Wa Gwan?!?!

That's Jamaican for, what's going on? For Jacob's summer break we got the opportunity to team up with the organization Great Shape! 1000 smiles and head to Jamaica to do dental work. When we signed up I wasn't pregnant and knowing how primitive our last dental trip was had me a little worried. This trip was completely different though. Great Shape works with sandals resort in Jamaica meaning we got to stay at a nice all inclusive resort.

We left Friday and flew to Miami and then Montego Bay. From there we had about a 2 hour drive to Ocho Rios where our resort was. Saturday was a free day for us to explore and a big group went to Dunns River Falls. It's a waterfall that you can climb up and explore. Everything I read online said it wasn't the best thing for a pregnant woman to do so I stayed at the hotel and read by our private pool. That night we got together for a meet and greet with the other volunteers on a sunset catamaran boat. We all introduced ourselves and then ate and danced. The waves got pretty crazy on the way back in which made for some awesome dancing ( dont worry I sat a watched)

The next day was orientation and we went to set up our clinics. Instead of going to different places like we did in the DR great shapes had split us into teams for the different locations. This meant we were at a place called Steertown for all five days. This particular town had raised money for a dental clinic meaning we had actual dental chairs, sterilization equipment, and town members to help us direct people. On our team there were 6 dental students, 1 dentist, 1 hygienist, 1 dental assistant, and me on sterilization. There were a lot of extractions, a few fillings, and few cleanings done in those five days.

The weather was interesting during our trip. The first day there it was extremely hot and i thought I was crazy to tagging along 26 weeks pregnant. However, mon-fri we got the tail end of a hurricane and it rained like crazy. It was actually really nice though because it kept the clinics cool. On our last day there it was starting to clear up so we were able to go scuba diving/snorkeling and kayaking.

The people of Jamaica are awesome! I could understand almost every other word except for the really little kids who i just smiled and nodded at :) They were all so nice and grateful for the work being done. At first we thought it was just a resort thing for the Jamaicans to say "Ya mon", like they were just doing it to make us happy. When we went out to the small towns though they were all totally saying it. It was awesome and they loved hearing us try to speak patois.

The trip was amazing and I'm glad I tagged along, even if I gained a bunch of weight and my feet swelled up. Serving people while getting a vacation is an awesome way to go.