HELPS Trip #3 - Tejutla

HELPS Trip #3 - Tejutla

Wednesday, March 21, 2012, was the longest traveling day I've ever experienced in my life. Explaining logistics would be boring, but you should know it took us 13 hours (which included over 6 buses; healthy mix of both mirco-bus and auto bus) to arrive in Tejutla. Very little food and rest during this day lead to some grumpy, exhausted Johnnies arriving to the HELPS medical team, stationed in a hospital on a hillside with a beautiful view. We arrived only just in time for a hot, delicious lasagna meal and rewarding reunion with Casey, Connor, and the rest of the friendly faces of the HELPS team.

Our Endless Journey

Connor gets busy in the operation room

Christy "Triage-ing"

Our experience with the Tejutla Crew was truly unique. Having joined a crew 1/2 way through their work week, the system of admittance, scheduling, and clinic were already well established. This actually made fitting in easier for us. More translators are always good news for medical teams; Justin and I posted up one-on-one with a doctor and their respective clinical teams. I worked a few hours with Pediatrics, a few with OB/GYN, and a few with clinical. I saw for the first time a live ultrasound of an unborn baby… life-changing. I met more incredible people on this mission, many of whom were coincidentally from St. Cloud, MN! I worked primarily with Dr. Steve Jameson and Dr. Eric Barth, both of whom were very patient, informative, fun gentlemen. I had a really great discussion about faith with Pastor Jim Tetlie (thanks, Jim!). Sonia Russ, my favorite translator, has the biggest heart and the greatest sense of humor.  Mrs. Christy Rice is the best Triage-r I've ever seen. Also, shout out to Dr. Jim O'Neill (one of those terrible 'Tommies') and Judith Scott for compiling "The Guatemala Dictionary; for interpreters/heath care providers." We have a copy, and it will come to use in future missions!

Learning from Dr. Barth

Sonia translating for Dr. Jameson

The person that liked the mission the most, however, was without a doubt Kurtis Nusbaum. Originally, our plan was to stay for only Thursday, then leave Friday for two days at the beautiful Lake Atitlan before returning Kurtis to the airport. After the first day, Kurtis asked if we could stay one more, which of course we did. 

Playing hacky-sack for the first time in years with the
high school translators

Kurtis was put in charge of controlling the Triage line. This included organizing the lines bursting full of people; basically crowd control, and occasionally occupying the attention of little kids. To some this might seem a mundane task, but when it started hailing on the first day and there was a stampede of people trying to squeeze into the doorway to the hospital, Kurtis and the rest of Triage were essential. Not only that, Kurtis's Spanish improved immensely over only 3 days of working at Triage. I hope he has the opportunity to return to a place like Guatemala with a medical team later in his life.. he seemed to cherish every moment. 

Kurtis, Sophia, Sonia, Me ... taking a break from translating

Thursday and Friday came and went quickly. Tejutla 2012 was filled with the typical medical team upper-and-downer stories, hopes and failures, celebrations and defeated looks. I met a 17-year-old man who couldn't (and wouldn't be able to) see out of his left eye after a fatal car accident. Several young women were unaware of their pregnancy. A 93 year-old woman made it from a village several hours away from Tejutla, and a young man of 5 had never learned to talk because of a severe but fixable ear infection in both ears. Many times we cannot help these kind of people. We try to send them to a specialist at a nearby hospital, but many cannot afford the medical expenses. More often than not, we send them away rather satisfied with a routine check-up and bottle of antibiotics, while the real health problem while persist due to their lack of ability to pay for it. This is difficult to consider sometimes, but for risk of sounding cliché or oversimplifying… at least it's SOMEthing for them.

A beautiful Saturday morning awaited our much shorter trip from Tejutla to Lake Atitlan - Panajachel. We gave out hugs and said our goodbyes, promising a brief reunion with the team in Antigua for the HELPS banquet.

View from Panajachel Hotel Room

Lake Atitlan was a short-lived, fun adventure. We arrived in Panajachel, small city next to the lake, at around 3p.m. We took a brief adventure exploring the shops, went out to eat with a perfect view of the lake, explored the beach at night for an absolute crystal-clear view of the stars. I gotta get back to Lake Atitlan ASAP. Before hitting the sack, we shared drinks with Chris Buckshaw, a young entrepreneur who recently started a company called "El Camino VolunTours". His idea is to populate the idea of an alternative "break" experience, what he calls "a volunteer vacation." He's spent his last few years bringing several groups to experience a true cultural exchange  by organizing humanitarian projects in Guatemala and Nicaragua. His program seems to be popular and growing; it was refreshing to talk to another young ambitious entrepreneur (please feel free to check out www.voluntours.ca for more info). We wish him the best of luck with the future of his project!

We got Kurtis to the airport in the nick of time. After enjoying a lunch and saying our goodbyes, we left Kurtis for his journey back home while we headed to Antigua for a few days to enjoy the plush compliments of HELPS International's hospitality. I especially loved this mission's banquet, where I had the great pleasure of meeting Steve Miller, the founder and President of HELPS International. He is a man of big ideas and endless giving; its a wonder what the world would be like without men like him. Thanks again to all members of the Tejutla 2012 trip… our short time spent together was a blessing… hope you come back next year!