Day 2 and Day 3

OK, so Friday. I had to leave the house around 7:30 am in order to pick up the walkie-talkies by 8 am. I make it to the school at about 5 mins after 8. And lo and behold, the director isn't there. There are people wandering around the building (the health fair doesn't officially start until 10). I had to kick all the people out of the building, which I hated doing. That is why the director should have been there. To do HER job. I digress. So the rest of the committee shows up by 9 am, and that is when we are meant to have a meeting. Again, no director. She is in the building by this point, but we aren't sure where. At around 9:15 the meeting starts. She doesn't have much to say, but I give out all my kitchen rules. I tell them that I am the kitchen Nazi, so please don't mess it up, and don't eat the food for the medical students. I am having trouble remembering all of Friday. I remember running up and down the stairs about 100 times with food to restock the medical break room. I remember agencies complaining that the food wasn't ready early enough (they were complaining at 11:30 am). I remember that we ran out of dentists at 6 pm, so we had to shut the dental floor down early. I can also recall one great JL member sitting in the kitchen and calling every dentist in the phone book to see if anyone could come and fill in. Unfortunately, no one could, but the fact that she made all those calls was such an incredible thing. I remember many JL members waltzing through my kitchen, and trying to eat the food that was NOT for them. And I also remember them giving me dirty looks when I told them they could not eat it. The event was over at 8 pm, and it took me about and hour to clean up. I got home around 9:30. Saturday. This time I didn't have to be there until 9 am. Again, we started at 10. This time, the morning was a little quieter. But as soon as 10:30 rolled around, I was busy. The food was being delivered, and I was trying to get it to where it needed to go. One of the elevators was broken, so we had to wait in line for about 20 mins to get lunch up to the medical break room. Every time I left the kitchen, I would always get stopped to do some translating. This was very difficult. I know conversational Spanish, not medical Spanish. They are very different things. Then the 4th floor (where the dental services were) lost power for about 1/2 hour. We had to cut the dental line off at 2 pm, and the dentists were still working at 6 pm (we had closed at 5). I also had to call the police on Saturday. There were some stupid teenage boys harassing everyone, and the security we had couldn't control it, so they asked me to call the cops. It took them 30 minutes to get there, and by that time the guys had left. My day was very similar to Friday: racing up and down the stairs with food and water. Running all over the building doing all sorts of random things. We shut down at 5 and began to tear down. My tear down was relatively easy, especially since Kate, who is doing my job next year, was there. We had lots of extra food left over, so we made a couple of homeless shelter runs. They were so grateful for all the food, and it was so sad to see these little kids. It just broke my heart. But at least I know they have food and cleaning supplies for a little while. I won't go over all the details of the tear down. Just know that I sincerely hope that next years director is much more organized, and know that I hope to have a more relaxing assignment from now on. I would definitely organize CARE Fair again, but not next year. I need a break. But it was all worth it to see the thousands of people come through and get immunizations, physicals, dental work, and many other services that they wouldn't have had the opportunity to get otherwise. I will volunteer next year, as should all of you reading this.

Here are most of us, we are missing the dental ladies: Michelle and Emily.

Back row: Wendy, Kathryn, Kelly, Michelle, Brittany, Rachel, Ellie.

Front row: Alise, Raven, Me and Lindsay.