September 23, 2009
I had the opportunity to go back to El Malcote today. Saul and I spent the morning there and I did some more hand washing and crafts around the germ topic. We made Henry the Hand hand puppets. I was able to bring individual packages of crayons that Tony Roma’s in Red Deer had donated and the kids were thrilled. The soap that I am using for the handwashing classes was collected by a number of people over the past few months (thank you to the Stantec employees, Steph and Kory and all you others who got that soap to me).
I also met with some of the moms in the community to see if we could find out what they saw as health or medical needs. The women are really timid and I think not “empowered” to speak at these kinds of meetings so they didn’t say much. What we did find out is that there are a lot of skin conditions, diarrhea, asthma and grippe. I think that the best way to handle the things they identified, is to get some actual medical attention there to accurately diagnose the problems. Will talk to Ellen about that at our meeting tonight.
One of the things that I learned today was that the government has a merienda (snack) program at the schools. So, at least once a day when there are classes the kids get a meal. If you watch, there are some children that take the food home to share, and some that share with their little siblings.
This afternoon Dona Delsy and I met to talk about the orphanage. I have t-shirts donated by staff at my office to deliver to the Hogar Angelitos Felices later this week. But, as little Heidi is staying at Dona Delsy’s I was able to give her the sweet little girl clothes today. Heidi plays “pat the tortilla” and loves her walker. She is a year now and continues to be plagued with pneumonia and other health stuff but is certainly better than the sick little girl I saw on my last trip here. I plan on another pizza supper for the kids at the hogar this weekend.
Some of the moms
Heidi - she's gained a lot of strength!
Girls eating their meal