Screening for Mabuhay Desert Foundation

It is about 10:30 at night, I'm reflecting about the day, what do I feel?

Traveling out of the inner-city of Manila and into the countryside for about 3 hours

I spent the day helping Elder and Sister Stroud in their role as Mormon Helping Hands or maybe LDS charities. In fact I still am not sure what their missionary calling is. I know that Welfare is somewhere involved. They have projects that the Webb's started and they have projects of their own. This project had to do with assisting the man screening people for a fit with the operations and Doctors that the Mabuhay house offers to those who cannot pay.

Sister and Elder Stroud came about three or four weeks after we did. They are from North Ogden, Utah

The Strouds told Jimwel Ambes a regional Screener for the Mabuhay house that they would help him out this Monday. Since I had a day free due to intake week, I went along to help and experience something different..........and it was an experience......and it was different.

This is Jimwel V. Ambes. He is standing in front of the board that we had the potential patients for the Mabuhay house stand beside with their information so I could take their picture to add to their file

When we arrived the chapel or main part of the church was full of people waiting in chairs. There were old people, and young people and babies in arms. One man immediately showed me his arm that was....well...rubbery looking. His arm between his elbow and wrist wasn't straight and when he moved his elbow it hung the wrong way. I told him I only took pictures and that a doctor would talk to him soon. Some ladies in yellow uniforms directed all the people into organized places and helped register all of them.
My job was to take pictures though I ended up writing down all the people who had been accepted to see the doctors because it made the process faster.

These signs hung outside of the church gate to let people know they could come to get screened here

One at a time a person or mom and child would come sit down by the doctor and explain what they needed or felt was wrong. Several of the people were given a prescription or names and numbers to call of others who could help them with their particular problem. One guy had pink eye and several of the older folks needed glasses not cataract surgery. The doctor was a young woman from Nepal who is a doctor in a residency program. Jimwel Ambes is the regional screener for Mahbuhay and he would check some obvious kids for cleft lip/palate and club feet and sign them up. The doctor took a look into all the eyes with a special light to check for all kinds of problems. Some she could refer to the Mabuhay house and some were given referrals to other places or a prescription.

In the morning when Jeffrey and I prayed, I asked God to help me feel compassion and not pity. To me compassion is caring for others and pity is feeling sorry for someone. I found it was all in the perception. Walking into a room full of people with noticeable problems in life could have brought overwhelming and helpless feelings. Instead I concentrated on how well the people lived with struggles and how cute the children were. I was able to note how inventive, smart and creative they were in solving life-style struggles. I loved the "shoes" an eighty year old man with two club feet had - curled rubber so his feet didn't touch the ground. I felt gratitude that so many doctors would come and give their talent and efforts for free to men, women and children in need. I was also very happy that the screener and doctor could refer other services to those who needed many different kinds of relief. Compassion can urge me to do something. Pity pulls me down.