It's Sunday today, and Heather and I are relaxing, sleeping in, playing in the snow, and of course, I was playing with the dogs. I also did some laundry, I'm getting pretty good at cleaning my clothes in the sink:) It's warmed up a bit here and the sun is out, making it a really beautiful day to be hanging out outside.
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| My roomie Heather and her snowman:) Alex our waiter helped with the hat and nose! |
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A little like freeze drying...
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Yesterday, we took a stroll into Barlad after we said goodbye to Steve and Kellie, the two weekers. We took the microbus with the locals, took a stroll in the local art gallery, and shopped a little at the open market. I wish I could have taken some pictures but my fingers were frozen...according to Heather, who is from Minnesota, it felt like it was below 20 degrees because of the wind chill. Brrrr...Heather made friends with some students and they totally helped me out in purchasing 2 kg of oranges at the open market. Speaking of students, we had the opportunity to visit a high school class for a little Q and A last week. It was so much fun and the school was absolutely gorgeous!! We talked about things like what we did and where exactly we were from, music, and living costs in the states. I was impressed with how polite they are and with their language skills. They spoke English very well and a few of them even busted out some Japanese!!!!
Heather and I also went for a short visit to the clinic yesterday, delivering our oranges and yogurts from our breakfast, as usual. There were only 2 aides there with 1 nurse and all the kids were napping, except for a very lively Alina and Raul. Alina and I reviewed our counting skills in Romanian, while I performed my best singing and dancing routines for Raul. I felt so badly when he reached out to me and not only did I notice that he didn't have any fingernails, but that I couldn't pick him up and play with him. It is so different on the weekends and now, without the 3 other volunteers, it was really different as to how I could distribute my time and attention. Sadly, a lot of the younger toddlers had to stay in their cribs while the babies and the older toddlers were attended to by Heather and I. It has also been hard as the babies continue to be in isolation and are unable to leave their rooms. Going to have to figure out a better way for Monday...good thing we had our mega-dance party on Friday with the youngsters :) And, it's a good thing I took advantage of having Steve and Kellie last week to take some more pics around the clinic.
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| Finally a full shot of Petre! |
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| Alex and I after our leisurely stroll. |
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| Marius! He was playing his little game of cough until the volunteer starts panicking, then laugh your head off!! |
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| Crisi Daniel. Check out those beautiful lashes and beautiful skin! |
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| Paula!! Time to get out and explore again!! |
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| Love this girl and how she lets us know what she wants, rarely takes a crib already occupied, and waits for my hands to become free before taking it to guide me on one of her adventures. |
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| Nico, right before she started blowing major raspberries and cracking herself up. |
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| Lea Celine, aka Ana's Mama. She is so good to her and oh so protective of her. |
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| I love this pic, Marius is so handsome! |
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| Alex, I feel like she is such a deep, old soul. I would love to know what she is thinking. She's probably like those silly, silly, big people!! |
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Andrea! This pic says it all. She has no fear and is so smart!! She figured out that Celine gets out for visits to the baby saying "Ana, Ana.." so guess what? This little one started it saying "Ana, Ana..." to escape!!!
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Thanks to all of you following my blog!! It has been so encouraging to hear from you and I really appreciate all of your comments!! Please let me know if there is anything else or anyone you want to know about and I will do my best to find out and post pics during this last week of mine.
Two questions :)
ReplyDelete1) Do they not allow you to hold Raul?
2) Is Alina talking more now? What can she say?
Hi Caroline! I believe we were told not to hold or touch Raul and that we had to go in with masks on the first day, but I will double check tomorrow. The other issue is I didn't see any isolation gowns in there and I felt like I would be transmitting all these germs from my clothes if I were to hold him. It's really sad but I didn't want to make things worse for him. The wounds on his hands were not open, but very red with some skin sloughing off that I did not want to risk touching his hands either, but like I said, I'll double check and let you know.
ReplyDeleteAs far as Alina talking, I have only heard her repeat words like "unu", "woo-hoo", "hello", imitate some melodies of songs and make monkey sounds. I'll work on it some more this week!!
Great, thanks! I definitely understand not wanting to pass him germs/bacteria, but I was just wondering if they had actually said that you weren't allowed to hold him. You're right, they don't have gowns, the best you can do is gloves and a mask.
ReplyDeleteThe only words I'd heard Alina say before were "woo-hoo" and "mama", so she's definitely got a couple new words!
yay! I can finally "publically" follow your blog. :) Feels like you've been gone forever! But I know the time is passing by quickly for you. What can I say, you're missed when you're not here and you'll be missed when you leave there. we should clone you! Love all the pics of the kids. Wish you had octopus arms so you could hold them all at once!
ReplyDeleteyoko, i wrote out a long long comment and then it got lost when i tried to post it and couldn't remember my gmail password (so i'm using danny's instead). in a nutshell, love love the photos of all the precious souls and love your blogs. i'm so excited that you're blogging, a way for me to live life vicariously through you. love you miss you sooo much!
ReplyDeleteHi Yoko -- I figured out how to find your blog!
ReplyDeleteThere's an art gallery in Barlad?!?
As for Raul, we were allowed to hold him in January, but were instructed to wash our hands first. Sort of.