This team report was written by me to serve as the team report for the N.C VIM web site.

Trip Report for September 3-12, 2005

VIM medical trip to Brazil

     While Americans were preparing for the Labor Day weekend, an eleven member team embarked on a medical VIM mission to the heart of the Brazilian Amazon. The team was led by veteran North Carolina VIMer Ann Whitt. After long hours of airline travel, an additional sixteen hour journey on the EvangeMed boat delivered us to our destination of the small town of Canuma. The river was low this time of year making it necessary to climb to the top of the forty foot embankment from the dock which floated on massive tree trunks.

     The trip was two fold – primarily a medical clinic, but also construction. Team members included one doctor, several nurses, an X-ray technician, a pharmacist, a play therapist, and a lab technician. Other non-medical team members assisted with the clinic and worked construction.

     The U.S. team joined Brazilian medical and evangelical team members. During orientation everyone introduced themselves and the talents they brought to the team. The Brazilian team included two dentists, three evangelists, a teacher, three translators, and multiple members of the boat crew. From this initial meeting we emerged as one team focused on the tasks at hand, but more importantly on building & cultivating relationships and sharing the Love of Christ.

     Medical clinic was held on the boat which contained a waiting room, two examination rooms, a pharmacy, a medical lab, and a dentist room. Patient symptoms were assessed before seeing the doctor, blood work analyzed, and drugs prescribed as needed. A wide range of illness and complaints were treated. The dentist was kept busy with more than a few brave children leaving holding a cloth to the side of their mouth and with fewer teeth than when they came.

     One day a portion of the team traveled in two smaller motor boats to a village twelve miles downstream. Clinic was held in a school building with triage, examination, and interacting with children each occurring in separate rooms. Initially only twenty patients were to be seen, but a total of thirty eight were treated because we did not want to turn away anyone in need. None of the medical work would have been possible if not for the excellent work of the three translators. 

     The construction project was to complete a building for use by the Methodist Association for Social Action who was part of our team. It was a rough red-block building with a roof, but no exterior and interior finishing. The goal was to make it usable by the end of the week! With many hours of difficult and sweaty work, local laborers, VIMers, and members of the boat crew transformed it by preparing and pouring cement floors, stuccoing exterior and interior walls, painting, electrical wiring, and installing windows and doors. Land was leveled next to the building in preparation for an open air classroom that will eventually be covered with a roof.

     On the last day, a ribbon ceremony was held with the U.S. and Brazilian teams, local villagers and dignitaries. The celebration was topped off with refreshments and fireworks whose explosions echoed back and forth across the river.

     An interesting social aspect was the floating dock itself. It’s a microcosm of river society. It was the swimming pool, laundromat, bath house, barber shop, trash dump, and social hangout all within a few feet of each other. With the boat moored to its side, it was the hospital, too. 

     While we were there, Canuma celebrated Brazil’s Independence Day with a festive parade whose entries showed different cultural, economic, educational, and historical aspects of Canuma and Brazil. It was a special treat to be asked to join in the parade as the last entry. The combined Brazilian and U.S. team formed up in rows and marched in step to the lively cadence of the drum corps as we stopped in front of the reviewing stand, turned, and presented ourselves. That day we were all Brazilians!

     Spiritual renewal was reinforced with bi-lingual morning and evening devotions. Devotions are a mainstay of any VIM trip. Team members took turns in delivering devotions. Music was important part of these meetings. If one particular song had to be picked as the trip’s “theme song”, it would be “This is the day that the Lord has made”, whether sung in English or Portuguese (occasionally both at the same time!).

     In summary, this trip was everything one might expect on a VIM trip. The searing sun, heat and humidity was more than offset by meeting new friends, treating the sick, gazing at the Southern Cross in the night sky, swimming in the Amazon, and the experience in general. Upheld and guided by our Faith in Jesus Christ, we played with children with children’s toys, visited people in their homes, held a five-day old baby, pulled teeth, ministered to others and to each other, wired a building, gave a hug to a 96 year old woman, and shared the Love of Christ. This is why we came to the Brazilian Amazon.