We had a very nice day serving this village. It was a day filled with hope. To start with, the road serving this community used to be rough, and made of red clay. Since we last visited in 2012, the road has been much improved and is a good solid road all the way to the village. It is an amazing scenic road with majestic mountains, steep drop offs, heavy forestation and clouds rolling in and out around the steep mountain curves. But the fact that the country of Mexico invested the time and money to improve this road was a sign of hope for the people. Some of you may remember that on our last visit, the slick clay roads made it impossible for the van to continue its forward momentum and we had to jump out and push. So the improved road was a great sign of hope for us.
Secondly, we were so happy to see that the community had built a new church made of cement since our last visit. The old church was very humble indeed with wood slats and it was very small. The new church in the same exact spot was designed by a local person and constructed with great effort. We could only imagine that they probably hand carried buckets of cement to built this church. Thus in this very poor community a new (almost completed) church is a sign of hope. We were grateful to once again use their church for our clinic. Thirdly, we were most happy to see a great sign of hope in the faces of the people as they greeted us warmly and sincerely. This is one of the poorest communities we have ever served. The people tend to be shy and reserved. The last time we came 2 years ago, we felt that we needed to earn their trust. They didnt look us in the eye (a sign of respect in their culture). But more than that I think that they had not really had any Americans visit their community. They looked at us with wonder and perhaps a bit of fear. Today, they welcomed us with open hearts, big smiles and even expressed a sincere handshake and - Thank You. One woman told Nancy that people said that the MDP doctors were the best who had ever been in their village and that our medicine helped the people. The implicit endorsement showed in the faces of the people who came all day long for medical advice and assistance. By the end of the day we had about 130 people who had consulted with us. (Colette still does not have a final count but should give us the information in the morning.) We saw some very poor people. Many older women did not have shoes. The cold mountain fog rolled in and it was bone chilling cold. The cold air rushed through the new windows which do not yet have glass. We all shivered but then we tried not to complain because these people had no shoes and they were often cold. We have served nearly 700 people total in our medical clinics thus far. In the morning we will have our final full group clinic. We look forwarď to helping others through our medical efforts. And we are grateful that we could experience this sense of hope today. Hope in the people. Hope that their future will be better. Hope that our God who loves each of us will continue to wrap His loving arms around all of us as we do the best we can do each day. -Helen Peterson and the team
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As we start our last day off clinics I look back and see the happy and sad moments of the past days. Although it is warmer here than home, we also are in winter. Our patients are so cold and are just wrapped in robojas or woven shawls, and many are not wearing shoes. One day of clinic we saw patients from 4 different villages and most had either walked or gotten a ride in the back of a pickup. For you in southern Minnesota, that would be walking from Winnebago to see your doctor in Blue Earth. The other day as I was standing with some village ladies I felt fingers going through my hair. This woman was so intrigued by my white hair and it formed a bond between us. She was a joy to connect with laughter and love. Of course she had lovely thick long black hair. I am always intrigued with the black wool skirts and shawls that the ladies wear and the wool jackets that are worn by the men. The children have always been a highlight as they are so interested in hearing a few English words and tryig to repeat them. The bus awaits us for our short half hour trip.
Colette Today we are in the village of Guadalupe La Floresta. It is near Napite where we were yesterday. We brought along with us a young man named Lino who works at the hotel. It is his day off and he offered to come with us. He helped to greet people at intake and take their name and chief complaint.
We are working in a community building. In this village they are letting the older women go first. It is interesting also to notice that the pharmacy needs vary a great deal with each clinic. Some villages have a lot of gastrointestinal problems, some have major pain issues and some blood pressure or skin needs. In each case we are grateful to be able to help with a well thought out formulary which has been developed over the years. Special thanks to Dr. Bob Christensen and to Susan Peller and others who have been working especially carefully on this effort. We also thank everyone who has donated to MDP. Whether it is $5 or $1000, we use your donations to buy medicines to help these people feel better. Once again today we decided not to take any actual clinic pictures as the people are quiet and reserved. The weather is nice and we are again next to a school and can hear the children playing soccer. OUR TEAM! Our Nurses.... I mentioned that Lino is helping with intake. We also have our nurses Sherry Bobich and Colette Meidinger working at intake. Colette is a veteran MDP volunteer. This is her 5th MDP trip and her 2nd to Mexico. We all appreciate Colette for her gentleness, compassion and quiet, kind spirit. Colette has worked at the Wells Clinic for many years. She lives in Winnebago and along with her friends there is very devoted to MDP. Sherry comes to us from Chisholm. This is her first MDP trip, however she had been previously to Mexico on another misison trip and had helped at an orphanage. She brings a sweet, upbeat heart and a willingness to pitch in and embrace each day. Sherry recently retired after having worked at the Hibbing Clinic for many years. The nurses greet the patients, take their vital information - blood pressure, weight etc. They are the first face of MDP. We are grateful for the excellent job they do. Next, the patients wait patiently to see the medical providers. Some have already walked for 2 or 3 hours to get here. They may wait for another 2 or 3 to see our doctors. The Clinic... Each day our set up is different. We gather a few chairs, set up the phamacy and adjust according to the space we are offered to work in. Today, Nancy Linder, a family nurse practioner (who works out of the Wells and Winnebago Clinics and lives in rural Easton) is working with interpreter Val Ross, a graduate of St. Marys University who majored in Spanish and Biology. Val is currently working for the Red Cross. They also have an interpreter named Maria who translates from Spanish into the native Tseltal. Nancy has been on many MDP trips and is an enthusiastic, hardworker who has a great desire to serve. She was very involved in helping to organize this trip devoting countless hours to planning. She is always ready to help anyone and will go the extra mile to make sure that the very best effort is put forth. Her passion for this medical mission work is amazing. She also keeps the conversations interesting. Val is a friend of Nancys daughter Megan who had worked in the MDP pharmacy in Mexico last year. Val attracts a lot of attention for her long, blonde hair. She is smart, patient and thoughtful and brings a caring attitude to each moment. She plans to go on to school and is in the process for applying for Physicians Assistant School. Our next station has Dr. Aaron Johnson and interpreter Lia Price serving the patients. Aaron and his wife Jenna are parents of 7 wonderful children. In addition to being a doctor at the Wells and Winnebago Clinics, he is also a minister for his church. Aaron is a man of God who is so humble and a great servant. He also has a wonderful sense of humor and can be counted on to clean anyones plate. Lia, is a member of the MDP Board. Lia lives in North Mankato and is a professional, certified medical interpreter. In addition to being a co-leader for our team, Lia serves as our head interpreter. Lia is passionate about our work and has been instrumental in making this dream of serving her people in Mexico a reality. She devotes countless hours developing contacts and the itinery for our trip, and hundreds of other details. We are so grateful for her presence, goodness and beautiful spirit. Even though she recently lost her dad in Gudalajara, she was able to step into this trip making everything just flawless. Along with Nancys help of course. Our next station has Dr. Bob Christensen and interpreter Curtis Brown. Dr. Bob is a member of the MDP Board. He is a brilliant guy with a deep devotion to serve his fellow human being. He works as an emergency doctor at Rivers Edge Hospital Emergency Department in St. Peter. As previously mentioned Bob has worked hard to pull together many aspects of our medical piece. Bob cares about family, knowledge and doing the right thing. He is invaluable. Curtis and his wife Rachel are the proud parents of 4 young boys. Curtis is in charge of economic develoment for the City of Urbandale, Iowa. He is a moral compass who exudes kindness. He constantly adds a goodness to our team. We feel it is a privelege to have Curtis on our team. And our fourth team consists of Dr. Don Mersch and interpreter Thalia Taylor. Dr. Don is originally from Fairfax, MN. He had worked in Alaska in his early years of medical practice. In fact, he used to fly his float plane to land on the Yukon River to serve the people in remote areas. He said it is much like we are doing now - except that he didnt bring the amount of medicine along like we do. He worked in Hibbing for over 30 years and is now retired to Arizona. He found us on the internet and it is a great match! And coincidentally, Sherry Bobich who is serving on this trip was his nurse for many years. Dr. Don is a jovial, good hearted man who finds the nicest things to say to everyone. He has a very big heart. Thalia Tayor is a veteran traveler with MDP. Thalia is retired and lives in St. Peter. She and her husband are world travelers. She is a wonderful interpreter and is a native speaker having grown up in Mexico. Thalia is a little dynamo who can lift everyones spirits with her great job and enthusiastic spirit. Everyone who travels with Thalia loves her! Our doctors and interpreters work very hard to give their patients the very best of care. They so carefully work to help them and it is heartwarming to witness their compassion and care. Each day the interpreters and doctors might switch who they are working with but their dedication and devotion to serving those in need is always amazing. The Pharmacy... And finally we have the pharmacy. We are responsible for unpacking our medicines each day according to their categories, We have pain, gastrointestinal, cardiovascular, eye and ear, topicals, vitamins, alergy, inhalers, antibiotics, gastrointestinal parasite, injections, hypertension, diabetes and steriod medicines. In all we bring 10 suitcases filled with 55 different kinds of medicines. We prepackage a number of medicines such as Tylenol, Ibuprofen, vitamins, Rinitidine and so forth with counts of 30 to 60 per plastic bag. Each bag is labeled with a Spanish label giving directions, their name and other information is also put on the label. We try to make it as close to the experience one might get in the U.S. Our days are spent counting, organizing and responding to the requests of our medical providers. My co-helper on this trip in the pharmacy is Kyle Meidinger. His mom Colette is the nurse I previously wrote about. Kyle is Muscatine, Iowa and works at Musco Sports Lighting. They make the lighting for all of the major stadiums in the US and worldwide. In fact, they have lights at the Olympics in Russia. Kyles mom invited him to join us. He was not quite sure what he was getting into. Kyle has proven to be a very smart, hardworking and good natured guy. He is often one step ahead of me and I am very grateful for his excellent work during this trip! Kyle likes Harleys and Dr. Don even named the bright orange Ibuprofen which matched Kyles bright orange shirt - Kyles Harley Orange Pills. The rain moved in late afternoon. We served 85 people. It was another good day. The village elder (and town founder) Ramiro thanked us for coming to their village. He said they were poor and had nothing to give us but a sincere thanks and asked us to please remember them. We sure will... Well, it turned out to be a big post. I hope you enjoyed hearing about our team and how we work together. Many blessings to all of you! - Helen Peterson We visited a very remote village called Napite today. It is a long, steep, winding journey to get there. The people are very shy and reserved. We decided out of respect for this we would not take any pictures of them. The women wore beautiful blue and purple shawls. There was a school there and the children were lively and full of energy. People actually walked in from other villages in the mountains to come our clinic today. Many walked a couple of hours and the mountains are steep.Most of the people spoke Tzotzil, so we had to have an interpreter translate from Tzotzil into Spanish and another translate from Spanish to English. Everyone worked hard to be very careful to get the translations correct. In the end we helped 92 people. It got cold and started to rain but our driver is excellent and manuvered the mountainous roads with great skill. We returned to San Cristobal about 7 p.m. exhausted but feeling good about the effort and experience. Thanks for following our journey!
-Helen Peterson and the team Greetings! We have arrived in San Cristobal! We served 70 at our clinic yesterday. Colette tells us that we served 136 the day before. The total thus far is 358. We feel very blessed to be able to help others and the team is working so well together. Last night after supper Dr. Aaron Johnson and Lia were going to help one of the Sisters get some wax out of her ears. They discovered that in order to get warm water for the procedure the nuns had to heat it on the stove. Now this is the second year we have been guests of the Sisters for meals while in Coapilla. Truth is we had never noticed that they did not have any hot water heater. All cooking, laundry, showers and such gave them the choice of heating it on the stove or of using cold water. Well, that got us to thinking... During the trip each of us has had at least one unpleasant, cold shower. In truth, we have grumbled a little about it and felt sorry for ourselves. When we learned that the Sisters never had hot water we felt bad. The guys started investigating whether one could be easily installed. Guess what? It was all set up and could easily be plumbed in. Before you knew it Dr. Don had purchased one to donate at Home Depot on our return trip and it was riding with us in the van. We dropped it at the house of our driver and he will have his nephew install it. We are delighted to help the Sisters with something that will make their life a little better every day! Also, we got our first flat tire. We were traveling slowly and were never in any danger. The guys had it changed and we were back on the road in a short while. People are out shopping and strolling tonight. The weather is good here. Sorry to hear about the minus 12 below last night. We will head to another small rural village in the morning. Lots of Love!
Helen Peterson and the team Greetings from Coapilla, Mexico! We are all well and our travels were safe. Sorry that we did not send any blogs or phone calls to our family and friends. There is no phone service on our cellular phones even with the international calling feature because we are in such a remote area and internet has been difficult. I am at an internet place connected to a home and the internet is so slow that it has taken an hour and a half just to pull up our website. Oh well....
Our flights here were wonderful. Lia´s cousin who is a priest met us at the airport and with some friends drove us to a retreat house called Retreat Home Casa de la Cruz which about an hour away from the Tuxtla airport. We had a very nice meal and slept well. Bob and Lia picked up some additional medicine in the morning and then we headed out for Coapilla. We ran a clinic there from 1:30 til 5 pm and served 50 people. The chief complaint was pain. It was a good start and a warm up for our upcoming clinics! On Friday we traveled about an hour through the scenic mountains to a town called Morales. It is rural with lots of corn and cattle and although probably a stretch we were told that every family has a horse. We served 125 people which is a new record for MDP! The whole team worked very hard and showed great compassion. At the end of the day as we prepared to leave, the people gathered and made an announcement that this community had never been served like this before. The people were beautiful, happy and kind. We arrived back in Coapilla about 6:30 pm and the Sisters at the Convent served us a great meal. On Saturday, we made a short 15 minute drive to LLano Grande. We worked out of a community clinic. Again, it was a great experience and everyone enjoyed the day. We served over 130 (Colette hasn´t tallied the final count for the day yet). It was another really big day. We worked hard and the people were wonderful. This was a coffee and corn area and the people suffered from a lot of pain and other ailments. When we got to the Convent for supper there was a 5 piece Marimba band and a wonderful meal waiting. They gave us certificates in appreciation for each team member. Today we slept in late and gathered at the Convent at eight thirty for breakfast. We went to a wonderful Mass together. The priest mentioned us three times and had us come up to the front to introduce ourselves. The people applauded. At the end of Mass all of the children in the congregation came forward to sing a song with the priest and processed out with him. There were lots and lots of kids! It was really neat! This afternoon we had another clinic in Coapilla. I snuck out early to send this message but all was going well. In the morning we will travel about 3 hours to San Cristobal. The internet and phone service should be much better there. We will hopefully be able to post pictures then. Thanks for all of the support of our family and friends. We miss you and love you. All is going well here. The team is filled with really nice, hardworking people. We will be thinking of you each mile of the trip! - Helen Peterson & the team Our medicines are packed and we are all set! We will leave the MSP Airport very early on Wednesday, February 5th. Watch for blogs and photos. Our twelve member team looks forward to serving the people of Mexico. Along with the entire MDP organization and friends, we thank everyone for their support and prayers. We also greatly appreciate the hard work and dedication of our team leaders - Lia Price and Nancy Linder.
- Helen Peterson & the team. Our next MDP Medical Mission Team is getting set for our trip to the Chiapas region of Mexico in February. We had our 1st team meeting last Sunday at Nancy Linder's home. We leave from Minnesota on February 5th. Much work has been done - much work left to do in preparation. We are grateful for all of the support we continue to experience. The many donations which MDP received over the holidays will help us greatly as we purchase medicines and supplies to take to serve those in need. The prayers and encouragement are also much appreciated! Thanks!!
- Helen Peterson & The Team |
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Lia Price - Team Co-Leader and Interpreter ArchivesCategories |