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Belize Wilderness Emergency Medicine

WTM21 Update - Sunday, July 29, 2012

New Beginnings

The first ray of sunlight enters my eye as I peer out at the morning dew in the middle of a Belizean jungle. The clatter of butterflies meeting in mid-air, the humming of a hummingbird with bright blue streaks running along its back, the jungle breeze, life is absolutely surreal when you are 16 waking up to these things. The group assembles their packs, as we eat our final breakfast at Jaguar Creek. Unfortunately it’s time to go. We get on the bus not with sadness, but with excitement to see what is next. The bus winds through tall mountains with something beautiful on every turn.

We arrive at our next destination, Maya Centre, the home of our next mentor and teacher, Aurora, a traditional Mayan healer. We are welcomed by Aurora, her husband and their family. Aurora tells us stories of how she has healed countless people, inspired many with her traditional art work, and taught many others of her traditional Mayan medicine. Next, we take a walk in her garden to pick ingredients for one of her natural remedies, but I noticed her garden was no ordinary garden. Her garden was the jungle. We walked through a winding trail as she told us about the many plants that she uses to cure and heal all of her patients. We picked various leaves and plants and brought them all back to the main gathering room. Next, we took all the leaves and we each got a chance to grind the leaves with a traditional grinding stone. After all the leaves were grinded we placed the green paste in water and we had mosquito repellent! Finally a natural alternative to the skin melting chemicals that is in the normal mosquito repellent.

Next the group assembled for our next lesson with our public health teacher, Kristy. We learned about preventative medicine and diseases world wide, information I feel I should have known a long time ago.

We all gathered for dinner and, once again had a delicious meal. But what was spectacular was yet to come. Aurora was kind enough to invite our entire group to receive a traditional blessing. She burned incense of Copal in a small basket and let the aroma fill the room. Next she brought in a small bowl with a sacrifice of food on fire. We gathered around as she took Mayan holy water on sacred leaves and showered away our negative energy, pure for the next day. Then she went around and said a prayer for each and every one of us. This truly was a life changing experience. So our adventures continue in the Belizean mountains.

-Eric

P.S. Emory we all miss you and hope that you are doing well!