HELPS Service Trip to Guatamala

This summer I was blessed enough to travel to Guatamala with 13 classmates! There, we worked with the SAGE group from Houston in partnering with HELPS International. The group was primarily a medical team consisting of medical experts, surgeons, and nurses. The first day, we set up the hospital that previously consisted of nothing but white walls and a floor. We set up an eye clinic, pediatric clinic, family health clinic, dentist clinic, and pre-op and post-op. As well as an operation room with three operating tables. That night, we performed five surgeries for people who were in desperate need of help.
I was personally on the construction team! It was the greatest experience i have ever had in my life. Our jobs were to go to these homes that were in rough condition and constructing cement floors through part of the house. The reason for doing this is that it rains a lot there and their homes are essentially flooded with dirt every time it rains. This was the hardest part of the trip BY FAR!! We had to carry the rocks, cement bags, and sand. Then, we had to mix them all together and lay it out flat on the floor. This was such hard labor and I was not ready for it. But the outcome of all the hard work definitely paid off. Seeing the looks on the people's faces was priceless. Another hardship was the speaking barrier. I had to use a lot of spanish in order to communicate with people we were helping. I was one of the only ones in my group that knew how to speak spanish. But even though this was hard, it really helped me with my conversational skills in spanish. I found that being forced and emerced into a language is the easiest and most effective way to learn spanish! For Monday-Friday we would leave at 7:00 am and travel for an hour to these villages up in the mountains. After we were done putting the cement floors in, we placed the ONIL stoves in each of the houses. We ended up all together as a group putting in over 52 stoves in the Guatamalan homes. In addition, we would put in outdoor stoves and give them a water filter. It was such an amazing to see their gratitude towards our help. We really got to know the people and families and became very attached to them! It was sooo sad to leave.
Not only did we work from 7:00-4:00 everyday in the villages, we also worked at the hospital when we returned. We helped with packing and labeling pill packages and also helped entertain the children waiting to be seen by the doctors. I really enjoyed this part of my job! One night, we also made backpacks for the nurses that would deliever babies on the dirt floors. We placed many materials that would help them in a healthy delievery.
Overall, the trip was my most memorable and emotional experience that i have ever had. All the people i met and families I worked with just made me feel so blessed to be given this opportunity. I have a whole new outlook on the persuit of happiness in life and not a day goes by without me thinking about this trip! I just can't wait to go back next summer and create new and impactful memories for the people who need it most.

This photo is us working in the kitchen at the hospital pill packing for the pharmacy after we finished dinner!

Documentation of our work in one of the houses to create and lay cement.

The view of one of our houses after we finished installing the outdoor and indoor stoves!

A mother and her three children that we helped out while on our community missions.

Some of the kids we entertained and got to practice our spanish with once we finished what we needed to for the day!!! They LOVED pictures!

A sweet little girl who was premature and is now in the nursery of the hospital. Some of us would go play with them at night and keep them company because many of their parents don't stay with them, and haven't seen them in a very long time. The lady said this little girl never smiles, but she gave me a smile that will stay in my head for a lifetime!

Walking to one of the houses up on a hill. Many of our walks were very pretty, but the houses were so far apart up in the mountains.

Taking a break outside one of the houses with our ONIL team and HELPS volunteers.

Installing the stove in our first house!! We were learning in this one so that we could do it by ourselves in the last houses.

Two little girls I played with at one of the houses! They loved the bubbles that i brought!

Creating backpacks for the midwives in Guatamala filled with useful materials they could use to deliever the babies.

At the school that we visited!!!

Teaching the children how to use the water filters we donated to their school!

Me with some of the sweet girls I got to play duck duck goose with!

Domingo teaching the family how to use the stove!

An example of an outdoor stove we would install in each house.

Ethan, Domingo, and I! We loved him so much! We worked as an awesome team to do amazing things throughout the week:)

A picture of the operation room we helped to set up and even got to watch surgery in a few times. It was a GREAT experience.

Playing patto patto ganzo with the children at school

The little boy that I played bubbles with before going in for his consultation with the doctors! He gave me a "beso" right before he went and said "gracias"! So sweet:)