Bienvenidos a Tena

Okay, I know I have been here for about 2 months now but I never really described the city where I am living. Tena is a town of about 20,000 people and somewhere around 400 taxis. It is divided into the northern and southern portions by a river, Rio Tena. The northern part is where I live and it is a little calmer. The southern part is where I work and has the big grocery store and bus terminal. Right now they are doing construction on the main street, the 15 of November. As you walk down this street, you pass stores with anything from fruit to internet, mattresses, toys, clothes, restaurants, butcher shops with boar heads and hooves, hostels, tools, anything really.
It is not a pedestrian first town and cars honk to let you know they are coming and not slowing down. There is a library and a couple churches but you would need to drive hours to find a movie theater. There are stray dogs all around.


At work, Nicole has recruited a few kids that come in to the clinic just for OT. Lately, all the kids have been showing up at the same time for therapy so it gets a little crazy. Maybe I am misled in my thinking, but the really low level kids just need therapy for normal development exposure and positioning. It does not really matter if they get this therapy from a PT or OT. When abilities increase, then you can focus in on what´s specific to your discipline.


This past weekend, a small group of us grabbed pizza and a drink on Friday. There is a student from the U.S. observing/interviewing mothers at work so she came. Apparently there is a Peace Corps volunteer here in town but I only met him briefly. Katie and I went on a hike to a pretty waterfall on Saturday called Las Latas. As Don commented to me the other day, there are a lot of waterfalls and rivers here – it´s true and they are gorgeous. Sunday, I went with some girls from work to Misahualli. We saw monkeys, boas, and little tigers. We took a powered canoe ride and learned about some medicinal plants and ways to trap animals using branches.