Buen viaje!!

Sometimes it’s just nice to go out of town, at least that’s the case for me. I’ve always enjoyed going out of town for the weekend in the States and I feel the same way here. At times, it’s just nice to have a change of scenery and get away from what you see every single day. I guess there are some things that never change….

This past weekend I went to Cotabumbas, which is about six hours outside of Cusco. It was nice to go back after being away for a few months this winter to continue with the community health project. It was good to see all the moms and kids show up for the “reunion” on Saturday so we could continue our teaching and our relationships with the moms in this project.

I have also come to understand that there is never a dull moment here and ANYTHING can happen at any time. The last time I traveled to Cotabumbas our car broke down and we ended up staying in a little town an extra night because of it.

Well….before I left Cusco, I was told that the van was in good shape and we should be good to go for the whole trip. After rainy season the roads ended up being pretty bad, as expected. But.……we did end up breaking down on the way home. Our kind driver did end up doing a makeshift job of fixing the car after about an hour or so of work, but we ended up checking it every hour on our journey home. Thankfully we did get home at a very early hour and when we did get back to Cusco. I was so glad to be home!!!

What??

I guess I have good and bad days with Spanish and it seems that ever day there's at least one person I just can't understand. Frustrating as it is, I think I've finally come to accept it and can now move on. I am comforted when other who have been speaking Spanish for years have mentioned that there's some Spanish speaking people they just can't understand. These incidents aren't usually that big of a deal and is at the most, a couple of minuets of either being lost in a conversation or asking the person to repeat themselves one more time.

Well, yesterday was extra special because my person per day quota happened to be someone I saw on a home visit. Even better was that the visit ended up being three and a half hours. In my defense, there was some Quechua mixed in there at times.

Needless to say it was a long visit and unfortunately I had very little to contribute to the conversation...

Burned

Today started off as a cloudy, cold Monday(great motivation to get out of bed and get going for the day!!) Mondays are usually crazy busy, which is alright with me. We have a Pediatrician at the clinic on Mondays, so there are usually plenty of screaming kids the whole day.

We started out pretty busy for a couple of hours and then all the busyness and fun came to an end. It started raining and that was the end of our patients for the day. Sad since I'd much rather be busy than just sitting around for a couple of hours.

About an hour before we closed, woman came it who had burned both of her feet(pretty badly) about five days ago. I think she had been cooking? They were easily second or third degree burns. They looked horrible and the patient looked like she was in so much pain. I felt so bad for her.

As I started to clean the wound, and dress it, the patient started to tell me about the care she had received at a local hospital over the past five days and how she had waited for hours and hours each visit. She then went on to tell me about how they pretty much did a half done job for her wound care. Again, it made me sad to hear about the care she had received. I asked her how she ended up at La Fuente. She said that a friend had told her about the clinic and about how good the care was. It's always great to hear how people in the community see La Fuente in a positive way as we strive to give good care and serve the community around us. I'm glad that God has given us the opportunity to give this woman good care, minister to her, and walk with her through this time of difficulty.

The best part is that we will be going to her house every day at least for the next week or so to clean, dress, and look after the wounds. I'm super pumped to visit her and do wound care for many reasons, but one of the top reasons is that I love wounds!! It's just one of my things I've always enjoyed as a nurse(it's close behind Cardiac Nursing). I always enjoyed working with skin grafts, burns, and all other kinds of wounds when I worked in trauma. It's just so cool to see the progression of healing and such. Probably the only wound stuff I don't like is when skin grafts are failing and as a last resort leech therapy comes to the picture. That's one of the things I cant handle...

As I work more and more in the clinic, its been an adjustment getting used to the fact that it's just not as exciting as working in the hospital where I have spent my entire work life up until now, so it was pretty sweet to add some excitement to my life with a cool case and be able to be more directly involved in patient care for a bit.

So....in the end it was a pretty interesting Monday!!

Ruins

This past Saturday I had the opportunity to do some travel some friends and a visiting team from the UK. It was a brilliant trip! We spent the day at a couple of sites in the Sacred Valley. It was nice to get out of the city and farther out into the countryside and be reminded of how beautiful it is here and how breathtaking the mountains really are.

Our first stop was Moray, which is one of the many Incan ruins around Cusco. It was a cool descent, but the way back up was a bit more challenging, but was worth the work(even though I'm feelin it in my quads today) But.....it was absolutely spectacular!! Here's just a few pics.

On our way...














Moray














Just beautiful from above















Nice from within, but quite a hike back up










Just passin through....

The next place we stopped was Maras, a town very close to some really cool salt ponds. The main attraction was the salt ponds, which are still owned by different families in the surrounding towns(each fam has about 5). The salt ponds still produce salt, which is exported to other countries and used in Peru as well. The salt comes from a single underground stream, but the all the separate ponds are supplied by different channels. After all the water in each little pond evaporates in about two months time, it’s ready to harvest.

After taking a look from the top, we got to hike our way down the mountain.

It was quite a sight to see!!

The first view was just breath taking!!


All different stages of the process



Irrigation system



Pillars of salt

Staying

For the past couple of months I have been doing a lot of travel to various cities in Peru for different things that needed to get done. My trip to Lima last week was the last trip for a while. I'm so glad to be done with traveling for a while. Don't get me wrong, I do enjoy traveling but it will be nice to be in Cusco without so many interruptions for a bit.

My trip to Lima last week was to finish the application process for my residency card for Peru. It was a long day of waiting at the office of immigrations(for all you Marylanders out there, it was kind of like doing anything at the MVA), but.......I am happy to report that I am now a resident of Peru. Yay!!!