“Where are you going?” asked my friend.

“I don’t know. Someplace about thirty minutes away,” I replied.

“Well you’d better figure it out,” responded my friend with a chuckle, as we drove off to pick up Delfina for our house visit. 

Our rehabilitation promoters set up the house visits with the families, so I often don’t know exactly where we’re going. Two days before, Delfina had clarified directions and saved the family’s phone number in case we needed to contact them. We were all set. What could go wrong?  

I picked up Delfina and we headed out of town. Along the way, we asked for clarification and made the appropriate turn into Xepocol Antiguo. We saw the school, but we didn’t find the Catholic church the mom had mentioned. No worries, we would just call the mom.

No answer.

Many times people in the community can point us in the right direction, so we asked a couple of people we saw outside. They informed us we missed a turn a little ways back, so we turned around and headed down the road. As we drove the road narrowed until it turned into single lanes going straight or left. With two options of where to go and no evidence of a church, we didn’t know what to do. We asked for directions but were given three different answers. One seemed like a long way around an area we weren’t familiar with and not anything like the directions Delfina had received. So we attempted to call the mom again. Maybe she had missed our first call. 

No answer.We headed back to the other road, uncertain of where to go and what to do.  Should we just go back? But we were so close. How could we find the home? We called again. 

Still, no answer, and Delfina seemed a little frustrated the mom wouldn’t have her phone on when she knew we were coming to visit. 

Sitting at the junction in the road, we decided to call the ASELSI clinic. Maybe they had another number. It took some time for them to find the family’s chart, but eventually, they sent us two different numbers. While we waited, another family walking down the road said they knew the family we were looking for. So all six of them got in my truck with the three of us, and we headed back to where we had just come from. When we arrived at the same junction in the road, they told us to turn left. I hoped they were correct as the road was quite narrow, and I didn’t see a good place to turn my truck around. The mom had said the roads were wide. I wouldn’t want to see a narrow road, if this one were wide, I thought to myself. 

As we said our goodbyes and thanks, Delfina was able to get in touch with the mom by one of the other phone numbers. She met us a little way down the road, directed us where to park, and we walked to the house.

The day after she gave us the other phone number, she lost the phone. Concerned, she had asked her husband to contact us, but if he had tried, we didn’t have the therapy phone with us. By this time it did not matter, and we were all glad to have made it. We were able to complete our house visit and see the progress her son made in the last year with his PVC pipe walker.