A word from Matti and Aubrey:
Due to continual technical difficulties, the blog is still a wee bit behind, but we’ll get there… eventually. Today and tomorrow are very special blogs, because they are coming from two very awesome people. The viewpoints of these two people, are also very different, because their days consisted of immensely diverse activities. Matti, along with the Dream Team, had a great experience in a sugarcane village, while Aubrey went to prison. Literally. Ok, maybe not LITERALLY, but she was definitely there. So below are their accounts of their differing days.
An account of Matti’s journey to the sugarcane village.
If you know me at all then it is no surprise that I am posting a picture with this blog post. The picture is of the sunrise this morning. It was a great way to start off what would end up being an amazing day. I am not a morning person (AT ALL!) but it was so worth getting up early for. The quietness of the morning, the stillness of the ocean, and the gracefulness of the fishermen was something I won’t soon forget. I am constantly amazed at the beauty of God’s creation. It is a reflection of His glory. After the sunrise and breakfast the team headed for a grocery store, Jumbo, were we racked up a bill of $6,000+. Oh, that’s in pesos. The food we bought would be distributed later that day. From Jumbo we took a long and bumpy journey to a sugarcane village. At the village we were able to gather a bunch of kids at the church. We played games with the kids, and then sang a few songs with them. After this, Miles shared his testimony with the help of Kiko, our driver and SCORE employee. Kiko then gave his testimony. The children and the adults who had also come to the church responded positively to these testimonies. After testimonies we gave out the bags of food that we bought at Jumbo to various adults who had come to the church. Each team member got the opportunity to give a bag to a person and then pray for them. The people were so grateful for the food and the prayers. Their smiles alone showed their appreciation. It is incredible what the simple act of giving a small bag of food can do for the recipient as well as the giver. It really proved to me that it is indeed better to give then to receive. After the distribution of the food, we played with the children again. They were so energetic and excited that we were there with them. Perhaps too energetic because one girl either sprained or broke her arm playing. She needed to go to the hospital so we boarded the bus and headed back down the long and bumpy road to the city. The girl was put in a sling made out of cardboard and string before we left. Seeing this and the distance to the hospital really makes me appreciate the medical care we have in the states. It is actually a good thing that this girl hurt her arm when we were there instead of at another time; otherwise who knows how soon she would have gotten to the hospital. We returned to score and got to watch the sunset over the ocean. Seeing a sunrise and sunset in the same day makes any day a good day for me; but then when you throw in the ministry that we were able to do in the village it becomes an absolutely fantastic day.
The tale of Aubrey’s trek into Prison:
Compared to the rest of the team, I (Aubrey) am on a very different mission’s trip, which has truly been a gift from God. While here in the Dominican, I met up with a group that was here for Medical missions, and they let me tag along for their week of clinical work! Monday we set up camp in a tiny little school room, where we were elbow to elbow with the team working next to us, and opened up the clinic to the public. I was working triage the whole day, so I took vitals and names and general information from the people coming in, and then passed them along to little stations. The doctors and nurses that participated in the trip have been absolutely fantastic, and Monday went so smoothly.
If we thought we were rubbing shoulders with our medical team members yesterday, we were definitely sitting in each-others laps today. Today, as was inferred by our opening paragraph, I went to prison, but as a part of the Medical team. We were treating inmates in a local prison about an hour and a half from SCORE, and they had us all stuffed like sardines into a room off the main courtyard. Today has been, in short, sobering. The male prison was originally built for 400 people to occupy it, and the day that we visited it was housing 1,312. Women were not allowed into the prison itself for safety reasons, but the men that were given a tour came out much quieter, and couldn’t quite put into words the conditions. Men were piled on top of men, and there wasn’t a space on the floor that wasn’t taken. Cells that were built for 2 had 20 men stuffed inside, and the stench and heat were overpowering. At first I was slightly worried about treating these men, and had visions of ten tattoo covered warlords with bulging muscles cramming into the cracker-jack sized room with me and the other caregivers. After the first several trickled in, all HIV positive, my fears were quelled. These men were absolutely broken. At one time they might have been feared, but their weakened bodies-most of them dealing with fungus or parasites of some kind- weren’t threatening at all. Men from all different nationalities were crammed in there, one group spoke to two Scottish men who had their court date Wednesday to see if they could get out of their ten year sentence early for good behavior after already serving five of them. These same men were ones that the year before had accepted Christ from the same medical team, with many of the same nurses present. This prison opportunity was amazing because the men were so reticent to hear something encouraging. As one of the translators said “these are men who have no hope.” What a powerful opportunity we had to share the gospel and the love of Christ!
On an exciting note for me, I gave my first injections here. So if any of you need a shot in your tush to ward off infection, I now know how to do that.
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