We've been back from Mexico for a couple of days now. It feels nice to be home, although I wish all my family and friends and I could go back to Mexico and live there until winter is over.
I haven't been able to blog for awhile. I wanted to write about last Saturday before all the details leave my brain. It goes a little something like this:
It was the day of the wedding and most of the bride's family and the groom's family (but mostly the bride's) were either buzzing around the little hotel where we all had been staying (we filled almost all 12 rooms of it up) finishing up wedding preparations, or had already left to decorate for the wedding and reception. A few of us didn't have much to do in the way of wedding preparation, so we decided to go have breakfast at a beach not too far away, primarily because of the delicious fried plantains with cream we had eatten there the first day.
It was a hot, sunny day at the beach. For some reason this particular beach had been empty both times we had eatten there, but the waves looked particularily good to the guys (Dave, Justin and Derrick) for body surfing. So we headed down toward the water to play before our food came out.
I had gone body surfing the day before myself, and still a little sore from being pounded under the waves, so I was not as entralled by the idea. Also, the pullback of the water was stronger than any of the other beaches, even when just standing in it up to my knees, so I was really nervous about the kids getting too close to it. The guys of course jumped through the huge waves and started waiting excitedly for some good ones to ride.
About 15 minutes into this, Derrick got caught up into a particularily huge wave. He curled up into a ball like Dustin had told us to do the day before if caught in a wave. He had been caught up for awhile and decided that the wave must be over, so he straightened up. The thing is that all the waves were big, and sometimes they came in sets of three. As soon as he straightened out, another wave crashed down on him and jammed his elbow straight into the sand with all it's weight. He disappeared for a minute, and the second he was able to get out, we all knew that there was something wrong with his shoulder. It looked completely sucked in, like there was a hole where his shoulder should be.
He barely made it back to our van, falling to his knees a couple times to avoid passing out, his brother and dad on either side supporting him. We needed help, but we did NOT want to go to a mexican hospital either. Jasa's best friend was at the motel still, so we decided to go there first because she speaks fluent spanish, and we were definately going to need a translator. The owner's of the motel were friends, and their daughter knew where there was a doctor in town who would help. So Dave, David, Derrick, Shawna (Jasa's friend), and the Mexican friend (whose name I never learned), all took off into Zihwatanejo (Justin stayed behind with the kids). The friend gave directions to Shawna, Shawna translated to Dave, and Derrick groaned loudly as we went over the hundreds of speedbumps.
We made a lot of wrong turns, and our friend had to make a couple calls and search a couple roads to find the right place. Zihwa isn't the easiest town to navigate. The streets wind this way and that, some don't seem to really go anywhere, and a lot of houses are located in tiny backalleys that you would never find without help. By the time we finally found the right place, it had been over an hour since Derrick's shoulder had been dislocated.
Shawna and the friend ran in to find the doctor, and out came a man dressed in a t-shirt and shorts, waving us in. As we walked the way up the covered sidewalk into his office, I saw he had a very large family having a gathering, all watching us with smiles. I could tell this wasn't the first time an American had come for help after playing in dangerous waves.
All of us walked into his "office". It was a dark cement room with a chair in the middle of is, a cement bed with a thin cushion at the side, and one single light bulb illuminating everything. He sat Derrick in the chair, and all of us gathered against the wall to watch. The doctor started by rubbing oil and Derrick shoulder to loosen the joint. It was easy to tell that the rubbing alone was making him see stars. Then the twisting the the yanking started. We all got dizzy watching, but Derrick didn't yell as much as I expected. The twisting and yanking wasn't working. The doctor had Derrick lay down on the cement slab. He placed his foot Derrick's armpit to have good leverage, and started the pulling and twisting. It didn't work. He left the room for a moment. When the doctor came back, he had his huge brother with him. Derrick was asking for tequila at this point, but they just had him sit back into the chair, and the big brother held Derrick tight to the chair. "You gonna be okay", he said reassuringly (although we think this may have been the one english phrase he knew), and the doctor started pulling Derrick's arm down and then he whipped it back up. Derrick's body relaxed perceptively. Our friendly doctor only charged twenty dollars, and it was the best money we ever spent.
When we got back to the motel, it was almost time to start getting ready for the wedding. We got dressed, and drove the hour to the Salidas. All I can say about the wedding is that is was beautiful. They had the ceremony at sunset, and between the golden light and the waves crashing on shore, it was the most romantic wedding I've ever been to. And with all of us being barefoot in the sand, it was the most comfortable one too. It was a great way to end the chapter of the wedding week.
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