Hello all.

It’s been a relaxing weekend here on the Ranch. Following a pretty intense week, this tranquillo weekend was just what I needed. One of our HIV children was admitted to the hospital last Thursday. I spent a good thirteen hours at Hospital Escuela (public hospital in Teguc) with him that day, going to various consults, and then waiting hours in the ER with him, just waiting for a bed to open up for him upstairs. Finally, at 6:00pm, they took us up. We didn’t get out of the hospital that night until 6:40, and the last bus we can catch to get back to our home passes around 7pm. Unfortunately, we didn’t get to the point to catch that bus until 7:20, so obviously we missed our chance for the bus. Thanks to a friendly ambulance driver who happened to pass us on the side of the road, we ended up hitchhiking back home in the back of an ambulance – lights on and everything. It was fantastic. Friday morning, bright and early, I was back at it again – went back to the hospital to take care of the kid during the day. (At the hospitals here, they don’t allow family members to stay overnight with the children. Everybody is kicked out, and then required to come back early in the morning.)

As much as I don’t enjoy being in the public hospitals in the city, it is good to be able to go every once in a while. It really brings me back to the reality of where I am. Sometimes while I’m on the Ranch, so isolated from the real Honduran life, I often forget about the life that the majority of the people in this country live.

Friday night, all of the volunteers were going out for dinner and dancing in Teguc, as a welcoming party for the new group of volunteers that came just two weeks ago. Earlier in the week I was really looking forward to going out, however, when the time came, I was just too wiped to even think of going out. I ended up coming back to the Ranch, and fell asleep by 8:00. Lame. In bed by 8:00 on a Friday night…

One of my jobs while I’m back is to help get the support groups we started last year for our HIV positive children up and running again. Since I left in March, a couple of the groups haven’t been meeting on a regular basis. A couple weeks ago we started meeting with our oldest group, and are working on developing their program a little more. The young adults that partake in the group have shown a lot of interest in getting it going again, and a lot of motivation for taking more responsibility for the groups. This is a huge success for us, since a couple of them have been our most difficult children over the years, in terms of getting them to take their meds, and in terms of their overall behavior. Some of them had been pretty closed off before we started the groups, but we’ve seen huge changes in their attitudes lately. It means the world to me to see these kids opening up like they are. I miss working so closely with them like you can’t believe. These kids have really become the motivation for the work I do.

In just a short two weeks, I’ll be taking off for vacation with a good friend, Tara, the current volunteer nurse in the clinic. We’ll be traveling to Cayos Cochinos, a group of little Garifuna islands on the northern coast. I’ve never been more excited for such a badly needed vacation before in my life!! I’ll make sure to post some photos upon our return!