Monday

As I explained in the last entry, our day ended up not being what we had planned. But it was productive nonetheless. The work was important and we feel good about what we were able to accomplish. We ended up moving about 70 out of a total 147 boxes, each weighing 110# all over creation. It was extremely hard labor and exhausting! We moved them from the second floor of the clinic down a flight of stairs, across a big driveway type thing, down some more stairs, down a sidewalk type thing, over the edge of a concrete wall, and into a garage storage space. It was insane. I kept saying that there must be a better way, but there truly wasn’t. This was the only way and it had to be done. We still, like I said, have half of the boxes left to move. We will get it done, but there was no way we could have done it all today. We’re all anxious to wake up in the morning to find out exactly which body parts are sore from the ordeal.

The clinic was very busy today! The orthotics and prosthetics lab accomplished a ton of great work. They saw a LOT of patients and were busy casting patients. What is so cool about the prosthetics and orthotics part of our work is that the results are so tangible. You can immediately see how you’ve changed someone’s life.

Tomorrow we will be attempting another visit to an orphanage. We are confident it will work out and that we will be able to measure the kids for their wheelchairs. From the reports we’ve had from other Healing Hands teams, the orphanage we will be visiting tomorrow (Mercy and Sharing) has a huge need for wheelchairs. We have a lot of work ahead of us, which is a good feeling. I can’t wait.

We received 147 of the Wheels for Humanity (the 110# boxes we were moving today) PET chairs (hand crank wheelchairs that are very useful in rural areas for disabled people), which is exciting. Now we just have to track down the regular wheelchairs, which we have heard are somewhere in the country. The next task is to track them down and get them into our possession. Then we will need to get them to the orphanages to be distributed.

As you can tell, the logistics of bringing a team of volunteers here is as challenging as anything. Things change all the time and there is so much lost in translation and so much that we just don’t understand because of the cultural differences. Many things leave us wondering how in the world it worked out while others leave us wondering what in the heck happened to make it NOT work out. This place is mind boggling!

Good night and I hope all is well with everyone.

Love,

Erin