Nuke the Fridge

Well I'll be here a little less than two weeks more. So I can start looking back at what has happened over the past six weeks. A majority of our time here has been spent working in clinics at local churches in Rio and so I have been able two see a large number of people/patients. A couple of things have stuck out to me, some them are quite funny. Most of the time, I have been tasked with taking blood pressures and sometimes measuring blood sugar. So I tell people what their BP or blood sugar is and I get a variety of responses. In many instances, people have gotten seriously offended when I tell them that they have high blood pressure. Last week, one of my teamates, Karen, told an older lady that her BP was high and she should get it checked out. The lady got upset and said it was not high, and then slapped Karen on her shoulder. The lady then stood up, took a few steps, still muttering in Portuguese and then came back and hit Karen on the arm again (Not hard, but not nice either). One of the highest BPs I have seen came from a lady who told me she had low BP. I also have to ask people if they are diabetic and I get 3 different responses. 1) "I don't know." which is then followed by a look or question that goes along the lines of "Am I?" I then tell them that if they don't know, they probably are not diabetic. 2) "No!" Which is then followed quickly by "Praise the Lord," "Thank God" or a similar phrase. The look on the person's is similar to when you ask a lady how much do they weigh or if you guess a woman's age and you go over. (Speaking of weight, the week I was doing triage, I stopped asking for people's weight about two hours into the first day, because 1) it wasn't really necessary for eyeglasses and 2) none of the women knew their weight or they had forgotten, hmmm.) 3) "Yes" but with a dejected look on their face, similar to the look a person has when they failed anything. More than a couple of times I had to try cheer some of the people with high BP or who were diabetic and explain to them that they were okay. I guess that is a part of being a doctor.

A note about the churches down here. I don't think we have been in a service shorter than an hour and half and most are about 2 hours. We went to a church Sunday night with several of our Brazilian friends and the service was 3 hours long. It hasn't really bothered me though. I don't know if it is the way the services are conducted (lots of singing) or the fact that I am down here to be missionary? The services are very organized, but they always feel very relaxed.

I have mentioned before that our missionary suggested we read Proverbs everyday and talk about it. It's pretty cool because my prayer before I left was that God would give me wisdom. We are well into our second trip through Proverbs and some things have repeatedly stuck out to me.

A wise man does 3 things
1) He works hard
2) He speaks honestly
3) He gives appropiately

Do those 3 things and God will be faithful to bless the wise man. All 3 of those virtues incorporate humility which reiterates one of main themes in Proverbs, pride accomplishes nothing accept trouble. So, I have stuff to work on.

Yesterday, we went to a school with a teacher from the church we go to. She teaches deaf children. We got to meet her class and talk to the other classes about us and why we are here. It was funny because most of the kids wanted to here what their names were in English. We would tell them, and then all of the other kids around them would laugh and point. I really only got into trouble when the kids found that my soccer team is Fluminence (Who made it to the championship of South America, but lost in penalty kicks last week). Let's just say the kids had a few choice word for me and some of them were in English. On a related note, Mrs. Reese got one of their neighbors who is not a Christian to translate for us. We had some good conversations with her and hopefully there is a seed there. Pray for Larissa, her brothers have decided to be atheists (She looks just like Amanda Bynes).


Tomorrow, Michael are going to the Christ Statue, that should be cool.