WEDNESDAY

sorry we forgot to put this picture up yesterday. . .
Ally has been such a great helper with all the kids waiting

Wednesday went very well. We split up into two groups a small group consisting of Richard, Kayla, Norm, and Dr. and Mrs. O'Halloran went to Claret 1 to put on a small clinic. The rest of the group went to Santa Madre de Jesus to keep on going with the big clinic as they played futbol with the locals and dealt with a power outage. Right now the kids are playing cards and getting ready for a awesome dinner once again. Well everyone is safe, and no one is seriously sick. Having fun and living life! Kayla saysss HIIIII MOMMMM!!!!

Monday and Tuesday

Dr. Novak Jr. and Tom

Pat - sterilizing (all day)

Dr. Novak and Richard

Sister Jeanne and Mark - cleaning away

Kayla and her new friends

Denise drawing with our clinic mascot (Marisela)

Carol, Conor, and Shenny our Guatemalan clinic assistant

Brenna with Marisela

Dr. Zelko and Amy 

Monday and Tuesday went very well.  Sorry we forgot to write yesterday but we were just too busy.  We had over 100 patients on Monday and over 150 today.  Everyone is feeling well and working hard.  Hopefully these pictures will speak for themselves. That's it for today. Keep praying for us!

The Rest of Our Group Arrived Safely

The Whole Group - in front of the dental clinic in Santa Maria de Jesus

The Novak's and Zelko's both arrived safely yesterday. Today we had a relaxing morning, followed by an afternoon of preparation for the upcoming dental clinics. We are all anxious and eager to begin the week!

Ali, Kayla and Sr. Jean

Ali, Kayla and Sister Jean all arrived to our hotel in Antigua today at around 11pm.

Safe In Antigua

We made it to Antigua around noon today after the 3 hour drive from Zacapa. We are all set in the hotel here and spent the afternoon shopping in the markets here. Were going out to dinner tonight with everyone for some good food which is exciting. Tomorrow morning we are going on a hike up a volcano (don't worry, not dangerous) at like 6am. Everyone is in good health. I will try to write again tomorrow night.


Britt

Leaving for Antigua

We are leaving for Antigua this morning (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antigua_Guatemala). We will be there for the rest of today (Friday) and all of tomorrow (Saturday). We won't have internet access there.

The clinic team at Rio Dulce saw 427 people yesterday.
The final count for the construction team (in three days); 5 large picnic tables, 5 small picnic tables, 15 bookshelves (4ft tall, 2ft wide), a set of 24 cubbies, 2 sets of bunk beds, a nice kitchen table, a baby changing station, and a small table.

Britt

More work

Today we continued our projects. More construction, clinic, and nutrition center. Instead of writing, I'm going to post a bunch of pictures (the internet is working a little better). The most important stat from today was 225, the number of people that we treated at our clinic today. I also added a picture to the previous post.

Marshfield (plus some) group shot.

Katie with a kid at the nutrition center

Megan and Katie painting at El Arco (a daycare)

Constructing a little picnic table

A set of cubbies for the daycare that we built

Jenna and Katie painting

Abby doing art projects with the kids

Shannon with a girl at the daycare

Taylor with all of her buddies at the daycare

Conor taking on three kids

Nicki and Edna at the clinic

The line at the garbage dump. If you click on the picture to see it full screen you can see the garbage in the background.

Day 3

First off, don't be alarmed if you don't hear from us for a couple days. The internet at the hotel is very unreliable. It works a little sometimes, and sometimes it doesn't work at all. It is never good.



Yesterday we visited the garbage dump. There is a community of people who live at the dump, and we brought 8 large duffels of shoes to hand out. The kids play soccer on broken glass, so they especially appreciate the shoes. We also visited a daycare run by a local woman, and a nutrition center. At the nutrition center we saw two and three year olds who were the size of infants. One boy who was 14 came to the nutrition center weighing only 27 pounds, and they are now proud to have him back up to 43 pounds. After that we visited another nutrition clinic, the one that we helped build on last years trip (see slideshow on earlier post). It is almost completely finished now.

Megan with a boy at the daycare and his new backpack (click for full size)

Today we started our projects for the week. Some of us went to "El Arco" a school up in the mountains, to build small picnic tables and other tables for the kids. Others organized donated medicines to be given out later in the week. Another group went back to the nutrition center to help take care of the kids and play with them.I'll try to keep updating during the week, but like I said don't be alarmed if I don't.



Britt

Here safe

We arrived safely to Hotel Atlantico today at about 3:45 local time (4:45 Wisconsin time, we are in the same time zone, but Guatemala doesn't observe daylight savings). The internet is a little slow right now so I'm not going to push my luck and try to upload pictures right now.

After getting in to Guatemala City, we took a 3+ hour bus ride out to Zacapa. The bus ride was hot (it's over 70 right now) so we all went swimming after we got here. The only other plans for tonight are dinner at the hotel and then going to bed early to catch up on sleep.

I may try to post some pictures tonight if the internet improves. If not, I'll post tomorrow.

Britt

Upload test

Gratuitous puppy picture to test picture uploading

2007 Trip Pictures

Pictures from summer 2007 trip. You can also view them full screen.

Also, if you were on this trip and have some good pictures (especially medical stuff), email them to me and I'll add them: britt.j.ohalloran@gmail.com

Guatemala

Welcome

This website will be used primarily when the group is in Guatemala to communicate back to family and friends. There may also be updates available on this site prior to the actual trip