Precamp

This weekend all of the people who will be working at the camp went to "precamp" in the Valle de los Chillos at a place called Nueva Vida where the actual camp is held. The place is so nice!! It's kind of on the outskirts of this little town and its like what you would expect a real overnight camp to look like, except it's just a place that we are renting out for a week. There are cabins and a dining hall and a theater, fields, a lake and a pool.. and it's especially awesome becuase its surrounded by big mountains on all sides.

At the precamp they brought everyone together so that we could keep learning about diabetes but also to start bringing us together and forming a real team before the camp starts. Along with playing games and doing team building activities, we also started to plan the schedule for the camp. We also talked about some really intense things like what to do if one your campers gets really low blood sugar and has a seizure, or how to teach campers who don´t have the resources to buy test strips other ways in which they can test their blood sugar (ex. rub pee on your skin and if it's sticky you have high blood sugar). After doing so much work this weekend, I am really excited but also nervous for camp to start. There is so much to remember!!! And while part of what we are doing is supervising and playing with the kids, there is the huge commitment to teach them about how to control thier diabetes, not to mention that their health is in our hands!

Anyway, there are about 40 counselors, half american, half ecuadorian as well as 4 guys who came from Bolivia who worked with AYUDA at the first ever diabetes camp in Cochabamba. Its awesome because everyone comes from really different lives and together, even though we are so different, everyone is equally motivated to help and do really good things. There will be 10 groups of campers, each with 4 counselors. I will be working with girls ages 12-14 or something like that, which i think will be a good age because they are old enough to really learn and understand how diabetes affects their lives and how they can improve their health, but they are also young enough to still want to hang out and play games etc.

Besides from working with AYUDA and the diabetes foundation here, there hasn't been tons of free time. We just got back to Quito last night and I think today is going to be one of the few free days. This coming week we have to do lots of recruiting for the camp. Some of the couselors are going to other provinces in Ecuador, but I am staying here in Quito. As far as I understand, and I guess I will learn more later today, we will be going to old and potentially new campers houses to evaluate thier living situations (you might not know from looking at people but a significant percentage of people dont have electricity or running water even within the boundaries of Quito), also to radio and tv stations to promote the camp, as well as working with this organization un techo para mi pais which is kind of like a south american habitat for humanity. So, it should be cool and I am really looking forward to getting out into the city and seeing more and working with people.

Thats all for now!
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