It has been a quiet Sunday so far, but when you are on call 24/7 you never know what might come up. Here in Haiti Mardi Gras is a big holiday and it starts today. Our church always plans what they call "retreat" during this time. It is about four days of getting together of all the Mennonite churches in Haiti. It started yesterday. About 50 people from around here went. Most of them rode in one of the brothers'  "commio" ( farm truck with tall sides) truck. We might have thought one truck with that many people on it was way overcrowded but according to Haitian standards the truck wasn't even full. It could have held 100 people at least or maybe 150.... The drive in a commio took 13  hours. The last ways was really bad road so took 4 hours. I didn't go as everything would be spoken in creole but am waiting for a report from Sallie. She and another young girl who is also teaching school here went. They were the only whites on the commio.
   The clinic will be closed except for emergencies this Monday and Tuesday. Pretty much everything shuts down here for Mardi Gras. I was supposed to change a dressing on some burns a man has on his back, neck, and shoulder today but he never showed up. We had asked him to come at noon. He got the burns from falling asleep with a candle lit. I guess the candle then fell on him and he was burned pretty bad by the time he woke up. When he came to the clinic the first time the burn was three days old already and had nothing on it so the skin had dried and then cracked on his shoulder when he moved his arm. It really needed cleaning but was way too dry then. I tried putting some wet gauze on it to soften it up and a few minutes later when I checked the gauze it was almost completely dry and the skin hadn't softened much at all. I guess the burn had so much heat in it that it evaporated or absorbed the water. It would have been torture to try and clean it that day so we put a lot of burn cream on it and bandaged it up good and told him to come back the next day. He came and we got most. of it cleaned but not quite all so had put more cream and bandages on and he was supposed to return today. Some places I think it was at least 2nd degree burns. I just hope it doesn't get infected.
         Creole lessons have been rather interesting. It hasn't went quite like we planned because the other couple that is taking the class also have been here 8 months already and know quite a few more basic words than I do so instead of having two hours of class each day we have been going separately for  one hour each. The first day was very frustrating but since then has been better. It's definitely harder work than the clinic work is. Over the weekend it appears somebody threw a rock at the ambulance window so I guess we'll be driving with a shattered windshield for the time being. So far I haven't had to go down the mountain with a patient but I'm sure that is coming.
    Last night it rained off and on for a while and today has been the same. We love to see the water level in the cistern come up. None of us look forward to the day we have to haul water. We will probably have to haul some yet from the clinic before dry season is over but if it can be postponed one week we will be happy.
     Last week one of the patients came to us with the complaint of a large stomach and it felt like it was moving. This lady is a prophetess and is no longer with her husband. She has two children from that relationship. We do have an ultrasound machine here as it seemed highly likely to us that she was pregnant but she said no. We did an ultrasound and according to its measurements her baby is about 30 weeks. I'm still not sure if she believed us but I'm not sure what other evidence to give her. I guess when the baby is born that will be the best evidence. I just hope she doesn't take anything to abort the baby. These people seem to know just what medications and things to combine to make them have an abortion.
  Until next time...