One of my favorite things this month has been going to a
nursing home that is about a mile from where we live. Our first trip there we hung mosquito nets
for people who didn’t have any. As we
went into different rooms and met the people living there my heart began to
break. The rooms there are very small,
basic (some people have beds and some sleep on the concrete floor), some have
bugs all over, and some smell of urine and other things that make it hard to
breathe. Don has said that compared to a
year ago the nursing home looks amazing and is a lot more sanitary than it was.
The residents there
are extremely friendly and I love when we show up each day and they get a huge
smile on their face. No one there really
speaks English so we don’t have the convenience of talking much but we just sit,
hang out and communicate with our hands and gestures as much as we can. When we first walk into the complex we always
see two men…Eduardo and Agostinho. Yesterday, Marissa, Kelly, and I sat with them for a few minutes talking
about the weather and how they were doing. After a little bit, Marissa and Kelly headed to the back of that dorm
and started visiting and painting nails with the older ladies there. After they left I stayed with Eduardo and Agostinho. Neither of them gets around well and they spend
most of their time sitting right outside their doors overlooking a dirt
yard. There are a handful of mango trees
in the yard and as I sat there and looked out with them, I realized there was
no way that they could even get out there and pick a couple. I motioned to them, trying to ask if they
wanted some mangos. They looked excited
so I decided to climb up the tree and grab a few.
As I started to shake one of the largest trees I had climbed,
I realized that I hadn’t asked either of the two workers there if I could pick
the fruit and give it to the guys. I
looked over and Eduardo and Agostinho were laughing at what I was doing. Even though it is the entrance to the nursing
home, the workers can’t see anything that goes on there because they do most of
their work in between the dorm buildings where Marissa and Kelly were hanging
out. Thinking I was pretty safe and also
for the fact that I didn’t care too much about getting in trouble for this
activity, I continued to shake the tree as two large mangos fell to the
ground. I jumped out of the tree and as
I walked over to the fallen mangos, one of the workers was walking towards
me. I picked them up and said good
afternoon with probably the worst foreigner accent she had ever heard. She started to say something to me, but I
just shrugged my shoulders and said I didn’t understand. She kept walking and I waited until she was
out of sight before I distributed the mangos. As I gave them each a mango, I put my finger over my lips and said,
Shhhh. They laughed again and
immediately started to eat. Most of the
time the language barrier is a frustrating obstacle, but sometimes it can be a
blessing (or maybe just an excuse) that allows me take a few more liberties than
I might normally do.
