I moved into the official Mercy's Dream room with 4 beds that will be used just for our volunteers (and so far we have a volunteer for December and one for Jan-April).
When I moved in Daniel mentioned the ceiling was lower than my other room, and I really didn't take any notice....until I was untangling my laptop cord and my finger got caught in the ceiling fan! Luckily it was on the lowest setting but it was going pretty fast and the tip of my index finger got what looks like a blister filled with blood, and my finger was all swelled up. Leo told me to let the blood out, so I let him use scissors to cut it open and I squeezed the blood out and he put disinfectant on it. I will either have an awesome immune system or be very sick by the time I get home! Today alone I probably could have gotten multiple diseases!
The kids eat sugarcane like crazy and they want me to eat it too. Basically they use their teeth to tear it apart, then give it to me and you just chew it to get the sweet sugary juice out of it. Today they wanted me to drink coconut water, and I didn't realize the straw was actually the outside of a pen...who knows where they found that! I have also gotten blood on me from 2 different kids, the first a mentally disabled child who tried to jump off a swing while I was pushing her; she fell flat on her face on the concrete; the second was a boy who stabbed his hand with some sharp metal thing and was bleeding all over the place. I also have about a hundred mosquito bites (or as 6-year-old Florence says, "Moquisto" bites!) no matter how much bug spray I use!
I made the mistake of letting 11-year-old Raheal stay the night with me last night, and now she wants to stay every night in my room! It would be fine, except tonight Madam Henriette arrives. (The kids call everyone Madam, even I am Madam Jen...well, until I went to the Catholic Church and now I seem to be Sister Jen!). Madam Henriette is one of the founders of the orphanage and she is from Holland. From what I gather, things are a bit uptight while the Holland people are here (she is the first of 3 to be arriving for the next couple weeks). Leo said she would probably not approve of me letting Raheal sleep in my room, and I can understand that. Leo also said they will try to ask me questions to try to get something on the staff (this apparently happened to another volunteer, and the staff was not happy with her after the Holland people left). Then they go tell the staff what I say. I will need to learn to keep my mouth shut, since they are white and European - I may feel at ease with them...
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