What a day!

After getting only a few hours of sleep this morning, we woke up and headed with the students to do a village clinic. We heard that there would be pregnant women there so they wanted the midwives to go. We were going to a village that MamaBaby Haiti had never been to before, to a church in a village that was a distance away. We were treated with a tap tap ride. So happy to not have to walk, already feeling so tired.

The tap tap ride was fun and I tried to get video but I don't know how successful I was. The village was remote and the roads were rough so we couldn't get all the way by tap tap and had to walk the last little bit. This ended up to be such a treat as we were rewarded with amazing views of the ocean, an island in the distance, a bay and the lush jungle. Many people were walking with bunches of bananas on their heads. A couple of people wanted us to take pictures of them.

As we arrived in the village there were many people watching us and waving, following us as we entered. We arrived at the church were many children were around in their school uniforms. The pastor has a school behind the church. I got so many good pictures of beautiful children.

We saw several pregnant mamas in our clinic. Marie arrived later because she had stayed behind with our postpartum mama. When she arrived we gave her our last few patients. Susan and I were losing steam and running low on water. We sent a Haitian woman (the friend of the mama who gave birth last night) with money to get us a drink. I really wanted water or Tampico, but she came back with Coke and Sprite. My second Coke in one week! And it was cold! At that point I didn't care and it was just what we needed. Later we went on a little walk through the village looking for some vegetables but all we found were cookies and candy. So we bought some! We were kind of laughing at ourselves; the dietician and two midwives who have been preaching every day to drink more water, no coffee, cookies, Tampico or soda, and here we were drinking and eating crap in front of them. We worked until 3:30pm without lunch so we now know that drinking sugary drinks and eating sugary food does suppress your appetite.

Since Susan, Nancy and I spent a lot of time sitting around in the afternoon the children were hovering and staring, giving us many photo ops. I think I got some good ones and can't wait to upload them.

Before we left the church the pastor gave us a beautiful thank you. So sincere and said he hoped we would be blessed for our work and that we would be able to come back again. It is a village of 5,000 people and no clinic or doctor, so when people get sick it can be serious. He said a prayer for us before we said our final meci's.

We had to hike a little out of the village, but the tap tap was waiting for us not too far away. The real adventure was when we piled 19 people in the back of the tap tap and two in the front and headed home on the roughest roads I may have ever seen. I had Michelet's bony butt on my knees for a while and I could not feel my legs or feet. Our Haitian friend who bought our Cokes hitched a ride with us and when she jumped off Michelet took her place and I could feel my legs again. Having 19 people in a tap tap is a true Haitian experience.

Susan and I were at the back of the tap tap so we jumped off first and headed to the house quickly, hoping the power was on and we could get a shower. I was a little thrown off when I saw the charcoal going outside, but YES the power was on. We got the first showers and feel much better after also having a bowl of shrimp soup.

A bunch of us went together and bough some fresh lobster in the village, so that's what's for dinner.

Truly a rewarding and exciting day. Glad we decided to go, in spite of feeling tired.