Day 6: Last clinic day at a church

Day 6 (Friday):  Most nights even though my body rested, my mind never went to sleep.  Yet as I first laid to rest till in the early hours of dawn my mind would be processing the day before, the special moments with the children, and our Haitian friends, my mind spinning in anticipation for the coming day.  Knowing this would be my last day doing clinic and being with the Haitian doctors, translators, driver, and staff, I woke up about 3:00am though my body lay still on the top bunk, my mind began to relay thoughts of the day.  How could I make the most of this final day?  Emotions of extreme sadness entered my mind knowing I would be leaving the next day.  I laid their in silence just listening to the sounds of the fans in the room, and the breeze flowing through the open screened windows of the house.  I began to pray to the Lord for each person by name, that I had met, and picturing their faces, and the moments I had with each one, the doctors, Williamson, Jennifer, the children, the drivers, the missionaries, political leaders for the upcoming elections.  Then I began to think of how I wish I had spent more time getting to know these people, was I as intentional as I could have been, was I as open I should have been.  Wishing, longing for more time, and praying that I would have some kind of peace about having to leave......
     (Even as I type, I get teary eyed, holding back tears, my ears hurt trying not to cry.  My body is here in Harrisburg, NC yet my heart is still in Haiti.)
    Soon.....the sun begins to rise and peer into the window beside my bunk bed, it is now 5:30am and time to get up and get ready for the day.  I gather in the kitchen as the rest of the team members begin to trickle in, we hold hands and say a prayer and eat breakfast.  Then we disperse some cleaning dishes, hanging laundry, gathering our items for the day, fixes our Gatorade water bottles, and we wait until the Haitian doctors, drivers, and workers arrive to the house.  After they have breakfast, they help us to load up the vans, we gather together hand in hand to say a prayer for the day before we disperse to our various locations. 
   Today I rode in a truck with our driver Innocence (can't quite remember his name right now), Dr. Vladimyr, and Jennifer (our pharmacist) and drive down the rocky path out of our guarded gate and down the rode to pick up our translator with our other team members in the taptap, and then head west to our clinic site.  This ride seemed to take much longer to get to but the ride down there was very revealing of the daily lives and activity of the Haitian people.  Riding down the road I see many people from young to old either packed on over loaded vehicles, or walking with filled buckets, or baskets on their heads towards perhaps their home or a market to sell.  We pass by many homes mostly wooden, some made of cylinder blocks, and people are gathered either cooking, cleaning, or working around the house.  This particular ride was quite beautiful getting closer to the ocean the green plants became more evident.  Acres of plantain trees line the fields, as well as more trees, various creeks of water flow through with people bathing in them, or young children filling up there water jugs.  We pass small my wooden buildings with various signs spray painted one being a bank, others perhaps vendors selling items or produce.  At one point in the road there is a speed bump, forcing you to slow down, boys and young men gather and come to your vehicle trying to sell you cold water bottles, or bags or peanuts.  I was excited that Jennifer showed me where she lives as we passed near by on the road.  She points out great photo opportunities of the beautiful mountains, more green than the ones behind our compound.  We pass by a very large truck that had completely turned over, people had gathered trying to clean up the produce that had been splattered all over the rode.  We continue on down the road, I enjoy listened to the radio as the others hum along to the songs sung in French. 
         We eventually come to a sign on the left side saying something like "Bienveny A Luly" (tried to take a picture but did not capture the entire sign) and we turn down the small pebble road and come around the curve to a church on the left.  A small boy waits there and opens the gate for us as the church and school building are guarded by a tall block wall.  People are already gathered outside waiting on us to arrive.  We pull the truck up to the front door of the church, called "Arnee De Saluy" and unload our medical items.  The church is small yet lined with pews, and the open ceiling adorned with a few strands of fake flowers in various colors.  I was very excited this day because Wiliamson had brought Bethany and myself bracelets that we had made for us. I love it because it is a tangible, constant reminder to pray for the people of Haiti, for the friends such as Wiliamson, Jennifer, the doctors, and the children I had met.  (Since that day Bethany and I have yet to take them off). 
       As we set up for the clinic, the people gather outside to sing a song of praise and hear the lesson about Cholera, TB, and hygiene, then Dr. Vladimyr introduces Bethany, myself, and Evan (one of the construction members who wanted to try helping at the clinic for one day).  Dr. Vladimyr translates for me and I smile and introduce myself, they respond, "Bonjour Rachel", and I tell them that I am very glad to be here, and hope to help make them feel better today.  They reply "Amen"! 
    We then go into the church to begin the clinic as our one of the Haitian workers speaks on the megaphone about how the process will work.  We first begin to see the patients that had an appointment (either they were to follow-up or were not able to be seen last week, and they bring there notecard with their name, age, and reason for visit).  They sit the pew beside of us, as Wiliamson tells them "tre vah" (not sure of the spelling but it meant something like "next please"), and we motioned the next person over to the chair across from me beside the table that had our medical supplies on it.  I would say "Bonjour" and begin to take their vitals (BP, pulse, resp. temp, O2, wt) writing each one on their paper, then thanking them (saying "Merci").  They would proceeded to the next pew to wait to see the doctor.  The doctors sat across the room from us I would watch as they quietly talk to each person, most of the time a mother or father one, or grandparent, and a child or two.  The doctor would address each complaint prescribing medications and also giving many injections. 
   As I have noticed each day there has been one child, one angel that captures my attention and my heart.  Today it was Angelique.  A beautiful young girl, 9 years of age with a pink outfit, and pink hair wrap.  She had a beautiful face, and her smile lite up the room as she would watch me and smile whenever our eyes would meet.  She waited patiently with her mother until it was her turn to come see me.  She was very inquisitive, watching carefully each task I performed.  Waiting to see the numbers on the thermometer, or on the small finger pulse ox.  She stood closely by me, her small hand rubbed and twirled the ringlets of my hair.  Even after I was finished helping them both, the mother moved on in the line and the little girl remained by my side watching me closely, rubbing my arm and holding my hand when she could.  She showed me innocent pure love and compassion.  Although she would say things to me in Creole, I longed to understand and be able to talk with her, but we could only smile and communicate though gestures.  I gave her a heart silly band, and cross silly band (I would wear a few each day to give discreetly out to some children).  The lines of people continued to come through each one special, and I could tell had a story I longed to talk with them, but we would simply exchange smiles, and gestures.  Even after Angelique and her mother had been seen by the doctor, Angelique stayed behind and began to help around the clinic.  I watched her as she stood by Dr. Vladimyr ready to assist.  She began to hold a small plastic cup under another small girls ear, as Dr. Vladimyr used a syringe with saline to flush out the girl's infected ears.  Young Angelique would hold the cup, and when it was full run the cup outside of the church to pour out the contents.  The picture of this little angel girl, brought to life the bible verse that as she was serving the least of these, she was serving the Lord.  This was a powerful picture for me to see, such a humbling, and selfless act of her serving others in her capacity even as a small child.   
    All too soon our Dr. Francis came over to us to tell us this would be our last patient.  We had to end early today at 12:30 in order for Dr. Vladimyr to have time to drive into Port-au-Price to buy more medications.  It was very sad, as I longed to continue on but new we had to go.  As we began to pack up, and mother came up to the side of the building behind me, and held up her small child to the small open square window and was saying something in Creole.  Wiliamson said that she was begging to be seen.  I felt bad that we had to leave, but Dr. Vladimyr told later told the people that were not seen that they would be first next week to be seen. 
   As everyone began to load up the medications and items and small boy came up to me.  He was very thin, very emotionless, had a dusty green shirt on and a small worn out brown hat.  He had me a piece of paper that said size 5-6.  I realized that he was asking me for clothes.  Sadly we did not have any clothes his size, but I did have a small blow up plastic ball in my book bag, that I brought out and blew up.  I motioned to hit the ball to him, and his face lite up. He smiled ear to ear and quickly hit the ball back to me.  We would hit back and forth two or three times before it fell to the ground.  Our playing captured the attention of Angelique and three other small children who came over to play.  These otherwise quiet children became very excited, jumping around after the ball, hitting it high into the wooden beams of the church. We had a wonderful time playing together sharing these laughs.  Then as it was time to leave I gave each child a dumdum, silly band, and small pad of paper.  They were also very excited to receive the empty plastic containers that we used to dispense our liquid medications from into smaller bottles.  I assume they would take the home, wash them out and use them to carry water in.  I was very glad to get a group picture with these children (which I will post), before we had to leave.
    On the way back to the compound I rode in the taptap with Wiliamson, Bethany, Evan, & Dr. Francis.  I enjoyed the breeze on the way back being in the back of the truck.  The ride was going well until we heard a "Whew" noise and the truck began to lean to the side.  We had been forewarned of this frequent occurrence, but this was our first flat tire. I felt sorry for the driver, and other guys who had to change this tire, but this was an exciting experience for myself. We could to pull over to the side and just watch the people walking by and slow down to see them in their daily lives.  I peeked over a stone wall to look down into someones side yard.  There on a blanket laid a small child chewing on sugar cane, watching his grandfather side on a wooden stool and weave dried, brown strips of leaves from the banana tree to make the seat of a small chair.  Tied to the tree close by was a pig soaking up the sun.  Before I knew it the men had changed the tire in a flash and we were back on the taptap heading to the compound.
   Back at the compound we ate lunch together, all the Haitian workers, and all the teams together.  They had made some kind of stew with vegetables and meat over rice.  All the Haitian workers gather together to eat in the living room sitting on the couches, and one table, getting onto the various computers to check their email, and give our team room to eat in the kitchen.
   Longing to get to know the workers better, and loving to listen to them speak Creole I sat, in there with them at the table.  I sat quietly eating my meal, not really knowing what to say but just listened to them talk, and watching them interact.  After we finished our meal, it was very sad to say our goodbyes, and give our last hugs to the workers, especially hard for myself and Bethany to say goodbye to our translator :(  But slowly they left down the road to go back to their homes.  My only consolation was the hope that I will be able to return soon, to work with these people again, to be able to come back knowing more Creole, and hoping to be able to get to know them better, one week is just too short.