Being sick is no fun

Sorry, I didn´t blog yesterday...we don´t have wireless at the place we are staying. At the moment I am writing this from an internet cafe in Pana. I blame any spelling or puncutation mistakes on the Spanish keyboard I am typing on.

Lets see...where did I leave off...

Sunday we went to church at Community of Faith, which is held at the house we are staying at. A nice short walk to church :-) The service was almost entirely in Spanish, although the message was translated for us gringos. After church, we went to Antigua (yep, where I am going to school). We went through the Capuchines convent again (always a fun time) and then wandered through the market for a while before spending some time around the Parque Central. Antigua is going to be a very interesting place to go to school. I have already found the Dominos Pizza, a bookstore, and several places to eat.

Monday I woke up with a bad cold, nausea, and extreame exhaustion (from not sleeping). This also was our travel day to Pana, so I got to spend all day in the car. After getting drugged up (in a good way), I crawled into the front seat and slept most of the trip. We started out by heading to Palencia (east of Guatemala City) and then backtracking through Guatemala City and out west to Pana/Lake Atitlan. That drive was about 5 hours, some of which was spent in traffic. We stopped for lunch at this resaurant that looks like it was taken right out of Leavensworth. Rolando (Tito´s assistant) ordered me some soup as I didn´t think the steak or chicken would been a good idea. I felt a bit better after eating and went and napped in the car while the group finished up. We dropped on clinic supplies in Ciprisales and then headed down to the place we were staying, a beautiful Christian retreat for missionaries. I got a bed by myself (due to being sick) and a roommate who is a doctor with all sorts of fabulous things to help me sleep. Went to bed early as we start clinics bright and early.

Tuesday

We had our first day in Cipresales. We saw about 55 patients in medical, which is really slow. Dental was very VERY slow. The community worker thinks it will be busier tomorrow, and I hope so. I worked betwen Pharmacy and Lab. We filled a lot of prescriptions and I had patients test positive for diabetes, H Pylori and a case of TB. I took a nap in the car after lunch and felt better as I had been running a temperature off/on during the day. We wrapped things up and headed back down to Pana and here I sit typing an update. Hopefully the wireless will be up and running so I can post some pictures (not that I took any yesterday or today as I was feeling so crummy). Oh, its also been increadebly windy and kind of cold the past few days. Last night I thought the roof of our house was going to come off in the wind!

Ok, well, I need to head off to dinner and then home to bed. Several things to pray for:

1) My health. Its tough being sick and trying to be a productive member of the team
2) More patients for tomorrow
3) Stamina and good will between team members
4) Safe travels