Our Campaign With the Gordon Group

On August 28 fifteen people from Gordon Hospital Georgia, disembarked a plane in Pucallpa Peru to head out into the jungle for a mission trip. They knew very little of what this trip had in store for them. As we waited at the hospedaje for our new campaign group, we had no idea what to expect either. They all arrived in around seven motos with their stuff piled high in our Toyota pickup. We all went out to our favorite little vegetarian restaurant. The meal was stacked up high with rice an soup. Not much of the group was hungry enough to finish up their food but Tara and I stuck around after and helped them out with that. After lunch we toured around the market and headed to the ice cream shop. We then loaded up a huge truck of all of our stuff and medications to head down to the docks to load the boat. The times of when the boat was leaving was a little bit sketchy and when there are about twenty two Americans who need a passage, people are desperate to keep you on their boat. They were saying that the boat would leave that night which was when we needed to leave but we caught word that it wasn’t leaving till the next day. We unloaded all our stuff off the boat that we had just loaded then headed to a different boat that was leaving for sure that night. The boat that we were originally on really did not leave till the next day. Good choice on switching boats.
It was a long boat ride but we enjoyed it on our almost personal floor with hammocks. After sixteen hours we arrived at Inahuawaya. It was around 2 in the morning and we were all pretty tired and these Peruvian boat docks consist of really steep and muddy dirt hills that you have to lug all of your stuff to the top of. By the time we got everyone to the hostels, it was around 4. Jenni came back after getting the other groups settled in around 5 which we were all still up because our hostel was a little scary. It looked a little haunted but hey, we had a bed to sleep in none the less. It was around 5:30 when I finally fell asleep and then 6:00 came way to early.
Our clinic consisted of four clinic days where our groups split up into 2 groups and went separate directions. Our first day we headed down to the shores and boarded our luxurious hand crafted peke peke boat. We were all looking at it wondering how we would all fit. We managed in two boats and made it safe to our destination.The first day was tough but Jackie, my fellow pharmacist for the trip caught on to the Spanish medications quickly and was able to fill orders about as fast as the rest of us. I had know what to tell the patience about the medications but didn’t know exactly what all of them were for and she helped me learn that as well. It was a wonderful learning experience. Being the only semi Spanish speaker in the pharmacy made me actually have to describe everything by myself to the patience.
The clinic days went on and we got quicker. We saw many patience every day. We had one night clinic till almost midnight and we had many early mornings. The amount of work and the lack of sleep made us all a little tired but everyone pushed on though and we all came out with a big success. It was a challenge but God brought us through it with many little encouraging moments along our journey.
One day we hiked a pretty long way carrying all of our medications and in the end town welcomed us with fresh coconuts and big smiles. Another time when I was headed back with the medication on a moto, I was alone with this little Peruvian woman who I had give a shot to earlier in that day and she greeted me with a big hug, kiss, and a buenos noches. She saw that I was being eaten by the mosquito’s that were swarming my head, arms, and legs and as I waited and hour or so for the rest of the group to show up, she fanned me to keep away the bugs. God knows even about the littlest things that we need. Our last night, we were up late packing up the medications and I was getting pretty tired so I walked outside. There was a group of kids just sitting on the steps. I played with them, spinning around in circles and throwing the little ones up in the air for about 10 minutes and then forgot all about my tiredness. God really does do amazing things when it comes to the smallest pieces of our lives.
The Gordon group were real troopers. The headed out on their plane leaving back to Pucallpa then back to the states. Although we were all worn out and tired by then end, God blessed so many people including all of us. It was a wonderful experience, one I wont forget.

We were pretty board some of the time on our long boat ride. I found this huge syringe and attempted to give Brent a shot.

This was our group hiking to one of our clinic sites.

This was the boat that we were on for six hours.

And this is how tight it was.

There were many motos when we packed up and left.

Just one of the shorelines along the way.

Just giving out a prescription

We had an amazing time.