Friday night and the last day of clinics... I was up until almost midnight last night, so when the donkey alarm went off at 5am, I was seriously considering sleeping. It took me about 30 seconds to think about missing out on my last early morning star gazing...and up on the roof I went! A few others joined Steve and I, and the shooting stars were in rare form. I still had a few last minute things to get together this morning, for Dr. Avril and Mme. Bluette, so I hit the ground running after breakfast. Surprisingly, by the end of the morning, Mme Bluette and I finished all of our OB patients with time to spare. I finally had the opportunity to see some of the agriculture projects going on in town, and my first stop was the farm of Mme. Missou. She has a couple of plots of land that has been in her family for generations, and learned most of her farming techniques from her grandfather. By Haitian standards, her living area is meticulous, and she takes great pride in all the work that she does. She has plastic water jugs tied to the base of her papaya trees, with a small hole in the bottom, so she has drip irrigation during the dry season. She keeps her donkey (I finally met my alarm clock!) on a long rope, near her compost pile, so he gets the pick of the goodies and kindly contributes to the compost. Once again, I promise to post pictures! My one disappointment on this trip, is that I was so busy in the clinic that I was unable to see the lunch program that has been established at the school. Terre Blanche school serves lunch to about 1,000 children a day, Monday through Friday. The youngest children start eating at 10:30am and they serve until the last child has eaten, sometime between noon and 1pm. For some of these kids, it's the only meal they eat all day. I did manage to see the morning flag raising ceremony, at the school. Every morning, before classes begin, all of the children line up in the school yard (wearing their blue checked uniforms), a band plays, and the Haitian flag is raised. Then they march, single file, into their classrooms. Yes, yes...I have pictures! :)
Finally, after a week of late night homework and early morning preparations, I realized that there is nothing more I can do at this point. I'm out of time. It was actually a great relief and the day went smoothly. We saw patients until around 4pm, and suddenly there were no more patients. We had actually seen them all! It was mind boggling to think of the number of patients sleeping in the classrooms at the beginning of the week. Many of the Haitian staff live in towns outside of Terre Blanche, so they live at the clinic during the week and leave Friday afternoon to return to their families. Needless to say, there was much hugging and kissing goodbye between the Haitian staff and the American teams. This evening, after dinner, we joined Pastor Delamy and a group of the towns people in the courtyard for singing, speeches, and a final chance to say goodbye. Tomorrow, we are up early, and will go down to the clinic to inventory all of the clinical supplies. Once that is done, we will load up our gear and drive halfway to Port au Prince to stay overnight at one of the coastal resorts for an afternoon on the beach and an overnight stay. Sunday morning we will all go to the airport together and leave on 2 separate flights. I feel exhausted, and drained, and I woke up with a cold (I could've gotten something cool, like a parasite or chicagunya, but I went all the way to Haiti to catch the common cold), and I feel so peaceful, and happy, and grateful for the opportunity to go on this trip. Especially grateful to those of you who helped me fund raise, so I could make this happen! And I can't wait to come back her. :) I do not know when I will next have access to wifi, so I may not post again until I'm in NY on Sunday night. My closing Caribbean moment story... This morning, on the roof, we were all talking and laughing about what we will miss about Haiti when we are back in the streets. I decided, and announced, that when I get home I will try to find a Donkey bray ring tone, so I can wake up every morning to a Donkey alarm and wake up smiling! We all agreed that we may need a recording of roosters crowing, donkeys braying, dogs fighting, and people singing, just to get to sleep at night. :) Have a wonderful weekend, in case you don't hear from me, and Bon Nuit! Ox