The LDS charties pediatric day nurses (minus Kristen who had the day off). We are required to be in uniform at all times while away from our berthing areas just like the Navy and other military people. Our baby blue shirts (which you can't see the color by this photo) make us very easy to spot. I was walking down beach street in Dili toward the embassy to drop off a few items for the Crawfords and all of suddent someone is honking at us. Kelly Crawford was driving by and remarked that it is so easy to spot us in our shirts. We ended up getting a ride down the street and able to get out of the humid Dili air.
A few of these photos were taken on Monday when I visited a community health site that USAID is assisting with.
I took this photo thursday at sunset while on Liberty. Katie, MaryAnn and I spent the day with Kelly Crawford seeing some of the sites in Dili--Dili Rock, an Uma Luma (sp?), and hiking the Jesus statue. Sammy, Kelly's 4 year old, joined Mary Ann and I in our hike to the top...he got a pleasant ride on my back and I got an extra good work out while climbing 250 of the 500 plus stairs to the top with him on my back. This photo was taken right after that. The clouds have come in, but I think the only rain we got while in timor Leste was Monday afternoon and it didn't last very long.
This is an after photo of one of the kids who received a cleft lip repair while on the ship. I posted a before photo a few days ago. You canlook and compare the difference. He had a cleft lip and palate repair with dental restoration and tubes placed in his ear. Wow--quite a lot for one little guy to deal with AND for his father to assist with care post surgery. He had one of the worst cleft lips/palate that I saw while here in Timor Leste. He is still pretty young and was such an energetic little guy. He didn't seem ashamed or aware of his deformity prior to surgery as he interacted with all the other children. I can't help but think what a blessing this surgery will be for him. Operation Smile was also doing surgeries on the ship and had some of their pre-op patients in our unit. There were a number of adults who were on board to repair thier lips. Cleft lips/palates seem to be more common in South east Asia than in other parts of the world, according to one of the doctors I spoke with, though they are unable to determine the reason.
Another photo from the USAID trip to a community center. The average age in Timor Leste is under 20 years of age. As I have written in a previous blog, this is because so many were killed during their fight for independence a little over 10 years ago. We didn't see people in the older generation very often and I loved seeing these 3 little ladies. I'm not sure if they were there seeking health education or if this is the place to hang out and get a little shade for the day. Seemed like most of the town had shown up for the event.
Me playing in the pediatrics unit. As a side note--as you can see, the garbages are all labeled. We are required to separate food, paper, plastic, and metal garbage into different bags. The capcity of these bags is obviously huge.
If the baby can cry, why can't I? Gotta love that hat
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