The Nursing Home. There are so many people here that just don’t have ANYONE to come visit them. They sit on their chairs or in their beds, and do not do anything all day. So sometimes when we go to the nursing home to clean, we stop and talk to the residents there. This is Eddy. Many people stop us when we try to talk to Eddy, and they tell us to stop trying, “El es loco y no entiende nada” But i know he can understand us. He has his good days and his bad days. On the bad days all he can say is “Tengo hambre” and “Llevame cafe” (Im hungry bring me coffee) over and over and over, sometimes screaming it. But on his good days, he will hold our hand and talk to us about his family and we pray for him.
This man stops us every time we go to the nursing home, to ask us how we are, and every time I ask “Como esta usted” (How are you) he always replies “Aqui” meaning he is still here and alive. I can never understand him when he tells us his name but I think its like Giglio or something that sounds Italian-ish. He always has interesting things to say, such as what he heard on the radio that day, or about the earthquake here in Granada that happened a long time ago, or about is childhood.
The people at the nursing home are friendly and always want to talk about anything. Like for instance this one woman I met, who always tells me to “PRACTICA ESPANOL” and I will only learn if I speak it (Shes way in the background in the picture below) She decided she wanted to give me lotion when we were leaving one day and she squirted like a 1/4 of a bottle of lotion into my hands to take with me. I thanked her politely and then tried to find a place to put all the lotion that was on my hands 🙂
This is Teresa, or Teresita we call her. She always greets us as soon as we get there and she watches us sweeping, pointing out things we missed. She loves to share wi us and to have us put eyeshadow on her, to make her look beautiful. She likes to sing and dance as well. We have fun with her.
There is also a nun at Lugar de Ancianos, named Nilda, who I must say is the happiest, nicest, most hardworking nun I think Granada has to offer. I wanted to grab a picture of her but she was gone by the time we went looking for her. Perhaps one day I’ll get a picture with her.
