Happy Thanksgiving! (and more typical updates.)

The weeks are going by quickly and although the mornings and evenings are pleasantly cool (at least relative to when I arrived in August,) it certainly does not feel like late November to me.

My groups with the kindgerten children are going fairly well.  The children really like the puppet I am using.  It is a turtle puppet, which I have decided to call "Ti Toti," which means "little turtle."  Now when some of the young children see me walking around the tents which is their school, they will ask for Ti Toti, I respond, "Ti Toti ap donmi", which means he is sleeping.  It is quite fun to work with the young children.  I began play therapy with a second child as well this past week.  My hope is that the workers at Kay St. Anne will do activities with the children after school even if I am not there.  This will enable me to start working some afternoons with groups of the children ages six and over, who live in the orphanage at St. Louie, which is on the same site as the school. 

All volunteers have been asked if possible to try to give some time at the Cholera tents to help out and be a supportive presence to the people, at least temporarily until administrative workers are hired.  I went over there yesterday for the first time.  There were a couple of large tents for children and a couple of large tents containing adults.  It seems over the past few days people have arrived soon enough after symptoms began that they could be re-hydrated quickly.  Yesterday during morning liturgy Farther Rick announced that nobody had died at our cholera tents for a few days.  While I was there for a few hours yesterday, I helped with copying some of the paper work for record keeping purposes and worked with another volunteer to mix water and re-hydration salts to form a serum that patients drink.  The tents seemed better organized than I expected and many established protocols are in place to prevent the spread of the illness, such as  soft mattresses soaked in bleach water people must walk on when leaving to kill any cholera germs that may have attached to one's shoes.  it seems that such prevention startegies are successful, as even those working directly with patients everyday for many hours are not catching the illness.  On one hand it seems under control at the moment, as there seem to be 40-50 patients there at a time, but there are several empty tents because some are predicting that it could get worse before it gets better.  The fears are around the crowded tent communities that lack sanitation.  I think I was a little nervous about going over there, mostly fearing that it would be chaotic and somehow overwhelming.  This was not the case at all.  As I sat helping with record keeping in the depo tent, I could actually hear singing coming from a tent of Cholera patients.  

While this coming Thursday is not a holiday in Haiti, I do believe that my being here has increased my thankfulness as my gratitude for what I have grows especially for what I have often taken for granted, but realize so many don't have.  I am also thankful for my family, friends, community, and all who are supportive of me in many ways especially at this time.  I say thank you to you, anyone interested enough to read this.    

Happy Thanksgiving!