fairly well, it didn't get infected, and looks not bad. But he has limited use of the hand, which is a problem, his work involves using a machete, which he is unable to grip, so he has not worked, or been able to provide for his family, since October. I'm not sure how they are managing. I gave him some exercises to do, and hope that in time it will improve and allow him to work again.

If you can stand to see more photos, here is a link - http://picasaweb.google.ca/heathermoore21/OnzoleDecember2008?authkey=py_sADDXJGU#

And now Christmas is coming. At least so I hear. I'm having a little trouble coming to grips with Christmas this year. It's 31 degrees out there, I wrote cards with 2 fans blowing on me, there's not a snowflake to be seen, and no Ikea Christmas trees! I read of everybody at home busily doing what you do there to get ready for the big day, and I see definite signs of Christmas coming here too. There are lights on houses, decorated trees inside the houses, and the stores and malls are packed. In the mall Santa has his house set up, and there is also the biggest nativity scene you ever saw. So Christmas must be coming. But to me it just seems completely unreal. I guess it's just the completely unfamiliar surroundings, and the lack of all my usual signals. I'm not really minding, it's just strange! But there's still more than a week to go, we'll see how it goes! One thing I am finding though - there isn't the "political correctness" that Canada obsesses about. Here, Christmas is called Christmas. There are nativity scenes everywhere, and many seem to remember just what it is that we are celebrating - Jesus' arrival on earth. And that's kind of nice.

where did November go?

2008-12-03T13:24:00.001-08:00

November passed in a blur of activity. There were 2 major events that made the month go by in a flash. My sister Alison arrived on the 1st, for the month, and it was her first visit down here, so there was lots to show her - places to go and people to see! We travelled, went on 2 separate trips, both to the mountains. First we went south to Cuenca for a day, and then on to Vilcabamba, close to the border of Peru. It's a beautiful place, seems to have the ideal climate - warm and sunny during the day, and cold at night, so you can pull up the blankets (not something you do here in Guayaquil!) and have a good night's sleep. We stayed at a place outside of the little town a bit, partway up the mountain, and the views all around us.........oh my! We had hammocks outside our room, with views of rolling hills leading to mountains, and happy hours were spent there with books. And the dining area was a covered over area, but open, with views that I don't think you could ever get tired of. We arrived at night, went there for dinner, we could see lights off in the distance but had no idea what was out there. Until the next morning when we arrived for breakfast - we just couldn't believe it. So we spent 3 days there, did a walk, tried a bike ride on awful gearless 400 lb. bikes - not altogether successful! And had a relaxing restful time. And took one or two pictures between us!

Our other trip was to Banos, where I've been a few times now, but always enjoy, and I like taking others there too. We had a much more successful bike ride, 22 km through the mountains, one very scary section through a pitch dark tunnel, but the rest of it is fine. You get to stop off and take a cable car across the river to a waterfall, and of course we were in the Andes, so there was no shortage of splendid views along the way!

We spent 2 days there, then headed north to Otavalo, which is the area around which most of the Ecuadorian handicrafts come from. Saturdays is the big market day, and the main square in town, as well as many of the surrounding streets are taken up with hundreds of stalls with the indigenous people selling their crafts. Of course, you are expected to bargain, you never just pay the first price they ask, and I discovered a talent in my sister that I didn't know she had - she drives a hard bargain!! So we went home with a rather fuller suitcase than we had arrived with!

So we had some great times, it was good to be away from all that goes on here for a little while, but I have to say that it was nice to get off a bus for the last time. Some day I may write a book all about the joys of bus travel in Ecuador!

Then the other big event of the month was Narcisa's long awaited open heart surgery. It did indeed finally happen, that's what kept us busy between travels, and I'm delighted to report that she came through it well, and is now at home recovering and doing really well. There were so many concerns around this operation, a big one, and being done at a hospital which doesn't exactly have a marvellous reputation. But God is bigger than all that, and I had to keep reminding myself that she was safely in God's hands throughout. It was an anxious time that we spent waiting while she was in the OR, but I had a picture in my mind of God holding her in His hands while the doctors operated. And I knew she was safe there, no matter what happened.

Of course, any time spent at that hospital, making arrangements, paying for services, or even just trying to visit the patient, is always an adventure. That may be my other book - all about the joys of Luis Vernaza Hospital!! I mean, just getting inside the place is incredibly difficult. You have security guards whose primary purpose seems to be to keep you out. I think it's probably easier to get into Buckingham Palace, or the White House, than into this public hospital. Always a series of questions - "what's your business, where are you going, what to do, who's the patient, No you can't go in. Okay then let me look in your bag" - you can't take in any food or drink, or cameras, it seems. Alison had a little camera in her purse one day, and they weren't going to let her in with it - it's just not allowed. Well we weren't about to leave it with them, so we just pressed on! I mean - really!! And then you get your bag inspected again when you're leaving. And all of that is just at the gate. Don't even get me started on all the rest!

A surprise at this hospital, a lovely parklike square inside, some of the wards open onto it. (the photo is a little crooked, I was in a hurry with my apparently illegal camera!)

So Alison got a good look at a side of life most tourists don't ever get to see. The medical sytem, and Bastion too, of course. We had lots of visits with friends there, and she got to meet people who had just been names to her for so long. And we got well fed, as usual. I've decided that I don't really need a kitchen in my house, all I have to do is walk by houses around Bastion and I get invited in and fed. I could have had 2 suppers in a row on Saturday, I had to decline the second one, I simply couldn't manage it. Why do they want to feed me - is it because I look thin and malnourished? Definitely not, they are just so kind and generous and willing to share what they have. These are my friends.

Return to Onzole

2008-10-27T19:32:00.000-07:00

Wow, another adventure filled week! I got to go back to Santo Domingo de Onzole, in the jungle, where I was in February. I loved the experience then and I did again this time too! A group of 10 of us (9 young ones and 1old one!)from Guayaquil went to spend the week helping out at a day camp that was being held in that little commmunity. We got on a bus in Guayaquil at 9:30 on Sunday night, and got off it 9 hours later. Well, actually we had to get off before that - this being Ecuador, we were stopped by the police twice, the first time just after everybody had gone to sleep, and we all had to stumble off and produce identification and be frisked. Then back on we all got, back to sleep, and 1 1/2 hours later at 1am, didn't we get stopped again! This time only the men had to get off, with bags to be searched and the rest of us got to stay on, and just show our ID again. I guess all in the interests of keeping us safe, buses do get hijacked and all the passengers robbed. But twice in one night?? As if bus travel isn't miserable enough!

We arrived in the unique little town of Borbon, at the river's edge, at 6:30 am, and watched the day get underway there while we waited for our canoe to arrive from Santo Domingo, to take us on the last leg of the trip. As much as I dislike the bus part of the journey, I LOVE the canoe part. And it was just as good this time as last time. The river was much lower so it took longer, 3 hours, but there's so much to see and experience. I am endlessly fascinated by seeing life along that river, a completely different world.

We finally arrived at our destination at noon-ish, and promply fell onto beds and fell asleep for 2 hours. And the rest of the day was spent preparing for camp.

The week we were there was for little kids, from Santo Domingo and another village further down the river. I will always remember the sight of a stream of kids appearing over the brink of the steep bank coming up from the river, the ones from downriver, having arrived by canoe, all excited and expectant and ready for some fun. They were registered, and then given breakfast, a bun and a mug of "colada", a thick warm-ish drink made from milk powder, water, some sort of starch, usually fine oatmeal or plantain flour, flavoured with sugar and cinnamon. It's sort of tasty, you just have to get past the somewhat viscous texture of it.

Then they were off to the chapel, for singing (lots of volume, little melody!), some time with the puppets that our gang brought and did a great job with, and a message. They had a devotional time in small groups with our kids as leaders, scattered around the village. And then were divided into teams for the inevitable competitions! They played all kinds of games, and competed and fought and had fun. These kids are scrappers, the cutest kids you ever saw, but boy can they fight, and fight hard, and to hurt! We were forever breaking up battles. This seems to be something that has come about since the arrival of electricity, with that, tv and movies, usually violent movies. The Ecuadorians seem to have a special fondness for "punch 'em, shoot 'em, knock 'em down" movies. This I have gathered from what gets played on every bus I get on!

But in spite of it, they had lots of fun, threw themselves into the activities, and heard all about God's love for them.

One of the highlights of the week for me was watching the young adults from Bastion working with those kids. I can remember many of them as youngsters themselves, being at camp, and now to see them stepping outside of their comfort zones and into another culture far from home, and throwing themselves into this camp - it was terrific to watch. They did a great job, and it wasn't easy! It was hot, it was wet, the kids were a handful, but they gave it their all, and loved it! It was a wonderful experience for them and they've gone home with some very special memories. And I loved being there to see it.

I wondered how I'd keep occupied while I was there, I wasn't really involved in the kids' activities, but I needn't have worried. Word got out that the "doctora" was in town, and due partly to Nixon, the young guy whose hand I had looked after in February and "cured", I was kept busy with medical needs. I several times badly wished I did in fact have the medical degree that they insist I must have. And I wished I had brought many more supplies than I had. But I was able to help with a few people, and I had taken some meds with me that I was glad I had. My worst moments came when they brought me a man who had cut himself with a machete. There's always that time between when I know I have an injury to deal with, and the time I actually see what it is, time to wonder what it is, how bad it is, can I deal with it, and time to pray for help. This one was bad, it was a long deep nasty cut through the heel of his hand - these machetes are very sharp, and there was no question that it needed stitching. I have never actually sutured, I've been shown how, and I have everything that I need to do the job. Problem was, it was all in Guayaquil - I hadn't even thought of bringing it.

They said there was a doctor in the next bigger village upriver, 20 minutes by canoe, so I cleaned the wound, dressed it, and they rounded up someone to take us, and off we went. Well, we got there, and I was soon wishing I had just kept him at home, and done my best with Steri Strips!! This was the most basic, ill equipped, decrepit "clinic" I have ever seen, worse that I could have imagined. And the doctor wasn't there, just a nurse who made a big speech about us not being from that village, and they would only look after someone in an emergency. Well, excuse me, this is one!! Finally she took him into a room that was equipped with stuff that must surely have come out of the ark. I went with him, and the job began. Oh my, it was not pretty, nobody had any fun, except the nurse, who had a good laugh when she pulled one suture so tight that she broke the needle off the suture material!! Hey that's not even a bit funny!! The poor man felt every last part of the procedure, she had given him some local, but it didn't seem to work. It was a disaster, and I was literally twitching around that room having a fit! I helped where I could, but I now know that if the need ever arises again, I will not hesitate to do the job myself.

Finally it was done, sort of, and we took him home to his little hut and I went and got him some antibiotics and pain meds that I had brought, and I pray that it is enough and he will heal without a huge infection. Who will take out those stitches? My friend Nixon, a 17 year old who wants to be a doctor, he watched me take the stitches out of his hand, he is intelligent, gentle, and wants to do it. So I left him what he will need, and told him how to go about it, and I really hope he is able to go and study medicine and one day go back and give his village some medical care. If he's serious about it, I'll do what i can to help.

We were up at 5 on Saturday morning, and away before 6, back to Borbon, and onto the bus for 11, yes 11 hours. The best that can be said for that part of the trip is that this time I took enough Gravol to avoid the problems I had last time!

And I've come back with some wonderful memories, and a deeper attachment to that village on the river Onzole.

link to photos: http://picasaweb.google.ca/heathermoore21/OctoberOnzoleTrip?authkey=yR3jhyxiR2A#

Thanksgiving

2008-10-15T17:43:00.000-07:00

Well this is what my thanksgiving weekend looked like, just a little different to others' I know, whose photos I've seen. Not a red maple leaf in sight where I was!

We had a family retreat at camp this weekend, for families from the block 6 church in Bastion and the church in Sauces, another area of Guayaquil. The block 6 gang packed, and I mean PACKED themselves onto the red and white bus on Thursday evening (I don't think you could have squeezed another single tiny item onto that bus) and headed off. They didn't arrive until 11:30 that night. I had had a wearing week, so had decided (rather wisely I thought when I saw the number of bodies on that bus!) to go on Friday morning, so I slept in my own bed that night and caught the Posorja bus, always an adventure, and made my own way out to camp.

It was a great weekend, very relaxed, little in the way of schedules, people just enjoying being away from life in Bastion and taking it easy at the beach. They hung out in hammocks, sat around chatting, played soccer on the beach, and volleyball, kids ran around doing what kids do, and had fun on the beach, in spite of the cold. And it was cold the first couple of days, really cold compared to what we're used to in Guayaquil, to which I must be adapted because I was freezing a lot of the time. But still they went in the ocean to be knocked about by the waves and then come out with goosebumps and blue lips. Then on Sunday the sun came out, and the whole world improved! I'm so used to sun and incredible heat at that camp, because I've always been there in February and March, I just can't get used to the different world that it is out there at this time of year.

The food was great, as always, all the favourite things, with plenty of rice of course! Different groups of women took turns in the kitchen for each meal, and then the cabin groups had to take turns doing the dishes. That meant that a couple of men who had literally never done a single dish in their lives had to learn how. I'll never forget the sight of Marie Eugenia taking one man's hands and forcing them into the water and showing him how to use a sponge and soap to wash the dishes!! It was worth the price of admission!

Shrimp ceviche was on the menu for Sunday lunch, and so on Saturday night, there were 30 pounds of fresh shrimp that had to be peeled. So a big gang of us all gathered round and spent a long time dealing with those shrimp. (By the way, the cost per pound for the shrimp...$1.50!!!) For me that was one of the best times of the weekend, a bunch of us working away together, laughing and having a ball! Good memories. I even learned how, and got up the courage, to behead the big shrimp, as well as peel them - yuk!

Another memory to treasure is of standing on the beach on Sunday just before lunch and seeing one lady from Bastion, who has a very difficult life, coming out of the water, laughing and being almost a kid again, and telling me how much fun that was! Oh, that was good to see, that weekend away was so good for her.

And there was a baptism on Sunday morning, and young girl from the Sauces church wanting to declare her faith an new life in Jesus.

So it was a successful weekend, and lots of good memories were made to be taken home and remembered for a long time to come.

And now I'm into a busy time for the next few weeks, as I prepare for Narcisa to go into hospital and have her surgery in the first week of November. Lots of arrangements, and lots of prayer. On Sunday I am planning to head for the jungle again, back to where I was in February, up the Onzole river to the little community of Santo Domingo. There are going to be 2 weeks of camp there, and I'll be going with a group from Bastion to help out. This is neat to see, a group of young ones who have been to camp themselves and grown up, and are now going off to help out in another camp in a community far away. We'll be there for most of a week. I'm bracing myself for the 10 hour bus ride, I'll be sure to have LOTS of Gravol with me this time. Oh boy!

So stand by for a report on that time. I am looking forward to it, other than the journey.

back in Ecuador

2008-10-01T06:38:00.000-07:00

Wow! Doesn't time move along when you're visiting home?! Those 3 weeks went awful fast, and now here I am back in Guayaquil, with a blur of memories of the time I spent in Canada (good thing I took lots of pictures!). It was a time of not much spare time, there was a lot of catching up to do with a lot of people. Of course, the first trip I made on my very first morning back, was to Dundas, to meet, at long last....Elizabeth Heather, my little grandaughter. And was she worth the trip from South America - you better believe it!! It was a good time to get to know her, she is at such a rewarding stage right now, 4 months old, smiling and "chatting" and responding, a little person with personality. And of course, the cutest baby there ever was!! I was able to spend lots of time with her in the 3 weeks I was home, and now finally I DO know how it feels to be a grandma.

We had an early birthday celebration for my mother, who will turn 80 in December. That was a good family time, had a riotous game of "jeopardy" where us 4 siblings were the contestants who had to answer questions about sometimes obscure facts from our family past. And the best part for Mum was that she isn't even 80!! (yet!)

I did lots of visiting with people, family and friends, LOTS of eating, was able to get in on the last of wonderful local produce - peaches, pears, raspberries, real tomatoes, corn....oh boy! I seem to have come back with a few extra pounds on me, although I'm blaming the lack of exercise more than the food. Here I walk everywhere I go, while I was in Canada I had the use of Mum's car, and so drove everywhere. Nice but bad for me! I did get in a couple of walks by the lakeshore, so clean and beautiful.

They tell me that I had the best 3 weeks of weather of the entire summer. Oh, the beautiful September days that I was treated to - sunshine, clear blue skies, some warm days, some lovely crisp cool ones. And the wonderful clean fresh air. And the quiet! Oh the quiet of Canada, I could lie in bed at night and hear......nothing, just the crickets. That probably tops the list of things I most miss, after family.

And now I'm back. It has taken me a few days of adjustment, I'm here but my head hasn't quite caught up with the rest of me. But it's coming. It's an altogether strange life that I'm now in, a life where when you go home, you're not sure that really is home, because there's a part of you that is somewhere else, and that's where the only space you can call your own is. It was definitely an odd feeling to be there just visiting, wonderful, but odd. But then when you leave, it's hard to say goodbye, and although it's good to be back here, and there were things I was missing, now I'm back to missing people and things in Canada! Oh dear, it's the "torn" life, having large parts of me in 2 completely different parts of the world. How to reconcile the two?

But now that I'm back, it's on with life here. There are all kinds of things to keep me occupied, the past couple of days I've been busy with delivering letters from Canada to people in Bastion, that's a fun task, everyone is so happy to get a letter. I'm visiting folks and catching up, and showing off photos of Elizabeth. And Narcisa's surgery is looming, she is to be admitted next week in preparation for the heart surgery. There are still details to be worked out before she goes in, and I quake in my boots to think about the running around that's ahead of us to get this surgery done. I'm praying hard for wisdom and strength in this one. And for good care for Narcisa.

The sick calls are coming in - bad cold, bad headache, blood pressure check, somebody stepped on a nail...oh yes, plenty to think about!

I'm going home!!

2008-09-03T05:56:00.000-07:00

It's September 3, a big day for me - I'm sitting in the Guayaquil airport at gate #8, waiting for a flight to take me to Canada. I arrived here nearly 7 months ago, and the time has come for a visit home, to visit family and friends, fit in a trip to the dentist to fix my broken tooth, and most important of all - meet my grandaughter!!!! Elly is now 3 months old, and we think it's high time that she met her other grandma - "abuelita" as they say here.

It has been a whole new experience preparing for this trip, it's all backwards this time. All of the other 8 times that I have left here it's been with great pangs of sadness, as I said goodbye to my friends in Bastion, knowing that it would be a year before I saw them again. This time I was able to say - see you in 3 weeks! And that was nice. And it's so exciting to look forward to being home in Canada and seeing everybody there. But then it will be time to come back, what will that feel like? But let's not think about that right now!!

And the culture shock as I return to Canada - it's usually an issue even after 3 weeks away, I can't imagine what it's going to be like after 7 months. And what will it be like to not have the continual noise and chaos that is part of life in this land? And what if it's cold???

It will be a busy 3 weeks, I think, lots of catching up to do with family and friends. But it will be good, and I"m really looking forward to the time.

Now if American Airlines can just break with tradition for once and keep to schedule......wouldn't that be nice!!

updates

2008-08-26T19:52:00.000-07:00

Almost a month has gone by since my last post, I'm getting worse at this! Well, life has got a lot busier in the last little while, that's why.
At the beginning of August, another short term room mate arrived, Angela, who lived here for some months a few years ago. She managed to get some time off and came down for an overdue visit. And as she is a nursing student, she spent some time with me as I went about my assorted jobs in Bastion, coming with me on visits, seeing how the hospital "system" works (or not!) here, and helping me with assessments of the children in the school. She sorted me out with a binder to keep everything in, now let's see if I can remain organized!
Then on August 14, Andrew and Kate, my son and daughter-in-law, arrived. And we've been having a fine time ever since, getting around Guayaquil, visiting Bastion, and working in a trip to Banos in the mountains for a few days.
Thus the lack of time for keeping this blog under control!

But I have been wanting to update a little, let you know how a couple of people that I've written about in the past are doing now.
First Narcisa, the lady with the heart problem that needs surgery. It has all taken a very long time, but we have had a cardiac catheterization done, which showed that yes indeed, she has a hole in her heart that she was born with, but there has been little or no damage to her heart over the years, and so she is a good candidate for the surgery to repair the defect. So that's good news. She is booked for surgery in October, after I get back from my visit to Canada. We just have a decision to make as to what kind of care she'll be admitted to in the hospital, general, where the care probably isn't the greatest (okay it's not good at all!), or more of a private arrangement, with much better care, but much higher costs.

And then there´s Michelle, the little girl who was diagnosed with leukemia, and for whom so many have been praying. She has been out of the hospital for a few weeks now, getting chemo on an outpatient basis, and she is doing well! She is eating well, staying healthy, having minimal side effects from the chemo, although she has lost most of her hair. She was able to pay a visit to her class one day last week, first time since she was diagnosed 2 months ago, and she was SO happy to be there, and those kids were SO happy to see her. She still has a long road ahead of her, but it was good to see her and her parents looking so much better than before.

a busy week

2008-07-27T16:54:00.000-07:00

It's been an eventful week. A group of Canadians (many from my home church, Forestview) has come, worked hard, seen and experienced and learned a lot, and gone. And I have a new "grandchild".

Better start at the beginning.

Last Saturday night I, along with a number of folks from Bastion, went off to the airport to meet 17 people arriving from Canada. I went to see all of them, the Bastion people were going for really only one person - Tim Horne, back for a visit after more than a year. For them, the rest of the group was incidental! Getting there was a long awaited adventure for me - I had my first ever ride in the back of a pickup truck, a popular method of transportation here. We were having trouble getting the right bus, and the next thing I knew, to my delight, they rounded up a "camionetta", in we all piled and off to the airport. It was great, I can`t tell you how much fun I had - I grinned foolishly the entire trip! And the view is so much better from back there!

When we got there we entertained ourselves while we waited with a massage chair, nobody can laugh at themselves and have fun like these Ecuadorian friends of mine!

After a long wait, with the Ecuadorians looking at every "gringo" that came out and asking me if it was anybody I knew, our group emerged, and finally, Tim, who was greeted with Antonietta blowing a whistle and all the Bastion people popping all the balloons we had blown up while we waited. It was showstopping!!

It was a good week for the group, only a week, didn't seem very long, but it was a full week. The group from Forestview were billeted in homes in Bastion, half in Block 6, where they spent Monday and Tuesday painting the outside of the school, and the other half in Block 10, where they worked on some improvements to the church. An amazing amount of work got done in those 2 days, and it was a great experience for them all to work alongside the Ecuadorians, live with them, and get to know the community a bit, and most important, make some new friends. Also part of the team were people who have been sponsoring kids at the school, and they were able to go and meet their child in his/her home. Then on Wednesday morning everybody headed to camp with the grade 5 and 6 classes from the school, and some of the graduates from last year. Everybody packed themselves, their belongings, and supplies onto 2 buses, and left - without me. I was supposed to go with them, but that's where the other bit of excitement comes in.

Mitzi, the pregnant girl I've been helping, finally went into labour during Tuesday night, and I got a phone call at 6:45 from her mother to say they were at the hospital. So I thought quickly, carted my bags down to be sent on the bus with everybody, then jumped into a taxi and went to the hospital. Where I found her mother waiting, outside the area where the operating and delivery rooms are. Nobody is allowed in, NOBODY!! I tried, but no way!! So we just had to wait, having no idea what was happening, until at 8, a nurse came to a window and called "Cobos family". Yes, that's us!! She wanted the baby clothes that you have to bring to the hospital with you. Does this mean we have a baby? "yes" Well what is it and is everything fine?? "a boy, and everything is fine". Goodness, just like decades ago. In due course she brought the baby to the window to show us briefly, and then told us that we would just have to wait for 2 hours before Mitzi and baby would be transferred out to a room. So then I just had time to jump into a taxi and get to the buses so I could tell Erika and Linder, Mitzi's siblings who were going to camp, that they had a new nephew. Then I went back to the hospital to wait to make sure all was indeed well, and took my camera so I could take a picture of the baby to show to his aunt and uncle. Had to wait a long time, much more than the 2 hours they had told us, but finally out they came, I got my pictures and got on my way to camp by public bus, got there mid-afternoon. (I'm calling this baby my other "grandchild" because one day when I was bemoaning the fact that I would be so far away when my first grandchild would be born in Canada, Mitzi said that I could be a grandma to her baby in the meantime.)

Camp was a happy time, 45 children and assorted leaders and cooks and Canadians. The days were relaxed, not nearly as scheduled as the camps in March, and everybody had fun. The Canadians did really well, getting involved with the kids and adults, forming bonds, some of which will last a long time.

It was cold at the coast, which I found very strange, the only feeling I've ever had out there is hot, hotter and occasionally less hot, but never cold. Two of the three days were gray and windy, and one afternoon I got so cold after our beach time that I went back and made myself some tea, just to warm up. Weird!! Admittedly, I was colder that all the other Canadians, I seem to have acclimatized to the heat somewhat. But we did have one glorious sunny day, it was a perfect beach afternoon, and everyone made the most of it and enjoyed it thoroughly. It still never fails to give me a charge to see those kids playing on that beach, being children and doing what children are supposed to do: digging in the sand, playing in the waves, catching little crabs, bigger kids and adults playing soccer. I love to see it. That camp is such a blessing for so many.

There were times of singing, workshop times, devotions, crafts that the Canadians brought, and times to just hang out. Lots of wonderful Ecuadorian food, including 2 meals that involved fresh chicken. VERY fresh chicken, straight from the hen house at the Horsts' house. These chickens arrived alive and squawking, and to my horror were dispatched right there in the kitchen sink, with a kitchen knife!!! Oh dear, I guess I'm still North American, I like my chicken to come dead and featherless and wrapped in plastic!!

We came back to Guayaquil yesterday, with a bug of some sort, which was passing through the group one by one. By this morning, 3 had had nasty bouts of sickness (I'll spare you the details!) and 2 others were feeling a little queasy. We saw them off and prayed that they wouldn't get any sicker or any more of them, because having what they had on a plane really would not be any fun at all!!

And now a new week starts tomorrow. I hardly even dare wonder what it will bring.....maybe a nice boring uneventful week? We'll see.

link to photos:

http://picasaweb.google.ca/heathermoore21/CanadianGroupJuly2008?authkey=l35fbLCovTE

hospitals, lines, shakes

2008-07-19T12:41:00.000-07:00

I probably shouldn't have asked in my last blog "whatever next", because i got my answer on Thursday night. I woke from a dead sleep to a rumbling noise and my bed being shaken back and forth rather vigorously. It didn't take me long to work it out - an earthquake. It lasted just long enough and was strong enough to get scary and make me wonder if I ought to make a move, and then it all settled down, although it took me some time to settle down again! Apparently Ecuador is on a fault line, and these are fairly regular happenings. I went onto the Guayaquil newspaper website to see what I could find out, and it was a 5.2, which seems a fair little shakeup to me! 2 houses in Guayaquil were destroyed, both squatter type dwellings, made of bamboo. When you look at some of those places and where they are built, hanging onto hillsides by their fingernails, it's a wonder more of them didn't fall down.
At this end of the last 2 weeks it feels as though I have spent most of them in hospitals, in fact it has been big parts of every weekday but one. I have got to know 3 of the Guayaquil hospitals quite well! But will I ever figure out the system, or even if there is one?? The big project was getting a test done for Narcisa, our lady who has the heart problem. When we were finally able to get her to see a surgeon, he wanted her to have a cardiac catheterization done, so we would know if she even is a good candidate for surgery, or if the damage was too advanced. This would be a simple enough process in Canada, but a whole different story here. She was admitted to one hospital, and the test done in another. And organizing that took an astonishing amount of time, and patience, and tolerance!! And many trips back and forth between the hospitals, and many people to talk to and many lines to stand in and bits of paper to be signed. It took 4 half days for Nikki and I to get it all in place, with Narcisa in the hospital all the while. A word about the hospital she was in: A very old place, I think someone said it's a heritage building! It is something from another age, big old place, built around a central courtyard, which was actually very nice. But then you go into the wards, which are the oldfashioned wards from 100 years ago, beds all lined up along both sides. As basic as you can get, this is the hospital for the poor. Men and women on the same ward, different ends, but no real dividers. NO curtains to pull around the beds to give privacy, no tracks even, there never have been curtains. Patients provide their own drinking water, toilet paper, even their own dishes, which they wash themselves after each meal and keep by the bedside. And the signs on the walls - Don't sit on the beds, Don't throw garbage on the floor, and my personal favourite - Don't spit on the floor!
All was accomplished eventually, and on Tuesday morning I was at that hospital at 7, rounded up 2 porters, a wheelchair, a nurse and an ambulance, put the patient together with all of the above, and waited for the doctor who was to come along to show up, an hour late! And finally off we went, me in the back of the decrepit ambulance with all kinds of new friends I made while we waited. Then of course we had to wait for a very long time at hospital #2, because we were late, and the doctor had got himself occupied with other affairs. But in due course it was done, I only had to make 3 trips out to get DVD's that they needed that nobody had told me about, then go and pay for bloodwork they did during the procedure! Then finally done, and back to hospital #1, siren going! All in all, an experience. And I have left lots out.
The good news of all that was that the damage to her heart is less than they had thought, so she is able to have surgery. Sort of a good news, bad news story. Good that she is eligible for the surgery she needs to repair that heart defect, but when I think about what will be involved in getting that done...oh dear! And I have a bit of a misgiving at having something like open heart surgery done in that hospital.
Thursday and Friday mornings were spent with someone else needing attention, we went to the nearby hospital, which does have a system of sorts, but involves waiting in numerous disorganized lines, for every step of the process, and there are many. By the time I emerged at the end of friday morning, my patience had worn very thin. I think this is the hardest part of my job here, the hospitals, the lines, and waiting and waiting. I went home feeling frazzled and exhausted.
But then in the afternoon I went to Bastion, made a couple of housecalls, then went and visited with Graciela, the wife of the man who had the leg ulcer. I don't get to see them anymore, now that the ulcer is all healed up, so I went just to visit and catch up. And got such a welcome, and had a great visit. Then went to pick up my nicely sharpened machete (well, I have banana trees to deal with!) from Felipe, and stayed for awhile, sat on a stool in his shoemaker shop, chatted, watched him repair a pair of shoes that most of us would have thrown out long ago, and watched the world go by his place on the main street - most of Bastion does go by sooner or later. And he knows them all.
And so 2 hours later, I went home feeling restored and at peace again. That's the good part of my job, getting to spend time in Bastion, with old and new friends. I am so blessed by knowing these people.
An update on Michelle, the little girl with leukemia: we had a call from her dad this week, saying she is doing much better than she was, tolerating the chemo and in good spirits. Good news.

whatever next??

2008-07-10T16:31:00.000-07:00

There has been a more or less steady stream of creatures in and around my house since I arrived. You read all about the rats (I'm happy to report that they have not reappeared - yet?). But there have been lesser critters coming in and trying to join me in my home - big fat slugs in the rainy season (never go around barefoot!), little centipedes motoring along on their many tiny legs, "grillos" - rather large crickets that come in under the doors at night, harmless, but very loud if they get into a hiding place and start to sing in search of a mate, and unnerving when they suddenly fly up at you. And there is always the occasional biggish cockroach to be dealt with, that's where flipflops are indispensable! The permanent residents who are allowed to stay are the geckos, little rubbery lizards who travel around on the walls making a living eating bugs, including mosquitoes. And out in the backyard assorted wildlife comes and goes: a big toad who lives back there, making himself useful I hope, little wrens, 2 little doves with a nest, the occasional hummingbird, giant dragonflies, once a beautiful blue butterfly.

But the other day I had 2 completely unexpected guests. I got up in the morning, opened the back door as I always do, and looked out. And heard some scuffling noises. Looked again, and there scratching about under the banana tree as though they'd always been there doing exactly that were 2 half grown chickens!! I couldn't believe my eyes. My yard is completely walled, by very high walls. I had to look again, just to make sure, but yes, those were chickens alright. Great, now what?? All my friends in Bastion would have said, Keep them of course! Chickens from heaven, think eggs, think soup, think "seco de pollo" a local chicken dish, or even KFC!! But I don't want chickens in my backyard, I haven't become quite Ecuadorian enough for that yet. So I got busy, opened the back gate, got a broom and directed them to the exit. One obligingly used it right away and hasn't been seen since, and the second one came close, but at the last second veered back in. And so began the chase round and round my little yard. After awhile Katelyn, my current housemate, woke up and came to help. She had once had a job on a turkey farm and said that she could catch it. But first you have to get near it, and that chicken was not about to let anyone near it! So we chased, dodging around the banana tree, flushing it out from under the play house, and behind the ficus tree. If anybody could have seen these 2 women chasing this beast around, in their jammies...! Finally he perched for a minute, and in a flash Katelyn reached around, grabbed him by his legs and ran out the gate. And I will always treasure the mental picture I have of her, outside on the pathway that connects these houses, clutching that chicken upsidedown, trying to decide which way to run with it. And then heading off out of sight to let it go far from my gate. I nearly did myself an injury laughing.

How did they get in? I had no idea, until I finally sat down outside with my coffee to recover, and heard chicken noises. And way up there, on top of the back wall, was another half grown chicken, eyeing my yard from above. Oh no you don't, I said, and shook the banana tree at it and it flew off. Thus solving the mystery as to how they arrived.

is it summer now?

2008-07-04T13:53:00.000-07:00

As hard as it is for me to get my head around this fact, being so far removed from everything that would usually remind me of the time of year - it is in fact July now! I'm missing all my usual signals that tell me that summer has arrived: kids finishing school, the Sound of Music festival in Burlington, the Forestview carnival, barbeques, Ontario strawberries (can you hear the agony in those last 2?!), and of course Canada Day.

But I did know that it was July 1st, and in case I forgot, Felipe sent all of us Canadians a text message first thing in the morning wishing us a happy one. And I (rather patriotically, I thought) hung my Canadian flag out on my front door. Later in the morning, we Canadians were talking about it and wondering what kind of Canada day thing we might be doing if we were at home. Barbeque? Oh yes......(again, hear the pain), a barbeque! So we decided to have our own little party that night, with hamburgers and chips and salad, and not a grain of rice in sight! The burgers had to be cooked on a baking sheet in the oven, not quite the same flavour as on good old BBQ, but we did have real Canadian cheddar cheese to put on top! And Nikki made a strawberry dessert, not Ontario strawberries, but hey, what can you do? We attached all the necessary extension cords involved in plugging in the white lights around the picnic table, tried to ignore the blinking that they now do (just added to the festive atmosphere!) And we had ourselves a Canada Day party in Ecuador. And I tried not to cry over the missing fireworks (those of you who know me well know my fondness for fireworks!).And now today is that other big July celebration for that other country up there! And can you believe it, there is an awareness of it here! More than an awareness it seems, we were in the mall yesterday and the window of the party store was full of stars and stripes stuff - flags, hats, cake decorations! And tonight there is another free symphony concert in honour of the 4th of July. Why, I wonder?? But I'm just accepting the fact, and the free concert, and looking forward to that.

But maybe we need to do some awareness raising for Canada. And try for fireworks next year?!

2008-06-25T11:31:00.000-07:00

Well, it's only been a couple of weeks since I updated this blog, it felt like much longer - now I don't have to feel so bad!
(as I write this I'm listening to CBC radio over the internet. A little weird to hear familiar cbc voices and programs against the background of noisy buses, honking horns, and all the other Guayaquil sounds!)
It's been a full couple of weeks, with lots going on. Kathryn has been here, just went back on Sunday, and we traveled a bit, saw the sights here in G., and amongst that I carried on with my daily life.
We spent a few days in Cuenca, a beautiful old city in the mountains, about 4 hours south of G. by bus. We stayed right in the old city center, all cobblestoned streets, interesting buildings, markets, MANY churches, some quite lovely and huge, a river running through town, and a big square where I was happy to sit and watch life go by. we had a visit with Daniel who has gone to live there to go to university. And we went one day to visit Ecuador's Inca ruins, tiny by Peru's standards, but I like ruins and I may never get to Machu Pichu, so I was happy. It was cold though, 3180 feet up in the Andes, and there are clouds up there, cold damp ones! As we arrived we could hear sirens approaching, and it turned out that a couple who lived just down the hillside from the ruins had been attacked by their bull, and these were ambulances arriving. I have no idea how serious it was, but in due course, they were carried up a steep hill on stretchers, the man with his hat over his face, put into the ambulances, and off they went, sirens and all, to wherever the nearest hospital might have been. I wish I had the end to that story, but I guess I'll never know it.
link to photos of our time away - http://picasaweb.google.ca/heathermoore21/CuencaJune2008?authkey=_ia_yq4reCQ
And in the meantime, life here has gone on, with its ups and downs. Last week, a crisis hit us that has set us all back a bit. A little girl in the school, 7 year old Michelle, was diagnosed with leukemia and sent straight to the cancer hospital where she has been ever since. It's Acute Lymphocytic Leukemia, and she has already begun the first stage of what will be a long course of treatment. I've been in to the hospital twice now, the first time was just as they were making the diagnosis, and there she was in a little bed on the pediatric ward, attached to an IV, scared, not eating, having been through some unpleasant tests all on her own, no parents allowed to be with her for those. It was a heartbreaking visit, seeing her and her parents, who were looking as though they didn't know what had hit them - she is their only child. And it was also hard to see the other kids on that ward, knowing that they were all there with some kind of malignancy. Cancer is a difficult diagnosis to deal with anywhere, but here, especially if you're poor, it's worse. Not only do these people have to worry about the illness, but also how they are going to find the money to pay for everything. And can it ever add up fast. Before anything is done, they are given a list of supplies that will be needed, and how much they will cost, and they have to go and pay for it all. If you're poor you can go and talk to social services, and you may be given a discount. But always - those bills, wads of them. We are so thankful that in Michelle's case we can help with that, and remove that part of the burden from her parents. This has been a blow for everyone at the school, I believe that this is the first really serious illness they've had to deal with. So they are praying for her, and sending her cards, it will be a good support system for the family as they face the long road ahead.
And then yesterday, some good news - I went to see the man with the leg ulcer who I've been seeing for 2 months now, and many dressings and many prayers later...the ulcer is completely closed!! And great was the rejoicing!! He told us recently that he had had it for 10 months before I arrived on the scene, and 3 different doctors had told him he needed to have the leg amputated! And now he's out and about, and working a bit, able to earn some much needed money. So how's that for rewarding!! How blessed I feel to have been able to be a part of that, to be used by God to help that one little family. And I have got some new friends now, too, people I feel pivileged to spend time with. Such are the blessings of working in this community.

a boat trip

2008-06-08T13:10:00.000-07:00

Kathryn is here now, arrived last Monday evening - boy, was it good to see her! We've been out and about ever since - she's been catching up a bit with old friends and coming with me on my rounds in Bastion. It's been nice to have some input from another nurse, we've taken stitches out of a little boy's leg, done the dressing on the man with the leg ulcer (which is about a millimeter away from being healed!), taken blood pressures, and visited. And been fed, of course, often a part of these visits.

And we've had outings, the highlight so far being the one we had on Thursday. We left Caracol at 6:30 in the morning, along with Janna, Nikki and Katie Horne, and caught the bus to Playas. (This time I got a proper seat, no folding stool on a platform on this trip!) We got to Dale and Janet's house at 9, and then all of us piled into Dales' truck for the 1/2 hour trip to Posorja, a little town at the end of the road that goes past camp. I've always wanted to see where that road goes. Posorja is a port town, fishing boats, and some container ships, and there is also a huge smelly tuna packing plant.

In Posorja, Dale had a contact who had a contact and we got ourselves a boat, complete with a very nice man to be our driver and guide, to take us out for the day. And what a day it was! The weather was perfect, you could not have ordered a finer day, sunny and clear, and not too hot. Our destination was a big island just off the coast, Isla Puna, but on the way there our guide took us by a place where dolphins often hang out, and they showed up, as if they had been waiting for us. Lots of them, and they came very close to the boat, and jumped out of the water, and did everything to make us all squeal and exclaim and clap our hands. Which we did. Then he took us past a tiny island inhabited by birds, blue-footed boobies, pelicans, frigate birds, and others.

Then finally to Puna, where he put us down at a beautiful, endless, empty beach. As we arrived, another boat pulled in too, but it was just to unload a few residents of the island who had been to the mainland to get supplies. 2 donkeys and a small pickup truck appeared to help carry them and their goods home, and soon we had the place to ourselves. The other side of the island is more inhabited, apparently, towns and villages and people, but on our side, there wasn't much. A collection of beach huts, which must mean that in the busy season there are visitors to the beach, and a very small village inland a bit. And nothing more. Just what we city dwellers needed!

We had a picnic lunch, then scattered to our preferred beach activities, little boys to swim and jump off the boat, others to lie on the beach in the sun to read and/or sleep, and me to go for a long walk along the beach (with camera of course) and then to join the others for a nap in the sun. It was a lovely relaxing afternoon.

Later we decided to go into "town" thinking that we could maybe buy an ice cream, or something to drink, and see what town looks like. Well, it took some searching, but we eventually found it after a hot walk, and it wasn't exactly "town" - just a few houses scattered around a very dry and dusty area, surrounding a catholic church, a school (John F. Kennedy school!!!) and not much else. Along came a man on one donkey with another in tow, and we asked him if there was a store anywhere, and he asked what we wanted. "Oh just something to drink." Oh well, he could help, and took us to his house, where he sold us a big bottle of "cola" and 4 plastic cups, and we stood out there, with the donkeys, and had our refreshment!

Then we headed back to meet our man with the boat,which we did with some difficulty. We were to meet him at a different place, by a river, a little estuary really, which is only there when the tide is in. Our problem was that we began the search before there WAS a river, so it was a little hard to figure out where he could possibly meet us with a boat, but we eventually found him, and it was a very interesting trip out along that tidal river to the sea. Mangrove trees all along the sides, covered with all the little crabs who live in the sand, but seem to climb out when the tide comes in, huge spiders hanging around in massive webs stretched between the trees above our heads (that one was a little unnerving, I might have been better to have not noticed that!), iguanas high up in the branches, and many birds. It reminded me a bit of the canoe trip into the jungle.

And finally out to the ocean, which had become a tad choppier since the morning. Well, more than a tad, and more than choppy!! Fun for the first few ups and downs, but then I began to wonder how I could save my camera if we went overboard. We kept looking at our man, thinking that as long as he was still smiling we were okay. And he was calm and happy, and said that part is always like that, and we'd soon be out of it. And he was right.

The sun was getting low as we approached Posorja, and everything was looking so nice in that light, and suddenly he said, "look, more dolphins". And there they were, 5 of them, having a fine time, jumping and showing off, and coming so close to us. Our very patient driver circled around for ages so we could enjoy them, what a bonus that was, a perfect way to end a wonderful day.

The other girls went back to Guayaquil that evening, but Kathryn and I stayed over and spent part of Friday at the beach and in town at Playas, and got the bus back that afternoon. 2 great days!

link to photos of the day - http://picasaweb.google.ca/heathermoore21/Posorja?authkey=oeFAyWzFSPY

well you need to see more photos!

2008-05-28T12:37:00.000-07:00

aww, now that's a cute little baby - that's my granddaughter!

Anthony, Jen & Elizabeth Heather

is that hand really that size?!

I'm a grandma - it's a girl!

2008-05-27T09:41:00.000-07:00

It finally happened. This baby really seemed to not want to enter this world, apparently fought it every step of the way! First she made us all wait 8 days after her due date, and that felt like a long 8 days to me, much longer for Jen. Then, finally I got word at 3:30 am Sunday that Jen had gone into labour. So I fairly reasonably thought that by that evening, I'd be able to call myself a grandma. But not so, labour went on and on.....and on. Until finally on Monday at 2pm, after more than 36 hours of labour, that baby had to be fetched out by c-section. So it was a very very long wait. But worth it, we have a pretty little baby girl named Elizabeth Heather, 8 lb 4 oz. And all is well. I've talked to both Anthony and Jen on the phone from the cyber (where I had to explain to the guy why the sudden flurry of phone calls, and he's entered right into it all, asking how they all are, getting me a chair so I can sit while I talk - how old does he think I am anyway!!) They are fine, Jen is very tired of course, but doing fine. And now the distance is feeling real, how I wish I could go and see my new granddaughter, and feel her little downy head, and give her a kiss. But for now I'm glad that there's such a thing as internet, and cybers, and Skype, and I'll see her one day.

Here are 2 photos from yesterday.

lots to think about today!

2008-05-25T16:24:00.000-07:00

Well, this day has been a long one. I had a text message at 3:30 this morning to say that Jen, my daughter-in-law, had finally gone into labour, more than a week past the due date! And now, many hours later, I still can't quite yet say that I'm a grandma. It's getting closer, but I'm not there yet!
So in the meantime, while I wait, along with everyone else who is part of this family, I've had to try to keep busy.
I went to church in block 10 this morning, and had been asked to visit a man with Parkinson's, so after church I went to see him. I took Janna to help with the Spanish, because mine is still not up to snuff (will it ever be, I wonder?). And oh, it was a heartbreaking visit. I wept when I left. This is a 54 year old man, diagnosed 15 years ago with Parkinson's, a progressive disease. It's an unhappy diagnosis for a young person in Canada, where the healthcare is good, with access to good doctors, and medications, and help at home if you need it. But to have to live with this disease here, living in block 10 in Bastion, such a poor community.........if you have no money, then you just don't go to the doctor. And if you run out of medication and there's no money, you just do without.
It was a little work to get the story straight, it sounded as though he had maybe had a bit of a stroke some months ago, he some sort of episode, and was in the hospital, but no tests, NONE, were done at the time, so who knows. Some Cuban doctor says he needs to have surgery, but nobody is clear as to what it's for, and they've told her (the man's wife) it will cost thousands! And to come back when they have the money!! They don't even have the money for a basic consultation with a doctor. He hasn't had a review in over 6 months - no money. When I arrived, he seemed not too bad, but in the space of 10 minutes, the morning med wore off, and it was awful to see. Shaking out of control, his little wife having to half carry him around the house, his young son exercising his arms up and down, because he feels as though they "go to sleep". No speech. And the next dose not due until evening.
Can I do anything to help - I don't know. That was partly the cause of my tears after I left, I feel so helpless in the face of that. What I can do is make sure he has the meds he needs and try to find him a good neurologist, and be sure he is seen regularly, and the meds adjusted when they need to be. And I'll start reading up on Parkinson's and meds, so that I have some knowledge when we see a doctor. And above all, I can pray.

2008-05-23T18:21:00.000-07:00

My, doesn't time fly when you have a blog to try to stay on top of!! May 9 was my last post, and I feel as though I just did it. I guess it's time for an update.
The weeks seem to have been passing so quickly. I feel as though life has been less exciting than it was (I think of those first weeks I was here - camp, jungle) therefore fewer blog updates, but part of that is just me getting used to this new life. In a way I don't want to get used to it all, I'd like to keep on seeing this place through eyes that are new, and have it all still have an impact. But I have realized in the last week or so that I am feeling at home here. And I think that's a good thing. When I've been to a different part of the city and then am on my way home, and as I start to get close to my part of town, and see the Bastion hill, especially at night when all of its homes are lit up, I feel as though I'm coming home, and it's a good feeling. I am a part of this place now.

My role, which I agonized over in the first little while after I arrived, has become much clearer. I am busy now with people who need help with health care issues. My "patient" load increases by the day now. And it's always varied. Sometimes it's incidents at school - little boy came to the office crying with a sore tooth. I got out my flashlight and had a look - a rather rotten molar - not my area of expertise, that's for sure!! But I gave him something for the pain, and we told his mother to take him to a dentist (which a week later still hadn't happened, as I discovered when he came back to me for more Motrin!). Or the mother of one of the kids in the school showed up with an infected cut on her arm. She had fallen in the area behind her house several days previously, cut her arm badly, not had it seen to by anybody, and by the time I saw it, it was very infected. When I eventually saw where she lived, and where she had fallen, it became clear as to why it got so infected. She keeps chickens, and they roam around inside the house and out, and um......well, the place isn't all that clean, shall we say! So that was a week of antibiotics and dressings. And then this week a cute little girl fell and broke her collarbone, so I retrieved the brace that we had used for the little guy who broke his at camp, and now Milagros is sporting it.
I've been accompanying people to doctors' appointments, this seems to be a big part of my work now. It helps to have someone with a little medical background to help the person understand what is being said, and to ask the right questions, and then sometimes to weed out the unnecessary prescriptions after the visit, and just buy what is useful. But in the last week, I have been to 3 different doctors and come away feeling quite positive about the care each person was getting. I haven't always felt so positive after some visits.

Some updates: The lady with the heart problem that needs surgery - we took her to the surgeon this week, and he wants her to see another specialist for a heart catheterization to be sure that surgery is the best choice for her. I was impressed by him, seemed to really want to do the best thing for her, and it was nice to find that he wasn't just going to operate without due diligence. She and I would appreciate prayer for the right decision in this.
The man with the leg ulcer - after more than a month of almost daily visits, and dressing changes, that ulcer is SO clsoe to being healed. That's after many prayers and lots of advice from Canada. (I'll have to find a new excuse to go and visit, they seem to feel that I need to be fed, and often produce a tasty little snack for me!)
And the pregnant girl I've been visiting - I decided last week to take her somewhere where she would get some better prenatal care. We went to the new-ish hospital near here, and saw an obstetrician who I liked and and he did almost all of what I thought he ought to be doing, (and, as a bonus, he speaks good English). So we'll continue on there, and that is where she will have the baby, which is a much better option than the maternity hospital downtown, where I'm told they do many c-sections, some for no apparent reason.

In between all of that, I've been settling into this house, and making it feel like mine. I at long last bought a desk and brought it home yesterday, so I have finally got my computer off the kitchen table and into an "office". My "consultorio", as one of my visitors said as he looked into this room. Maybe I should hang out my shingle - it would be that easy here!

And I'm awaiting 2 big events. The first - my first grandchild who was due one week ago, but as Jen says, he/she seems to have put up shelves and bought a couch and is planning to stay in! I check my cell phone many times a day for the message saying that he/she is on the move! Stand by for that news.
And the other - Kathryn will be arriving for 3 weeks in just over a week. And I'm really looking forward to that.

So maybe life still is exciting after all.

bargains in bastion!

2008-05-09T13:09:00.000-07:00

Last week there was an event in Bastion block 6 - a flea market held at the school. The office that I'm to share with Nikki has been FULL of clothing, sheets, towels, used and new, all sent down from Canada for this purpose. So much stuff that I've been unable to start my work at the school because there's been nowhere to work. So last Thursday was the appointed day, May 1st, a holiday for everybody. So all Wednesday evening we hauled stuff all the way from the office to the gym, then roughly organized it. There was so much stuff spread out in that gym that we could hardly believe it had all been in that little office!

We were there early the next morning for the final preparations, and then the doors opened at 9. And the shopping began!

the 3 photos below are of the same area, before, during and after

Prices were great, most items were less than a dollar, there were clothes for women, men and children, and some household stuff as well, most of it in great shape, some of it brand new.

the guys found these shirts and thought maybe they could be a cleaning team (the thought didn't last!)

The event was a success, a huge quantity of stuff was sold and people went away with necessities for their families that they were able to buy for very little money. In a way it felt wrong to be selling this stuff here, instead of giving it away, but it seems to be a better plan to sell it for a very low price. I was one of the "cashiers" and at times I was practically giving things away, when I knew the circumstances of a particular family. And I guess it helps to attach more value to something if they have paid something for it.

The money raised from the sale will go towards repairs to the roof of the gym, there are many holes. When we were organizing stuff the night before, we had to arrange it in the places where Felipe knows stay dry if it rains. There were many spots that had to be avoided.

And how does the office look now? Well, there are still an amazing amount of boxes and bags in there, but we're going to work on that next week. We WILL make that a usable office! Eventually.

a night out

2008-04-25T08:24:00.000-07:00

I had an experience last night that still has me feeling slightly boggled. Did it really happen? 10 of us, 4 canadians, and 6 youth from Bastion, all caught a bus last evening and went off to a concert, a symphony concert! Turns out that Guayaquil has a symphony orchestra and this is the beginning of their new season, and last night's concert was free, and so we went! And in the space of a few minutes, I was transported from this new world in which I now live, a world of poverty, noise, dirt, and endless blaring salsa music EVERYWHERE, to a slice of my old world. A quite nice concert hall, plush seats, cool, dry, quiet, and Mozart! The transition was too fast, it took me some time to make the adjustment, and it just seemed too incredible to me. Very weird. But very enjoyable. The first half was Mozart, a very familiar piano concerto, followed by Mahler. Then out we went, back into the other world, of pouring rain, flowing mud and smelly buses, all of which we experienced on our way home. And then to climb into bed and wonder if that was just a dream. Wow!

2008-04-24T07:06:00.000-07:00

Another week of ups and downs, maybe that's just the way of life here, maybe life anywhere! Better just get used to it.
On the downside (for me) I've had all kinds of internet grief, losing my connection at home for days at a time, finally getting the guy in to fix it, then promptly losing it again. It's working at the moment, but still precarious. Now I know that this is a luxury, and not a necessity, and people have lived for a very long time without it, but here's the problem - I've got used to having it. And for me living here, it has been such a bonus, being able to talk to my family over skype, and having access to help on the internet and from doctors at home for some of the medical issues that I'm encountering here. Not to mention being able to update this blog in the comfort of my own home, on a keyboard that has letters!

My patient load has been on the increase, and I haven't even started work at the school yet. I have accompanied people to doctors' appointments twice, and have another visit coming up tomorrow. We have a lady with a fairly major heart problem, which is going to need open heart surgery to correct, so that is going to be an ongoing issue for her and me. One little guy in the school has been having seizures and had some tests done which confirm epilepsy, so there's some juggling of his meds to get that under control. There's a pregnant teen who has been having almost no regular prenatal care. And my current big challenge is a man with a rather nasty leg ulcer that he's had for 2 months, and now is there for me to try to cure! I'm making daily visits to his home to do dressings, with some input from Jannine, a nurse at my old clinic at home who has more experience in these things, and all the while knowing that it's not me who can heal this ulcer, it's only with God's power that I can help. It's a further challenge because I've been told that the family of this man would really like him to see the local witch doctor - yes they still exist around here, so it's with lots of prayer that I try to deal with this.
As I experience more of the medical system here, I am so thankful for our system in Canada, and don't ever wish to hear any complaints about it!! We are SO fortunate to have such medical care, that we really take for granted, and feel we must complain if we have to wait a bit for attention or appointments. Our healthcare is excellent, available and above all - FREE! We are looking at needing to find probably $5000, maybe more, for this lady's heart surgery, completely unaffordable for someone living in Bastion. So may Canadians be truly grateful for their healthcare system! There, that's my rant done.
The population in my house rises and falls, Julia is here with me until the beginning of June, Bethany and Paul have been here, coming and going between travels. Now Paul has gone back to Canada and Bethany is here for 2 more weeks. The visitors to the house come and go, too. Sometimes there is a steady stream of dropins, and then other days, it's quiet. Flexibility is the key!

And a brief rat update. In short, I haven't got the problem licked yet! There is one small fellow who insists on coming to call, in spite of quantities of rat poison that I've put out and which disappears. Surely there must be a lot of rats somewhere who are not feeling well. Yes this one is only small, but small rats turn into big rats, and that is where I draw the line! Then there's the side effect of the cementing of holes that was done to try to discourage the rodents, which has become apparent since the reappearance of nightly downpours of rain. I can now see that the water used to drain away down these holes, and now the only place for the water to go is under my kitchen door and into my house. So I have to stand by with mop and bucket while it's raining hard. We'll have to find a solution to that one.

So life carries on, seldom without interest, and almost always hot. But when I feel that these little trials are making my life hard, I go over to Bastion to visit there, and that cures me.

camp photos

2008-04-15T11:22:00.000-07:00

here is a link to some photos from all 3 weeks of camp
http://picasaweb.google.ca/heathermoore21/Camp2008

good days, bad days

2008-04-13T14:59:00.000-07:00

Another week has gone by, a week with challenges, but with rewards and joys as well.

On Monday I went to the school in Bastion to talk to the director (or principal) about what my role will be there. As a result I will be starting there on the 28th of April, and will start by seeing each child in the school individually to do a kind of once over, a "well child check". Just to see if we can catch any health issues that need to be dealt with. I'll be doing that 2 days a week.

In the meantime, there are a few medical issues that are needing my input. There is a lady, mother of one of the kids in the school, who has a fairly serious heart problem. She has been to see a cardiologist at the hospital in the city, not one of the better hospitals, and he is recommending surgery, but before she agrees to that, we want to make sure it really is necessary. It will be very expensive, and this is a family without much, so we are looking for a diagnosis and recommendations we can trust before we go ahead. So we'll try to find another cardiologist this week and I'll go along with her and see what we can find out.

Then there is a young girl from a family I know well, who suddenly had 2 seizures in one day a few weeks ago. Never had a seizure before. So she is needing an EEG and CT scan to see what's going on. I'll go along for those.

And there are other issues out there, probably an endless list.

I went to visit a lady from the church one day this week, she had had a C section 9 days previous, and still had her sutures! She asked if I could take them out - great - that's one of my favourite jobs! So I hurried off home and got my supplies and took them out. She hadn't had a very good suturing job done, one end of the wound has needed care, so I've been going in each day to look after that, and give advice on breastfeeding and baby care. Felt good to be doing some real nurse stuff. I stayed on one day to have a visit with her and get to know her a little better. It was great, she understands the need for some of us Canadians to have people speak to us a little more slowly than the folks in Guayaquil usually do! So we were able to have a good chat, because I wasn't constantly having to have her repeat things.

The big news of the week was that I finally was able to locate some tetanus vaccine for Daniel. And I still can't believe where I found it. After a week and a half of scouring this city: pharmacies, clinics, hospitals, my taxi driver who took me on one of my fruitless seaches told me about a little hole in the wall pharmacy right here in my own community of Caracol. It's run by a nurse who works at a hospital. It took 4 trips to find her there, but indeed - she had it!! So Daniel at long last got his shot. He didn't seem all that pleased when I showed up with it, but I was kind enough to not give it where the nurse had told me I should, and I used a much smaller needle than what she sold me! He lived though it and I'm happy he's had it.

But... the bad days. There were a couple of days this week when life got on top of me a bit. It started with the rat. Yes, RAT. A big one. In my house! I looked up in time to see it leaving last Sunday, so went out and bought rat poison on Monday, put it out, and on Tuesday morning it had all gone. Great, I thought, that will be the end of that. But when we got home on Tuesday evening, it was clear he had been (or maybe still was?) in the house. Julia (my current young roommate) squealed and got up onto a chair so it was left to me to take a flashlight in one hand and a broom in the other, and press my face to the floor to peer under the fridge and into other corners where he might be lurking. I decided it wasn't in the house, but it had chewed away half of the rubber strip along the bottom of the kitchen door, leaving a huge gap. I put out more poison and jammed a piece of cardboard into the gap, and went to bed, hoping for the best.

Then the next morning, with visions of rats still troubling me, I had computer problems, and there's nothing like computer grief to put me over the edge! So it was in a rather poor frame of mind that I headed off to Bastion. All the way there I had complaining little thoughts grumbling though my head - I'm sick of being hot, I'm sick of being all sweaty all the time, I'm sick of the noise, and dirt and of having to always look out for drivers who seem happy to run me down given half a chance (pedestrians have NO rights here). And now I have a rat problem AND computer problems too. I know I had no right to complain, after all I was on my way to see people with much bigger problems than my miserable little grievances, but I'm trying to adjust to a very different way of life and this wasn't helping!!

Then I went to church in Block 10 that night, and it was a very happy time, and afterwards those who are leaders in that little church had a meeting, and while I waited for Janna, I sat with my eyes closed and absorbed the atmosphere. I could feel a blessed cool evening breeze - such a relief. I could hear the sounds of evening life in block 10, I could hear discussion in Spanish in one corner, I could hear William playing the guitar very quietly and singing softly nearby. And I came away with such a feeling of gratitude and joy. In spite of the challenges, and the minor hardships and trials, and missing my family, I am happy here, and I have the deep contentment that comes with knowing that I am in exactly the right place, the place God has for me right now.

And the end (?) of the rat story is that it probably did me a favour by showing its face when it did, because when I got Jose over to try and sort me out, we found that it had been living in and making free with the space where the water drains out of my house from sinks and showers, and it had been doing a lot of earth moving so that the outgoing drain was almost blocked. Could have been nasty! So that all got fixed up, cement applied, more poison put out, and the happy news of today is that a large dead rat was found in my backyard. I had the privilege of getting it into a bag and into the garbage and my, but it was ugly close up! But that's one down. Are there more? We'll see. I am in the market for a cat - a biggish one would be good!

a day trip to Playas

2008-04-06T14:44:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I went to Playas for the day. We (all the Canadians who are living and are involved in the ministry here) are trying to meet regularly to talk about things, pray with and for each other, and have a devotional time. Because some of us are now living out at the beach, we are taking turns at where we have the meeting. Yesterday it was our turn to go to there.
So we left at 8 in the morning to catch the bus, walked to where we could get the right bus to stop for us. And I am discovering that travel by bus here is almost always an adventure. Just part of daily life for those that are used to it, but a definite adventure for me!
When we got on that bus, it was full, well, the seats were all occupied, but in Ecuador, that's not full, far from it. So we resigned ourselves to standing all the way there (about 1 1/2 hours), but another discovery that I've made is that there are advantages to having gray hair, and being slightly on the mature side, shall we say. I was offered a place to sit, a little metal folding stool that the fare collector got down and set up for me. Right at the front of the bus, on a little raised area, facing backwards towards everybody. Kind of felt as though I was on a stage and should make a speech or do something interesting. (Of course, as a "gringa" here, everything I do is interesting!) But I was grateful for a place to sit, and settled down for the trip. But the peace didn't last. The bus kept stopping and more and more people got on, and you start to think that there really isn't room for anybody else, but there always is. At one point there were a family of 6 or 7 all standing in my tiny space, one leaning on me from the side, and one cute little child leaning on my knees for support. Then when the bus really is completely packed full, on get the vendors of food items, who think they are going to work their way through the bus to make some sales. And, unbelievably, do so! All very well and entertaining, but I was having quite a time trying to keep myself on the stool, because the driver's goal (besides trying to squeeze as many onto that bus as he possibly could) seemed also to be to try to throw me off my stool. He drove like a maniac, at top speed, then slamming the brakes on to go over a speed bump or pick up more passengers, swerving around potholes and hurtling around bends. And I was on a very small, unanchored folding stool, remember. I was scrabbling around trying to find something to hold onto to keep myself from tipping over. I didn't want to be that interesting! And my other problem was that right behind my head was the television set that they have on buses for your viewing pleasure, and every time the driver stopped or started my head banged into the bottom part that stuck out right at head level. Oh yes, it was quite a trip, the last half hour into Playas became an endurance test. But we made it, and it was wonderful to finally stagger off that bus onto terra firma!

We had a good day all together, the Marshalls, the Horsts, and us 3 from Caracol plus our visitors. We had a wonderful lunch together (pulled beef sandwiches, salads and 2 kinds of pie, yes pie!). Afterwards we had a great time of prayer together, giving thanks for so many things and praying for the work here, and for each other. Then Nikki led a time of discussion on prayer and we had some good discussion and sharing of thoughts. Finally we talked "business" matters, it's good to bounce things off each other and get input on issues that we are dealing with.
And at long last I was free to head for the beach, which may be my favourite place in the world! I just had to check to make sure it was still there, that nobody had rolled it up and taken it away since I was last there. Nobody had and I put my feet in the Pacific and had a lovely walk, and time to sit and let the peace and beauty wash over me and blow away the dirt and noise of Guayaquil. Late afternoon is such a beautiful time on that beach.
Then it was time to head for home, us 5 who are living in Caracol at the moment caught the bus back. That trip was not without interest, too. First the army got on and told all the men to get off while they checked both the men and their bags (I was told it was because 2 weeks before some guys had held up 2 buses between Playas and Guayaquil, waved guns about and robbed everybody). Then a guy who had lived many years in the US sat himself beside me and talked endlessly - told me more about his life than I think I needed to know, breathing beer and garlic into my face, and then wanting me to prove my faith to him ( he was Jewish). I finally plugged my ipod into my ears and tuned both him and the blaring salsa music out and slept.

As I walked along the street towards home, it felt as though I had been gone much longer than a day!

last week of camp

2008-04-01T09:30:00.000-07:00

So, the final week of camp has come and gone. It was different this year having the 3 weeks spread out over such a long time. We've always in the past had all 3 weeks one right after another. It was tiring, but you just kept going until it was over. This year was easier in some ways, but I found it hard to gear up each week and get into camp mode again. But it worked for various reasons.

The past week was a good one over all, I think. There were around 150 older youth there, and they were great. It was a mixture of kids from 2 other churches besides the 2 in Bastion, as well as a group of 11 from Onzole, where I had my jungle adventure (Nixon was there, the boy with the hand that needed my attention when I was there - it looked great, all healed up). It was the first time at that camp for those kids, and they had a wonderful time.
The music for the worship times was really good, Dale headed up a team of music people from Bastion and Alborada and they were excellent - I loved the singing time, and so did everybody else, those kids got right into it, clapping and singing their hearts out and it all sounded great.

The week went smoothly in the water and power departments, no problems there at all. And no major health issues all week, just one or 2 shortlived fevers and some headaches, and the usual sore throats. Nothing big at all, smooth sailing. All is well............... until Thursday afternoon. We were on the beach, having a lovely time, the kids were playing games, running back and forth. Suddenly a gathering by the water - "Heather, come quick". Uh oh, what is it, I have about 1 minute while I'm getting there to wonder if this is a big problem or a small one that everybody is overreacting to. But when I arrived and saw, my heart sank to my boots. Daniel (yes the same Daniel who got hit by the stingray 2 weeks ago) had been running and ran right onto a dead fish, which had big long spines along its back, one of which went straight into the bottom of his foot. He was in agony, rolling around with this very dead, rotting, reeking fish attached to his foot. I looked, got some water to wash away the sand, then tried to pull it out. I pulled, then pulled harder, and even harder, but could not budge it. So I took a minute to try to think it through, and pray, and wish I was somewhere else, and while I was doing that, Daniel got scared. He decided that thing was coming out and gave a mighty yank and out it came. All 3 inches of it, and when I looked at it closely to see if it had come out intact, it became clear as to why it was so hard to get out - it had barbs all along both edges of it. Oh so horrible! After I saw that bleeding wasn't going to be a problem, and he could move his toes, and didn't seem to have done any major damage, I knew that infection was the next issue. That fish had been dead a long time, so he would certainly need antibiotics. What to give him? Only one thing to be done - place another call to my longsuffering boss in Burlington and get advice. And thanks to a doctor who had visited 2 years ago, and left an assortment of antibiotics behind, I had the right one for the job with me. I had found the bottles of meds right before I went to camp, and almost left them here, but something made me bring them along. I guess God knew I would need them.

So poor old Daniel, he was very good about the whole thing, kept his sense of humour and took it all so well. He said "First the sting ray, now this. What's next - a shark??!! He's doing fine, it seems to be healing, no signs of infection, I am just having a hard time finding him a tetanus shot, which he surely needs.

There was another stingray sting the next day, to another kid, but I'm becoming almost blase about those now, especially after the other incident. And it seemed to be a relatively mild sting, he was better after only 1/2 hour in the hot water.

And so camp season wrapped up for this year, 3 good weeks, each different in their own ways, all successful. A great deal of very hard work went into those weeks by many people, lots of planning and organizing ahead of time. And much hard work during the time, by those directing each week, by the counsellors, by the wonderful cooks who produce such huge quantities of good Ecuadorian cooking, and by all the behind the scenes people. Ray and Kelly did a great job of managing the place, sorting out water and power problems, looking after the money side of it, doing shopping runs for the kitchen and manning the little tuck shop (which was a huge hit).

And now it's all over, and for me now, this first day of April means that I am about to begin the next new part of my life. School is starting and I 'll be working there for part of my time, and what will it all hold for me? Lots of unknowns ahead, but I do know that I am not heading out into this on my own, I am looking to God for direction and guidance.

water

2008-03-30T17:40:00.000-07:00

Isn't this just the most entertaining land! I just got back in from getting water. And things never seem to happen as you think they're going to.
Here, of course, one doesn't drink the tap water, you buy water in great big blue bottles. Tonight I suddenly remembered that I needed water, so I grabbed my empty and went up and around the corner to a little "tienda", a sort of corner shop that someone has set up out the front of their house. While I was waiting my turn, along came a lady who asked me if I needed water. Yes, I said. "Vamos" - let's go, she said, so as I wasn't making much progress where I was, I went, not having any idea where I was going! Down the stairs, past my front door, and along a few houses, and I realized she was a neighbour. So into her house we went, and I'm still wondering where the water is coming from. The house is quite luxurious by Caracol standards, all ceramic tile and everything quite lovely. And I can't see a supply of big blue bottles anywhere. So then she shows me a separate tap at her kitchen sink, she has a filter system. She gets out a glass and pours me a taste test, I approve, so then she gets a little jug and starts filling my big bottle, bit by bit. And while she did, we chatted. Turns out she worked in the US for 25 years, and tomorrow is going back for a visit, staying until November.
So she filled my bottle 3/4 full, all I was able to carry home, and off I went, with my filtered water from a kind and generous neighbour, my new best friend who is leaving town. What a place!

photos

2008-03-22T20:11:00.001-07:00

I have added a link below in the "Onzole continued" post for pictures of that trip

Kids' camp

2008-03-21T10:11:00.000-07:00

Time hurries on by at such a rate! Kids' camp has been over almost a week now, and I'm just getting down to writing about it. It had just started when I last wrote.

It was a great week, in spite of one or 2 hitches along the way. The water continued to be an issue all week, for some reason the city water was coming into our tank at a trickle, and that couldn't keep up with the need. So by Monday afternoon, we had run out again. the cry went up again - "No hay agua!" (there's no water!). So the solution was to bring it in by tanker twice a day, and that kept us going. So then all was well, until the last evening, when the program for the final night was just getting underway. Everything suddenly went black - no power. This is a common happening here, and usually you just wait and it comes back on in due course. But I looked around and realized that neighbours on all sides had power, it was just us. So probably a bigger problem. And It didn't come back on. But in true Ecuadorian style, the program went on, with a couple of feeble flashlights, and the headlights from Ray's car, which he moved into position to add some light to the scene. It was also pouring rain. So the evening progressed and the awards were given out, winning team announced and all was celebrated as it should be. But between the lack of light and the rain, it meant that it all wrapped up and everybody went to bed a lot sooner than usual - not a bad thing in my opinion!

The power thing turned out to be something between our transformer and the wires that feed us our electricity. For awhile it looked like it was the transformer, which would have meant a huge expense to replace, but it turned out to be a smaller job. It was repaired later in the week. But in the meantime, no power meant no pump, and - oh no! No water again! So we had to leave camp uncleaned.

Healthwise,the week began really well, no problems, no sickness, no injury. On Thursday morning I was in the cyber in Playas writing an email to someone, saying that it had been a really easy week for the nurse. Just then my cell phone rang, it was Janna telling me that a little guy had fallen and either dislocated his shoulder or broken his collarbone. Please come back quickly! When I got there, I looked at it, and decided that it was probably the collarbone. So we called the local clinic to see if they could do x-rays, and they couldn't but the doctors were having lunch at a hotel close to us, so they would come and look. Which they did. I told Alejandro that he must be really important, the doctor was coming right to camp to see him! They confirmed what I had thought, and said that he needed a splint, which one of them would buy in Guayaquil and they would put it on the next day. We got it x-rayed later in the afternoon ($20 for an x-ray and consultation), and I made a call to one of the doctors at my clinic in Canada for advice. Next day we took him to the clinic, got the splint applied, and that was that! Alejandro by then thought he was pretty special, was quite pleased with himself. So what began as an "oh no, now what do we do" situation, finished off well. But it is indeed an education for me to learn how to navigate this healthcare system, or lack thereof. Skills I'm going to be needing as I start this new life.

The other crisis that day was another stingray sting, to Daniel Lucas, which happened while I was back at camp between attempts to get the xrays done. He took it very well, and by now we knew what to do, I like to think I'm becoming a bit of an expert on this one! Into the hot water went the foot, and we waited it out, while swarms of concerned campers and counsellors looked on. Could he possibly have been enjoying it all just a bit? Concerned females giving him treats and attention? No, of course not!

But in spite of all these happenings, the week was a very good one. William and Johanna did a superb job of running the camp, and the counsellors were involved with the kids and everybody had a lot of fun. The tides were very high for the early part of the week, so the schedule was adjusted and the beach time was in the morning when the tide was out, and it was safer. It was good to see the new young counsellors doing the job, and doing it well. Leading groups, doing devotions with their cabin, and serving the food at mealtimes, and keeping good control of it all. A couple of the older counsellors ended the week feeling really good about time they had spent talking one on one with a child, and leading the child to the Lord. We pray for the seed that is planted during that one short time at camp, and that the ones who were counsellors will be able to shepherd the kids once they're back in Bastion, and be an example. They will see each other around the streets lots.

back at camp

2008-03-11T08:38:00.000-07:00

Wow, it´s a whole week since I last updated this. I´ve been out at Playas since last Tuesday, with limited access to internet.
I came out here last week, and with nobody at camp just yet, spent a lovely peaceful day on Wednesday. I alternated my time between the beach and a hammock underneath the cabins, in the shade, in a lovely cool breeze off the ocean. I walked on the beach, read, dozed, thought, prayed, stared at the ocean, and did a lot of nothing much. It was very soul restoring. And I didn´t feel the least bit guilty about it (well, only a tiny bit) because I knew that soon enough the peace would be over.
And sure enough, Thursday morning, a bus full of Canadians and some youth from the church in Alborada arrived. And then in the afternoon more arrived, and finally late that evening a bus packed full of youth from Bastion arrived. That bus was so full it was bulging! They all came for a training weekend, a time for all these potential leaders to spend time learning about serving at camp. So for the next 2 days there were Bible studies, workshops, time spent on getting ready for this weeks´ camp, and then lots of fun too -soccer games, beach time. It was good for me to see them all in action, because I have seen so many of those kids grow up, coming to camp as children and young ones, and now here they all are, growing or grown up, becoming leaders themselves. It was a very good couple of days.

Then yesterday, was the start of the childrens´camp. 2 busloads of children (ages 9 to 12, more than 100 of them, all from Bastion) arrived to a welcome team of 2 guys on the tallest stilts you ever saw, and another guy beating a drum, and hundreds of balloons. The noise was astonishing, between barking dogs, banging drums, bursting balloons, and yelling kids, but those kids were well and truly welcomed!
And so kids´camp has begun. There were challenges yesterday, we had no water for 24 hours, it all vanished on Sunday afternoon, and didn´t get sorted out until yesterday afternoon. Made things more than a little difficult in the kitchen (and the potential for problems in the bathrooms was something I didn´t want to think about!), but Ecuadorians are a resourceful people, and we managed to get things done. But great was the rejoicing when we turned on a tap in the afternoon and water flowed!
So the week is ahead, and I´m praying for good health for them all and safety on the beach, as always. There have been unusually high tides again. And for patience and wisdom for a lot of new young counsellors.
And now I´d better get back to that camp to see what illness or injuries await!

fun day in Santo Domingo

2008-03-04T07:53:00.000-08:00

One of the hightlights of our time in the village was a family fun day the Canadians organized for the whole village. On Thursday, they put on a huge push and got all the construction work completed by lunchtime, and then the afternoon was devoted to just fun. Everybody gathered together in a big open area, and sent out the word to bring all the family along. And people came, dozens of kids, mothers, fathers, grandmothers! They were divided into 3 groups which went to 3 different areas and played games. Silly games, fun games, like finger fencing, rock, paper, scissors, and many others. And everybody, adults included joined in and had a blast. You never saw such hilarity. After awhile the groups rotated and played some more. Then when the games were over, they all gathered back together in the main "square" to do a craft that someone in Canada had organized into many ziplock bags. A very simple craft, glue a picture cut out from a greeting card onto a piece of cardstock, along with some little foam shapes, tie a ribbon into 2 holes at the top, and there you have something to hang up in your house. Well, I'm telling you, you have to have seen it to believe it. EVERYBODY did this craft. I got the biggest kick out of seeing the men, big strong men, even the toughest of those guys, sitting on the ground intently gluing little foam shapes into place. Unfortunately my battery had died by then so I didn't get any pictures of that, but it's a sight I'll never forget.
Then there was a snack for everybody. The day before, under Nikki''s direction, we had made about 500 scones, using the oven of the local bread bakery. So we gave those out and someone in the village had also made a local specialty - a rice and coconut mixture, almost like rice pudding. And only then did it rain. A highly successful afternoon.

A word on rain - Can it ever rain there! Hot and sunny one minute, and the next there's a rumbling of thunder, a lovely cool breeze springs up, a black cloud rolls in, and the heavens open. Rivers of water pour out of the sky. And then it becomes clear as to why you need to take boots to the jungle. The mud is something else.

And a word on insects. I've always felt pretty good about the apparent lack of scary bugs here, only some cockroaches, and ohter non-threatening creatures. It's another story in the jungle. HUGE spiders on the wall, and the biggest cockroach you ever saw. I learned to shine my flashlight around the walls of my room before I went to bed and tuck my bug net VERY tightly.
But I lived through it, and everything else more than made up for the wildlife.

onzole continued

2008-03-02T12:50:00.000-08:00

So to continue the story...although I´m at an internet cafe using an uncooperative keyboard again, so we´ll see how it goes.

So after 2 1/2 hours we rounded a bend in the river and I got my first glimpse of the village of Santo Domingo, high up on the riverbank above us. As we pulled in onto the sand, the bank above us exploded into action, with children pouring out of everywhere and down to meet us. Talk about a welcome!
This village was settled originally by black slaves from Africa, brought over by the Spanish conquistadors. When they either escaped or were freed, they settled all along the river in that area of Ecuador, and the people in these communities look as though they just got off a ship from Africa. A mission in Quito has been involved with this village for some years, and that´s how our connection has come about. A group of Canadians built a big mission house there 3 years ago, and that´s where we stayed. Basic but adequate. No running water, no electricity in the whole village, including our house, so it was a little like camping. I shared a room with an Ecuadorian missionary who lives there full time, a lovely girl called Yadira. I had met her in other years at camp.
And so I found myself in a completely different world, a world that felt very far removed from any I have ever known. It felt so unreal to me, felt like I was watching a National Geographic program, but I wasn´t, I was actually in this world, living in it and sharing a bit of it with those people. A world of mostly small bamboo houses, more like shacks, most of them. The women´s lives seeem to revolve around a porch outside, where I saw a lot of daily life happening - washing dishes in large pans of river water, food preparation, bathing of small children, brushing of teeth, washing clothes (although that also happened down at the river´s edge, I found a couple of laundromats down there one day). Water is carried up a very steep bank from the river, and they also collect rain water for drinking. The only means of transportation into or out of the village is canoe, made from a huge log dug out and shaped by hand. I saw one being made over the course of 2 days, and talked to the guy making it. He would be taking it into the town of Borbon to sell, and will only get $100 for it. A little different to the boats Anthony makes, 2 years and a LOT more money!
A lot of the people earn money from little "fincas", farms that are all along the bank of the river. We visited one on Friday,and it´s not an easy way to farm, they are up those steep river banks. They grow cacao (for chocolate), plantain, bananas and some of them have cows as well.
The purpose of the trip for our group was a construction project. Originally to have been some work on the school, but it was closed in September due to a lack of funds needed to run it. More on that later. So instead the team was asked to expand the little church. Over 3 days it was extended out by 6 meters, and a second story added to one half to house a new library. Those guys worked at an incredible rate,and in some amazing heat a couple of days, and got the job done.
I wasn´t part of that work, and had gone at the last minute with no real job there for me, but I helped out in the kitchen with food preparation, and found myself a patient or 2. On Monday, a young guy came to me in the street - "Doctora" - and showed me his hand. He had cut it quite badly 8 days previous on a motor, and it had been sutured (I don´t know where), the stitches were still in, and it was very swollen, and hot. Oh great - infected. Now what do I do? So I told him to come and see me at the house, and I took out the stitches, cleaned it, and dressed it, pretty certain that it would open. Lacking any better ideas or antibiotics, I gave him a course of Cipro I had and told him to come back the next day. Sure enough it opened and was draining, so for the next few days I looked after it, and by Thursday I wasn´t feeling very good about it. But I had no other options, so kept up my program of cleaning and dressing it. And then when I looked at it on Friday for one last time before we left, WOW - it was dramatically improved. Wound closed, swelling down, and looking good. So I left feeling much happier. His name is Nixon, 17 years old,and he will be coming to camp at the end of March. A really nice young guy.
Enough for now, more another time.

see the link below for photos
http://picasaweb.google.com/heathermoore21/OnzoleJungleTrip

2 weeks later

2008-03-01T12:05:00.000-08:00

Wow, those 2 weeks have gone fast. And now where to begin? They were 2 very full, very different weeks and last week was such an adventure in such another world that the memory of that first week of camp is already fading.
So first came camp, the week for the younger youth, the week that Forestview sponsored. It was a good week, our new camp was well broken-in last year, and this year all went smoothly. We had the most people there ever - 192, including kids, counselors, kitchen help and others. That was a lot of people to feed, and at this camp all food is prepared from scratch. No frozen shortcuts, no cans to open, no big ovens. And I'm talking some complicated and tedious preparation. Like french fries, from potatoes that you-know-who peeled, cut into fries with a blunt knife, and fried in a frying pan, batch by batch!! yes, we are talking time consuming. But we all just take it as part of life, and it all gets done. And we had some pretty fine meals. Shrimp ceviche one lunchtime, 15 pounds of fresh shrimp bought from the market in Playas, all cleaned and peeled and deveined (not by me - yuk!), and turned into wonderful ceviche. Yummy!
Only one major health issue all that week. Carlos (one of the older guys who I have known since the first year of camp) arrived at camp sick with a fever. I decided it was probably viral, there was nothing else to show for it, but by Thursday he was still sick. Seemed to get better during the day, but then spike a fever of 40 at night. Somebody raised the possibility of malaria, and it was a valid thought, so on Friday we took him into a little private clinic in Playas. Well, there was an education for me. It was so interesting for me to see the workings of a place like that, in some ways not unlike where I had been working in Burlington, but in most ways, poles apart. Anyway, $50, 3 hours, and many prescriptions later, we left, happy to know that it wasn't malaria, just an infection that he showed no signs of. Of the 6 prescriptions that he was given, I decreed that only one of them was necessary, the Cipro to treat the infection. The only fault I could find with the care he got was overkill on prescribing - a whole bunch of things that in my humble opinion,he didn't need.

In the meantime, during the week, I had got myself talked into joining a group that was going into the "jungle" last week. Not really the true jungle, but as near to it as I'm probably ever going to see.
So last Saturday, camp was done, the buses full of tired kids departed, and I with other staff from Bastion, got on a public bus and came back to Guayaquil, where I spent exactly 4 frantic hours doing email, reorganizing and repacking for the next trip.
We were a group of about 15 Canadians, and a few Ecuadorians, and we all got on a chartered bus at 7:30 and headed north up the coast to the province of Esmeraldas. That was a journey to forget! Many hours of jolting, jerking, swaying, stopping, bumping over untold numbers of speedbumps through every hamlet that we passed through, swerving around enormous potholes. Pouring rain for much of the night. Sleep was next to impossible, there was nowhere to put yourself, and I would just get sort of settled when the driver would slam on his brakes for something and I'd slide off the seat. But at least I wasn't carsick, like one poor girl the whole way there. (However, I made up for it on the return trip last night - oh boy!!)

But in due course we arrived at the landing spot, by the river Onzole, near the town of Borbon, and we loaded ourselves and all our belongings into 3 very long canoes with motors. And then began the part of the trip that more than made up for the misery on the bus. It took us more than 2 1/2 hours to travel up that river to our destination. And that trip was unforgettable, cruising along into an evermore unreal world, little bamboo houses on stilts by the river's edge. Some completely isolated, and others gathered together in little communities. We passed people going about their lives, washing clothes (and themselves) in the river, travelling in their own canoes, most of those much smaller than what we were in, and powered by a paddle, not a motor). People just hanging out by their homes, waving as we went by. Lush greenery of every kind all around us, coconut palms, trees full of orchids (not blooming) vines, flowering shrubs planted around the little houses. Once I saw a huge blue butterfly. And when we stopped to refill the gas tank, I could finally hear all the birds that were everywhere, but we couldn't hear above the motor. Tired as I was after the night before, I didn't even think of dropping off to sleep, my head never stopped swiveling about to see all the sights all the way there. I think it was just about the most fun I ever had!
(to be continued)

Friday in Playas

2008-02-15T10:31:00.000-08:00

It´s Friday afternoon, and it´s a very hot day, and here I am in the bustling town of Playas. I´m in the internet cafe and it´s quite cool in here, maybe I´ll just stay here for the afternoon!
I came out to the coast to camp on Wednesday, by bus with Janna and Daniel, and arrived feeling as though I´d been beaten up, a combination of the lurching, swaying and jerking of the bus, and the speed at which it traveled when it found open road, and the endless music blaring from the speaker above my head the whole way here. Travel by public trasportation here requires nerves of steel. Being a little deaf would also help!
Anyway, I´m here and it´s wonderful, the beach is still here and that´s one of my favourite places to be. We had lunch on the beach yesterday, at the little establishment right outside the camp. It was my first Ecuadorian meal and was I ready for it! Rice and fried corvina (a local fish), and salad and plantain. SO good. Hard to beat, sitting there eating a great meal gazing down the beach at the sand and and waves. Felt pretty good, indeed.
I had my first casualty right afterwards, though. The 6 young Canadians who have been there getting camp ready, went swimming for awhile after lunch, and I headed up to lie down for a bit, it was so hot, and then heard somebody holler. It was one of the young guys, got himself stung by a stingray. Oh great! I had a idea what to do, but it was hard to know whether or not to take him to get more attention than I was equipped to give. So I prayed hard, and did what I knew, which is to get the foot into water as hot as he could stand as quickly as possible, give him some Advil and Benadryl, and then Ray looked on the internet to see if there was anything else we should be doing. There didn´t seem to be anything else, the only other worry is if there is a piece of the stinger left behind, but I investigated that as far as I dared, and I couldn´t see anything, and after an hour or so of being in the water he was feeling better, and by last night he was fine! What a relief. Stingray injuries haven´t been all that common at the North Burlingotn Medical Centre! I hope this isn´t going to be a common happening this year.

I'm official!

2008-02-12T19:39:00.000-08:00

So in the end it only took a day and a half, and all my paperwork that had to be done after arriving, is done! It seemed tedious at the time, nobody can create red tape like the Ecuadorians can. But I'm told it went fairly smoothly, compared to the experience that others have had. But my goodness, the hoops you have to go through, and the amount of paper that you have to gather and hand over.....makes a trip to a passport office in Canada look like a party!Today I had to get my "censo" a little card that all foreigners living here have to get. I gave that guy 9 pieces of paper, which he didn't even look at. AND my passport. Janna and I got to that office at 7:30 this morning, to stand in line, just to be given a number, which then meant that we could wait for a very long time (2 1/2 hours) and then finally get our stuff processed. But at least it was all done in one place. Yesterday's outing to get my visa registered involved standing in a line, only to find out it was the wrong line, then get into the right one to find out which papers I needed copies of, go next door to an opportunist who had 2 photocopiers set up in a vacant space. He was a pro, copying 2 or 3 peoples' documents at a time, keeping it all straight, knowing who owed how much, and selling the right sized envelopes and folders that next door would require. All for $0.80. Then back to the office, give it all to the guy, who gave me a piece of paper that said I had to pay $10. But not to him, oh no, I had to go off to find a bank 2 blocks away, stand in line there, and pay a teller, who gave me a receipt to take back to my original man. Which I did triumphantly, expecting all to be done. But no. Come back tomorrow, he said, keeping my passport. Tomorrow?????? So we did our sad, pleading "what are we going to do?" thing,and he said okay come back at 2. And that was that.
So more Ecuadorian experiences to add to the collection. What next? Stand by to find out!

Sunday

2008-02-10T17:00:00.000-08:00

This is the end of my second full day here, and I'm starting to get my feet under me. I didn't feel settled at all yesterday, partly because there isn't really a place for me to settle yet. I was between houses Friday and Saturday, but by last evening was in what will be my house sometime in March, and was on my own. But I felt very out of sorts. It's altogether a different feeling to be here this time. Kind of between lives at the moment, I guess. The Canadian life is behind me, for the time being, and the new Ecuadorian life hasn't yet begun. I haven't even got to the familiar camp life yet.
But this morning I went to Bastion to church, and saw all my friends for the first time, and I remembered why I was here. I crossed that dreaded busy road to Bastion Popular (the squatter community where I'll be working), and into such a welcome. I was well and truly hugged by all, I know where to go if I'm ever in need of a hug!!
It was SO good to see everybody again after a year. The year goes by so quickly in some ways, but it feels like it's been a long time when you see the folks you've missed.
My Spanish has been pulled from the shelf and is getting dusted off, and the rusty spots are showing. It got a workout this morning,and it was a huge relief to get to the church in Block 10 and find my friend Daniel has carried on with his English study and is really good now. I had a great long chat with him in English, and it was good to give my poor Spanish a break. I'm hoping that maybe I'll just wake up one morning and find that I'm fluent! Well, I know it's unlikely, but it would be nice, wouldn't it?!
Before I headed out this morning,I sat with my coffee and read my Bible a bit and landed on verses that I knew, but needed again today - Isaiah 41 v 10 & 13: "Do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you........" "For I am the Lord your God who takes hold of your right hand and says to you, Do not fear: I will help you." And I hold those promises close as I go forward.

I made it!!!

2008-02-08T16:20:00.000-08:00

So I thought that Wednesday was a difficult day. But nature seemed to be out to get me at both ends of this trip. Thursday morning we headed off to the airport to do it all over agin, still snowing, so without a great deal of confidence that I would leave, hoping that Wednesday wouldn´t be repeated. But no problem, the flight was on time, and we got off to Miami. And arrived there in good time, time for me to find a Starbuck´s and get my caffeine fix, sit awhile and think that things were going really well this time. Then went to look for my next flight on the departures board. Funny, it´s not there. Try another board. Not there either. So I went to find someone to ask, and was given the unhappy news that Guayaquil airport was closed because of the erupting volcano!! And so my flight wouldn´t be going anywhere until 6 the next morning. I simply couldn´t believe it. But what do you do - nothing to do but get used to the idea and then figure out what to do. 14 hours to put in at Miami airport. Which I did, wandered around trying to get information from various people, then went outside and sat in the warm Florida breeze for awhile. Made some phone calls home,and then got supper. I was told that there was an auditorium upstairs in a disused part of the airport where they would be setting up cots for all the stranded passengers. So I went off to find it ( I began to feel like the guy in "The Terminal", finding odd corners of the airport). Sure enough there were rows of canvas cots all set up with a tiny pillow and blanket. I staked a claim to one, and it did feel good to finally stretch out. I had thought I be spending the night upright in a chair. But I think I have an inklling now of how it feels to be a refugee. (Not really, I know that is something much worse) It was just lying down on a cot in this huge room full of cots and mostly Spanish speaking people. I think all the rich white folks had gone to hotels. But I did sleep a bit, but gave up at 2:30 and went back downstairs. I wasn´t going to take any chances on missing that plane if it went at 6.
And it did go, and I didn´t miss it, and by 10:15 I had landed in Guayaquil. And now I´m here, feeling slightly stunned and unreal, but a good night´s sleep should fix that. And after all the problems getting here, I´am very thankful to have finally made it.

snowed in!

2008-02-06T14:55:00.000-08:00

So this is the day on which I should have been on my way to Ecuador. As I write this, by now I should have been on the final leg of the trip between Miami and Guayaquil. But of course, this is Canada and it`s February, and snow can happen. And did happen. And so instead of being almost there, I`m at my parents` house waiting for another try tomorrow. And it`s still snowing. Hard. So we`ll see.

Everything went smoothly at first, it was a little slow driving to the airport, but we got there in good time, and all went smoothly there. No, no, the man who checked me in said, the flight will be going and on time. Oh good. And I was at my gate by 7:30. Then suddenly it was going to be delayed until 12:10, and then by 10:30, it was cancelled. So back out we all went, collected the bags that we thought we`d seen the last of, got re-booked, I called the family to come and get me, and 5 hours after I had arrived at the airport, I left it, having accomplished nothing. Except to spend a lot of time in a crowded gate area, spend a lot of money on things like water ($2.79!!) and yogurt ($1.99!!) and wait a lot.
So I am booked onto the same flights tomorrow, same time, same station, different day! And I will get to say goodbye all over again. I just pray that tonight`s snow will be done in time to be able to leave.
So I hope that the next post will be to say I`ve arrived.

a few more days

2008-02-02T12:35:00.000-08:00

Only 4 more days before I leave this cold and snow for something completely different. It snowed yesterday, and I went for a walk in it, and as I trudged through the snow, I tried to think about what I would be feeling next Friday, and couldn't get my head around knowing that by then I'd be very hot, very sticky and no longer able to grasp the concept of cold!

I'm getting ready bit by bit for this great adventure, still not feeling that this is all real. My supplies are all bought (except for some more Muskol, hard to find on February 1st). A couple of bags are partially packed and I'm gradually learning all the new technology that has come into my life as a result of this move. There have been a couple of good-bye get-togethers with my friends, and tonight there is a big family gathering. And then it will be a matter of getting down to business and getting ready in earnest.