Work Day 2

Construction - Jeremy Kenny:  Today six of us worked at Batey 106 on the house project.  We made sifted sand that is used for mortar, which we dubbed 'arena bonita' (pretty sand).  We also moved the bigger rocks off of the dirt floors in preparation for the concrete to be poured and moved in dirt to level them.  The local workers focused on the roof construction by setting more cinder block and placing support beams.  The wooden beams had to be cut to fit together for a pitched roof.  The local workers had a circular saw (blade worn out) to cut the wood, but the portable generator powering the saw wasn't staying on while the saw was running.  The MVP award goes to Jeff Spencer, who worked on the generator (after the local workers had given up) and got it running smoothly.  There was quite a celebration when the generator was fixed and allowed the workers to cut the roofing beams quickly instead of using hand saws.  The guys also played some basketball games with the Batey kids - while some games were lost, the TBC guys are still in the Tournament Internationale so more to come later in the week.  On the bus ride back, Andrew, Daniel, and Jacob got in touch with their feminine sides by working on hair extensions and painting each other's fingernails...and there was plenty of photographic evidence taken by Jeff and Chuck...good times!

 Shoveling Fill Dirt

 Painted Roof Caps

 New Style House Under Construction

 The Problem Generator

VBS - Lisette Colson: Today was a much calmer day of VBS! When we arrived the school age children were all still in class so we gathered the little ones for story time.  One of the residents had a covered area with a concrete floor where we were able to seat all the children. After Teresa read the story of Jonah and the whale and some fun coloring it was play time. We blew up a couple of beach balls and Ashley Rehage played volleyball for at least an hour! They never seemed to tire of it. There were lots of bubbles too. Around lunch time Noah must have been building an arc somewhere because the heavens opened up and boy did it rain!! Our afternoon session of VBS took place in the church. Clinic had finished using the space so we called all the children back for another story. Some of the school kids joined us too so we had a bigger crowd but they were very attentive and loved making the craft that went along with the lost sheep story. And no VBS would be complete without snacks and juice. I'd say today was a success!

 

Medical - Ashley King: We had a long and rainy day in the clinic. As usual, we set up our supplies in the batey's church. This batey was one of the poorer ones I have been to and it hurt my heart seeing the shacks most had as homes. The church also reflected this. It was very small and we had to try and cram as much as we could in a small space. Everything went very well though. We saw around 90-100 people and they seemed to be really patient and appreciative of our help. Julie and Susan worked in the "pharmacy" sorting medicine and getting the prescriptions for the patients. Sarah and Katie worked taking blood pressure. Everyone worked really hard making the best of our space and amount of patients. I worked with the dentist. We saw around 7 patients and only one person had a full tooth for us to pull. She was eight. Everyone else had remnants of old teeth now decayed. With no dental care or real access to tooth brushes, things that are so minuscule to us, fixable things for us like cavities cause decay that break their teeth into pieces. The only real option is to pull the teeth. We did lots of that, so I didn't get the chance to actually pull any teeth myself today. The eight year old girl was crying and really resisting getting her tooth pulled. I sat with her, holding her in my arms to try and calm her so that we could get her decaying tooth out. Really sad seeing an eight year old with a tooth so decayed that we had to pull it. It took around 20 minutes for her to let us convince her to pull the tooth. She would not let go of me the whole time. It was a really touching experience. I felt like she trusted me, and that really reminded me how special this time we have here is; so much love we share.

Water - Glenn Bowers: Water buckets came in today and the team helped prepare them when we returned from Day 2 activities.