We're Here!

After traveling for seven hours, the whole group, minus Olivia's luggage, made it saftely to the Hearts for the Children Ministry house in Guatemala. Friday was a day of planning, as we prepared for medical clinics and the boy scout campout. That night everyone went to sleep pretty early to get ready for the week ahead. On Saturday, the team hit the ground running with a medical clinic in Barcenas and a Boy Scout Jamboree and Campout in Embaulada. Many of you may not know that Barcenas is the town of our beloved bus driver, Mochilon, who was shot in January. We are happy to report that he is doing well, and was extremely supportive of our teams efforts today. Although our team has less than perfect spanish, we were able to see 105 people with the help of Pastor Tom and translators. Olivia, Carolyn, and Jordyn worked the triage table and were at the frontline of patient care. After triage, the people were able to see our wonderful doctors Cindy, Tom, and Jon. These three worked very hard to see every person that came to the clinic, and they made sure that no one was turned away. The pharmacy was the final step after seeing the doctors, and Melanie and Lyndy ensured that everyone got the medicine that they were prescribed. I know your thinking that the pharmacy is surely the end of the line as far as the clinic is concerned, but there is no way that our clinic would be complete with out Kathy, our dental hygenist. With the help of her assistant Jennifer, she cleaned the teeth of 25 kids. Over all the medical clinic was a huge success and went very smoothly, even though all of the man power was at the boy scout camp. Although in the past our team has concetrated its efforts on the medical clinics, last year we started a boy scout troup in Embaulada. This year the guys in the group continued their efforts to establish the pack. Today they gathered all of the boys in Embolada and taught them how to start a fire and they learned all of the ways of the scouts. They are currently spending the night in the basement of the church and we won't have a full report util tomorrow. However, Dale, Ken, and Jay came back the mission house to get to sleeping bags and they seemed pretty worn out. I'm sure they would welcome your prayers because you know how men can get when they been around kids all day. We have already been so blessed by all of the people in Guatemala and we are excited to see how God will work this year! None of this would be possible without the support that we have received from all of you at home, and we continue to ask for your prayers while we're here. Also, Pastor Tom has become very sick and he needs your prayers. We know that God is the great physician and we are praying and believing in that power.