i am sooo bad!

Wow, I am so sorry for how horrible I've been able keeping up with my blog since I've been in Chicago. Let me give you two excuses: 1. Our days are sooo long and exhausting and 2. I have been pretty sick this week which adds to the exhaustion.


I am struggling with sinus problems which are affecting my asthma and all of this is not helped by the poor air quality here in Chicago, the necessity of sleeping with the windows open, and living with cats. I don't really feel like I can skip out on things at the clinic so I just try to get a lot of rest while I'm home.


I didn't let my sickness stop me from going out with some of the group on our Wednesday off. We went downtown and got off the train at Millennium Park. For those of you who know Chicago well, you will realize that what I'm about to say is absolutely crazy. From that point, the group decided that they wanted to go to the Lincoln Park Zoo (which for the record is nicer than the Indy Zoo and free as opposed to $13). And they wanted to walk! I knew it was far but I had no idea how far. It took us over and hour to get there! But we got a great walking tour of the city. After the zoo, half the group went home but three of us stayed around for the free concert. It was excellent! There are free concerts in Millennium Park every Wednesday, Friday and Saturday during the summer. Chicago is so much fun!

The whole team at one of our group dinners (here at Dae and Esther's house)

The night before, on Tuesday, I had promised Shane that I would go to Borders on Michigan Ave to get Floyd Landis' book signed for him. It was definitely worth it because I got to have my picture taken with Floyd. He's a really nice guy. In case you don't know, Landis is the guy who won the Tour de France last year and was accused of doping.

Me and Floyd Landis. On a side note: I did not see him put his arm around any other fans.

The project is going well. Our home visits are going much better- we had zero "no shows" this week and made lots of appointments for patients to see their doctors. We felt like we actually accomplished something this week. At our health fair last Saturday, we did over 150 blood pressure and blood glucose screenings! This is really a great step in encouraging people to seek routine medical care.

Our home visit teams
The Chicas: Linda and Jenna

The Hawks: Gabe and Mahate

The Ninjas: Justin and Ibukun

The Canes: Chase and Jess

Some pictures from our first health fair at a local grocery store

On the non-medical side, we have been having great discussions about racial reconciliation during our conference times and we are all making great bonds with the kids that we're mentoring. Hopefully this Sunday, I'll be going with Mayra to her church and then out for some authentic Mexican food in our neighborhood, Little Village.

We have our second health fair tomorrow and hopefully it will be as successful as the first!

Oh yes, and I registered for my grad school classes at IUPUI. I'm getting a master of science degree there this year.

Hopefully it won't be so long before I write again! Thanks for not loosing faith!