The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly- from Becky

The past few days have been a bit of a roller coaster, with some good moments, bad moments, and darn right ugly ones. But with every disappointment or letdown there seems to be a silver lining or at least something to bring our spirits back up. Let me explain.

On Thursday, as Hubs was writing her blog (among other things), Myra and I were on a mission with Yelba to register her at a new school. *(for more on Yelba) As we collected the necessary papers from her current school to matriculate at a new one, we noticed that Yelba seemed extremely sad, quiet, and distant. Before we left the school grounds we stopped and asked if changing schools was what she truly wanted/needed. After an honest (hopefully) and confusing (because of the Spanish) conversation, Yelba said that she would prefer to stay at her current school. While it seemed like a let down to have her stay after all the hype of changing schools from the previous week, we quickly realized that this was going to be great for Yelba. She would start the school year excited to be there, with the teachers and friends she already knew. The good.

We walked home and made lunch with Yelba while discussing the importance of school and the excitement of a new year. As we were really enjoying ourselves, Yelba started to appear tired, had difficulty breathing, and eventually experienced a full blown attack. She passed out and despite the help of Dona Berta, Dona Chilo, and half the neighborhood we couldn’t get her back to a conscious state. The bad.

An ambulance came and I hopped in with Cesar (a 22 year-old who lives next door). We rode without much urgency to the hospital about 10 minutes from our house. I sat in the front and frantically looked back as the EMT? (not sure what he actually was), did not seem to do anything. Yelba occasionally opened her eyes or appeared to gasp for a breath; she was really struggling. At the hospital they wheeled Yelba into an “Emergency Room” where I am pretty sure she sat completely unattended, but I wasn’t allowed to enter so I can’t say for sure. After about 15 minutes she walked out, said she had woken up and a doctor told her that she could leave. But, I refused to go without speaking to someone. They hadn’t done anything – from ask her name to run tests, yet no one seemed to mind, and I didn’t know what to do. Cesar kept telling me I couldn’t go into doors as I tried to find a doctor who would talk to me. Finally, we spoke to someone who said Yelba’s sugar has been low. The whole experience was a repeat from 3 weeks ago when Mary was there – and I finally understood why Mary had been so angry afterward. The ugly.

Obviously I was happy that Yelba was okay, but I was beyond angry at what had happened. After some venting, we took some steps to find out what had really happened and to see what was wrong with Yelba. We set up an appointment with a private doctor – the one that our host family goes to. On Friday, we went to the doctor’s office. It was completely different then the hospital. The doctor sat with us, did a full checkup of Yelba, and helped her understand what has been happening.

Less than 24 hours after the incident the whole situation seemed 100 times better – Yelba had recovered, and I had recovered from my extreme frustration. It is difficult not to get angry when something seems so wrong, because while it might seem wrong to me I have to realize that it is a different country and a different culture – something that is extremely difficult to do. In the end, Yelba was given the care she needed and is ready to head back to school on Tuesday. And while things sometimes seem tough or frustrating, there always seems to be something to look forward to, work for, and enjoy.


A brief rundown of other news:
-PE CLASSES: We met with Milton, the director of sports here in Granada and we’ll meet with him and the gym teachers on Tuesday to finalize when we will go to each school. We are anxious to start going to gym classes and recruit more girls for the Saturday practice.
-WEEKLY PRACTICE: They have been great this week – fun games and lots of kids. A bunch of kids are getting closer to filling their participation cards and earning a pair of cleats or a ball. We even did a trash pick up after practice on Thursday for some extra points (more on trash pickup later this week from Myra) Exciting teams! Fernanda and Alberto need just 4 more points and they keep chanting “casi, casi” (almost, almost) whenever we see them.
-SATURDAY PRACTICE: We had practice this morning and unfortunately low numbers. Even still we had a great game at the end with the girls that were there and we really think they’ve improved in just the 3 weeks we’ve been here. We’ll be working this week to get the numbers back up for next Saturday.
-PRESS: The Nica Times this week features an article about us!
-FUN: We enjoyed pizza last night with Suyen and her visiting boyfriend Michael (who we’ve heard oh so much about). Cesar (our neighbor) played in a concert last night at his church. The professional baseball league starts today so we’ll have to get to a game soon. And we plan to go to San Juan del Sur tomorrow for the day to enjoy some time on the water – we’re very excited!


*For those just tuning in, Yelba is a 16 year old girl who coaches for SWB, plays on a team here in Granada. She is a very energetic, high spirited, and darn right funny girl as well as a very promising soccer player. Yelba lives without family in a tough home, and has had some serious health problems recently (passing out after having difficulty breathing). Because of her unfortunate situation she has sort of been “adopted” by SWB.