Friday, July 17, 2009

Guatemala

Last week I went to Guatemala! It was so much fun I LOVED it! It was so beautiful and there were so many amazing things to see! We took a bus into Guatemala City and went by the temple which was really cool. We didn't go in but I wish we could have, that would have been a really awesome experience. After that we went to Antigua! Antigua is such a cool city that has a lot of history. It was so cool to see the cathedrals and of course go shopping because they have all the handmade crafts there. The food there was also wonderful! I hadn't had food that good since I left the States! On Sunday night four of us took an overnight bus to Tikal! I am so happy that we did this because it was so amazing to see the ruins and temples that are thousands of years old! It was also really cool to think that this could have been one of the places talked about in the Book of Mormon! Here are some pictures!

Here is all of us at the temple. The order is Cole, Allen, me, Tawnee, Crystal and Taylor:
We are at dinner at the best place ever! The food was sooo good!


This is in the market after a few hours of shopping.

The Cathedral

This is one of the Cathedrals we went in (this one is more like a ruin)

In the monastery right next to the Cathedral





Here are all the temples we saw in Tikal







This is the town we stopped in and to get to and from Tikal, Flores



Guatemala was an amaizing trip and I would love to go back and experience more of the culture and country!

Wednesday, July 1, 2009

USNS Comfort

This last week our team went and volunteered with a ship full of military doctors. The ship has been going to different countries since April and giving the people free medical care. The LDS church donated a lot of money and has been involved every stop they’ve made by helping supply translators for the doctors. Since most of my team is fluent in Spanish they called us and asked if we could go and help! I of course can’t speak Spanish so I had a different job every day.

We started out in a city called La Union which was where the boat was. The first day I filled out paperwork for each patient that came in. This was interesting because I had to still had to speak a little Spanish so I could fill in all the correct information. Luckily I had Alisha, another girl with HELP, to get me through.

The second day I worked in optometry which was really fun! I didn’t do much, just made sure all the people knew where to wait and where to go. The doctors were really nice which made the day awesome; one even took the time to explain to us what was going on with different people’s eyes!

The third day I worked in the pharmacy. I liked this because I stayed really busy and I was able to practice my Spanish. I had to tell the patients what I was giving them and how often to take the meds. Good thing for me it was written on the bag so really I just had to read it to them. The hardest part was calling the names out when their prescriptions were ready. Some people didn’t even realize I had said their name until the fifth time I said it! Oh well, it was good practice!

The forth day was probably the best one; we went to a new town called Pasaquina. I really liked this place because it was set up differently so everything was closer together. Because of this I was able to talk to a lot of new people and get to know who the people were I was working with. I also met a really cute doctor named Andy which defiantly made the day more exciting; to bad I didn’t meet him till the last day I was there. Anyway, that day I helped people in the lines for internal medicine and then observed a doctor talk with his patients.
doctor Andy!

Overall this was a really good experience. I was really nervous going into it because I don’t know Spanish and I thought I wasn’t going to be any help. By the end I really didn’t want to leave (and not just because of the cute doctor J ). This trip made me realize even more that I want to be able to help people like this in the future and that I need to go to nursing school.

Random pictures:

have you ever seen a burger king in a trailer?

the view from the hotel the soldiers were staying in... ours was for sure not that good.


the ocean

Scary... young boys with huge guns
there were fireworks one night and I love this picture