Christina Bennett Blog 2 3/14

Today was such an amazing day.  We drove over an hour or longer to Las Minas, a small mountainous community west of Chitré.  We started our day with visiting the Centro de Salud de Las Minas, a social security facility.  The building was sparse, to say the least, but nursing staff seems to be able to provide adequate, thorough care to the community.  We were all astounded by the low cost of dental work!  No service, including root canals, was more than $20.

We then drove through a very remote, isolated mountain terrain to reach a two-room schoolhouse government-funded school house at the top of a mountain.  The panoramic view from the school was incredible.  We learned that they did not have electricity or running water.  Three dilapidated outhouses served as restroom facilities.  There were two teachers and approximately 35 children, ranging in ages from 5 to 14 years old. The kids, nor the teachers, knew we were coming that day.  Apparently, the school had not had any visitors from outside of the Las Minas community in four years!  The children have to walk to school, many walking over an hour to reach the school.  Most of the family homes in the area are also without running water or electricity, so these children do not have water to carry with them on hot days when they walk.  They also lacked proper footwear.  Many wore sandals or flip flops which are not conducive to walking on the rocking, dry, climbing road.

We held a Feria de Salud (Health Fair) for the kids.  We had five stations: dental care, hygiene (hand washing, coughing in your sleeve, etc.), nutrition, human values, and healthy choices.  The children were given a Pasaporte de Salud (Health Passport) at the beginning of the activities, and upon completion of the activity, they were given a “stamp” (sticker) and were allowed to move to the next one.  The kids won prizes and were given toys and hygiene items that were donated to us (THANK YOU ALL WHO DONATED AND COLLECTED ITEMS FOR OUR TRIP!!!).

My group, which consisted of Ping, Sujin, and Scott focused on dental hygiene.  We started off with asking the kids how many times a day they should brush their teeth.  Much to our surprise, all of them responded with three times per day: after breakfast, lunch, and dinner.  We then did a skit where I played the mom, Scott was my stubborn son, and Ping was a pretty girl.  We taught them a song on how to brush my teeth and demonstrated with them using donated toothbrushes.  We also taught them how to floss.  We played a game where all the kids stood in a line and had to jump to the “healthy” food side or the “bad” food side when we showed them a picture of food.  We talked about how many teeth they will have at 12 years and 18 years old and then counted their teeth.  Many of the children had missing or rotten teeth from lack of care.  Most of the families in the area do not have running water in their homes, so even with the knowledge that they are supposed to brush three times a day and with the new information we gave them on how to brush and floss, it is likely that these children would not be able apply it in their homes.  Very sad.

We hope to hold a shoe drive and possibly do some fundraising to get a water well built for the school.  Hopefully, we can make an impact on the quality of life of these kids!