Tammy's Last Weekend :(

This was Tammy's last weekend with us. So sad that she has to go back to the US. Granted, her husband and her residency await her there, but nevermind that. We had a wonderful time with Dra. Tammy. She got her first paycheck here as a doctora - a bunch of bananas (yes, we have a picture). She also got to assist on a surgery, some procedures, and see a ton of patients. (She also learned some new recipes, something we hope will help convince her husband she needs to come back and visit us again!).

We had a great weekend with the Fickers. Two clinics, two days, lots of fun stuff. Nothing super extraordinary - no fancy deliveries in the back of a pickup truck or anything, but a good overall weekend with plenty of quality patient care and some wonderful fellowship.

We did load up three of the Fickers' non-working ultrasound machines in both of our pickup trucks and bring them back to ASELSI where there will be a technician arriving from the US to take a look at them this week. The average weight of one of these ultrasounds is in the neighborhood of 200 lbs, so we had our work cut out for us!

Tomorrow is clinic in Chicabracan, then Matt takes Tammy back to Guatemala City for her flight out on Tuesday morning. He also has to get the green truck re-aligned. We're not sure exactly what Pastor Eliseo did to it when he borrowed it last, but the front end is VISUALLY out of alignment and it pulls like crazy to the right. And he somehow broke the tape deck. That is a REAL bummer because the radio stations here are terrible.

Tuesday we'll spend organizing and shopping for another trip to Zona Reyna from Wednesday - Saturday. We'll be completely incommunicado for those days because there is no electricity in this area, thus no internet or phone service. We are told to be prepared to see over 1200 patients in two full days of clinic. HOW we're going to see them, we have no idea. But we'll do our best.

Here are some pics. The first is Heidi and Tammy examining the results of a pregnant woman stepping on a nail about a month ago. The second is Justin getting his weekend workout in with Jessie (one of the Guatemalan girls who lives at the Ficker compound). Third is an amazing shot of the sunset over the mountains in Canilla. And the last one is the whole group: Steve, Tammy, Justin, Matt, Heidi (and Isaac - a little hard to see just yet, but still there!)