A la Dentista and Our Summer Job

So, although summer break will end in a couple weeks, I am finally caught up and will tell you what I have been doing all summer (when it´s not holidays). Basically our job is to babysit the 5 younger girls that are staying here all summer, which means we are with them ALL THE TIME!

These duties include: dentist visits, going to park, reading, drawing, bathing them, lots of cards (especially Uno and their version of Old Maid), playing with the new hermanas dog, and of course the girls still have to do their chores in the morning as usual. We also did a HUGE gardening project for a few days last week
(let me give you a hint: no lawn mower here, just big clippers and a lot of grass and weeds, took three full mornings to finish, but I enjoyed helping out with it).

I want to talk about this dentist we have here...
First of all, on the paper where his phone number is it doesn´t say Dr. so and so, it´s says Señor...hm...
We walk 15 minutes there, to a random white sign inbetween a few houses that says dentist
When you enter the gate, there is a home with a small room on the right meant for dentistry. The waiting room was the outside patio.

So, Ang and I take turns bringing them...go in with each girl, while the others wait outside and take a look at this simple office. Most of the tools are out in the open (though he has a hot box for ¨sterlizing¨some of the tools, he did not use it inbetween each girl, which includes drill, tiny mirror, and the pointier tools for checking cavities and such). A quick wash up of his bare hands (sans gloves let me tell you) and he´s ready to poke around in your mouth! No bib for your spit or mask for germs on his face, alright Bolivia dentists!

Basically, the mindset / reality of Bolivians and dentristy is that you don´t need to go until it hurts or you see something wrong in your mouth (like a cavity). There´s no yearly cleaning or dental checks, just the rough stuff, so to speak, not that anyone could really afford yearly checks anyway... Well, some of the girls have little cavities and he´ll just cap them. Others have huge cavities (they call huecos, which literally means holes !!) rightly so, they really are holes in their teeth, their teeth are basically gone. This is when they get them pulled. It is not rare to see a young person or adult with caps on their teeth or teeth missing around here....we will continue to go with the girls til we get through all the younger ones...not the best dentist, but at least he cares about the girls, doesn´t make us pay all the time, and he is within walking distance, plus he´s a pretty nice guy, at least the girls get to go!

Don´t worry, if/when I need to go to the dentist while I am here, I will NOT be going to him.