We are in the midst of fiesta season around here which seems to start at the end of August and winds up on New Years' Eve. As we entered Xepocol today we saw the tell-tale signs of a party about to start at the Catholic church. It was for their youth group but a good time was being had by all. But, we did see a few patients including one little 9 month old with periorbital cellulitis, whose parents agreed to a shot of Rocephin and a change in antibiotics since he wasn't getting better with the amoxicillin he started 3 days ago.

We also saw Josue, the 12 year old son of our health promoter Gaspar. He has had nausea and dizziness for 2 days. He denied any earache or headache or other symptoms, but when I checked out his ears, I found a bug's rear end staring back at me. He doesn't remember anything flying in. After a quick lavage we watched two halves of a bee wash out. Ouch!

Kemmel and Josefina and Tomas had an even worse day. They headed out early this morning to the Capital to get some errands done but only got 30 minutes down the road before running into a road block/ manifestation by one of the polical parties. It was one of many affecting major crossroads in the country. This was a real downer as they were going to pick up Leo Rojas from Venezuela who is teaching the marriage seminar we are hosting tomorrow and Thursday. So, they turned around and came back home, asking Alex in Guatemala City to pick up Leo and find him someplace to stay the night. Kemmel will head out tomorrow morning early to pick him up. Since there are only a few major highways in this country, they are easily pirated by those who have a beef with the government. Nothing gets attention like stopping traffic all over the Republic!

Well, we're back home safe, enjoying some apple crisp and coffee right now (thanks for the recipe Mama!). Wish you were here!

Weekend Roaming

We also headed to Antigua this Sunday to help Glenn and Neva move up here. The weather was great and we enjoyed strolling around town taking in the sights. Since it is almost All Saints' Day, which is a big holiday around here, there were kites for sale everywhere and signs out for ordering your holiday Fiambre. We like describe this dish as a chef salad on steroids. It is a mixed array of cold cuts, cheeses, sausages, picked vegetables, etc. to be shared on this special day. Like Americans and our prized turkey dressings, every family has their own fiambre recipe which is guaranteed to be the best. And if you don't like fiambre it's because you haven't tried "good fiambre". Anyway, it was a nice weekend, and we got everything moved without a hitch.

"Fiambre for All Saints' Day"

This is an example. I pulled the picture off of google images. It's a pretty accurate depiction.

These are kites from a few years ago--they won't bring out the big ones like these until November 1st.

Measure Three Times,Cut Twice and File to Size

This weekend we caught up on household chores. Kemmel was kind enough to change out the glass in our bathroom window to a smoked glass. Our new neighbors (They of the Bear-wolf) have a two level house which looks right down into our shower area! So, Kemmel measured the space and went to buy/cut the glass. When he got back, of course one of the panels didn't fit. So he headed back to the glass guy to re-cut. He comes back, tries again and, guess what-----doesn't fit. So after filing down the offending edge for about 30 minutes it popped in! Nothing like privacy--what a sweet guy!

God's country

We are up with the chickens (maybe before the chickens) this morning--of course this always happens when we plan to sleep in until 6:00. But we are enjoying some coffee and FoxNews and Internet surfing. We have plans to get some housecleaning done before going to church and then on to Antigua to help Glenn and Neva move up here to God's country. It's always amusing what people from the cities (the Captial, Antigua and Quetzaltenango) have to say when you tell them you live in Chichicastenango or are moving to Chichicastenango. They can't imagine that anyone in their right mind would want to come here. "It's so remote" "Wow, its so MAYAN out there" or "there is so much idolatry out there". Well, it's a great place to live. The people are hospitable, the chruches are growning, and we don't have the crime rates that you see in the urban areas. Sure we don't have supermarkets or malls or movies or Pizza Hut, but we have people who call to check on us, churches that raise up and train their own preachers and leaders, unlimited fresh produce in the markets and great weather!
So, welcome Glenn and Neva--you're going to love it here!

Un Buen Caldo

When someone wants to make you a nice meal they make you a "buen caldo" --a good soup. When they really like you they make a chicken soup with one of their own chickens. Today we were invited to lunch at Tomas Canil's house. He is a member of the church in Paxot III about 10 minutes from Paxot II where we had clinic today. After we finished clinic around 1:00 we went over and he greeted us at the door with a big smile. After taking a seat in the kitchen his wife offered us a drink--they had two diet cokes! It's the first time anyone has ever done that! We had a spectacular caldo de gallina criolla--soup with home raised chicken and seasonal vegetables. The tortillas were also out of this world.

After lunch we chatted about things going on in Paxot III, his work as a health promoter in that town, and how he can go about updating his license to see patients. He is one of the original health promoters trained by Dr. Rhienbolt more than 20 years ago. He still has quite the following of patients out there. We wrapped up our visit with chocobananos (chocolate covered frozen bananas) and gift bags of apples to go. He also asked us to send a letter to Dr. Rhienbolt if we could.

Clinic was busier than expected, but good and Juan still had time to do registration, vitals and lab as well as make kites for the kids. This week seems to be the opening of kite season. Everyone makes them out of little colored plastic sacs and sticks and string. You have to keep your eye out for little boys standing in the road staring up at the sky. Gaspar had an education class to give at the water committe meeting about contamination of water and maintaining clean drinking water.

On our way back we picked up some men from the church who were carrying huge baskets of apples up the hill to their house (about half a mile). We felt good that we helped "carry their burdens"--I bet they did too! They gifted us some more apples. Guess we will have to make another pie--bummer.

Who Let the Dog Out?

We try not to complain (in public) very often, but we have to vent about this one. There is a new house going in next door and our new (not very considerate) neighbors seem to be getting close to moving in. Well, last night they drove up about 8:00 and dropped off some things and left. Later after we went to bed we heard an unknown dog barking his head off about something.

Turns out, they left their pure bred bear-wolf out on the roof to keep guard. He barked aaaaall night long. We got up a couple of times to tell him to shut up (in English and Spanish) and he would, until we would turn off the lights and get back into bed. We put in our ear plugs around 0300, Kemmel could take no more around 0400 and when the lights came on when Kemmel got up, he finally piped down and went to sleep. We thought (or hoped) someone had poisoned him, but there he was this morning trying to look friendly. I think "we'll keep the light on" for him tonight and see if he can keep things under control. Maybe he is scared of the dark!

Hopefully this won't be an earplug night.

Clinic in Chutzerob went smoothly today. We met some new Christians as well, which is always a plus. We also saw a little boy (Moises Abraam--pretty hefty name to live up to!) who came in last month with a severe cellulitis in his foot who looked 100% better today. He and his parents were very pleased and thankful for Sheri's good care.

We are in the process of getting our health promoter Juan up to speed (no pun intended) on his driving skills. He has had his license for a while but not too much experience. So today I let him drive back, which included a tight driveway turn-around and a steep hill up to the main road. He did it with only a few stall-outs. Once on the road he did great and I let him keep going on the highway. It was a little scary at first as he sped down the hill toward the hairpin turns, but I quickly advised him to put it into second gear to control his speed better. We made it home without a scratch. He told me it was only his second time to drive on the pavement......Now I know how my parents felt teaching me to drive!

Kemmel made a quick trip to Antigua to drop off Glenn and Neva and then to the capital to pick up clinic supplies and meds. He even went grocery shopping for me and brought us home a pizza for dinner. What a guy! Still no canned pumpkin hitting the shelves. I guess we will have to try some of the local pumpkins for our holiday baking. Should be interesting--we have yellow as well as green-fleshed varieties.

Old Stomping Grounds

What a treat for us today to take Sheri to Xela to our old Spanish school to refine her language skills for a couple of weeks. Glenn and Neva went with us, and we all enjoyed the beautiful scenery as we headed west, climbing to 10,000 ft altitude at Alaska, Guatemala and then descended to 8000 ft where Quetzaltenango (Xela) sits in a high valley. It was fun to look at all of the old colonial buildings of downtown, the beautiful central park and the downtown plaza with its historic Catholic church built in the 1500's. Best of all we got to see all of our friends from church in Zone 1 which has almost doubled since we were there. After church we went to the ever-growing mall and had lunch at Pizza Hut (I know, I know, but it's really much better pizza than the stuff in the States)! Finally we headed over to our old school, Centro Bilingue Amerindia www.languageschool.com.gt. We chatted with Hugo and Elvia, the owners, and caught up on news, introducing them to Sheri. Tourism is extremely low right now, especially in the language schools, so Sheri will have them all to herself until next week. After our visit we continued over to Sheri's host family's house-the same family we stayed with. Dona Elubia was warm and welcoming as ever, and we spent a few minutes catching up with her. Finally, we headed out, leaving Sheri to enjoy her couple of weeks of language classes, feeling a little envious that we couldn't stay too! But it was a beautiful trip through the mountains covered with fields of corn, wheat, cutting flowers and pine trees back to Chichicastenago. Tonight we rest a little and tomorrow morning we go to a thanksgiving service at Mactzul VI.

It's been a good week so far. Tuesday was an education day for our staff and volunteer promoters. They presented posters on childhood vaccines and we did a handwashing demonstration. Sheri posted some more good pictures (and gifted me these!)

www.sheriinguate.blogspot.com

Wednesday, Sheri went out to clinic in Chuguexa, tending to our diabetic population out there with a bonus nutrition class. She thinks it went well, and was a good opportunity, as there were seveal diabetic patients present at the same time. Kind of a group therapy setting.

Kemmel and I stayed back at the "office" (our living room) with Mauri organizing Sunday School education materials and goodies and I worked on our staff education curriculum. We got quite a bit done and I took advantage to read up on some topics I hadn't studied in a while. That's the benefit of teaching--it makes you stay up to date some what.

Yesterday Sheri and I saw patients together at Caris and finished early enough for everyone to go have coffee and dessert with our new missionary couple Glenn and Neva Berkey who are in town looking at housing options. We don't get very many chances to sit and visit with both teams like this very often, so it was a special treat.

Today we headed out to Choacaman IV and saw some of our regulars and several new patients as well. One of my favorite patients has congestive heart failure and we recently started him on digoxin. Well, he also suffers from a hernia and a bum leg from a previous accident. So he decided that he should take some of the new medicine to help the pain, but wasn't getting much relief! I very firmly but gently advised him that the new medicine is a form of poison and is only meant to help his heart but at small doses. He was surprised to learn that it's not effective for all pain, but agreed to stick to the prescribed amount. We upped his dose of Tylenol, and hopefully we will see some pain relief. We wrapped up his visit with a thorough review of all the medicines in his bag. His wife looked relieved!

Tonight we will enjoy dinner out with Glenn and Neva and Sheri at Los Cofrades--Yum!

It's been a nice quiet Sunday today. We did our usual trek up to town "to see what there is to see" (not much) and got back just as Sheri was getting back into town from her week at Clinica Ezell. We had some quick lunch and headed back up for worship services.

Now, we love listening to people sing here, because they all put a lot of spirit into it. But we sat in front a brother today that seemed to have a different metronome setting than everyone else. He could not (or would not) stay with the pack, but rather stayed ahead by about half a beat throughout the entire song. It was a pretty amusing and the family of girls in front of us seemed to be equally entertained. Kemmel even tried tapping out the beat with his hand on his leg to see if the guy would catch on, but no.

After services we chit-chatted with some folks including one little 8 year old boy who has been seeing some specialists in the Capital for a hypoplastic lung. Kemmel asked him how he was doing and what the doctor had said. He stated very matter of fact, that " I am doing some breathing treatments because the doctor says that my lung on this side is too little" showing us with his fingers about 2 inches apart. But he seems to be doing well and will keep praying for God to strengthen him.

Now we are back home enjoying some coffee and pie and catching up on internet world. Everyone have a good week.

Rigt after this post we experience a power outage, so ended the day with going to bed at 7:30pm. :)

Despite having our clinic trumped by a visit from Guatemalan President Colom in Chichicastenango today, we had 7 patients. That's quite the feat considering all of the truckloads of people we saw heading to town (away from our clinic!).

Juan showing the curious on-lookers what he lavaged out of a patient's ear. Always a crowd pleaser!

The ladies who fixed us lunch today--see the smoke in the air????? But is was an excellent and colorful soup with beef, potatoes, guisquil, and pumkin. Yummy! Tomasa on the left is a midwife and was very thankful to receive the gloves we brought her.

These kids pestered me all day for a picture, so I told them they had to count to three in English first, and they did.

Goofing off in the kitchen.

Everyone looks up to Erica(in the middle)--whatever she says, goes! She wanted their picture taken outside.

After clinic, we had a visit from some men from the Mactzul III church to help them petition for some funding to build a church building. This is a church that has been meeting in homes for several years now and has saved enough money to buy land and start buying materials. They still have a significant financial need so they are beginning their petitions to the area churches as well as to the local mayor. They have a special request to send to church in the United States, so they brought all the paperwork today so we can send it by email. We had a good visit together and reviewed their budget. Interestingly, they have to buy 15 trees to supply the lumber they need--somthing you wouldn't think about in the States! They are very organized and have their budget lined out to the penny. After we met, they asked to pray before leaving and prayed for our safety and protection and for all of us to have our faith stregthened.

Ernesto, Sebastian and Tomas--with their serious faces on.

Early Revolution Day Festivities

We are celebrating Revolution Day early today because we had a clinic cancelled and we prefer to work on Revolution Day since no one really recognizes it besides us and the banks! So we enjoyed a good walk to town this morning, seeing off Harriette and Sarah and Danny, then picking up some nice produce in the market.

I've had some apples crying out to be put in a pie-- today was the day. I didn't have anymore shortening, so I tried an all-butter pie crust that was delish! It was a little harder to work with as it was either too cold to mix in easily or too warm and sticky while rolling out. I stuck the crusts in the freezer and when they came out they were like ceramic plates. But, I quickly got the pie put together and in the oven. Here is the recipe if you want to try it.

http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/perfect_pie_crust/

Kemmel was in top form today bird-dogging down some plane tickets for Christmas. He finally locked onto some, saving $500 over the prices we saw in the beginning! He is quite the travel agent. He was working all the possible angles and ticket brokers and airline sites, and finally designed the perfect flight plan. We even have direct flights this time! Good job!

The picture is from our sunset tonight. I really miss a good sunset like the kind you get in Amarillo, Texas, so this was a real treat. These clouds are actually in the east getting the reflection off the setting sun. A nice way to wrap up Revolution Day.

Yesterday we drove back from Montellano after spending some time with the visiting surgical team. It's always fun being with everyone and getting a change of pace, but it's great to be back home (in the cool weather!) After making it back to town, we had some time organizing our new meds in the pharmacy and had some education time with Gaspar and Juan. Our topic was vaccinations, which they had never studied. We looked at pictures of all the illnesses that can be prevented by vaccine and discussed the various myths and rumors that are common here.

Today, we showed up for clinic in Mactzul III with quite a surprise--patients! This is one of the communities that is new and struggling to get off the ground. We have talked with the church leaders who say they have announced and the town is not against the clinic per se, but there doesn't seem to be a lot of interest. The last few months have been a real disappointment when only 2 or 3 patients come (for medical and dental).

Well, today, Marcos had 20 dental patients and I had 9 medical patients. It doesn't sound like much, but we had a nice mix of repeat and new patients and non Christians. We even had some come from surrounding towns who are faithful patients from our other clinics. People were pleased with the care and appeared to enjoy visiting with each other. It is a good sign that we may be gaining some ground in this town.

Kemmel was busy today catching up on reports, and later in the afternoon, meeting up with one of our board members Harriette Shivers to help with interviews of four scholarship applicants. They will continue the process tomorrow with 5 more. Funding is tight this year and there are several applicants both here and in the Montellano area, so competition is hot and heavy. What a nice problem to have so many students interested in getting through high school now. We will pray for God to provide.

Well, that's all for now....