August 9th, 2011 - Mosquito Bites from Day 1

My body was completely exhausted this morning when I woke up in the clinic, although after bathing the girls and stripping/remaking the beds in the clinic…my brain was more awake, so that when I got back to the volunteer house I could not nap.  Because my body was so exhausted, I knew that going out into the hot sun would really not be good, so I decided that rather than help the children…I’d help the volunteers by cleaning up.  I swept & mopped the common area (hall, living room, dining room, kitchen), washed dishes and 2 loads of laundry from the clinic.  I began washing laundry from our house (bedding from those volunteers who had left – yep, not done yet), and finally sent one of my own loads through.  I sprayed my bed down with lice control aerosol and then made my bed with new sheets since the discovery of the lice.

I headed to the little girls kitchen (which is still flooded) with Joy to help serve lunch and do dishes. When we finished I headed again to the clinic.  Fortunately I didn’t have to spend tonight as well because Evelin was sent home this morning and Erika headed home just after supper.  I changed bed sheets there and swept…Karelia said she would mop since there was a doctor in the clinic today doing exams and I didn’t want to keep interrupting him by running around with a mop. I took the sheets back to our volunteer house to wash and will get them back tomorrow.

I’ve been here a week now and I still have the 14 mosquito bites from day 1 of arriving at Emmanuel, however they are now about the size of a standard Wisconsin mosquito bite once it turns into a red bump, so hoping that tomorrow or Thursday will be the last day of the appearance of all of these bites on my legs.  These mosquitoes seem to rip off your flesh and dive down deep (hence the drops of blood on my legs the first day).

Also, I got to see a boy who was about to have the little worms come out of him from having been chosen to be a “host body” by one of those bright green flies (you’ll have to ask Andres or me more about this).  The boys arm was very swollen and he cried terribly.  Unfortunately the worms did not come out today, so hopefully tomorrow.

Joy and Julie invited me to hear them practice with the music team for tomorrow’s evening service. They’ll be singing Power of Your Love which was one of the songs Bob & I chose to be played at our wedding. I’m pretty excited to listen to that. 

After an full day, it’s finally time to turn in…I really need the recuperation time for an active day tomorrow!