Farewell to the clinics..
Trip Start
May 07, 2012
1
21
27
Trip End
May 30, 2012
Dagami, Western Visayas, Philippines
Friday, May 25, 2012
We arrived at the clinic and it was the busiest I've seen it since we've been here. There were hundreds of patients lined up everywhere. So we got right to work. We found ourselves in a vitals station outside the clinic where patients were checking in to receive services. Allyson did blood pressures - lots of them! After a while I think people were just coming up to get their BP checked simply to talk to us and have it done by Americans. A novalty we are.
After a very busy morning we presented Dr. Sangrano with our donations to the Dagami clinic. Scrubs, face masks, sanitizers, patient education materials and more. She was so grateful for our gifts and wanted to have a photo shoot of her receiving them. What's more funny is that she then begged me to "Facebook friend" her and tag all the photos for her. Not sure that I've mentioned the obsession with Facebook here in the Philippines? Just like America, all you see here is people on their computers on Facebook. On their phones or in coffee shops, Facebook is everywhere.
We started the long trek back to Tacloban and didn't arrive to Robinson's until almost 2p.m. which is pretty late. Allyson and I decided to try a new resturant today and attempted a Filipino version of Mexican food. Shockingly, it was AMAZING! Very different, but really good. I mean when can you have a mushroom taco in America with garlic dipping sauce? Not necessarily authentic Mexican, but boy was it good.
After lunch we had a shopping agenda. Today we were going to buy backpacks for the children on the streets of Bliss that live near us. School starts next week, so as our going away gift we wanted to leave them prepared with all the supplies they need. It was fun shopping for notebooks, pencils, markers and all the fun school stuff they'll need.
We attended another going away party tonight. Jezabel from the UK and Henry from Switzerland are both leaving tomorrow so we were invited to their party. I had shrimp (heads on - ewwww) and rice for dinner. Not many choices for my picky self who doesn't eat meat. After dinner we decided to adventure out to Leyte Park downtown. This is another resort with a pool that we have yet to go to and is popular with the volunteers.
When we arrived at Leyte Park I could believe my eyes. Not only was it an amazing resort area, but also an entire plaza of restaurants, bars and nightclubs! What!!! How did we not come here sooner? Kelsey and Melissa went to kareoke with the nurses from Pastrana while the rest of us toured all the hot spots. We had snacks at one place, dessert at another and were all loving this area. The restaurants were very trendy and awesome. Sorry we didn't find this sooner.
We are off on our final weekend excursion tomorrow early. We leave at 7am to visit all the VFV placements that we did not work in like the Dumpsite Project, Build a Home project and others. From there we load up for a van/boat ride to an island off the coast of Leyte as our final weekend destination. Not sure what to expect but I'm sure I'll have great stories when we return late tomorrow night.
Until then...
