Scary Times

Hello friends! Much has happened in the past couple of weeks, so once again, I will do my best to be clear.

The overall sentiment of the last three weeks or so has been one of sadness. I miss home, I miss friends, I was feeling lonely and lost...many questions of ¨What the hell am I doing in Ecuador? Why did I think this was a good idea?¨ Thoughts about leaving and going home were entertained in my head and I put little effort into being present in the community around me...

But that was before I remembered to breathe a little, to pray some more, and to trust in God, to trust in the present and to once again, stop living for the future.

So then, you may ask, Santi...what has happened lately? I will tell you then :-) At the beginning of the month we had a retreat on the beach, where I reflected, rest and swam in the ocean morning, day and night. I throughly enjoy the beach and hope to find myself near one often.

The bigger news began Thursday, November 15. We have 12 volunteers in our community here, living in two homes. On this particular night we decided to have a spirituality night together. It was really a great evening where we reflected on solitude versus loneliness, and we did an activity where we were blindfolded and told to think of a person from home we missed. We did so as we were across from another person who was also blindfolded thinking of someone they missed.

I was across the way from Patrick, who at the time was really missing his girlfriend. At one point, we were told to greet the person in front of us, who was the person we were thinking of (quite believible when you are blindfolded), as they were right there for real. Well my friends, that was the closest I have ever been to being kissed by a man. Haha. It didn´t happen, but he really missed his girlfriend. But! The really wild part, was at the end of the night, around 10:10pm we were all holding hands, the twelve us, praying together. We were near the end of it when Daniel started speaking...

As Daniel started to speak, the ground started to shake. The windows vibrated, lightly at first, and then it intensified. Drea was sitting next to me, and as we were holding hands, we looked at each other due to the ground shaking, and she squeezed my hand. We were both a little worried, especially when the shaking last more than five seconds. 12 seconds or so after the shaking started, it got stronger, and all of us realized, yes, we are experiencing an earthquake. As we got up to run out of the house, a mirror in the boys bathroom broke which just made the situation scarier. We went outside and the earthquake continued for a good 15 seconds more and it felt real weird and real cool. Thankfully nothing substantial happened. The story I just wrote makes it sound more dramatic than it was, but it was still something that instilled more respect in mother nature. It turns out the earthquakes epicenter was 150km south of us, a 6.7 earthquake on the border of Ecuador and Peru. But as I said, we and our neighbors were fine here, but it was the strongest many had ever felt.

That was last Thursday. This Thursday, I experienced the greatest fright of my life. To be sure though, everyone involved is fine and things are much better. But as you know, I work at an afterschool program called, Semillas de Mostaza. Well, the kids either have homework for an hour, or they do some sort of activity, after which they then have an hour of recess. One of the kids there is named Paul, but everyone calls him Raul or six, because he has a sixth finger on each hand. He is 12 and he is the man. Super strong, super skinny, super good at soccer and super loving towards his family and friends. He doesn´t go to school but takes lessons with a neighbor and is just a wonderful kid. We had our rough times in the beginning but now he is one of the people I am closest to here. I remember one day he was being made fun of by other kids and he was about to leave when I saw him crying. I asked him waht was wrong, and he told me he comes to Semillas happy and leaves sad, and I said, well we can´t have that happen, and we figured out what had happened and took care of it. From there, and other conversations, we have been very close.

So Thanksgiving, recess has just started. Many of the boys play soccer on the concrete field we have. Other kids, mostly girls but some boys too, play tag and sometimes cross through the soccer field. So Paul was playing, with other kids, going after a ball, when a kid who was playing tag didn´t see him and ran straight in to him. Brian, the kid running, collided heads with Paul. I didn´t see it happen because I was with Christina, another volunteer, talking to a girl about why she had broken a rule. That´s when kids came running up to me saying Paul was bleeding from the mouth.

I ran on the field, saw a lot of blood on the cement field and became very worried. Paul was being held up behind a wall by one of the Ecuadorian volunteers with blood dripping heavily out of his mouth. His eyelids were fluttering and he was looking down, very dazed and unresponsive. He was being held up by volunteers and I was super worried. So I ran to get water to clean the blood, but when I put it to his face, it was bleeding so heavily that it just completely diluted the water. This was all about 20 seconds of time, and I thought to myself, we need to get this kid out of here. I was legitmiately concerned that death was possible. I couldn´t see what was cut, all I know was that we was weak, unresponsive, bleeding, with his head hanging and his eyes fluttering.

The taxi circle is a good three minute walk from the school where we have the afterschool program and I didn´t think we had that much time to get out there. Thank God the director of the school where we have Semillas was there with his car. I picked up Paul in my arms and ran him to the car. Christina came with me and with my shirt and a rag I started to catch the blood out of Paul´s mouth. We drove to a hospital and a doctor, both of which were CLOSED! and the guard outside one didn´t know where another one was. Finally we found a doctor who was open, about 15 minutes after having left Semillas.

The entire time, I kept talking to him. I asked, are you tired, don´t go to sleep, look at me. I told him about how great he was and when I cracked my head open. I made fun of his ¨girlfriend¨ i asked him if it hurt, i assurred him i wouldn´t leave, i assurred him he would be ok. In my head, I prayed to God. I feared the worst, I questioned our response time, I made an effort not to say anything that would worry him like the fact that I thought his tounge was cut. I kissed his head and held him close, at first a little taken that his blood was on me, but then not caring. I came close to crying but thought, you have to be strong for him. He wasn´t even crying! This kid is amazing. But it was in these moments that I felt like a father, like this was my child. I felt a little like my mom must have when I got stiches after I cracked my head open. I was scarred.

We finally got to a doctor who was open, and I had Paul spit, but the blood had clotted in his mouth and it looked like a tongue so I said not to spit. We went in, and the doctor looked at him, made him spit and we saw it was just blood in his mouth and that his tongue was fine. We laid him down, they gave him anestisia and then three stiches. And I was so relieved. He held my hand as they stiched him and he felt better with the drugs. They gave him a prescription and he is on the medication now, and getting better despite heavy inflamation, but he will be fine. I was very shaken by the whole thing and am doing better now, having visited him a number of times in the past 3 days, and just grateful to God and relieved that he is fine. Wow.

The whole situation made me realize how important it is for me to answer this call I have had to take some sort of EMT course to know basic emergency medical information. It also made me recognize the importance of good roads and infrastructure that are necessary in emergency situations. I do not like to think about what would have happened had Paul not had a car at his disposal. And just the need for fair medical attention in all parts of the world. I don´t know...still more to think about.

Later that night I went to a sweet Thanksgiving dinner with many people and had a blast. Friday was nice, I played soccer for the first time in a while, and yesterday we had a wedding for our In-Country Director, Kevin, and had an amazing time. Partying and dancing till 3am. Good stuff. That is about it though...now I am happier and a little more present. Thinking about the good things around me and trying not to take too much forgranted. I am recognizing, for a number of reasons, my place in this world under God and the delicate thing that life is. I guess I am recognizing that at any moment it could all dissapear and so I must realize the gifts around me and life with love.

Thank you for reading friends. I hope to get new pics up soon, so stay tuned! Talk to you soon, Paz!