PRACTICING GRATITIUDE

Practicing gratitude 

I am very excited to be here in Costa Rica.  This is my fourth trip with TWECS and I met a whole bunch of wonderful new people. 

We started the day with our sponsor, Gail, from the Costa Rican Humanitarian Foundation, briefing our team about the La Carpio area.  People from Nicaragua fled to this area in the 1990’s. It’s a small area built over a landfill site and houses approximately 25000 refugees. Gail took us on a walking tour and showed us the progress of the building currently taking place. Their homes in the past were made of tin plates, then of wood, then brick. And now they are building concrete structures with 2 or more stories. There is a strong sense of community here based on a spiral model of growth with a self esteem core and compassion as the intention. 

We set up clinic in the very clean and functional foundation center. I worked in the triage station where we basically direct patients to get simple glasses or readers, have them visit special testing as they are more complex cases, or congratulate them on having excellent vision and ocular health. Our work in triage couldn’t be done without the tireless efforts of those in the registration and visual acuity stations. And we rely heavily on the volunteers working in the auto-refractor and special testing areas. The dispensing station is where the magic occurs. People get their glasses, and often for the first time in their lives, they can see clearly. 

Our team that serves this marginalized population include opticians, optometrists, medical students, assistants, and volunteers from outside the industry. The foundation provides transportation, safety and nourishment for our team.  The translators are an absolute necessity. They never leave our side and are so eager to learn, we joke they can start doing our job by the end of the project. 

I look forward to the tough, fun, exhausting, humbling days ahead. It’s an experience like no other. 

Here is an excerpt of “In the Service of Life” by Rachel Remen:
Helping incurs debt. When you help someone they owe you one. But serving, like healing, is mutual. There is no debt. I am served as the person I am serving. When I help I have a feeling of satisfaction. When I serve I have a feeling of gratitude. 

Chi Miigwetch. 

By Dr. Dana Blakolmer, Ontario