A new world, a new day

It is hard to explain what we, as students, have experienced in the last few days. There was a comment made during our final evening meeting on the first full day in Peru that has stuck in my mind since I heard it. I believe it was Jana that said: At home we come across so much red tape when it comes to therapy... (or something like that). It resonated in my head - at home there is so much red tape and here there is nothing but a red carpet. It amazed me right away that the parents, the families and even the professionals we encounter have so much faith in us. So much hope, so much trust.

We're here to do our small part. To teach and to help, yes, but also to learn. I don't know that any of us could learn what we're learning each and every day...about love, respect, dignity and service. We spent years studying to be professionals and (what feels like) thousands of hours sitting in classrooms waiting to figure out exactly how it feels to be a speech-language pathologist (SLP). I don't know that we ever really expected this. To go beyond every book that we have read and every note that we have taken...and to hold a 5 month old child with an open complete cleft lip and palate in our arms, to take children from a shanty town to the park for the very first time, to give a child from the jungle a piece of candy and watch his face light up, to have a young girl who refused to cooperate in a therapy session draw you a picture as a gift....

We are all so thankful for this experience. I know that we went in to this first day of clinic with such a feeling of fear and anxiety (mixed in with all this excitement) because of the language barrier, because of the lack of experience in the area. We came out of this day, however, realizing what an honour it is to do what we do, to have the privilege to learn what/how we learn, and to come here to this wonderful place to do both those things.