January 11th — Day Six

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Once again this journal entry is going to be a little short. I wish that I had a tape recorder to carry around with me to capture all the things I’m processing, since I’m an external processor. I usually think I’m exhausted by the end of the day in the United States, but I haven’t felt this tired in a while. Every day we come back ready to hit the bed, so doing our work has been a bit of a challenge. My heart goes out to our Thai buddies as they usually stay up even later than us!



This morning we went to the hospital, we observed in hemodialysis for a bit. Most of what they had to say was similar to the United States, but it was interesting that they needed to use peritoneal dialysis more because of the lack of equipment. The rest of our time was spent on our unit giving medications and doing wound care. In fact, they gave us most of the patients for wound care, freeing up the nurses. The nurses decided to use their time to make a dance video!





After lunch, we went back to BCNC for the temple festival, thai dancing, and thai fashion show. It was super fun. We played games like musical chairs and made tie dye with our buddies and other students at BCNC. We laughed so much. Later we ate a TON of food once again. My stomach seriously can’t keep up. I keep saying they're trying to make us fat, but I realize food is a huge part of hospitality here. I love that they honor their guests and offer all that they can even with little money. They are not concerned about what is in their bank account but offering what is needed in the moment which I greatly appreciate and would like to be more generous with my money, despite my bank account numbers, back in the USA. We played a gift exchange game, and I won a pink pig pillow. It was funny to hear every one scream when they won gifts. Whoever said the Thai people are quiet lied haha. It was sooooo loud with lots of girls screaming over gifts and of course over boys. The ceremony ended with a dance by the seniors which was beautiful, fun, funny, and dare I say a little horrifying as two boys grinded on each other lol. It was definitely unexpected, but it got the crowd roaring. I really enjoyed my night and shared lots of laughter. Every day has been full of smiles, laughs, tons of good food, and business. I’m looking forward to getting to relax a little next week. Lack of free time is starting to get to me, but I know I’ll be grateful for all the time we got to explore and be with our buddies, even if I’m tired!

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