Felipa - part 3

After moving in a week ago I wanted to visit Felipa to check up on her, see how she was adjusting to her new surroundings and give her some more house-warming items I'd been gathering for her.

I drove down to her house this morning (Saturday, April 16) and found her happily passing time on her new front porch, smiling and waving as I drove up.  I dropped off some food supplies, some housewares, and other things to make her new home more comfortable and we chatted for a while. She told me she loves her new house and is so much happier than she was before.  Her old shack rested on a rock pile and it was hard for her to come and go but her new place is on much leveler ground and with her fading eyesight and mobility, it's much easier for her to get around.

PazSalud will of course stay in touch with Felipa and her family and I'll keep you all posted here on her progress.

Settling in to her new home

Hanging out on her front porch

Felipa - part 2

With still so much work left to be done on the modest new house we were building for Felipa, the team returned to the work site on Saturday the 9th to finish the job.  We ordered some additional material to complete the expanded scope of the project and got to work first thing in the morning.

Adding zinc sheeting to create the roof...

...and the walls

Coating the wood frame in termite poison

Building the door

With most of the construction done, we turned our focus to moving a boulder that had rested for decades in the spot where we intended to locate Felipa's primary walkway.  Two pry bars, 6 men and an hour later we were able to dislodge and remove the over 2-ton chunk of granite bedrock.  Felipa now has a clear path to the rest of the family compound and the nearby creek.

When I asked when Felipa was going move in to her new home her daughter said, 'as soon as you want to bring her!'  So we hopped in the PazSalud truck and drove just a little way up the road to help Felipa move her things.  When we arrived at her shack, I was surprised to see that it was actually in the process of being torn down by the new landowner and she was living in the half the 10'x15' shanty she occupied before.  Some volunteers and I gathered up her minimal possessions and brought her to her daughters home where we just completed construction on her new house.

Escorting Felipa to her new home

Testing out her new hammock

Me, Felipa and Maira

Felipa was thrilled and overwhelmed with her new home.  In contrast to her old one, her new house is larger, lighter, cooler and safer than her previous space and being located on the same land as her daughter and grandchildren is a huge bonus.  We hope it will be a comfortable and safe place for her to spend her remaining years.
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Many of the volunteer team members

A huge 'thank you' to everyone from Tamanique who so generously volunteered their time and effort to realize this dream for Felipa.  Without their labor and their spirit, none of this would have been possible.

A special 'thank you' as well to Jim and Jan Streff and other PazSalud donors who allowed the project to even be imagined.  The total cost of giving a very special old woman a new home was roughly $800.  What may not seem like much to us in the U.S. can literally change a life in El Salvador.  Sometimes modest donations combined with communal effort and a simple vision can accomplish an amazing goal.  That's the work we strive to do every day at PazSalud.

Sister Eleanor Gilmore, 1932 - 2014

Our beloved founder, Sister Eleanor Gilmore, died Saturday, July 12th after suffering a massive stroke. Here is some information about her amazing life of service with PeaceHealth, the Sisters of St. Joseph of Peace and the people of El Salvador:

Sister Eleanor Gilmore, (Sister Estelle), a woman whose life was marked by peace, courage and a  joyful spirit, died July 12, 2014 in Bellevue, Washington.  A Sister of St. Joseph of Peace, Sister Eleanor served in leadership for her community and with PeaceHealth; she ministered to the people of El Salvador during the Civil War of the late 1980s and later returned to found PazSalud, the El Salvador Health Care Mission of PeaceHealth and the Sisters of St. Joseph of Peace. 

Eleanor Catherine Gilmore was born in Seattle in 1932, the only child of Michael and Anne Gilmore.  She described her vocation as a Sister of St. Joseph of Peace as a “mysterious gift of joy” that interrupted her plans to marry a young man she’d met in England.   She entered the community in 1955, earned a B.A. in Seattle University, trained as a nurse at Sacred Heart Hospital, Eugene, Oregon, and earned a Masters in Hospital Administration from St. Louis University.

Sister Eleanor served as Administrator at St. John’s PeaceHealth Hospital in Longview, Washington and as operating room supervisor at Sacred Heart PeaceHealth Hospital, Eugene, Oregon; she was elected as Councilor for the Sisters of St. Joseph of Peace Generalate in 1970 and as Province Leader for the Western Region in 1982, leading  the community through years of great change in religious life.

Eleanor’s life changed dramatically when she decided to work in El Salvador in 1988, during the final years of the Salvadoran Civil War.  With Jesuit Refugee Services, she organized a sanctuary in San Salvador for country people needing to come to the capitol for health care.   Twice arrested during that time when religious workers were often threatened or deported, Eleanor still returned to work with the people she had come to love.  Later, as Vice President for Mission at PeaceHealth, she organized PazSalud, bringing medical teams to  serve poor rural communities in El Salvador.  She led that mission from 2001-2009. 

Since returning from El Salvador, Sister Eleanor has lived at St. Mary-on-the-Lake, Bellevue, WA, playing an active role in the life of the community, serving on PeaceHealth and Mercy Housing Boards, and delighting in travel to visit friends and family. She will be deeply missed by her family, community, PeaceHealth co-workers and many friends in El Salvador and around the world.

The Vigil Service will be on Wednesday, July 16, 7:00 p.m. at St. Mary-on-the-Lake, 1663 Killarney Way, Bellevue, WA.  The Mass of Christian Burial will be at Sacred Heart Church, 9460 NE 14^th St., Bellevue, on Thursday, July 17 at 10:30 a.m. Burial will be at 2 p.m. at Holyrood Catholic Cemetery.

In lieu of flowers, donations can be made to the Sisters of St. Joseph of Peace Retirement Fund or to the Sisters of St. Joseph of Peace for Paz Salud, the El Salvador Health Mission founded by Sister Eleanor, P.O. Box 248, Bellevue, WA 98009.

Missioning Rosanne

Monday, March 24th was the 34th anniversary of the assassination of Archbishop Oscar Romero.  As always, there were commemorative marches in San Salvador and elsewhere among Monseñor Romero's beloved people. 

For us in the El Salvador Health Mission, Monday was also memorable because of the missioning of Rosanne Ponzetti as the new System Vice President for Mission Services.  We were especially delighted because Rosanne knows El Salvador through a 2010 Immersion Mission, and she's been a staunch friend of PazSalud since.  Rosanne and her family sponsor one of the children with disabilities we have been assisting.  Now she will be responsible for the overall direction of PazSalud, as well as for mission integration and ethics. 

Here's a photo from the missioning: from left to right, Carol Aaron, SVP for Culture and People; Rosanne; Alan Yordy, CEO and Chief Mission Officer; and Dr. Howard Graman, SVP, CEO and Chief Mission Officer of the PeaceHealth Medical Group.  It gives me joy to point out that every one of them has been part of a PazSalud mission!

Later in the day, Kathy Garcia, Rosanne and I met with Angela Dellinger and Mara Kershaw who are planning PeaceHealth's new leadership development program and want to include an immersion mission in El Salvador, probably beginning in fall, 2015.  It's a great challenge for Kathy and Darren, and I know it will be a life-changing experience for the participants.

Susan Dewitt, CSJP

Congratulations and thanks!

Here's our great clinic space in San Pedro Perulapan.  This huge auditorium space easily and comfortably held all our clinics and most of the waiting patients with plenty of room to spare.  We wish we could pack up the auditorium for next year, but ACOSAMA - the non-profit organization that kindly welcomed us into their space for the week - probably has some other uses for it.

Darren writes:
A very special to thanks to everyone who worked so hard to make the PazSalud medical mission in San Pedro Perulapan so successful.  The countless hours by the the US and Salvadoran volunteers paid off as we were able to see a record 1,647 patients in 4.5 days and deliver much needed care to an under-served population.  Congratulations to all and thank you to all the wonderful people we met along the way.

A present for our friends in Santiago de Maria

Many Salvadoran hospitals have allowed us to use an operating room for our week of eye surgeries - and they've never charged us for the space or the time they spend to coordinate with our mission.  The latest of these happy relationships was with the small National Hospital at Santiago de Maria, where we held our April, 2013 eye surgery week.  We always try to return the favor in some way by giving the hospital some useful gifts and a financial donation.  When we asked Dr. Gonzáles, the Director of the Santiago de Maria hospital, what would be helpful to them, he swallowed hard and said that they really, really needed a new autoclave (sterilizer).  Their old one had given up entirely.  We said we'd try, but weren't sure we'd have enough donations to purchase an autoclave of the size they needed.
Happily, when we checked our donations at the end of the year, we did have the funds needed to purchase a new autoclave for Santiago de Maria, and here it is, with one of our favorite nurses showing it off to Kathy Garcia.
The new autoclave will mean sterile instruments for all the surgeries at Santiago de Maria.  We can't think of a better way we could have helped the hospital - and helped the needs of the community they serve.

Moving Days

On Monday, with the help of two big trucks and four hombres plus Darren, we moved the contents of the Suchitoto house to the new PazSalud base house in San Salvador.  That was a lot of stuff!  Fourteen years of PazSalud, and beyond the tubs full of mission medications and equipment, we've accumulated a small mountain of kitchen equipment, books, bedding, etc.  Especially etcetera... mosquito nets, flashlights, a tub of red curry paste, a potato masher....

Then we got down to San Salvador and los hombres unloaded the lot, while I stood in line for Chory hotdogs for all.  These are a Salvadoran speciality, 80 cents the hotdog, and it was great fun to watch the cook do his elaborate dance - bun from the steamer, open, squirt ketchup and mayo, hotdog from the fryer, top with onions, curtido, and more ketchup and mayo, bag up, add napkins, take payment, wipe cart, next.  He worked so fast and so energetically, and I can imagine for what small earnings.  He made our 17 Chorydogs (three for each of the guys and two for me) in about 5 minutes; with six Cokes, the total was $18.30.

And now we're unpacking.  Fortunately the new house has more built-in storage than I have ever seen anywhere in El Salvador.  Or perhaps it's fortunate - Darren is a bit horrified at the sheer amount of stuff that is now occupying that storage.  I trust that in time the duplicates will find new homes and Darren will feel free to simplify the household.  Here's the kitchen in progress:

But for a more serene view, here's St. Francis presiding over one of the patios:

Along with all the moving, we've done a lot of official business. Darren is heading out to the airport to pick up Kathy Garcia, and we're beginning to get ready for the Open House on Saturday.

And then, on Monday morning early, I'll head for Seattle.  Hard to believe.  I think it's going to take me quite a while to catch up with myself.

- Susan Dewitt

Tumultuous Times

This past month has been absolutely wonderful and - at the same time - somewhat terrible. 

Wonderful: I spent an amazing four days seeing the best of Ireland with Sr. Andrea Nenzel.  Our hosts, Joy and Michael Moore, turned themselves inside out for us, and shared their family stories and histories as well as the sights with us. 

And wonderful: Ireland was followed by our Sisters of St. Joseph of Peace Contemplative Retreat in Loughborough, England - the last of the three Contemplative Retreats, and an amazing experience of gathering ourselves as a community to take what our facilitator, Sr. Nancy Sylvester, calls "a long, loving look at the real.-

And wonderful: I got to spend time at St. Mary-on-the Lake in Bellevue on either end of those travels - time to visit with the Sisters and with my sister, time to pack up for my July move to a community house in Seattle.

And wonderful: while all this was going on, Darren had located the perfect base house in San Salvador, with plenty of space for all our tubs and equipment, and even for a few guests.

And wonderful: Darren flew north for meetings with PeaceHealth and we had an excellent meeting with our El Salvador Advisory Group, got many details straightened out, and continued what's been a great experience of transitioning from me to Darren as our in-country Coordinator.

But somewhat terrible: I came back to the northwest in early May barely breathing.  Seemed that my bronchial stent had become completely plugged.  Fixing that required two rigid bronchoscopies (full anesthesia), the first followed by a night in the hospital.  Breathing got better, then worse again, and not long after my return from England I ended up in another hospital with a pneumonia diagnosis. 

Now, thanks be to God, things seem to be mending.  I'm breathing well, I'm headed back to El Salvador on the red-eye tonight.  For the next four weeks, we'll be busy moving to the new San Salvador house - and I'll be connecting with as many friends as possible.  It's another whirlwind, and there's even a few days in Cartagena, Colombia tucked into the mix (a visit with my niece Carol and her husband Gus Aponte)....  It should be wonderful, but I imagine quite a few tears may also be shed.

-  Susan

Welcome

Welcome to PazSalud in El Salvador, our new blog for PeaceHealth's El Salvador Health Mission!  We'll be posting about life and work and mission in El Salvador as we carry the Health Mission forward.

PeaceHealth and the Sisters of St. Joseph of Peace have been connected to El Salvador since 1985, when Sisters Andrea Nenzel and Margaret Jane Kling accompanied refugees, providing an international presence in the Calle Real Refugee Camp.  In the late 1980s Sisters Eleanor Gilmore and Margaret Byrne worked with Jesuit Refugee Services to help wounded civilians get health care. 

The El Salvador Health Mission began in 2000, when Sisters of St. Joseph of Peace Eleanor Gilmore and Grace Didomenicantonio moved to San Salvador to coordinate the work of volunteers from PeaceHealth.  The mission's first volunteers helped with emergency medical assistance following the devasting earthquakes of 2001. 

As the Health Mission in El Salvador evolved, PazSalud began to offer regular opportunities for PeaceHealth staff and Sisters to participate in general medical missions, eye screenings, and eye surgeries.  Our assistance to the communities we serve has expanded to include followup for special cases, a water filter program and community education.

And we continue to evolve with Kathy Garcia, PeaceHealth's Director of International Missions, with Darren Streff, PazSalud's new In-Country Coordinator, and with Sister Susan Dewitt, Communications Assistant.