Rain Changes Everything on Tuesday

The heavy tropical rains started Monday night, and were still going strong Tuesday morning when it was time to leave the hotel at 8:00 a.m.  Our driver Glen, who is never late, was late.  He uses his bus to shuttle University students every day, and reported upon his arrival at 8:20 that classes were cancelled because of the threat of flooding. Days with a lot of rain can be like"snow days" in New Hampshire and Vermont, we would discover.  We set out for the village, making our standard two or three stops to pick up water, equipment and people.  The bus was completely crammed, with material on everyone's lap, and five suitcases full of medical and dental equipment in the back, in anticipation of a full day at the clinic.

The largest river in the district is on the outskirts of Cotui, and as we crossed the bridge we could see a construction crew frantically pumping out an area where only yesterday they had been working on building a new bridge support.  The river was brown and fast-moving and angry. As we worked our way into the mountains, the standing water in the rice fields and the swollen streams were evident.  On the final approach to Hernando Alonso through the village of El Hato, it was clear where the water had come over the road in several spots.  Driving through the villages, we saw many children playing in the rushing water on the sides of the road, and guessed that school had been cancelled.  Just like a snow day. We also had an interesting delay on route when we shared the road for a while with a small herd of 20 or so cows.

We pulled into the temporary clinic building in El Hato over an hour late, and there was a large line of people waiting for their opportunity.  We unloaded the health team and the suitcases, and they burrowed through the crowd at the front door.  There were civil defense personnel in orange vests to help with crowd control, and also the local Peace Corps volunteer, Mateo.  The crowd was not disorderly in the least, but eager and anxious to get help with health problems, as well as the chance for vitamins, new eyeglasses,  and dental treatment.  Those with small children were particularly assertive, understandably, seeing a chance to advocate on behalf of their kids. We were lucky to have the services of a local dentist and also a local ER nurse supervisor, and it took good work by everyone to greet people, triage their needs and deliver what we could for them.  Since there was no school that day, and since the school served lunches to the students, the school personnel brought lunch over and almost all of the people waiting in line enjoyed a full, healthy meal.

Meanwhile, over at the school, it was eerily quiet with only three or four students and no teachers. Many of the teachers had been prevented from coming by local flooding.  With no efficient way to broadcast news of school closing, several of the local children were there.  Happily it had been our plan for the day to involve students in covering books, and three of the girls, shy at first, were engaged in the process of applying the sticky Contact paper to protect the books which had been donated.  In the actual library-in-process, Kerry Martin and Cameron Miller assembled the last of the new bookcases, and a painting team of Henry Bernard, Ben Ives and Mia Gallardi began to apply fresh paint to the walls.  Victor Rodriguez, our Renaissance man, connected a borrowed drill and began drilling into the concrete so that we could screw the shelves to the wall for safety.  As we were leaning into our work, we noticed that it had begun to rain again, hard.  Then at 11:30 the word came:  we had to quickly stop what we were doing and leave soon.  There was additional danger of flooding, and it was possible we would not be able to get home.  In addition, the School Director was certain that he would be stranded at school unless he left.  Victor, amazingly, accelerated his drilling process and safely completed the last hole just as his drill bit died.  The painting drew, which had found a rhythm, managed to close up shop with very little spilled paint.  We boarded the bus and headed back to the clinic.  Miraculously, they had been able to treat most of the patients, and the rain had diminished the line as the morning went on.  The health team stored their stuff, and loaded the bus, and we headed home, safely crossing all of the streams.

It was a bit disconcerting to arrive back at the hotel in the middle of the day.  Fortunately, the hotel staff managed to rustle up lunch for us, but it was still frustrating to leave unfinished work back in the hills, knowing that our time here is limited.  We made the most of the afternoon, however.  Two groups walked into the center of the city, taking advantage of a lull in the rain.  Several of us managed to purchase a few items to make tomorrow's work smoother.  After we returned to the hotel, the library crew hopped into the bus and took a short trip to the other side of the city, near the University, and visited a creepy abandoned school building owned by a friend of our resident school psychologist, Ruth Soto.  In an old open-air classroom, populated by flitting lizards and wasps, there were hundreds of discarded books scattered on the floor and piled on tables.  Many of them were not suitable for the elementary kids in Hernando Alonso, but we found more than a dozen which we could add to our stash.  We brought them back to the hotel, cleaned them up, and continued the book-covering operation in the dining room while the health team met and planned for tomorrow's clinic work.

With our prep work completed prior to supper, we'll have a chance to be in bed on the early side.  The forecast for the next few days isn't that great, but our spirits are high and we are determined to accomplish as much as we can as we work alongside our new friends.