After two days and five stiches

"Guatemala--take two" has been interesting. This time, there were no tears when I hugged my dad good-bye at the airport, there was little apprehension about flying, and when I arrived everything was familiar. But along with the comfort of knowing a place, there was a little less anticipation and excitement in my stomach as I de-boarded the plane.

In any case, I would have to say that it was easier the second time around. It´s like I´ve been here and done this before.

And now on to my most recent mishap which resulted in my first official Guatemalan medical treatment. On Friday morning, I was playing with Bryant´s dog, Remy, in their back yard. Remy loves to play fetch but doesn´t always find and return the sticks that we throw down into the barranco (canyon) behind the house. So at this point, Remy was stickless and I set out to remedy the problem.

I had never before ventured into the barranco, as it is steep and covered with vegetation. I found a decent sized stick on a downed tree, and was working at detaching it when I lost my footing and fell into the tree. I landed with my shin against the end of a broken branch, which punctured my leg and left a dime-sized hole in my lower left shin.

I was more in shock than in pain, as you could see into my leg and it was kind of fleshy and oozing stuff. I was heading to Camino Seguro for the day to volunteer at the English Office, and Bryant had to go to work, so I tried to put on a brave face and I stuck a piece of T.P. on my leg and we set off. (Never mind that I started feeling slightly ill and faint upon walking to the truck.)

En route to Camino Seguro, Bryant helpfully snapped his fingers in my face and yelled, "Don´t you die on me!" with volume and enthusiasm, which helped keep my mind off the swelling that was turning my lower leg into a kind of ugly, swollen version of its former self.

Luckily, Camino Seguro has a medical office with a wonderful and talented enfermera named Lucy. Lucy cleaned up the wound and agreed with me that it was "muy feo." She tried to close it up with a butterfly bandage, but it continued to gape and so she determined that I needed stitches. I have only had stitches once before in my life, but it is a testament to her that she was able to do such a good job (note the photo) since there was no flap of skin with which to cover and stitch up the wound. Not to mention that I continued to be faint and slightly nauseous during the entire visit. (I guess I won´t be trying to get into Med School)

She had me good as new in about 45 minutes, and I went to work for the day. So much for that expensive travel medical insurance!

Now I am healing quite well (check out that photo!) and have a whole new group of Spanish vocab words at my disposal: branch=rama, wound=herida, stitches=punzadas, y hinchazón=swollen part.

And so, despite my "extensive" travel experience at this juncture, all it took was two days back in Guate and a vicious game of fetch to land me under a nurse´s care.