After picking up the Japanese surgeons from the airport, we headed straight to Kalasin. The drive included a stop at a local restaurant where Dr Yoe ordered a whole bunch of local foods. It was great to finally be with a local person that knew good, different food (not just Pad Thai!).

We arrived at the hospital in Kalasin around midnight Thursday night. We got to stay in patient rooms - we hope we weren't pushing any of the patients out (we did some people on cots around the hospital). Scott and I slept across from the maternity ward, so lots of crying babies (good thing I brought my ear plugs). We started Friday morning at 6am with a trip to the local market, which was pretty crazy. There were live (just barely) fish in huge tubes, meat hanging all over the place, tons of fresh veggies - it is hard to describe. The Thai people in the market were just as interested in staring at us as we were at the market! Although we had 4 other foreigners (the Japanese surgeons), somehow they blended more... I was really happy they were on the trip though, the amount of pictures I took was nothing compared to their snapping fingers.

After the market, armed with who knows what, we head to a Buddhist Temple. Scott and I could hear the fish flipping around in a bucket behind us in the car. At temple we walked up to the moat surrounding the temple and Dr. Yoe took out all of our purchases from the market - snails, tiny frogs, fish, and some enormous bugs. It was our job to set them all free. It was pretty cool (and quite a relief to know we weren't going to eat them!).

Following our snail/frog/fish/bug liberation, we walked down to the temple area and were given trays of food. Friday was Buddhist Day, which involved towns people coming down to the temple and donating food to the monks. This is actually a daily process (monks go around every morning collecting food and offerings from the community). But on Buddhist Day, the community comes to them. The monks walked in a line around all the people and we scooped up bits of food and put it in their baats (special bowls). Afterwards we knelt on the ground while the main monk gave a sermon-like talk. This talk lasted about an hour - Scott and I were in quite a bit pain getting up at the end. Since the whole talk was in Thai we tried to pass the time watching the surrounding roosters, peacocks, and squirrels running all over picking up the fallen food.

After out temple visit we returned to the hospital and started seeing patients and didn't stop until midnight. The next morning, Saturday, consisted of the same routine - going to the market to pick up our liberation supplies, heading to the temple and setting the critters free, offering food to the monks that were returning from the village and listening to the monk's sermon/talk. With the exception to kneeling for an hour, it was a great way to start the day!

After Saturday's surgeries, which ended at around 5pm, the group headed to a nearby school for the handicapped. When we drove up and got out of the vans, the kids were all cheering and clapping for us - it was really cute. Our job was to serve them dinner and ice cream. It was a ton of fun serving them the food, especially the ice cram and then hanging out afterwards. One girl just wanted Scott and me to say English words to her. So, we went around pointing everything out and saying the English word - she loved it. It was a great way to finish the trip.

Scott and I were so glad that we got to be a part of this experience - not only for the amazing surgeries I got to see, but to be involved in such a great organization. We got to do and see so many things that we would have otherwise never been able to do.