Operation Smile 2010: Guadalajara Day One

This year, spring in Mexico has been renamed the “Season of Smiles.” The Instituto Jaliscience de Cirugia Reconstructiva (The Reconstructive Surgery Institute of Jalisco, Mexico) is the second tour stop this spring in XanGo and Operation Smile’s joint mission. As is typical for these missions, the first day is open to children and families traveling from all around Mexico, anxious and hoping that their child will qualify for cleft-lip and cleft-palate corrective surgery. Monday, May 17, was no different, as large crowds of families came from remote areas of Mexico, some traveling ten hours or more by bus to change the life of their child.

This is an emotional experience. You can see the hope and fear revealed in the eyes of the parents who anxiously await their young child’s new lease on life. Operation Smile turns these anxious looks into smiles when the parents see their children come out of surgery. As we always do, our XanGo corporate staff has partnered with XanGo Distributors in Mexico to offer support. We work alongside doctors and patients to help with translation needs, documenting the biographical information of the would-be patients and taking photos. Distributors also provide XanGo® Juice for the medical volunteers to keep them refreshed as they so lovingly give of their time and talent. Together we’ll change about 100 lives this week.

We’ll keep you updated on the progress of this, our fourth mission to Guadalajara since May 2008. Keep up with us at XanGoGoodness.org as we work with Operation Smile to give back this spring and summer, changing hundreds of lives one smile at a time.