Back from the Dominican Republic

Hello again! I got back last Wednesday from 2 1/2 weeks in the Dominican Republic. Such an amazing experience! Although I wasn't looking forward to going, I'm so glad that I went. It was a great time to get to know my fellow Gatewayers and be blessed by the people
of the DR; even though I was supposed to to ministering to them. Our main project while there was to help construct a foundation for the expansion of a Christian school's cafeteria; but we nurses were also able to provide some nursing care to some of the locals. I was able to get to know some of the lovely Villa Ascencion villagers, and was invited, along with three others from our team, to eat lunch with one of the families on a couple occasions. It was really neat to eat in their home with them, they are SO hospitable, and welcoming. I had lots of interesting, challenging, funny, and unusual experiences, I don't even know where to start. So, instead, I'll just put some photos on here, they'll be much more interesting than my ramblings anyway.











Shovelling cement -
works lots of muscles
I forgot I had!












Stefan - our fearless leader!


















Praying over
the new foundation













Playing with a child in Aguas Negros (Black Waters)














Football (soccer) game -
we lost, 0-6.








The cheering section
for the football game.













Nursing: third-world style










One of the nursing stories is about an intriguing lady named Louisa. Louisa has an infected toe that she has been treating with home remedies for a while. Some of the nurses in our team found out about her and were able to start treating it. I was able to go along on one of the occasions, and was elected to do the actual dressing change, because Louisa was known to swat at whomever was cleaning her toe. So along we went with a whole entourage of care providers. While I was holding the lady's hand with one hand (she had some scary-long nails), did the dressing change and wound cleansing with the other, one of the guys in our group was playing the harmonica - for distraction; another was giving her a shoulder massage - also ready to grab swinging fists; one nurse providing PR - taking pictures and translating; another nurse was squeezing the saline bag to rinse the wound; a third nurse was providing the necessary supplies and helping with 'sterile' field; and finally, the grandson, who was watching all the going-ons and laughing about our unique techniques. In the end, the wound was cleansed thoroughly, the dressing changed, and a wonderful time was had getting to know Louisa. I don't know if our efforts had much effect on the wound on her toe, but I hope that Louisa was able to see a little glimpse of God's love for her through our being there and spending time with her.
Thank you all for your support in this chapter of my life.

- Snuggs

Heading to the DR

It's been an exciting couple weeks since I last posted on here. Classes are going wonderfully, but sitting so long in one spot makes me so sleepy! We will be leaving for the Domnican Republic (DR) early, early Sunday morning - 3am. While we are there, the plan is to get to know some of the locals and work on building relationships with them. Also we will be helping to pour/build a foundation for an extension to a school. Wel will also be going into some of the classes and performing biblical skits, playing games, and generally interacting with the children.
This week we have been taking the Basic Safety Training (BST) course; which involves practicing being a firefighter, and also a water safety pratical. We did the firefighting today, and it was fantastic!! At one point we got timed on how fast we could get the equipment on. I got the breathing apparatus and mask on in 35 secs, and the fallout gear on in 50 secs - we had up to 3 min total to get the stuff on. One of the exercises was to pull 'Buck' (a 165lb dummy) out of harms way; I had teamed up with Alex, and fortunately he was able to pull Buck, becasue I had a hard time getting a good grip on him. We also got to use a fire hose and put out two different fires, whis was so exhilarating! I'm ready to go back and do it again.
Tomorrow we will do our water safety practical in an indoor swimming pool. I think it will be fun too, but I'm just a bit worried about the 'floating/treading water' part. Part of the exercise will be to don emersion suits, and flip over a life raft; that's gonna be great!
Last Saturday, most of our group took a trip to the local zoo. It is really nice, and has a great variety of animals. One of the girraffes liked my hand - they have extremely slimey tongues that feel nasty! But it was pretty cool anyway. Well, gotta go to the DR preparation meeting, so I'll try and add more later.

Infiltrating Gateway.....

Been here almost two weeks now, and things are going wonderfully! There is this lovely pear tree here on the property, and I've become very well acquainted with it; a little too well today when I scraped my knee while almost falling out of it. The food here is wonderful, but I think they are seriously over estimating the amount of calories we burn while sitting in class.
This week I have been learning more about spiritual warfare and having a real relationship with God. It sure is eye-opening. We are all grouped in groups of five at each table during class, but my table is probably the craziest. Next week the table assignments will be switched around, so I'll get a whole new group of people to harrass; can't wait!
There is a lovely swimming pool here, I've gotten in it twice, and froze both times. I'll be putting in a petition for a jaccuzzi. At the end of the first week (IMS) several of us got together and played some basketball. Very rousing game indeed, I tripped over the ball, got sat on, and was head-butted in the nose; I can now be located lounging on the local couch.
Went on a tour of the various offices and buildings here on the MS campus. There is a small working farm here, but I have discovered after many inquisitions that there are no milkable cows or goats. Which is a real bummer, 'cause I was really wanting to learn to milk one. But, we are going to the Dominican Republic in a few weeks, and there is a picture of a cow on the hand-drawn map of where we will be, so maybe I can learn there. Hope springs eternal! Although I was terrible despondent about the lack of milkable creatures, they do have some lovely chickens here and I got to gather some eggs. It was really fun, and the eggs were still warm from the chicken when I got then. They were also slightly sticky feeling, but I'm not going to dwell on why that might be.
Well, time to sign off for now 'cause our presence is required at a BBQ (which unfortunitely will not involve NC BBQ); but should be fun anyway!

Roaming the Southeast

Howdy all y'all from Texas! I have decided to try my hand at blogging, so we shall see how this goes. I arrived at the IOC (International Operations Center) for Mercy Ships, located in Garden Valley, TX, Monday. As some of y'all already know, I was able to meet up with three other fine young ladies that I had met on the ship earlier this year. We had a very relaxing, exciting and fun journey through some of the southeastern states.

A brief synopsis of our trip goes like this: leave from my home town of Clinton, NC, stop to check out some cotton in the field; stop by the South of the Border and go up in Pedro's sombrero; stop by a bowling alley in goergia to meet Alainie's friend and get the key to the friend's parent's house where we would stay that night; get up the next morning (Saturday) and go to the local Waffle House; stop in Montgomery, AL to tour the church where Martin Luther King, Jr was pastor, and the Rosa Parks Museum; stop in Biloxi, MS and camp in an RV park that ended up being about 100 yds from some railroad tracks (we now know that four trains come through each night); continue to New Orleans, LA, and go to the French Quarter where we get caught in a torrential downpour; then drive up towards Alexandria, LA and try to find the Kisatchie National Forrest, drive around for an hour without success, so we take an exit that said 'camping at Lake Cotile', which, it turns out, was in the Kisatchie National forest; get up Monday morning and finish driving to the IOC.

Well, that's all folks! (for now)
I'll try and get some pics up soon.