We started the day with our normal breakfast with lots of fresh OJ. YUMMMM! Each day we start the students with PT and a run. We head into the heart of town circling the square several time singing cadences while running. We sure get a lot of looks from the citizens. They know their fire department that is out training with the “Gringos”. It is a lot of fun doing the morning run this way and gives the community something to talk about.
Today I responded on my Mexican fire response in the engine. During this morning’s class the call came in for an unknown type fire on the outskirts of town. Now let me tell you how a fire response works here. The call somehow comes into “066” and get radioed to the fire fighters, Here in El Grullo “Oscar” the paid captain is the only one that can drive the engine. This is somewhat of a good plan because the streets are so narrow and choked with parked cars. More than once we had to do multipoint turns to get around parked cars, (I have trouble getting the mini van around here, none the less a large Fire engine) He is a very good driver! Oscar had to come from wherever he was, get the engine and respond while other firefighters responded via mopeds. It must have taken us 10 minutes to get less that two miles. One at the scene it turned out to only be a garbage fire that got into some tires. The bad part was, that the fire was at the water purification plant and may of damaged the utility lines that supply the plant.
Last night the beds that we bought for the firefighters were delivered, much to their surprise. They were very happy, something we all take for granite, a bed off the floor.
Today has been a full day of first aid and CPR training. (I think we need Cedar here to help. Last week at 3 ¾ years old, he taught his preschool classmates CPR, we are not sure if his teachers were ready for that or not)
Last night while both of the interpreters from our group (Gonzo and Jose) went to have a several hour meeting with the Mayor of Auytla. We went to at taco shop in the main square of town and were forced to order without help. We were all so happy that we managed to order in Spanish without any help. Of course when our food came we were let down, due to not getting what we thought we ordered. Despite that we all enjoyed our meal and finished to evening off by stopping at an ice cream shop. There is nearly no tourism in this region and very few people know any English.
I did learn the river in the gorge out of town runs year round and there is access on hour north into the gorge. (I’m thinking KAYAK run) I hope I can break free for a couple of hours before we leave and do some scouting. But I’m not going to hold my breath, our schedule is really tight. Tomorrow I will be spending all day leading the teaching of rope rescue, Sunday will be tactics, fire extinguishers and on Monday and Tuesday will be “Crunch Time Mexico” auto extraction.
We just finished a quick trip up to “Kent Washington”. “Kent Washington” is the name of a skateboard park up on the hill, paid for by one of the civic originations from Kent. The park unfortunately is just far enough out of town that it does not get used. ---Except by us, being that it is on the hillside it will be a great place to do our ropes class. The only down side it is on a south facing hillside with no shade. It will be a heavy sunscreen and lots of water day tomorrow.
It is so hard to get the experiences and paint a picture of these trips into just a few paragraphs. Please drop me a line ask any questions, give comments and let me know someone besides Rebecca is reading and following along.
Andy aka Kayakmedic
Today I responded on my Mexican fire response in the engine. During this morning’s class the call came in for an unknown type fire on the outskirts of town. Now let me tell you how a fire response works here. The call somehow comes into “066” and get radioed to the fire fighters, Here in El Grullo “Oscar” the paid captain is the only one that can drive the engine. This is somewhat of a good plan because the streets are so narrow and choked with parked cars. More than once we had to do multipoint turns to get around parked cars, (I have trouble getting the mini van around here, none the less a large Fire engine) He is a very good driver! Oscar had to come from wherever he was, get the engine and respond while other firefighters responded via mopeds. It must have taken us 10 minutes to get less that two miles. One at the scene it turned out to only be a garbage fire that got into some tires. The bad part was, that the fire was at the water purification plant and may of damaged the utility lines that supply the plant.
Last night the beds that we bought for the firefighters were delivered, much to their surprise. They were very happy, something we all take for granite, a bed off the floor.
Today has been a full day of first aid and CPR training. (I think we need Cedar here to help. Last week at 3 ¾ years old, he taught his preschool classmates CPR, we are not sure if his teachers were ready for that or not)
Last night while both of the interpreters from our group (Gonzo and Jose) went to have a several hour meeting with the Mayor of Auytla. We went to at taco shop in the main square of town and were forced to order without help. We were all so happy that we managed to order in Spanish without any help. Of course when our food came we were let down, due to not getting what we thought we ordered. Despite that we all enjoyed our meal and finished to evening off by stopping at an ice cream shop. There is nearly no tourism in this region and very few people know any English.
I did learn the river in the gorge out of town runs year round and there is access on hour north into the gorge. (I’m thinking KAYAK run) I hope I can break free for a couple of hours before we leave and do some scouting. But I’m not going to hold my breath, our schedule is really tight. Tomorrow I will be spending all day leading the teaching of rope rescue, Sunday will be tactics, fire extinguishers and on Monday and Tuesday will be “Crunch Time Mexico” auto extraction.
We just finished a quick trip up to “Kent Washington”. “Kent Washington” is the name of a skateboard park up on the hill, paid for by one of the civic originations from Kent. The park unfortunately is just far enough out of town that it does not get used. ---Except by us, being that it is on the hillside it will be a great place to do our ropes class. The only down side it is on a south facing hillside with no shade. It will be a heavy sunscreen and lots of water day tomorrow.
It is so hard to get the experiences and paint a picture of these trips into just a few paragraphs. Please drop me a line ask any questions, give comments and let me know someone besides Rebecca is reading and following along.
Andy aka Kayakmedic
2 comments:
I am cracking up at your restaurant experience! What did you manage to order???
Your schedule sounds exhausting AND you are having fun and teaching!!! Before your teams arrival, how did they handle fires and medical emergencies? Is there a hospital/clinic in town?
Were there ANY emergency response services?
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