Adventure to the Isle of Roatan

Houses on the way to the "brigada."

View on the way to the "Brigada"

More gorgeous views of the countryside.

This blog is incredibly behind the times...Lacking even the completion of our group over two weeks ago when 4 more LLU med'ers joined our medical and other adventures.  In spite of the content here which has been much more about the random, fun, adventures, there has been quite as many delightful, educational, and challenging medical/work related adventures. It has been fun to see different members of the group contribute different strengths...K has contributed her artistic talents to directing the mural painting project of "Jesus and the Children" at the school (pics to come)...D's Spanish skills have helped immensely for various important challenges/random adventures such as tracking down cheese for pupusas on our trip from Julio the best cheese seller in the town...M (the Argentinian nutritionist who has been adopted into our group) has been a welcome ally in relaying gluten allergies/vegan diet needs to the kitchen staff, and making sure B has enough to eat...B has taken it upon himself to be a (usually) welcome comic relief...to mention a few hidden and shining talents of the group.

Last week we did our first health expo at a church in Tegucigalpa, did a "brigada" setting up clinic in one of the more rural areas, started Spanish lessons, finished a painting project at the school started by other LLU students on their trip here over spring break, started painting the mural of "Jesus and the Children," had 2 game nights, and learned how to make pupusas.

Tomorrow we embark in the wee hours of the morning on a grand adventure to the beautiful isle of Roatan, home of the second largest barrier reef in the world, and according the the very well traveled Dr. L the most beautiful beaches in the world. On a side note...One thing is for sure, in Honduras they have taken the concept of "take-out" to whole new extremes. We went out for pupusas (my first time eating out since we got here!) after our "brigada" last week. We were paying at the end and B decided to get a coke. He was walking out with the glass bottle of coke and went back to ask if he had paid for/could take out the glass with the coke. Turns out the answer was "no," but, no problem, they just poured the coke into a clear plastic bag and sent him on his way with a straw. (Which of course precipitate many comments about the sort of thing you might find in a hospital that resembled the coke-in-a-bag setup). Tonight we were exploring our meal options from the cafeteria for the long bus followed by ferry ride to the isle. Inspecting, the contents discovered granola in a bag. I said "Hmm how are we going to eat these without bowls," K said "I think this is like trail mix to eat out of the bag." As M was explained to us the process behind reconstituting the powered soymilk into soymilk, we realized indeed, breakfast ("desayuno" one our our first words we learned really quickly) tomorrow is granola and milk in a bag.

Schoolhouse Housing our "Brigada" Clinic

Delicious Pupusas!