There’s a little girl named Jassel who lives in Welfareville, a slum in Manila consisting of 42 blocks of squatter homes. She’s 9 and has a heart condition that will eventually require surgery. Because her heart doesn’t pump properly, her blood becomes super thick and cannot circulate. So every so often she goes into the hospital for transfusions where they remove her thick blood and replace it with new blood. However, here in the Philippines, it’s not quite as simple as going into the hospital and asking for a transfusion. Because the mindset here about giving blood is so twisted and corrupt (many donors require ridiculously steep compensation), each patient who needs a transfusion must have a donor (or in this case 2) to give blood to replace the blood being used from the blood bank. Jassel went into the hospital Friday night and because her “usual” donors were not able to give (since they had just given blood recently) Marybeth (Naomi’s sister) and I went on Sunday to donate. After almost 4 hours of waiting to be screened, we found out that Marybeth could not give and since we had to have 2, we decided to save my blood for the next hospital visit (which will probably be sometime next week). However, God supplied other donors for Jassel and she received her transfusion.
The best part of the trip was after we decided to wait to donate. Because then, we went to visit Jassel in her hospital room. And even though she’s in the best children’s hospital in the Philippines, her room is still shared with 3 other children. I had met Jassel before but only very briefly and I expected to see her frail body lying in the hospital bed with very little energy and excitement. However, as soon as we walk in the room, she sits up and smiles the biggest smile I’ve seen in awhile. She gives Eskimo kisses and crinkles her adorable little nose. She immediately begins joking around and trying to pull pranks on the nurse. She critiques us, especially me and my glittery eyeshadow! But quickly stops after finding out that we have the same blood type and she might need my blood later on, haha! We prayed with Jassel and then left to go back home after a very long day at the hospital.
Later, I found out that Jassel had whispered to Marybeth that I looked like an aswang. Naomi then proceeded to explain to me that an aswang is something like a witch and a ghost combined with prominent features like really pale skin, crazy colored eyes, and wild rambunctious hair. To which I responded: “Okay, now tell me something that I DON’T have and I might be offended, but as of what you’ve told me so far, I think Jassel is very precise in her description of me.” I don’t see how I could be offended because even in her situation, she can smile and laugh and joke and be mean like any other 9 year old. I love that about her!
PS: Here’s an artist's depiction of what an aswang looks like…
Haha! So minus the wings, fangs, and nails, she wasn’t far off after all J
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