Journal

Oh what a weekend!!

2008-09-23T11:36:00.000-07:00

Three people from an organization called, Kids Against Hunger, showed up to visit with us and see what we were doing for disaster relief and what kind of programs we run on a daily basis. Two of them had never been here and the other had been here once before. They were also accompanied by Janeil, Andy, and Mary Beth. When they arrived Wednesday, the spent the remainder of the day getting acquainted with the Campus and getting ready for there busy week/weekend.

On Thursday we headed to the market with Janeil to check on how the supply and prices were on food post-hurricane. After lunch we headed to Ansefaleur to show them our church and school there and start a feeding program with that community. While we were there we visited the voo-doo temple. It was interesting going through this time because it wasn't very busy so we got to take our time and we had the pastor of our church with us and he explained everything to us in wonderful detail. On the way out we walked by this food stand and they had REALLY good chicken there, that I took the liberty of purchasing. IT WAS SOOO GOOD!!! Thursday night, since we still had no power was another early night.

Friday after breakfast we loaded up for a day in the far west. We started our trip by crossing what everyone called a high river. Several of us thought it wasn't the highest river we had every crossed but it was still to high for most trucks. Our first stop found us at La Baie, where we set up another feeding station. Several people stayed at that campus to organize a little after the flood, while the rest of us headed to Beau Champ to check out the market situation there and show our friends the Grants Ministry Campus. The road to Beau Champ was unbelievable, I mean I had not really understood why it was so hard for people to get to and from there due to the storm until I had actually seen it. The few creeks/rivers you have to cross to get there were SOO much bigger than they used to be and things I remembered seeing were not there anymore and new things had shown up. Once we were at the campus we got a chance to relax there for a while and see the progress they were having. The market to me, looked like it was doing ok, but to those who had been there before it was smaller than normal. I had a great time trying to find things to buy, it seemed that everything I wanted was unavailable. :( After the market all but two of us made our way to Salienes-Myette to see the progress on the new orphanage. Man does it look like it is going to be nice. Although, none of us expected to see what the storm had done to the Succoon church that the people of that area were using. It completely destroyed it, so hopefully we get the concrete church finished soon so that they will have a place to worship. We had a great time with the children while we were surveying the land. The kids and I shared some Kaneps, which for those of you who don't know, Kaneps are a seasonal Jelly covered acorn that is REALLY REALLY good. All of the sudden we found ourselves retreating because several horrifying rain clouds rolled in got us wet. On our return to the bay we got some really nice pictures or some of the destruction, and got the chance to talk to one of the other local missionaries in the area about how they were being effected by the weather. Same thing as we were hearing all over, hard to find what you need because of the road to Port-au-Prince being closed. Once back at the Bay we had a little lunch and then took a tour of the area and spent some time just hanging out at the bay until it looked like it was going to rain there too. What an unbelievable site it was to see what water could do to land.

Saturday was an on campus, relaxation day. We went to the market in the morning to see if the St. Louis market was post hurricane. It wasn't that much smaller than normal, there just wasn't as much produce or meat. After lunch, we went to the orphanage to show the Kids against Hunger crew, the orphanage as it is now. What a good time that was, it had been a while since I had seen the kids and they were excited to see some visitors.

The crew left early Sunday morning and then I spent the day relaxing and haven't been doing a whole lot since then. We are focusing now on getting ready for the October Medical teams.

The other two people that showed up were Frank and Chuck, who showed up Friday at about 10 in the morning and left Tuesday morning at 430 in the morning. They worked harder during that time period than anyone I have ever seen. They managed to fix 2 trucks, a dump truck, and our long flatbed, the bobcat, AND THE GENERATOR!!!! After a lot of worry and trial and error and winding up greasier, dirtier, and more frustrated than I have ever seen. It all ended in a VERY fulfilling trip for them, because of how much they managed to get accomplished.

Thank you all for prayers concerning the generator, they were very much needed and obviously very much listened to.

Talk to you all soon. Have a wonderful week.

Prayers

2008-09-11T23:17:00.001-07:00

This blog consists of some stuff that I have been struggling with and some other things coming up that it would be nice if you could put on your prayer lists.

Just a side note on everything that I talked about in my recent posts. Please be in constant prayer for all of the Haitians, our staff included, as we all join together to try and re-build from this disaster. Also, if anyone is interested in things taking place as far as disaster relief goes please feel free to email me or check out our website, www.nwhcm.org and click on the hurricane relief link.

Separate from that, PLEASE PRAY FOR CHUCK GRAHAM. He is coming in next week to re-build our generator so that we can be fully functional for our surgery teams coming in.

Thank you all for you constant support, prayer and financial. We really can do nothing without you and God.

HURRICANES!!!

2008-09-11T22:20:00.000-07:00

So, I just don't even know where to start. I mean, dang, one never thinks, when they see the footage on the news of a hurricane that they would actually ever live through one, let alone several. Well this guy did and, can I be the first to say that check that off your list if you are looking to experience it. I feel like Kate Winslet, getting ready to tell you all about what the real experience of Titanic sinking was like. (sorry if you did not see or did not like Titanic)

Faye and Gustav hit us with a little bit of rain in St. Louis and both was after the hurricanes had passed by us and it looked like Hanna was going to miss us so we were like "sweet." Then what does that "tropical depression" (yeah right), do but decide to stop right on top of Haiti and stay there for a couple of days. Thanks a lot Hanna. The wind and rain was just UNBELIEVABLE, I mean it fell in all sizes, directions, and several times I could have sworn that Tortuga and the mountains behind the mission were gone. You have to understand that I am from Pennsylvania so I am used to the snow making things disappear, but my gosh, when the rain does it, even I wonder what is going on. I don't know if fortunately is the right word but where I was specifically and the orphanage in Port-de-Paix were not that effected by Hanna because of all the concrete and the high walls everywhere. We just go wet from the rain and had to hold our hats on real tight. Our far west location on the other hand, was not so fortunate. They got some pretty serious flooding. From what I understand it came into all three building on that campus about 18 inches. They were able to get their stuff out of harms way though, for the most part, however they had to ride out the bulk of it from the roof of one of the buildings, since sitting around/sleeping in 18 inches of water did not appeal to any of them. After Hanna finally decided to move on, we had 2 BEAUTIFUL days of sunshine and got to survey some of the damage and make sure that our staff members and family were for the most part ok. Port-de-Paix got a good amount of flooding from the river and the ocean, to the point of it being over peoples houses, however the death toll remained at zero for us in the Northwest. Goniaves, however was NOT so fortunate, they got VERY devastated by Hanna, lots of death and destruction, and when that happens it does not bode well for the rest of the country. ALOT of commerce goes through Goniaves by truck and bus. When you can't take the bus the airlines get PACKED but lets remember that they also had not been flying for a while. So people are EVERYWHERE trying to get home or to family. Not only people are stranded but gas trucks, food trucks, etc can't travel either, so what you have gets sold quick and for ALOT more money than normal. Supply and demand is amazing.

Well after our 2 days of sunshine, Mr. Category 4 shows up and pounds us for 2 days. What I did not think was possible was that the wind and rain was more severe this time around than Hanna. WOW is all I could say. I mean, we could not keep up with sweeping water out of our facilities. Most places did not have enough time to recovery from Hanna fully so it just made all the previously discussed devastation worse. Fortunately right before Ike hit we were able to get our far west staff to St. Louis to power through Ike with us. During Ike I had the most eye opening experience I have had since I have been here. Moleon came to me to morning of day 2 of Ike, it was Sunday and POURING. I did not expect to see him because of the weather and he asked me for a tarp that had been hanging from one of the walls and some nails and a hammer. I of course sad yes, and then as he was getting ready to leave I noticed that he was crying and I asked him what was wrong and he said that his house was starting to lean to the right and he did know how he was going to keep it from falling on his wife, 3 kids, brother, and cousin. And it just dawned on me that, sure we have more than the Haitians and they might look at our possessions and want them, but when it all boils down to it what he wanted more than anything I could have given him was to be able to protect his loved ones during a hurricane, and there I sat dry as can be worrying about a little water on the floor. Man, what the heck. Fortunately, there are better people than me at the mission. One in particular that day was Curtis Rogers who heard what we were talking about and asked me if we had any wood at the mission and of course we do. So, he suggested we take a few 2 x 4's to Moleon's house and re-enforce his house for him. Moleon loved this idea and so the three of us headed to the back of the campus and found three nice beams and hiked up the hill to his house and in the rain nailed three boards to his house to keep it from falling down. The look on his face and the faces of the rest of the residents of that house were just AWESOME. Ike died down later that day and we have been storm free since then. Cross your fingers the others wait a long time or just miss us all together.

After it got a little nicer and drier the Rogers, the Jumps (a couple living with the Rogers for a year), Mischler (the security guard at the bay) and myself headed out to the west to survey the damage from Ike and try and bring back some stuff for them since they would be staying in St. Louis for a while. We had to take a mission truck to the river, cross it by boat, and then take a tap tap to the turn off to the bay, and then hike the 3 miles to their house. It was a lot of fun, I mean aside from it being ridiculously hot, and the fact that the tap tap (a 2 door toyota pickup truck) we rode had 27 people on the back of it and 2 plus the driver in the front. We got to make the hike with our overnight bags, a few army duffle bags to bring stuff back in and a 5 gallon jug of culligan water because the pipes at their house had broken and they had no water. When we got to the house, the families were surprised that the water had only been about twice as high as it was after Hanna, and the guy that was still out there watching the house, did a wonderful job of protecting what he could. So we spent the rest of the day, accompanied by about 20 children and maybe 10 adults, dumping buckets of river water in the house to make the dried mud turn to water so we could push it out of the house with tote lids. It was SOOO much fun to slide around with the kids. After we got done we took a walk through town to see some of the damage they got out west. It was unreal to go places where there used to be buildings and see a new ravine filled with water. The next day we got up and got what they wanted to take with them and got into a boat like the Tortuga boats only with a motor and no sails and headed back to Port-de-Paix. It was so much nicer than the truck and I am convinced that if the motor had not stalled like 6 times it would have been ALOT quicker. Oh well, we made it back and it was a wonderful trip. That was Wednesday, and today (Thursday) we said goodbye to Maureen who finally was able to get a flight to Port-au-Prince after trying for several days. She is getting ready to be enjoying her vacation in Italy, lucky (like Napoleon Dynamite if you can hear it). We also, got to say welcome back to the Castillo family, who arrived today after being gone for a long time. It was good to see them, and just catch up and brainstorm a little about things to come.

AND THE BEST THING OF ALL HAPPENED ON WEDNESDAY!!! GIGI DECIDED THAT SHE WAS READY TO WALK BY HERSELF AND NOW THERE IS NO KEEPING HER DOWN. AND MY GOODNESS IS SHE QUICK.

Stay tuned, who knows, maybe there will be more. ;)

Back in Haiti

2008-09-11T21:57:00.000-07:00

So, I got to the Philadelphia international Airport and to my gate by like 530 in the morning August and who do I run into, but someone wearing a Northwest Haiti Christian Mission shirt. I was like, "wait a minute," thats weird. However, it was Maureen Moore, so it was not all weird. It was actually pretty cool to be traveling "with" someone even though we were not together on the flights. Passes the time in the airports a little better though and just gives you a sense of calmness(not sure if that is a word). After several flights and a lot of waiting, we arrived at the mission to be greeted by more Americans than I expected and ALOT of excited Haitians, staff and non-staff and of course 5 dogs. Good times. It was so cool to see all the faces of my friends, that I hadn't seen since May, get so excited that I was back. I almost did not know what to do with myself, because there were soooo many people shouting things at me in Creole (which I don't speak very well) that I tried to get the driver to take me back to the airport ;). Just kidding. It was cool to find that I actually understood and spoke better Creole when I got back than I did when I left. I am not sure how that happened since I did not study it for 2 months. Oh well, must have been a God thing.

I spent the next couple of days just getting an idea of what took place while I was gone and what needed to be done before a group got here or just in general as far as up keep. Fortunately, Moleon was here and he gave me the run down on mostly everything that happened over the summer. I am telling you what, if it wasn't for Moleon, I would not be able to do my job very well. That man busts his tale for me and he loves to do his job, its quite a testimony. We spent A LONG time staring at a depot of ALOT OF RANDOM STUFF. It was a lot of fun to organize it though, cause we found some pretty interesting things in the process and found some new solutions to some old problems. I mean, you would not believe the amount of stuff that we had in the dining hall for like weeks and weeks. It was insane.

I had several great work days, with some of the guys I got to be good friends with in the spring , and we got the campus looking pretty good for upcoming visitors.

AND THEN IT HAPPPENED......

CONTAINERS!!!! AAAAHHHH!!!!!!!

I was not ready for that to happen yet. However for the most part they were not that bad because all but 2 were medical, which made them really easy. One of the other 2 was from Canada, which means it was Ensure and Glucerna, etc for the feeding programs, and A BUNCH of clothes that I am getting ready to organize to give out to some of our branch locations. The other of the 2 non-medical was a delivery from the "Feed my Starving Children" organization. For those of you who don't know what I am talking about, here is the 411.

We got hooked up with this organization and what they provide are these vacuum sealed packets of pre-made meals (rice, veges, etc.) that when cooked provide 6 servings (or 6 meals) and we got soooo many of them, it is really exciting. We are going to be looking into organizing feeding programs, as part of a disaster relief drive, in the very near future. Look for more on that later and, to the best of my ability, more constant updates.

Summer 08

2008-09-11T21:26:00.000-07:00

So... back by, apparently popular demand, is a blog post from me, Matthew C Sereno (aka the Haitian Sensation).

It has been a while for me and for that I apologize. I would like to take a moment to just involve everyone in what has taken place in my life over the last several months. After a very exhausting but very exciting spring time in Haiti during the last half of April and all of May, which consisted of ALOT of on campus construction, I headed home for the summer.

As many of you know I am involved in a faction of the Children's Cancer Foundation, known as Hike for a Cure. What this encompasses is an annual hike on the Appalachian trail. This year we were planning on trying to do 100 miles however the entire first day was all up hill so we only did 50 miles again. It was still a blast though, I LOVE hiking and camping. After that I devoted just about 3 and a half weeks to the closet thing I have to a brother as he got ready for his wedding. We did a week at the beach for his bachelor party/vacation (which he needed because he is a Kindergarten teacher, just bought a house last August, and was doing wedding stuff all year). The wedding was probably the most fun I had had in a while. He is the biggest Steelers fan I have ever met and for a wedding favor at the reception everyone got custom made "terrible towels" (which are a steelers thing the fans wave at the games). They had the names and wedding date on them. We were waving them the whole time. Ok so, that is it for that.

The rest of my summer was spent at my most favorite place in the whole world (north of Florida that is).

CAMP EPACHISECA, translated that is the:

Eastern

PennsylvaniA

CHristIan

ServicE

CAmp

I ABSOLUTELY LOVE IT THERE. It the a christian church camp in my area and I have been working there for 6 or 7 years. I spend the better part of 4 and a half weeks there and help the camp manager do whatever it is that he needs me to do. This year was especially AMAZING because another guy and I got to kind of head up the Middle week, which is 6th and 7th graders. I got to be the missions moment for the week, which means everyday I got to talk to them about Haiti for about 15-20 minutes. It was cool to see them get fired up about it and ask sooo many in depth questions. I was kind of caught off guard a little bit, but as always, I managed. I even taught them a little bit of Creole. For parents night, I had them sing TOUT BAGAY DEJA BYEN. It was really awesome. There are so many exciting and also possibly controversial things getting ready to take place there that I ask you keep the decision makers in your prayers. This camp is getting ready to celebrate it 75th anniversary so it is very important to many people and hopefully many generations to come.

Well that about sums up the summer for me. Sorry that I did not write about this sooner.

Support Letter

2008-06-16T07:21:00.000-07:00

Friends and Family,
In August of 2007, I began what was to be a one year internship with the Northwest Haiti Christian Mission. My responsibilities during that internship were to be helping with the planning and implementation of the day-to-day operations of the Chalet Orphanage. In the two months that I participated in that internship, God opened a new door for me, one in which I can utilize even more of my particular gifts. I have been offered and have accepted the position of the Assistant to the Executive Director/Haiti Office Manager. As the Assistant to the Executive Director my job duties will be to help Janeil keep up on everything going on, i.e. communicating with Haitians and Americans working with and for the mission and staying ahead of emails he receives. As the Haiti Office Manager I will be responsible for assisting Jody, Jose, and Heather with all the things they do on campus on a daily basis to keep things running, and be the go-to guy for the Americans that come in to work with the mission as well as the Haitians that work with and for the mission. I feel that God has gifted me with organizational skills and with interpersonal skills, both of which I am able to utilize in this job.
I am very excited to be taking this step and am unsure how long God will use me in this capacity. Since I will be working for the mission now I will be in Haiti 9 or 10 months out of the year, returning to the states 2 or 3 times each year. With that in mind, I am asking you to pray fully consider partnering with me in this work. I am asking for your support, both financially and in prayer. In order for me to be able to do this work here in Haiti, my monthly financial support need will be $2200.
In order to keep my supporters updated on our work here, I will be providing regular email updates. If you would like to be in my email list, please send me an email requesting and update to namsadida1@hotmail.com. For those of you who received this via email, you are already on my update list. There are several websites that you can access which will also keep you updated on our work here in Haiti; www.serenoinhaiti.com is my site. The links to the websites of Northwest Haiti Christian Mission and the other people laboring for Christ here in Haiti are there as well.
I would like to thank everyone in advance who supports me by prayer or financially. I am looking forward to serving the Lord by helping the Haitians work towards a better life now and for eternity.
**Oh, and by the way, as you can see from the picture at the top, I WOULD LOVE FOR YOU TO VISIT!!!!

Help Matthew Sereno serve in Haiti:
I want to partner with you in your ministry by:
Praying daily weekly monthly (specific prayer needs are financial stability of the mission, health and safety of all the Haitians and Americans working here on a day-to-day basis, patience and humility for me, being able to bridge the language gap.
Giving financially weekly monthly; in the amount of$
Giving this special one-time gift of $
Please send me information:
Weekly by email
Send support to: Northwest Haiti Christian Mission
P O Box 829
Versailles, KY 40383
1-502-695-7870 – KY Office
1-859-400-0481 – Haiti Office

Name
Street City
State Zip
Telephone
***when sending checks to the office please do not put my name on the memo line, instead include a note with the check. IRS regulations
***you can also donate online at www.nwhcm.org, just click on make a donation and go to the “make a general donation” tab and be sure to make sure you put my name in the comment section.

Monday, January 14, 2008

2008-01-25T16:30:00.001-08:00

Today the group is supposed to show up so after a very long night of broken sleep, I got up and took a shower ready for the last day of laundry, cleaning, and organizing before they get here. With the ladies generous help we finished everything we needed to do an hour before the group arrived. To our surprise only about a dozen people out of 40 showed up and we found out why that was after they got settled and we all sat down. Apparently the plane that was supposed to bring them to Port-de-Paix got a flat tire in and when they got it changed and tried to take off again the landing gear would not retract all the way. So the rest of the group had to spend the night in Port-au-Prince while they attempted to fix the plane. Not being able to help them, we just got the people that were here something to eat and all situated in their sleeping locations and then met for dinner and devotions. After devotions we kind of hung out for a little and then the luggage arrived so I went downtown with some of the Haitian guys to pick it up. There were A LOT of bags. It is how much stuff one group brings. After that it was just about time for bed so I relaxed for a little while and then went to bed. Peace.

Sunday, January 13, 2008

2008-01-23T18:32:00.000-08:00

So today, there were no groups here and I got up to go to church and never made it there because I got the wonderful pleasure of babysitting Josiah. So we had some breakfast and walked all over the place and played a lot. After church, we did more laundry and cleaning to get ready for the group which was supposed to be showing up Monday. So today was just the full timers and Glenna and Linda, so we just kind of relaxed most of the day playing with the children and babies and doing a little organizing and whatnot until it was time for dinner which was wonderfully prepared by the ladies. I try to keep out of the way when the cooking is happening because I am not a very good cook at all. After dinner everyone turned in early because there was nothing really to do and it was still a little cold and gross. Talk to you later. Peace.

Saturday, January 12, 2008

2008-01-23T12:13:00.000-08:00

Today started at 330 for me since I had to make sure that the group was all up and ready to go by 430. Once I was showered and around I got everyone up and we fed them something small and coffee and we all piled in the mission bus and headed to the airport. The trip seemed like it took forever, and I was just about to be very sick when we pulled up in front of the airport, WOO-HOO. We got there at about 545, and there were no planes waiting for us and very little Haitians already waiting there, so we had great position to make both of the flights that we needed to. It was now a game of sit and wait for the plans to arrive to take everyone to Port-au-Prince. Fortunately, no got antsy waiting for the planes to show up, which happened at about 650 and they showed up back to back so everyone was in the air with all their carry-on’s and the one check bag that got forgotten by 720 which made everyone at the mission breathe easy. I came to find that after the bus dropped us off the driver only waited 25 minutes before he left so I had to find my own way back to the mission. It was ok though because I took money with me to the airport and just caught a moped to the tap tap station and then took a tap tap back to the mission. The rest of the day was cleaning, cleaning, cleaning, and laundry, laundry, laundry. We broke to eat and then got right back to it. We worked all day and put a little bit of a dent in it, and since we did not meat for devotions because there was no group in, after dinner we played cards and hung out a little with an ease amongst us because travel was incident free this time and we had a wonderful week with this group. Generator off time now though so to bed I go, peace.

Friday, January 11, 2008

2008-01-23T12:07:00.000-08:00

Today was the last day for this group so we finalized some of the projects they had been working on and since it did not rain Thursday they got to go to the Far West and see where they would have been if it had not rained all week. This was wonderful for them because at least they got to see where the money that they raised was going to go. Janeil took them to a few other places while they were out there so that they could see what the mission was doing as far as expansion. The rest of us that did not go on that tour stayed back and worked in the supply closets and played with the babies and the children and the granmoun. After lunch I took the girls to the orphanage again so that they could say their good-byes. They wanted to ride mopeds but Jody thought that was a little far and said “nope.” Once we got to the orphanage we decided to take the children swimming since it was Friday and not a school night. So the four of us and about 80 kids walked to the beach to go swimming. It was really fun, although, Becca found out the hard way to walk very carefully and pay very close attention when wading through the water, because she took one too many steps and wound up shoulder deep in the ocean. The other two ladies thought that was quite hilarious as did the children, and Becca did not even miss a beat, she just kept playing with the children. We let the children swim for about an hour and then headed back to the orphanage. When we got back we handed out some little cross necklaces and played for about 30 or 40 minutes longer and then headed back to the mission with Mislin and Tailin. The way home this time was incident free, and we got cleaned up for dinner and hung out until it was time. The nightly activity was just about the same tonight except that the generator stayed on until 11 so that people that got back from the far west late could get their things around and be ready to leave the mission by 5 o’clock. Since I am getting up to go to the airport with them tomorrow I am going to bed now. Peace.

Thursday, January 10, 2008

2008-01-23T11:48:00.000-08:00

Today there was no rain, WOO-HOO. I still did not send out the laundry because I wanted to make sure and give the ground a good chance to dry. So since it was not raining we tried to hang out as much as possible but just keep a watchful eye on everything. Today I took a group on a hike up the mountain to this gorgeous look out that gives you the opportunity to walk through some of the villages and see what kind of terrain the Haitians deal with on a regular basis, and then to get to this beautiful grass area where you can see a lot of St. Louis and the mission and just relax it is amazing. What a funny experience this was because since it had been raining so long the paths were muddy and slippery and the only thing to grab onto if you did not want to have a thorn in your finger or cut yourself was the person in front of you. After we rested for a while and took a million pictures they wanted to walk further up the mountain but one of the ladies did not so I took her back to the mission since I needed to go pay for the laundry anyway. We got back around 230 so I just hung out the interpreters and the security guard while I waited for the laundry to show up. After the laundry the rest of the group showed up and we all sat down to eat, and then had devotions. Tonight consisted of popcorn, cards, soda, and of course…LAUGHING. We hung out until generator off time, and then all went to bed because we were tired from hiking up a slippery mountain. Peace.

Wednesday, January 9, 2008

2008-01-23T11:47:00.000-08:00

Day 8 of rain has officially begun and I am tired of it. Fortunately, it is raining through the night and after dinner so although it is cold and cloudy during the day we are still able to get things done. Even though we were all having so much fun cleaning and organizing, today was a good day to take people off campus since it is market day. so around almost all of the group, along with Roland headed downtown to see the market. Since it had been raining the market was smaller than it normally is but everyone still enjoyed themselves and we spent about an hour there walking through to all the different stands and checking out everything that there was to see. Since the walk was apparently longer than some had anticipated a few of the ladies decided to moped back for the convenience and the experience. The rest of us walked back to the mission and for fun I took them a different way home so that they could see as much of St. Louis as possible. They enjoyed it a lot because this group is full of people that love people and that is what they got to do while they walked through towns and villages. I took them to the soccer field that the schools use and we hung out with the children that were there playing in the muddy grass. We got back to the mission with a little time to spare before dinner so some of us showered and cleaned up a bit, others washed hands and went straight to playing with the babies and the children, and others found other tasks to finish working on while they had time. After dinner and devotions we played cards and hung out in the dining hall laughing and chatting about the trip getting ready to come to an end and what we still wanted to do. The generator went off at 10 and to bed we went. Peace.

Tuesday, January 8, 2008

2008-01-19T06:36:00.000-08:00

Today it is still raining, which puts us at day 7, blah. It’s another day where they could not go to the far west to work on their project. They were still ok with it though because I was keeping them plenty busy with all the stuff I had to do and the children in the programs loved all this attention. After lunch it was nice for a little bit so 3 of the girls and Steve wanted to go to the orphanage and see the kids so Roland, Ne Ne, and I loaded them up in a tap tap and headed to the orphanage for the afternoon. Being that they had never been here before the tap tap ride was fascinating to them because of how many people they jam in the back of a pickup truck. When we got to the orphanage, the children were really excited to see some new faces. We spent about an hour and a half there and thought it looked like it was getting cloudy again so we loaded up with 4 extra for the ride home and headed back for dinner. On the way home the newbies got to experience car trouble in Haiti because we ran out of gas and then got stuck in a puddle. We made it home just fine though and in time for dinner so that is all that is important. After dinner and devotions some people started up some card games and the rest of us just sat around and traded stories about experiences of the day or of life that related to the trip so far. The generator went off around 10 so we all called it a night. Peace.

Monday, January 7, 2008

2008-01-19T06:35:00.001-08:00

Today is day 6 of rain and the small group from Oaklandon that is here is being very flexible for having never been here before. They raised money to start building a bathhouse for Mike and Teresa Grant and with how it’s been raining they may not be able to go. So instead of being disappointed about that they willing offered to help me get re-organized from the 140 person group that just left. To start we had to keep the laundry going in the one washer/dryer we had, since it was to rainy and gross to send anything out. Second we got tried to figure out how to dry all the wet tents, air mattress, and pillows that were left from the big group. Several of the gentlemen were quite handy also and were able to get some of the little fix-er-upers done for me. After lunch several of the ladies and I went into the supply depot to start organizing that train wreck of a room. Being that this is the first day for the first timers we did not do a whole lot except unpack bags and I gave them a tour of the campus and they spent some time loving on the children in the programs. After dinner and devotions we all hung out chatting until about 10. Then the power went off and I was sad, but ready for bed. Peace.

Sunday, January 6, 2008

2008-01-19T06:34:00.000-08:00

Today is day 5 of rain and is really not making me happy because there are a lot of wet tents to get dried and put away and A LOT of laundry that needs done. In spite of that we still had a group of about 12 showing up today so we found other ways to get organized and clean up before they get here. I did not go to church today because I wanted to get most of what I could get done finished because the group was supposed to be here around 1. There are two groups coming in this week, but one is immediately going out to the far west to spend the week with Miss Pat because her daughter is part of the group. So we only got about 15 people, which compared to what we just went through will be like having no group at all. They arrived around 130 and after directing them to their appropriate dorms they sat down and had a bite to eat after a long flight day. After a quick lunch they spent the rest of the night before dinner setting up where they were going to sleep. We met for dinner and then had devotions and found out that they were intending on leaving Tuesday to go out to Beau Champ for three days to begin construction on a bath house for Mike and Teresa that they raised money for. Most of them were pretty tired so after devotions they only chatted for a little bit and then it was just me, myself, and I. WOO-HOO for silence, but now it is time for bed, Peace

Saturday, January 5, 2008

2008-01-19T06:33:00.002-08:00

My day started at 3, keeping the group motivated and organized and focused on getting everything around to leave. We had about 80 people and carry-on’s that had to make it to the airport, so the plan was to load the women, children, and elderly in the bus and put the men and the luggage on the big flatbed and take them all to the airport at the same time. However, someone decided that the flatbed was not suitable for travel and wanted to rent a tap tap, so we took the first two flights to the airport on the bus and flight would wait for the bus to return or to get them. Well after it was all said and done the last group of people did not leave the compound until about 630 which I thought was a little late, but it was not up to me and my job was to make sure they all left and had everything they needed and then to clean up the mess. So once that last group pulled away, it was time to powerhouse the cleaning, and since it was so rainy, we could not send out any laundry and had all these sheets and clothes to wash. By about 915 we were done with pretty much everything and sat down to chill for a little bit before lunch. After lunch I set up my tent with the help of Marvin, a gentleman that is staying until the 13th. Then I moved all my stuff up to my tent and got it all set up. After lunch we just kept doing laundry and finding little things that needed done to get ready for the next group. We did that until dinner and then called it a night and just rested and all turned in early because of how long of a day it was. Peace.

Friday, January 4, 2008

2008-01-19T06:33:00.001-08:00

What an emotional morning for a lot of people because half of the group had to leave and go to Port-au-Prince today so that everyone could be in the states by Saturday afternoon. The only people that stayed were the eye team because they had a day of surgery and patients to see and they were planning on going to the orphanage today to see the kids and check some of their eyes. It was nice because they left around 11 and that gave us the whole day to start cleaning up and getting everything around for the next group. That is pretty much what I did the whole day until they got back and then it was time for dinner and we just ate and did devotions and hung out getting everything around for a very early morning departure. No one was looking forward to leaving because it has been rainy and windy and nasty since Wednesday night. I feel asleep around 1130 and woke up at 1 and then back to bed until 3 am. Peace.

Thursday, January 3, 2008

2008-01-19T06:31:00.000-08:00

Oh what a day Thursday was, after breakfast and devotions the fun began. Cara and I had planned on taking whoever from the group that wanted to go, to Laforge to hike 30 minutes up a mountain to see an ex-voodoo priest’s house that has been turned into a house of prayer. Well since it had been rainy and windy all night everyone thought that we would cancel. Little did they know that we were in Haiti and unless you are driving through a river or sailing you keep your plans so the trip was on. Also leaving the mission that day was a very daring group from Tomoca, who was planning on going to Tortuga. There was a break in the rain and the clouds and we all thought it would be ok so we sent them on their way. Back to Cara and me, who counting us and the interpreter had 11 people which was a small group considering there were 141 people at the mission this week. We did not have a truck available to take us to the church in Laforge so we just walked downtown to catch a tap tap. When we got to the town square there was a bunch of mopeds parked waiting for people to get on so I thought it would be just as easy that way so I sent everyone on a moped to the church. Mistake number on was taking a moped with this many people. Mistake number two was not getting a price for the ride. Now to give you a little background, we are talking about maybe 2 miles from start to finish. Cara and I have both ridden mopeds that route before and paid between 4 and 8 Haitian dollars each way, so I did not think to ask how much. So after a very interesting ride through the mud and water we arrived at the church ready to hike. Here is where the fun began, because I had 9 Americans with me and apparently because of the rain, they wanted 20 Haitian dollars a person. This was absolutely ridiculous, so me a Jocelyn (the interpreter) argued with them and tried to negotiate a more reasonable price. I started with what it should have cost and even made it up to 10 Haitian but they simply were looking to rip us off and were on their way to the police station when the Haitian gentleman who donated the land for the church came out and talked with them and just paid them to get them to go away. I was very angry that he paid them because the chances of them actually going to the police were very very slim and then they would have had nothing. Oh well though, at least the Americans got to see an interesting situation. After all that excitement was over we started the hike up the slippery mountain side to see this house of prayer. When we got to the top, we did not find a nice house that, according to a few people, you could stay in overnight and pray if you wanted. We found a run down, dirty; building that was in no condition for visitors. There were two buildings to the side of them, one looked like a kitchen area and the other was kind of a fellowship hall. Both of those buildings had paintings in them that to me looked like gods that the voo-doo priest would have worshiped. In the fellowship area there was a circle in the middle of the room, where sacrifices or rituals would have taken place, if in fact it had been used for voo-doo. After about 30 minutes we took a group photo at the house and headed back down the mountain. Because of the pricy ride there we had to walk half way back to the mission so I could get us a less expensive tap tap ride. We took a different route home through the rocks and the river. Just as we got to the market and we were waiting for everyone to catch up we could see the rain literally moving toward us and it was so funny to see everyone frantically trying to get their ponchos on before they got wet. There was one other girl there that had been to Haiti before and her, Cara, and I just watched and laughed because we knew that was what happened in Haiti during the rainy season and that it would not last very long. Back at the mission we showered and had lunch and for the rest of the day kind of just hung out at the mission and organized some of the stuff that the groups had brought in. Shortly after we returned the group from Tortuga returned safely and just before the water started to get to choppy. For dinner the four past and present interns, Elevus, and Rolgard (the two full time Haitian staff members) ordered out from a Haitian restaurant and went down to the Grants house and hung out and ate away from the group because Friday two of the girls were leaving. It was really fun to just be away from everyone and enjoy some Haitian food and laugh about past times. After devotions we all hung out in the dining hall for a while then the people that had to leave in the morning went to finish packing and went to bed. The rest of us hung out until about midnight and then called it a night. Peace.

Wednesday, January 2, 2008

2008-01-19T06:29:00.000-08:00

Today I spent the day hanging around the mission with Kara and Erin and doing some little things that Jody and Janeil needed done. We went back to see Sonel and I spent a lot of time down in the Miriam Center. At noon the Tomoca group felt for the Orphanage and Heather and Erin went with them and Cara took a group to the market on her way to Lafarge. That was all fine and everything was working wonderfully, until 230 came around, when all the laundry decided to return and what seemed like everyone on campus needed me to do something for them. By the time 4 o’clock came around and the girls returned I was ready to keel over and die. So during and after dinner I did not do a whole lot of anything but sit in the dining hall and talk with people about upcoming events in the mission, how they trip was going, etc. After dinner some of the interns and interpreters sat around and chatted while we waited for everyone to go to bed. Wednesday night was extremely windy, rained a lot, and I was up for a lot of it. That’s ok though because it made me feel right at home and it made me laugh to see everyone scurry for their long sleeves. I finally got to sleep after having to find a new bed because of how many people moved inside due to the weather. Peace

Tuesday, January 1, 2008

2008-01-02T19:38:00.000-08:00

WOO-HOO today is the start of another year. Today was probably the slowest day that this team is going to get to see. In Haiti, New Year’s Eve is not the celebration day; New Year’s Day is the celebration day. They do not celebrate the beginning of a new year, they celebrate the fact that they lived through the past year. Also, January 1st is their independence day. So once we were all up and ate, I spent the morning catching up on some random things and Erin and I went to see Sonel and Flober for a little while. After lunch I went with the Tomoca group to Anse-a-foleur to help with their VBS program and go to the VOO-DOO temple and the VOO-DOO monument. I did not make it to the monument at the top of the mountain because one of the ladies in the group decided when we were half way up, to go back to the church. So we walked back to the church and hung out until the rest of the group was back. I ride to and from Anse-a-foleur was about 40 minutes and was nice to get to see some of the country that I had not seen before. We got back about an hour before dinner and for me it was back to helping out everyone with little things that needed done and going to see Sonel and Flober again. After dinner and devotions I spent some time with some of the interpreters and the other interns that are here for a short while. We were up until about midnight and since there was a group planning on leaving at 5am, we thought it best to call it a night. Peace.

Monday, December 31, 2007

2007-12-31T19:38:00.001-08:00

Today I did not do a whole lot of everything because I spent the entire night throwing up and with real bad diarrhea. So after I got up to make sure the laundry was taken care of, Maureen gave me some medicine and I slept until 1230, got up and made some popcorn for a VBS program and then went back to bed until 530. I felt better so I took a shower and hung out in the dining hall with everyone until it was time for dinner. When everyone went over to the nutrition cafeteria for the hot dog roast and smores I stayed back and made popcorn for everyone to snack on during the New Years Eve talent show. The talent show started at 730 and went until about 10. At 1015 everyone moved to one of the many roves and watched the fireworks being set off from the roof of the church. After that those who wanted to stay up hung out in the dining hall and watch the New Years Eve party at Times Square. Happy New Year everyone. I would like apologize for the shortness of my journals but we have been so busy lately that I am just paraphrasing until I get some more time to elaborate. Peace

Sunday, December 30, 2007

2007-12-31T17:53:00.002-08:00

Well today is the first Sunday for me and I got to go to Chalet and see the kids because I needed to go downtown Port-de-Paix to see if a shop was open. When we got to the orphanage the children were really excited to have visitors and get to spend some time with the Americans. Church was of course a good time; we all sat upstairs with the children. After communion Rony and I went into town to try and buy some popcorn seed for Monday night. The shop was not open so we headed back to the orphanage and hung with the children until about noon. On the way back to the mission the truck got a flat tire and so we got to hang out in the middle of the road in the heat for a while, while they changed the tire. When we got back to the mission we had lunch and said goodbye to a group of 45 people who were taking a trip to Tortuga. The rest of us just kind of worked on some stuff around the mission getting ready for the busy week to come with all the eye surgeries. Sunday night a group from New York showed up and I spent some time getting acquainted with them and making them feel comfortable because most of them are first timers to Haiti. We also had to find places for them to sleep. Although we have a lot of beds and space for tents, the New York group makes 141 people staying on the mission compound. That is a lot of tents and beds and just people in general. After devotions and our meeting for Monday I was not feeling very well so I just worked on some emailing and journaling. It’s time for bed now. Peace

Saturday, December 29, 2007

2007-12-31T17:53:00.001-08:00

I got up today really excited about the agenda for the day. Since it is Saturday, we got to take a group to the market to see how the Haitians do their shopping. We had also planned on going to La Fordge and the waterfall. Half of our group did not want to go to the waterfall so we organized 7 interpreters and about 50 Americans and headed to the market, which is about 2 miles from the mission base. Once we got to the market we spilt the group up into the group that was going to the waterfall and the group that was going back to the mission. What an adventure this was because in each group there were only 2 or 3 people that knew what was going on and where they were going to keep track of 20 plus Americans. Around 1215 we got to the church in La Fordge and took a break for lunch before we headed to the waterfall. The walk to the waterfall was easy and quick, mostly because people were tired of walking at this point. We spent about an hour and a half at the waterfall swimming and playing. Once we got back to La Fordge we lost Cara and Vogly because Cara wanted to stay and visit with some people from that community. The rest of us made our way back to the market at which time half of our group decided to take a tap tap back to the mission and the rest of us walked. Saturday night consisted of hanging out at the mission and getting the luggage that came in sorted and put away and trying to find a place for the new group to sleep. After dinner and devotions some of the interns and interpreters sat around and chatted about times past. Then it was time for bed so away I went. Peace

Friday, December 28, 2007

2007-12-31T17:52:00.000-08:00

I made it to the airport and got checked in and to my gate in plenty of time to be able to get some breakfast and relax before my flight so I made some phone calls before I became international. Once on my flight I tried to go to sleep but the gentleman beside me felt the need to wake me up every time the stewardess walk by or had something for us or whatever, which I was not thrilled about because if I am sleeping obviously I do not need anything. I made it to Port-Au-Prince just fine and found myself at the airport still by myself. I was ok with that it just seemed weird that I did not see anyone else. It took me an hour to get my luggage because my carry on snuck passed me and I did not see it again until later. One of the Haitian men that work with the mission at the airport found me and took me to the buses where Jose, Roland, and 50 or 60 Americans were waiting to depart for our bus ride across the country. We finally started our 120ish mile drive to Port-de-Paix at 1245 and arrived at the mission at about 7. The roads were a mixture of paved and dirt/rock/puddles, but it never was uncomfortable. I got to ride on the roof of the bus for the last 2 and a half hours of the trip which was amazing especially because it took me the first 4 hours to convince them to let me on the roof. Once we got into Port-de-Paix we hit a couple of traffic jams and it seemed that it took a really long time to get to the mission. We arrived in St. Louis and the bus driver did not take us all the way to the mission so we had a little bit of a hike at the end of our ride. As soon as I got to the mission Janeil recruited several guys to go with him back to the bus to gather the entirety of luggage and pick up the Americans. That took us almost an hour and a half and was taxing on the back and legs but not so bad because there were a lot of us to get the job done. Finally at the mission it was time to sit down eat and visit with familiar faces and new faces. We chatted and got organized until about midnight and then hit the sack. Have a great tomorrow. Peace.

Thursday, December 27, 2007

2007-12-31T17:51:00.002-08:00

So today was flight day number one for my return trip to Haiti. I did not have to be at the airport until 1230 so I got to spend the morning with my boys and my parents getting around and chillin. We grilled Venison stakes for my last meal, and they were wonderful. My first flight was the most amazing flight of my whole life because after the 10 minute take off and 10 minute landing we were in the air for a grand total of 19 minutes. For those of you who are wondering why, it is because I flew from Williamsport to Harrisburg. After the unbelievably painful flight, I spent 3 and a half hours in the Philadelphia airport. Once on my 650 flight to Ft. Lauderdale I immediately passed out for the 2 and a half four flight. I was unable to check my luggage all the way to Port-au-Prince so I had to pick it up in Florida and take it to my hotel with me. I got to the Comfort Inn and all checked in and was on my way to McDonalds to get some food when I got stuck in my elevator for 6 minutes, and the only reason I got out was because someone opened it from the outside. I thought that was quite hilarious. Oh well, I am in Florida incident free and have eaten so now I am going to go to bed because I have to get up at 5 to be at the airport on time for my flight to Haiti. Peace.

Sunday, November 18, 2007

2007-12-31T17:51:00.001-08:00

Well we got packed up around 1130 and what an adventure that was because we got to drive the new four wheeler that Heather and Janeil got. So loading the van was a lot easier than unloading it because we did it in a third as many trips. Once we got all tore down and I made sure that they did not need my help anymore I began my 8 hour drive home. It was absolutely wonderful until about an hour and a half left, because it started to snow. But I made it home just fine, and had a wonderful time at the convention.

Saturday, November 17, 2007

2007-12-31T17:49:00.000-08:00

I got detoured on my way to the convention today, but I am the man so it worked out just fine and I still made it there on time. Same as the other days, I was the only one there until 9. It was looking like it was going to be a much slower day today, since I did not have any people stop and visit until like 850ish. It was a pretty normal day at the convention. I met a lot of people that have been to the mission or work with them stateside, which I really enjoyed because they knew who I was and now I got to meet them. Saturday we ate in the food court and just hung out all night at the booth entertaining Ne-Ne and Josiah.

Friday, November 16, 2007 - Convention Day 3

2007-11-26T10:59:00.002-08:00

The first full day of the convention and it started with me being the first one at the stand so I got everything organized and waited for the rest to show up. While I was waiting I talked with some interesting people about possibly bringing some kids during the summer and wanting to know what they could do while they were there. The rest of the crew showed up between 8:30 and 9, as well as most of the people walking around so it was nice to have some re-enforcements/more educated people. Not much to tell for Friday, I spent most of the day babysitting Ne Ne and Josiah, and visiting with friends that are here for the convention. I opted not to go to any of the workshops because I was having too much fun with the kids and the staff and I am such a people person that that fun never ended with all the people coming in to talk. At noon we all went over to the food court for lunch which was absolutely packed but really good, and it was amazing that we found seating for 7 plus the little ones. After lunch Rachel, Andrea, Erin and I took Ne Ne and Josiah from Heather and Janeil for a while. Between 2 and 5 I sat at the booth with the kids and chatted with people that work with the mission in one way or another. Dinner on Friday was AWESOME, because we had Skyline Chili, which I had not had in a very long time. Rachel had never been there before so I was insanely jealous that she got to experience it for the very first time. After dinner I spent the remainder of the night at the booth. It took me 25 minutes to find my way out of Cincinnati because I do not remember the route anymore. I made it just fine and spent about a half hour chatting with the Mussers and then hit the sack. Peace.

Thursday, November 15, 2007 - Convention Day 2

2007-11-26T10:59:00.001-08:00

Oh what a day Thursday turned out to be. It began with a wonderful breakfast with the Mussers and then HA led me to the gas station so that I could get gas and told me how to get to the convention center. I arrived at about 8:10 and started to organize all the pieces for set-up that day while I waited for Curtis and Janeil to show up. Janeil showed up, followed by Curtis, his brother and a friend of his, and the fun began. This church that we are trying to build was way beyond our area of expertise until Curtis brought us extra hands. We started at about 8:30 and broke for an hour for lunch and still did not manage to finish putting everything together and all the tables set up and organized until almost 4:30. We only got done that soon because Maureen showed up before lunch to help us guys do the church and Erin and Laura Jo showed up to help hang everything and organize the tables. The frame of this church is six 3 inch bamboo posts that are not straight, hollow, and very easy to snap. The top is seven eight foot quarter inch posts going from back to front and four 10 foot quarter inch posts from end to end. We had to put two corner brackets on each post and tie two of them to items in our display and the rest to the tables for our display. After it was all together and standing on its own, we moved on to putting the roof on. This consisted of 14 pieces of grass thatching and we need 15. Fortunately, Chris (Curtis’s brother) was inventive enough to make it look presentable. After we got the roof on the four of us went out to the trailer to unload a Club Cadet, which is a glorified golf cart that Janeil had donated to his family last week. The fire marshal was in checking everyone’s booths to make sure we were not going to burn and for us that consisted of fire proofing all the thatching, which was done at the office warehouse, have working smoke detectors and a fire extinguisher, and disconnecting the batter of the Cadet and making sure that there is only a quarter tank of gas in it and making sure the battery is disconnected. Once we found the battery and found the something to test the level of the gas and found it to be ok we VERY slowly pushed it off of the trailer and made our way to our booth. It works very well as another stand to hang things from and makes for a real nice seat/place to play for Ne Ne and Josiah. After the Cadet was in place we were done setting up and got to relax, WOO-HOO. The main session started at 6:45 and ended around 8:30. Most of us hung around until about 915ish while the crowd died down and then called it a night. On my way back to the Mussers’ house I got lost in downtown Cincinnati because I am not familiar with the roads and directions anymore but after about 10 minutes of trial and error I figured it out and was back to the house at about 10:30. I chatted with the family for about an hour and then hit the sack. Peace.

Wednesday, November 14, 2007 - Convention Day 1

2007-11-26T10:38:00.000-08:00

So I got up today at 5 and got ready to start my long drive to Cincinnati, OH for the National Missionary Convention. I was really excited to get there and see everyone from Haiti. I got on the road at about 5:45 and headed West on the PA turnpike for 163 miles. I had to stop 30 miles in to get some fuel and breakfast, which did not thrill me because turnpike prices are not the best. I found out that at some point on Tuesday I came across something that I was allergic to and it was making the hardest part of my trip really really difficult. I had to atop again 80 miles into my trip and at this point I was getting really annoyed because I am the type of driver that does not like to stop unless I need gas, so to have done it twice already was not cool. Oh well though because this second stop proved to be very effective at both waking me up the rest of the way and working the allergy attack out of my system. WOO-HOO, on the road again!!! So 5 highway changes and 380 miles later I pulled into a parking garage next to the convention center and since I got there and hour before you were allowed to start setting up I sat down at a little café and got some lunch and Janeil and did some emailing. I went over to the convention center around 2 and found our booth and waited for Janeil and Curtis to show up so we could start setting up. An hour and a half later they finally arrived, having had some difficulty getting out of the office. So we begin the process of building a model of a Haitian church. It was quite interesting because there were only three of us and this church is 20 by 8 and 10 feet tall. To witness this was quite interesting because no one has set this up before and we had no instructions for assembly. We worked until about 545 and then cleaned up and went to Parkside Church for a dinner for the missionaries and their families. It was very very good and Maureen was there and Elizabeth too. Liz was there because she goes to that church but Maureen was there for the dinner because she is helping the mission work the booth for the convention. On our way to the dinner I called the Mussers, who are the family that I am staying with, and let them know when I was going to be there and made sure I knew how to find their house. I had my first fly in the ointment on my way to their house, I ran out of gas. I came to find out that the gas needles on Chevys fluctuate so when I parked my car and thought I had enough gas to get to the house and that was not true. I called HA and he brought me some gas and I got to follow him to his house. Once we arrived at the house I spent about an hour catching up with HA and Ronda and Joel and then was way ready for bed. Peace.

THE GOAT MINISTRY

2007-11-26T10:33:00.000-08:00

The Goat Ministry
Ok, so apparently I have a little bit more of a fan base than I thought I did with my daily journal and there has been a request for an elaboration on the Goat Day’s. To bring everyone up to speed, “Goat Day’s” refers to a new outreach ministry that we are starting at NWHCM, which a lady and her husband have felt led to head up. Their names are Dave and Sue, and sometime ago Sue felt a calling by God to buy pairs of goats and give them to needy families. She kept this to herself for a while, because she was afraid that people would think she was crazy. So time last year for one reason or another she told someone at her church about this and they went nuts with it and did research on the value of a pair of goats to a Haitian family and what it would cost to buy them, and then they made cards and sent out support opportunity letters giving people the chance to purchase a pair or simply donate to the ministry. In case you are wondering, a male and female goat, in Haiti is equivalent to 5 months salary for a teacher and I am sure much more to an everyday average person, that is of course, if they do not eat them. Selling the milk and breading them to sell the children is where the money comes from. Dave and Sue are really excited about this ministry and when they found out what it was going to cost to buy each pair they thought they would not get very many. Well, while they were in Haiti in October we had to make 2 trips to buy goats and distribute them to people that we knew needed them and that had a good re-pour with the mission. In total Dave and Sue were able to purchase 40 goats (20 pairs) and hand them out to the people themselves. I did not get to go on either of the trips because of being sick for one and having a previous engagement for the other but from what I hear, they were very successful and seeing the goats when they brought them back was a real treat as well. It was really funny to see the people loaded in the back of this truck right along with the goats. On the first trip the mission had seven teachers in mind out in the far west that they wanted to give the goats to because the church/school that they work for could not afford to pay them enough, if anything at all. So when they got this pair of goats that equals 5 months worth of salary for them assuming that they just do not eat them. The other pairs of goats went to families that were struggling as well and they joy on their faces when they received this gift was just so fulfilling. To purchase all the goats that Dave and Sue raised money for took two trips and to give out all the goats took about a week. This is going to be an amazing ministry and if you would like to get involved please drop me a comment and I will get you the appropriate email address to do so. Peace.

Saturday, October 27, 2007

2007-11-09T20:57:00.001-08:00

Once 4 o’clock came and people started to be up and about and ready to roll things moved much quicker. Since the buss did not make it to the airport the last time that they tried, we took two trucks and just split up the group. At the PDP airport it was sit and wait time until the sun came up and the planes could fly. I was on the second flight and to my benefit my luggage had not gone to Port-au-Prince yet, so I was able to go through it and change some things around. We finally got our flight to PAP and I slept for the whole thing. At the PAP airport we caught a ride to the big airport and got in line for our luggage check time and to begin our first customs check point. This is where we also split up for our flights. Only three of us were going to Ft. Lauderdale, the rest Miami, so we said our good-byes and went to our respective lines. Once through customs we did not have time to go to the lounge so we just met up with a few that were on a later flight in the boarding area and waited to fly to the states. Once in Ft. Lauderdale me and the two ladies I flew there with made it through customs incident free and found out at the baggage check what a difference the states are from Haiti, because we got yelled at 3 times in 10 minutes for things that Haitians do all the time. I now had a different flight than the 2 ladies so we parted ways and I made it to my gate where I had a little bit of a layover, so I got some food and relaxed. Flight number 3 was the same as the first 2, A NAP. I just love sleeping on planes because it makes them go so much quicker. Once we touched down the fun began, hello Chicago, love the airport, and hate the lack of time I get to get around. It’s all good though because I can handle just about anything, and made it to my gate with lots of time to spare. Got some dinner and waited until nap number four, which sent me into the coldness that is Pennsylvania. That is ok because once I got my bags and made a quick phone call I was in the car and headed back to Konieczny’s house for the night. Oh, how I love incident free flying. Peace.

Friday, October 26, 2007

2007-11-09T20:56:00.000-08:00

So after going to bed at 245 and getting up at 330, I spent the morning in the kitchen with Kathy, keeping her company while she made breakfast and watching the critters crawl around in the kitchen. It was amazing how many of them there were with two people walking around. I got to play with one of the rat traps, can’t wait to see if it works. At about 445, the Owens family appeared and I helped them load the truck and Mike, Jeff, and I saw them off. They had to leave today to go to the states for a while. About that time people started to wake up and it became livelier and I got reinforcements in the kitchen so I found elsewhere to cause trouble. Friday was supposed to be a Tortuga and hike day but because of the rain all night and through breakfast Tortuga got canceled so Erin and I decided that since it was not a nice day we would have people help get the place ready for when the group left, so we spent most of the day cleaning, organizing, and finalizing stuff that we had been putting off. I tried to spend some time with Sonel and Anita since I am leaving tomorrow, and also the Heaven’s waiting room kids. Since most of the people that were going to Tortuga went on the PDP trip instead it was nice and quiet around campus, which made it a very relaxing day. At about 10 I decided to go and put the recovery room back in order, for Maureen, since Jeff and Bob were done with their plumbing work (and it was air conditioned). After lunch I fell asleep in the OR for about 90 minutes and then continued re-organizing the recovery room. We finished a little bit before dinner and headed upstairs to get ready. As I was heading upstairs I got some disturbing news that was not something I needed to hear the day before I was leaving. As it turns out Flober is not interested in helping with taking care of Sonel when he moves into the house that we rented for them and that his father is not planning on staying there as much as he was going to. So 12 hours before I am supposed to leave I am faced with Sonel not having a care giver while I am gone. When Erin and I presented this to Jody she decided that since right now it does not look like we are going to be putting anymore boys in that house for a while and since there were two entrances and a door in between rooms and they were meant to be rented individually anyway, she would allow Sonel’s father and his wife to stay in one room and Flober and the other boy to stay in the other room. I was really happy about that as was Sonel, because he was really worried about who would be taking care of him. After that episode it was time to hang out and relax for the last time with most of the people that were left on the compound. Devotion and share time was nice because the people leaving get to talk about what they liked the most and the memory that will last the longest. After that we played Shanghi again and then went our separate ways for bed. I opted to attempt another all nighter because it is easier to sleep on the planes when I am actually tired. It worked out quite nicely and I wound up only getting about 2 hours of sleep. For most of the night it was raining and terribly windy and there was this lady in the birthing center that was going through a terrible birthing process, wailing and singing and praying all night long. Peace

Thursday, October 25, 2007

2007-10-25T23:08:00.000-07:00

What a wonderful mood I was in today when I got up, I was ready for a day of fun and packing and getting ready to depart. Little did I know that my day was going to get completely switched, rearranged, and befuddled, it was nothing that I could not handle though because I am really chill like that. During breakfast I got recruited to go shopping for 6lbs of sugar, 5 Machetes, 2 Creole Bibles, and 21 Brooms. So I spent until 10 writing 2 journal entries and checking my flight itinerary for Saturday. At 945 I took Pat and her husband up the mountain to look at the plateau and to the boy’s new house to see where they were living. I really enjoy hiking to this location although every time I have done it we have taken a different uphill route. This time we went the long roundabout way and with a little stroke of luck we made it where we wanted to. On our way down we picked up a few boys that stuck with us until the mission gate, it is nice to have some tour guides. When we got back it was time to find Gesner and get going on our shopping spree, I could tell that he was way super excited. I got just as frustrated shopping today as I always do, but we managed to get everything that we needed expect the Bibles, which he thinks he can get tomorrow morning. The brooms were a little more than they were supposed to be but I guess that is because today is not a market day. I really like the machete styles that they had, they were a little different, than the ones Jacque used to sell, and I did not buy one though. We got back around 1 and had some lunch and then I made some popcorn for the Bible college students, although I did not have enough seed to make them the same amount I did Tuesday. After popcorn cooking it was time for the Heaven’s waiting room party, so Erin and I cut open and duct taped trash bags together for them to be able to play on and we got them all together. First things first, animal crackers and marshmallows, followed by something very new for them, Pop Rocks, which we are sure they did not know how to handle. While they were eating marshmallows off of each other’s face Erin took the liberty to get most of them dirty with the shaving cream, which they did not leave unpunished and she was quickly covered in it as well. Several of the team members that had been taking pictures and feeding them also wound up with cream on them from the vicious battle. At about 340 we took the little ones to the pool and I, shortly followed by, Erin got into the baptistery with the children to make sure that when they put their head under water, they came back up. Mostly we were there for the children that cannot move on their own. They did not stay in very long before they were taken to their rooms to get dressed. After the little ones were safely out, the fun began. It was just like being in the room with them except we were getting wet. We played for about 40 minutes and it looked like rain so we got them out and put away. After they were all passed off, it was time to drain the baptistery and Erin and I thought it was be a wonderful idea if we sat in it while it drained. It was kind of like adult swim but only ankle deep water that was slowly draining. It was nice to spend some time with Erin since between being sick and busy we have not done that in a while. Once I was done LOVING the water, I changed and Roland and I hopped on the 4-wheeler and headed to the Orphanage to get the luggage that I needed to take back to the states with me and a bag that was left here in June that belonged to Justin Crider. What a long interesting drive that turned out to be, because apparently the 4-wheeler does not like Roland, because it died 5 times on the ay there. We finally made it and were only at the Orphanage for about 30 minutes and I got everything I was after and we jumped back on for the long haul home. The ride home was not as nearly as bad as the ride there, because it did not stall at all, which thrilled Roland a lot. It was quite interesting to do the trip with three full pieces of luggage. We returned while share time was going on and Miss Tulenko motioned to me that there was food for us in the kitchen. Indeed there was, and a piece of the desert for both of us, Roland did not eat his so I shared it with Mike who showed up earlier than I thought he would. After dinner it was time to get packing so I took a shower and got my stuff around for the night of packing. Didn’t I get a little helper though, Miss Elizabeth graciously helped me get all my stuff packed and into 2 duffle bags that way under 50lbs. WOO-HOO, I am ready to go now and I can worry about other things, like my website. I still did not get caught up on that, I apologize. Liz and I sat up until 1240 journaling and talking about the patients and Cincinnati, which is where she is from, and the National Missionary Convention in November. At 1240 we were both tired so that was all she wrote for the day. Peace.

Wednesday, October 24, 2007

2007-10-25T23:07:00.000-07:00

Ok so I forgot something very big that happened on Monday night after we got back from La Fordge, some of the ladies had a party for the Gran Moun. They took them cokes and had me make them some popcorn. Apparently they really loved it, and were pretty wild from what I heard. I did not got because I opted to hang with some of the younger people and talk young people things. Ok now onto Wednesday. So today was a really lazy day for me, I helped Liz for a little bit after breakfast but Erin was really sick today so I just did some computer work and kind of hung around the dining area with Kathy and make sure that Erin did not need anything or get disturbed while she was resting. Between working on school prep, I went down to Heaven’s waiting room and wrestled with the boys, went to recovery to see my two children, hung with Jody’s girls, and babysat for Heather so that she could work on some accounting for the mission. Today was kind of a lazy day for me in that I did not do a whole lot with the team; I just left my availability open for anything that came up. When the group got back from taking the Gran Moun to PDP for lunch and the Orphanage for a children’s program, I lost my babysitting job to Mary Beth, which was ok because it was time to do laundry. After dinner we played Shanghi again and had a grandiose time doing it. After that it was bed time so that is where I went. Peace.

Tuesday, October 23, 2007

2007-10-25T06:43:00.000-07:00

No getting locked in the prison today, just regular morning routine an then breakfast. After breakfast, I went down to the recovery room to help Liz get what she needed to so that she could go to La Fordge with us and see the waterfall. What a morning we had, my gosh, she tried Sonel’s IV again and was successful so we did not have to switch him to the pill equivalent of Maxipene, which is good because everyone prefers the IV. After we managed to get the IV and checked temps on the rest of the patients, we moved onto little Miss Anita. We had to take off her dressings today so that Liz and Shawna, a nurse that came in with the women’s group, could look at them and determine whether or not her legs could be unexposed. We had to photograph her wounds so that the ladies go email the doctors and get a second opinion. Neither of her parents we available so she had to go in with only me as he familiar face. I fell so badly for the patients because they have this mindset that everything is going to be painful until they actually figure out what step we are on and then everything is fine because it really isn’t painful. Anita is so funny because she likes to take control of all the removal so that she knows that it is not going to be painful. Man was she screaming up a storm anyway though, but we got through it and mama finally did show up, which helped a lot. After we got all her dressings changed, and fixed her with a sucker it was just about lunch time so we headed upstairs. We figured that the post-op patients that have been waiting could wait a little bit longer for us to eat. After lunch Liz went back down to handle what patients were left and I stayed in the dining hall to cook some popcorn for the Bible College students that Mike wanted to give them in between classes for a snack. It was a good time because I love cooking popcorn. After I cooked the popcorn I got ready to go to La Fordge for a VBS and to go to finally go to the waterfall. There were so many people going and gifts for the programs that the truck had to make two trips, so I opted to be on the second truck because Liz and I needed to email some of the doctors about a few of the patients in recovery room. So we emailed and I played with Anita for a little bit and then we headed to La Fordge. We got to the church and the programs had already begun and were well into being finished, so we just watched and took some pictures until they needed help and were done. I decided to go swimming early, so I walked across the grass from the church and waded out into the river with a few of the local children. When the programs were over, we loaded up the truck with the supplies that needed to go home and the few people that did not want to take the 30 minute walk to the waterfall. The rest of us started our journey accompanied by almost all 200 of the children that were present for the VBS. The walk was a little rocky and one lane most of the way, but the end result was WAY worth it. The waterfall came off of the mountain into this cove we you can swim and jump off a rock and you can even stand in the waterfall if you are brave enough. There is also an awesome river rock that is about 15 feet off of the water and that was a lot of fun, I even did a belly flop off of it in tribute to camp EPACHISECA. After about 30 or 40 minutes of fun, we headed back because it looked like it was going to get dark, and when we got back to the church we put 23 people on the back of the mission truck for the drive back to the mission. The trip back to the big river consisted of throwing candy off the truck to the children that were chasing behind us. Back at the mission it was about time for dinner so we got ready and ate. After dinner and devotions we were all tired from the day so it was an early night for most people. Peace.

Monday, October 22, 2007

2007-10-24T20:13:00.000-07:00

Today I made the mistake of going to the bathroom before leaving the house and got locked INSIDE, Mike and Teresa’s house. Fortunately, Mike did not leave that much before me so he heard me when I shouted his name. It was really funny because he thought I had left before him and I had thought that he heard me go into the bathroom. Once I was let out of the prison we headed up to breakfast. After breakfast I went over to Jody’s house to spend the morning working on three journal entries, some pictures, Creole CD’s for Innocent, and some school stuff for the spring semester. It was quite a relaxing morning. At about 10 I took a few people on a hike up the mountain and through some of the town. It took about an hour, and was fun because we picked up a few tour guides, which was ok because I had only been on this trail one time and was not that familiar with it. They took us a different way than I went the last time, but the result was the same and I saw some different stuff. After we visited the plateau we headed to a soccer game that we could see being played while we were on the plateau. When we got there we found that it was actually a real soccer game, uniforms, refs, goalies, and everything. It was cool to see an actual soccer game, but the cloud started to roll in and we had to head back to the mission. We got back and it was time for lunch so we ate and then after lunch I hung out another group of people asked me to take them on the hike again, so once again up the mountain I went. This on the way there we stopped at the house that we rented for the boys and I showed the group around the house and then we took the walk. This time when we got back I was dog tired so that I went back to Jody and Jose’s and did some more internet school stuff until dinner. After dinner and devotions a few of us played Shanghi and relaxed until about 11 and then I hit the sack. Peace.

Sunday, October 21, 2007

2007-10-22T07:11:00.001-07:00

Today is my last Sunday in Haiti for two months and I got up feeling much better but missing breakfast and went downstairs to help Liz in recovery and check to make sure that Sonel still wanted to go to children’s church today. I did not have any clean Sunday clothes; I hung out outside of the Citadel with the children that are not allowed in because of their clothes. We had a wonderful time listening from the outside and hanging out where we could not get yelled at. After communion I Liz and I went over the get Sonel changed and out of bed and take him to the children’s church location. As I was getting him ready I noticed little Anita in a little pink dress and just chillin eating some bread, so I asked her if she wanted to go to and she lit up like a Christmas tree. So I took that as a yes and the four of us went to children’s church. Today one of the ladies in the new group did the service and she taught the children about Elijah and the prophets of Baal. It was really funny to see her try and get the kids to act out things, and it seemed that Sonel and Anita enjoyed not being in the recovery room for a little bit. After the lesson was over Anita wanted to find daddy because she had some breakfast for him so we walked over to the church and Sonel wheeled behind, and we found everyone coming out to go home and daddy was right there to snag up his little one and eat some bread with her. After church we all just kind of hung around until lunch was ready. Liz and I went down to take care of the patients and get them ready to be moved outside. While we were doing that Erin came down looking for scrubs because there were going to be 25 baptisms and we did not want the people to have to wear wet clothes. After a bit we went upstairs for lunch and then right back downstairs to begin empting the recovery room so that the plumbers could start the work they need to do without getting anything dirty or ruined. Fortunately, we had some volunteers to help because Maureen had a lot for us to do and we found a broken toilet that was overflowing with dirty water and floaters. It was nothing I haven’t seen before and Liz is medical so we quite nicely tackled that obstacle quickly and efficiently. The main reason we did that was because it smelled so bad that we felt bad for the patients that had to sleep in the same vicinity as it. According to the plumbers the clog is in the drain somewhere because a plunger was not doing the job, so we cleaned up best we could fixed the odor issue and told all the patients not to use that bathroom. By that time it was about 430 and we were all done downstairs so, per request, I took a couple of the people on a little hike up the mountain to see some of the land and meet some of the people. We picked up a tour guide that spoke very good English and I let him take over and he led us to a real 11 on 11 soccer game, uniforms, referees, the whole nine yards. It was really cool to see their skill and how many people were gathered to watch. One of the guys and I wanted to see if we could sub in but our guide thought that was a bad idea and the clouds started to roll in so we headed back to camp. When we got back it was almost time for dinner so I jumped in the shower and got ready to eat. After dinner I chatted with some of the women that came in and tried to get a CD player working for Jody before devotions. After devotions, I let Deb use my computer to do some internet stuff and then headed down to Mike and Teresa’s to sleep there again. I did a few emails, chatted with one of my boys and hit the sack. Peace

Saturday, October 20, 2007

2007-10-22T06:41:00.001-07:00

So the team left this morning and after passing out on the concrete floor I was awoken to 30 Orange shirts walking around above me. It was a long good-bye process and after the bus was gone we all went right back to bed, until it was time for breakfast. I woke up to almost missing breakfast and not feeling well at all. Today turned out to be a putter around and clean and organize day. I went down to recovery after lunch with my computer with the intent on working on my journaling and hanging out with Sonel since his dad was not there but I wound up falling asleep for about an hour and a half. When I woke up I found that the group had arrived so I went upstairs to mingle because there were some people in this group that I knew so it was nice to see familiar faces. We had an earlier dinner because the group had been traveling all day and was a little hunger and then we just relaxed, mingled, and got beds ready before our first devotion. After devotions I took Mike up on his invitation to use one of their extra beds, took some Benadryl, and went to bed way early. Sorry for the short report but nothing really took place today because I was sick and did not feel like doing a whole lot. Peace.

Friday, October 19, 2007

2007-10-20T18:12:00.000-07:00

Well it was the day before departure for the medical team and only one surgery was scheduled and the OR/scrub help had the day off so they all decided to go on the second goat trip. Roland and I, after showing the new house to the boys (minus Sonel), went to Port-de-Paix to try and buy 2 wall crosses, a cross necklace, shoe laces and coffee. I got ragged by the guys on the tap tap because I was falling asleep on the way down due to being sick and tired. Once we got there we stopped at the Orphanage so I could get some money from Wisley. Only, I found out that Wisley was not there like he said he was going to be, so we had to call him so he could tell his wife to give it to me. After we finally got the money, we caught a few mopeds and headed downtown to start our shopping. Oh what a day this turned out to be. We started out looking for shoelaces and the lady that we usually buy them from was not set up today so we walked to a few other stands and found no match. When we moved on to the wall crosses, we did not have any better luck, only finding one place that sold them and the ones that they sold had really not good looking plastic people hanging from the cross. We walked around so long for this failure, and wound up at this catholic organization where we ran into a lady named Joan Martin, who ironically enough had a message for two people that were at the mission. After resting for a minute we headed to two retail stores to get coffee and then head back to the mission. We found coffee and some cold drinks, and I bought some chocolate for Erin in celebration of a job well done with her music class, and then we headed back to St. Louis. On the way back we saw Mike and Vogley on Mike’s 4-wheeler and were keeping pretty good pace with them until we had to stop to let someone off and then they left us in the dust. Once we got back to the mission, it was only 230 so I went down to recovery to hang with the patients and wound up falling asleep in Sonel’s wheelchair for about an hour. Then I went up to work on the rest of the pictures that Rolgard needed for the website and responded to some emails. I got the chance to chat with some of the medical team that I had not see all that much because of being in the OR the whole time they were here. By the time it was time for dinner we were all wondering where the group that went for goats was, because it was now dark and being that they were in the far west and it was the day before the group flew out, we were getting a little nervous. We made it through dinner and started devotions before the goats and the people showed up. When they did we all breathed a sigh of relief and took a short break so they could get ready for devotions because it was the last night for the group and it is always a big share night. It was really fun to hear them all share stories and insight and encouragement. After about an hour of sharing, people packed and chatted and relaxed. Most of them called it an early night, I tried to stay up with some of the teens but I was getting sicker than I was when I got up so I passed out at like midnight. Peace.

Thursday, October 18, 2007

2007-10-19T04:34:00.000-07:00

Today everyone has a very full agenda, getting the house ready for the boys, going to the prison and the brothel, and trying to get most of the patients discharged and out of recovery. I decided to stay on campus and go to the boy’s house and help get that ready. First I had to go to Sonel’s aunt’s house to get his bed frame and mattress. I recruited Wayne and Sinclair to go with me and papa Daniel and the four of us carried the two pieces back to the mission. It was really hot today and not fun to start the day off with that kind of work, but we got it done and then started to get ready to go see the house. This house was amazing, it was 2 rooms were big enough to house at least 6 beds and there was a 3rd small room where we are hoping to be able to build shelves for their personal affects. The location of this house is quite perfect of the people that are living there. It is like this little village, there are three houses and the community seemed to be really excited about the boys coming to live with them. After we checked the place out and decided what we needed to make it livable, we headed back to the mission and got everything around so that we could get most of it done before lunch. I helped them take everything to the house AND GOT TO DRIVE THE GATOR, but did not stay because I almost killed myself and just about took off Erin’s foot. So instead of going to the prison and the brothel I took over in the recovery room for one of the ladies so that she could go, so I spent the day being the assistant and falling asleep with the patients. They got back from the prison/brothel trip around 330 and a few of them said that they were glad they went but felt very uneasy at the brothel. At 430 I went to the recovery room to get Sonel ready to go to a concert that Erin was putting on at the church with her music class. We headed over there at about 5 and watched them get ready and practice their songs. The concert was really good, and I was glad to see that pretty much everyone went to support the children that worked really hard to learn to play these instruments. After the concert and dinner, we all got to relax because the surgery team was done, there was nothing major going on in recovery and it was Thursday and everyone was tired. While we were chillin in the dining hall I found out that I did not have to work the overnight shift in recovery because there were no mission critical patients and the overnight nurse could handle it. I was way super excited as was Sinclair and took the chance to go to bed earlier than I usually do. At around 11 it was pretty quiet around and I decided it was time for bed. Peace.

Wednesday, October 17, 2007

2007-10-19T04:32:00.000-07:00

So today is Tortuga day, and after a very exhausting night in recovery I got breakfast and got around to take the group sailing. We were not scheduled to leave until 10 so I had some time to kill, which I did by helping in recovery, working on CDS, DVDS, and my journals. Once 10 o’clock rolled around we all got our life jackets, our interpreter, and our security guard and started to walk to the dock. When we got to the dock, it was quite a show to see them getting carried to the boat on the shoulders or a Haitian male. The boat that we rode over in was a little 20 person sail boat that looked like it would rather sink than ferry people across the channel. The trip over was not fun at all, 2 of the ladies got sick and I was so tired that it was ridiculously uncomfortable the entire time. it was ok though because we made it in one piece and incident free. First things first, Cokes, and what do ya know, there was a little shop right off the boat dock. After wetting our whistles, we headed to the Baptist church to drop off the formula that we had for them and relaxed there for a while and had some snacks to recharge. We decided that we were going to walk to this spot of the beach where it was shady and nice to relax and we could hang out with the children and swim. The pastor of the church was really nice and acted as our tour guide through our little adventure. When we got to our spot several of the ladies found out what it was like to give away candy and little things to children that don’t see that very often. They also, found out what it was like to not have enough for everyone. Contrary to what Sarmone wanted to do we spent about 2 hours on the beach with the children until it got cloudy and we were all afraid of being stranded so we high-tailed it to the dock to catch the boat. I slept most of the way home while everyone chatted about whatever. Back on the St. Louis side of the water, the gentlemen that carried us to the land tried to swindle me on the cost of their services. It did not work though and they got paid and we left. Once back at the mission it was time to get ready for dinner and relax, so that is what we did. Apparently while we were gone some more people showed up, so we spent some time talking with them and hanging out in the dining hall. I decided to go to bed around 10, because it was my second to last overnight in recovery, so I visited Sonel quick and went to bed. Peace.

Tuesday, October 16, 2007

2007-10-17T00:31:00.001-07:00

At about 630 the little one took a turn for the worse in that we could not get her saturation percentage up where it belongs, it was staying around 90 percent. After about an hour of work I got replaced and hit up some breakfast and sat and talked with Heidi (my newest mother) for a while, while people were using my computer. While we were chatting, one of the nurses brought me a pair of crutches for a patient but she thought they were too short. So I found Bobby (a jack of all trades) and he and I fixed these crutches so that they could be used. Man, they were rusted, but we got them fixed and then the ladies and I replaced the armpit pads because the ones on them looked pretty dirty and old. Around 930 Erin and I took an air mattress donated for Sonel down to recovery to change his bed but saw how busy it was so we just got it ready and waited for a while. She had her class so she only waited until 10 and then went up; I however, had nothing to do so I fell asleep in Sonel’s bed for about an hour. It really comfortable in there with the air on, and at 11 I got woken up because traffic was slow enough to change his bed. So I dead lifted a 70 pound boy while the ladies changed out what he sleeps on. After that I went upstairs to get ready for lunch and one of the ladies wanted to check her email. So there I was finding myself with some downtime. Since I have some let me tell you about the goat trip that took place today. A couple by the name of Dave and Sue, when they were here last, felt that God put it on their hearts to do something like a goat ministry, aka, by goats for poor people to use as a source of income. So they passed this ministry opportunity on to their congregation, friends, and family, and got enough money to buy 40 goats (20 billy, 20 nanny), and give one pair to families that they feel lead to give them too. So today about 12 people took a 2 hour, 30 foot flatbed, truck ride to a market to buy goats. They were only able to buy 22 today, must have been because of the quantity needed. Janeil says that a pair of goats is the equivalent to 5 months salary for a teacher in the far west. That is phenomenal that they are going to be able to change the lives of 20 families when this portion of this ministry is complete. Back to the mission, after lunch Erin and I went down to see Sonel and the baby and Diane said that she was going to die no matter what because her heart rate had just been slowly going down all day and several times she stopped breathing for a little and started up again. So Erin and I went over the baby orphanage to take over for the workers so that they could spend some time with the little one before she passed. Man do we have a whole new respect for the ladies that work in the baby orphanage and we were only there for 3 1/2 hours, but a part of that was feeding time and diaper change time. We did not have to bathe them; the ladies did that for us, thankfully. At 430 the ladies came back and took over and we went to the dining hall to hang out and have a little fun with a stuffed monkey and just relax. Right as dinner was starting the goat crew got back with 8 Goats in the bed of the truck and looking like they very much enjoyed themselves. After dinner and before devotions the little one left this world and is now being rocked in the arms of the angels or maybe even Jesus. We were all sad but were glad as well because she is no longer suffering. There is going to be a small memorial service here on campus tomorrow morning at 645 for the baby orphanage staff and whoever else would like to attend. I am going to go to the baby orphanage and take over for the ladies so that they can go, I think Erin is going to go with me and either a fella named Tony or a young lady named Elizabeth. After devotions I went over to Jody and Jose’s for a little bit and chatted with Jose and Erin about this and that, and Jose and I fixed the kitchen door before we called it a night. Erin and I went on the roof above her room to find out where the leak was and it was pretty easy to figure out once she figured out where in the room we were standing. After that we had to go downstairs to say goodnight to Sonel cause he was wondering where we were. Once the goodnights were finished, Erin, Liz, Rolgard, and I chatted for a while until the girls went to bed and then I began my long night of catch up. I told Erin I was not going to bed until I was all caught up and everything I wanted to be. As I am writing the last journal I need to in order to be caught up on that, I only have a few website things to do and then I am caught up, WOO-HOO. Peace.

Monday, October 15, 2007

2007-10-16T23:34:00.000-07:00

So Monday was day one of week number 2 for the surgeries, and Sonel got bumped to the first case because of his circumcision and the closing of the sores. We got breakfast and went down to hang with him for a bit. He was really nervous, and enjoyed us being there while they were getting him ready. Since they were taking him in first Erin could not go in and observe this procedure either because she had class, so I went in again to watch and get pictures for Melissa. I only stayed for the circumcision and the beginning of the sore stitching because another gentleman came in and he was going to watch and photograph as well so I let him and I went to take care of other things. Sonel was only in the OR for like a combined total of 3 hours, which was not bad. While he was in I was able to get some photo stuff done for my website and chat with some of the new team members and make sure they did not need anything. Erin and I went down to see the wounds right before they bandaged them and I think they looked really good and am excited to see how they develop. It was now time for lunch, and after lunch some of the fellas and I talked about what is all going on this week and when we can fit it all in. We wanted to go to the Prison and the Brothel, Jody found a 2 bedroom house that is going to get rented for Sonel, his dad, and Folber, and we wanted to get that house ready. We talked about Tortuga on Wednesday, and the biggest topic of discussion was the goat trip scheduled for Tuesday. I will tell you more about that as the time goes on. Of course mixed into all of this discussion was the internet, email, pictures, etc. I was scheduled to be in recovery from 3am-7am so I slept in the OR on the rolling stretcher. It was wonderful for 2 reasons, 1 is so that I am right there if the nurse needs help and number 2 is because it is air conditioned. I slept on the rolling stretcher and it was NOT comfortable at all. Oh well, I got a few hours of comfortable sleep and then it was time to work. I was able to give the overnight nurse a break for an hour so she could take a nap during her busiest time. I spent most of my 4 hour shift with the little baby that is still there from Sunday afternoon, her vitals had to constantly be checked and she needed to be played with to know that people were around. We are sure that she has a little brain damage because she was not breathing for a couple minutes on Sunday, so it was talk and play and monitor all night. It was mostly a quiet night, because most of the patients did not require much attention, we just had to help them pee if they needed it or watch their catheter levels and ivy levels. Peace.

Sunday, October 14, 2007

2007-10-16T22:58:00.000-07:00

So I only slept until 5 when I was woken up to a man that almost passed out on his way back from the bathroom. I was up for the rest of the day then, which is ok because I got too much rest anyway, but it did keep me from going to PDP to do junior church. That is ok, because I had a good time at the church in St. Louis; I spent most of it outside listening in, with the children that did not have “appropriate” clothes to go to church. We were having fun messing with each other because I am learning more Creole and they knew a little bit of English. After communion, I went over to the recovery room because we were going to try and put Sonel in his chair for children’s church. Our original plan was to get him to church for the whole thing but because of the babies needed to be watched all the time we did not have the opportunity to get his dressings changed. This also prevented him from going to children’s church, so I just observed Erin teaching. She did the story of Shadrack, Meshack, and Abendago, and the cool thing about the way she does her lessons is that she reads the story and lets the children act it out as she goes. It is fun because it gets the kids involved and they can learn more if they see it and hear it. By the time church was over the babies were back in the baby orphanage with the belief that they were doing better. After church it was time for lunch, which on Sundays is just snacks that people have brought and leftovers from the week. After lunch I went down to recovery and demanded that they change Sonel’s dressings so that we can go outside. Erin had an extra music lesson today, so when Sonel and I went outside we got to leave the gate because we went to her class to watch her teach. While we were there a group of the medical team decided to take a long walk up the mountain because they had the day off and they needed to get off campus. While I was at Erin’s class I had to go back to campus because Wisley showed up with something that I needed from the Orphanage so I went to put it away. While I was gone Sonel had someone move him to the window and he could see the boys across the street playing basketball and Erin said she thought he looked sad because he knows he will never be able to do that. It was good timing that the crew that was walking arrived as Erin was coming in with him because there is quite a step down from her class room location and she needed help. After class Erin and I spent some time with Sonel playing catch in the courtyard and talking with him about things and just trying to get his mind off of the fact that he had to go back in his bed later. After 2 hours outside he was ready to go inside but not into bed so his dad took him back to the recovery room courtyard where they said he hung out for about another hour. I went upstairs to chat with the group that went on the hike. They had a wonderful time and got some really nice pictures, and Sarah (a 19 year old from the group) lost something while they were hiking so her and Candice (another teen) were debating whether or not go retrace their steps to see if they could find it. I suggested that we do that because of what was in it, so the three of us went on the hike again, looking for a camera case with tent keys, 50 American dollars, and a woven patch in it. We did not succeed, however we had a great time and met some very fun little children on the way. We got back just in time for dinner and found out that one of the babies was back in the recovery on monitors and oxygen with respiratory problems and was going to require her own caretaker all night. A lot of people volunteered for Sunday night so I waited to see if I could help another night. After dinner and devotions we watched a documentary on the mission shot by Tina, a woman who is from Canada. The item that I had Wisley bring me from the Orphanage was the popcorn machine because Carmen requested popcorn on her day off. Since I had the most experience in that area I made everyone movie theatre quality popcorn and they loved it, of course, I did not eat any. After that we just hung out and ate popcorn and fellowship. I went down to the recovery room to see the baby and wound up falling asleep in Sonel’s bed with him because he was awake and we hung out for a little bit. Peace.

Saturday, October 13, 2007

2007-10-16T22:23:00.000-07:00

Ok so Saturday started really early because we got up to say goodbye to the first half of the medical team to leave. After that, we were all up so it was fellowship time and coffee time for the coffee drinkers while we waited for breakfast to be ready. I decided to go down and wake up Sonel since I was awake I figured he should be too. After breakfast we kind of chilled a while and worked on some odds and ends organizing wise while we waited for the new people to show up. The surgery team thought they were going to have a half day today because it was Saturday, but unfortunately their last case took almost 6 hours, it was a little girl that got really burned and they were doing a major skin graft on her. They made it through and it looks like she is going to recover just fine. Another fly in the easy half day ointment was that several babies from the baby orphanage got taken to minor, to be put on ivys and oxygen because they were really dehydrated and having respiratory issues. It wound up being three of them, which meant that a bunch more people got called to work the night shift. I was planning on going to PDP tomorrow morning for junior church at the Orphanage, so I volunteered to help in the recovery room. I spent most of Saturday just being lazy and hanging around, playing with the Heaven’s waiting room children, the recovery room patients, and Sonel, because he got to be in his chair for a long time. Erin and Rolgard decided to take the Heaven’s waiting room children on a train ride today so that was fun to participate in and watch and chase around with Sonel. I even spent some time in one of the chairs, just like a big kid. J The older ones in the baby orphanage even got to join in on the fun. They did not seem to enjoy it as much as the others. They all got to ride for about 30 minutes before it started to rain and then we had to rush to get them under cover before it rained. After that I just spent some more time with Sonel and then headed upstairs to chat with some people while they used my pc. Erin decided to upload some pictures to Walmart photo center to have the developed and brought in when the next group comes in. She seems to have been doing that for quite some time. It is a really good idea, because she gives the pictures to the Haitians that are in them, and that is a big thing for them because they get to have pictures for their homes or whatever. After that we ate dinner and then just hung out for the rest of the night, randomly visiting the patients in recovery. I found out that all I had to do for the overnight recovery room shift is sleep in the recovery room so that if the nurse needed any help there was some there for me. So I decided to lay down around 930 and see if I could maybe get some sleep. Peace.

Friday, October 12, 2007

2007-10-16T22:00:00.001-07:00

So I was up for most of the night again with intestinal issues, and I do not like it anymore. Oh well though right, grin and bear it. After breakfast I just kind of putter around and hung out in recovery, helping the ladies. At 10, 9 Americans and 2 Haitians headed to Port-de-Paix for the day so that they could see a little bit of the town. We got together and walked down town to the square to catch a tap tap and I thought it might have been wise to split the group up to experience the ride a little and I did not think that there would be a truck available to house us all. As it turns out I was wrong, and the first truck we saw, could handle all eleven of us. The ride to PDP was very amusing because this driver had speakers in his cab for his passenger and when he picked up 11 blancs, he changed the station from the local Haitian music to sappy early 90s love songs, and we were singing karaoke. It was really fun to be the “veteran,” so to speak, in that I got to educate the others on what they saw and some construction, etc. When we got to our get off point, the seven-eleven, we went in and got drinks and snacks, and recharged because it was time to walk. I had quite the hike planned for them and they started off energetic and excited, and quickly moved to excited but tired. We pretty much took the roundabout way into the back of PDP and they got to see some gorgeous views of the county. Once we got into town, we headed for Ares’ because it was about time for lunch and the Americans wanted to eat. When we got there however, we found out that they did not have the supplies they needed off the boat yet, so the restaurant was not open. So we walked to another place nearby and found that it was too expensive there, but the third place we went too, I had been to before and it was a good price and we were hungry so we ate there. It was quite the experience though because, we ordered the chicken meal and got goat, they messed up most of our drinks so it was confusing to try and fix that, but we made it through and got food, WOO-HOO. After lunch I had to boys take them to the market and walk through it to see what it was like to shop in a Haitian market, MISTAKE. There were so many Haitians and only 2 interpreters and myself (who speaks virtually no Creole), and a lot of Haitians selling things and begging, so it was a chore to keep them away. We browsed the market until about 2 and then headed back to the Orphanage to show them that facility and hang with the children a little while. We got there around 3 and stayed there playing with and loving the children and left around 345. This part of the story will be amazing to those of you who have been to Haiti before. I was planning on walking back down to the tap tap center because usually by the time they get to the 7-11 they are full and 11 people never would have gotten on. So we walked for about 2 minutes and an empty one passed that picked us up, we only made it about 5 minutes though because we got a flat tire and had to get out. Coincidently, there was an empty truck right across the street from where we got the flat that was ready and able to take us to St. Louis. We got back about 515 and got around for dinner, relaxed, and shared our day with the people that did not go. Dinner was amazing again, and devotions were really good. After that we entered into relax and fellowship time until bed time. We had a portion of the group leaving in the morning so we all hit the sack early so that we could get up with them. I stayed up for most of the night, working on internet stuff, and hanging in the recovery room. I also did not have a bed because I gave mine to one of the members leaving since he packed his up and it was more important for him to get good rest than it was me. I passed out for about 90 minutes from 230-4 and one of the couches, which was really comfortable. Peace.

Thursday, October 11, 2007

2007-10-13T10:35:00.000-07:00

So today I got woken up at 1240 because Dr. Dell wanted to use my computer to surf the net to find out what dosage of a certain med he should give to an infant. I tried to link into a server that was not on the generator but could not get a connection. It was ok though, because once he woke up fully and thought about it he found a better med that he did not think we had. So I got woken up for nothing but it was ok because it was for an important reason. Once back in bed I had a not difficult time returning to a state of unconsciousness, and slept until the rooster got up and then it was off and on until morning devotions. Once again this morning I woke up with such a pain in my lower back that I could vomit with every step. It only seems to be lasting for about 40 minutes each morning. I may ask one of the medical people what they think. After breakfast, I went down to say good morning to Sonel and spend some time in recovery, which turned out to be a lot of my day because the nurses kept getting me to do little things for them, like moving patients, entertaining patients, sitting them in wheelchairs. Kim sent me to the dungeon to hunt down a wheelchair for one of the older fellas that had surgery on his leg. Normally this would be a very easy process but, because of the construction in the back, all of the stuff out of the maintenance shed got moved into the dungeon and all the wheelchairs got stacked on shelves and buried. I immediately called Erin to come down because she was not going to believe what happened. She just walked in all open mouthed and was like, “WOW, who did this?” Once we were over the room organization, we amazingly found a wheelchair that will be perfect. When I got back to recovery, it was time for Sonel’s dressing change so I went and got Erin because she wanted to take pictures and send them to Melissa so she could see the after surgery turn out. The nurses finished his dressing a little before lunch and we left his dad, aunt, and “stepmom,” take him around the grounds. He was way super excited about being in his chair, in his brace, on his new seat cushion, and OUTSIDE. It was time for lunch now and after lunch, Tim got the interested people together and we walked to the local Brothel, to evangelize. Once we were there Roland and I said our hellos and then went shopping for some wood, a cross, and some other little things, none of which did we manage to find. Roland and I went to one place to look for wood and the guy had what we were looking for however the price was way too high. So we continued through the market and I even rode a motorcycle without getting burned, WOO-HOO. After striking out all over the place we went back to the mission and got ready for dinner. After dinner I helped the recovery room staff for a little while longer and hung out with Sonel and Erin, until it was time to go to up and start the internet waiting line in the dining hall. Tonight’s episode was a little shorter because the server was being difficult, but it was still just as enjoyable to hang out with everyone. Well 10 pm came again and it is time to go to bed. Peace.

Wednesday, October 10, 2007

2007-10-13T08:35:00.001-07:00

I got woken up at 5 this morning to be involved in the prayer circle for little Lovely who was not doing so well. She was having a hard time breathing on her own and the doctors could not keep her stable. She was a little fighter though, all the way until 830 when she just could not anymore and unfortunately passed away. After that they slowly started to allow people back into the recovery room and I went down to see Sonel and got to see them change his dressings and his sore’s looked really good today, a little bloody though, but getting better. After that it was about 10 so I headed to the dining hall to meet the people that I was taking to the market. There was a good turn-out, about 9 and 2 interpreters, and Janeil had us take a bed frame and a mattress to Claudette’s new house so we took a back road path. That actually worked out to be a good thing, because it gave everyone the chance to see a little more of the country, and walk through some of the muddy terrain. After we dropped off the bed and chatted with some of her neighbors, we headed down the muddy mess they call a path into town which is where we met the coolest little boy, who Brooke got the chance to lead to Christ while we were walking, I thought that was pretty amazing. When we got to the actual road, we stopped at one of the convenient stores to buy some drinks and snacks and Sinclair, ventured across the street to buy some sugarcane from one of the venders and he did very well with no interpreter. Now it was time to walk and so we headed down the road to the market. We stopped at this store on the way to exchange some American money to Haitian, and the owner did not give them a very good deal and I was mad a Sarmone for allowing that. It happens though, nothing you can do about it. When we got to the market, they were pretty amazed at the size and randomness of the retailers, and we just simply walked around and through the whole market, talking to the venders and taking pictures and gaining more people in our group as the trip went on. We even got harassed by a crazy person until one of the interpreters politely asked him to leave. I bought some Kanab (jelly covered acorns) and Patay’s (meat filled fried bread), and got some of the group to try them but not all of them, because they were too afraid to eat. After about an hour of wondering around the market it was time to head back, so away we went. We stopped to buy more snacks and drinks and then took a different way home. We turned so that we could walk along the beach line so that they could see some of that living area and what the ocean/beach looks like. As we were walking it began to rain so we got wet on our way home, which was ok with most of us because at that point we had been sweating. We got back at about 230, and I went down to visit Sonel and found out the funeral for Lovely was going to be at 4 and we were allowed to go, so I hung in recovery for a little bit and then went to the dining hall to check my email, but did not manage to get to do that because of all the people that want to use the internet from the medical team. So I just hung out chatting sports, the day’s activity, and other miscellaneous things with the computer line until it was time for the service. The service was a twofold new experience for me in that I had never been to a Haitian funeral before and I had never seen an infant casket before. Erin, me and about 20 of the medical team personnel went over to the service and it was quite an interesting experience because in Haiti instead of crying they wail and oh my do they wail. One lady even started to have a seizure. It was about a 40 minute service and then Janeil took the family and the casket to the mission cave, which I am assuming is a Mausoleum that the mission owns for situations like this. After the service it was just about time to get ready for dinner so I went back down to see Sonel and Flobear. After dinner, I had devotions, which I was really nervous about because I am not well versed in scripture nor am I a public speaker. It was ok though, I just read 1 Corinthians 13, and then had Tim close in prayer. After devotions there was another line for my computer usage, so it was chill and chat time for me. This lasted for the rest of the night, so I went to visit recovery again and Heaven’s waiting room for a while. Decided to try and go to bed early tonight, so it is 10 and I am going to bed. Peace

Monday night/Tuesday morning 10/8-10/9

2007-10-09T05:43:00.000-07:00

So instead of going to bed when they shut off the generator I decided to go to the recovery room and sit with Sonel for the first night after his surgery, so that if he woke up he would see a familiar face. When I got down there I was surprised at the amount of activity that was still going on at 1030 at night. Kim, the overnight nurse, was busy taking vitals and getting all the manual machines set up so that the boys could cut the power and the interpreters were chatting at who knows what, because I don’t speak Creole. So I set up my computer to begin burning CD’s for Elveus and talked with Daniel about Sonel and what all went on during his procedure. At about 1230 two of the interpreters left and it was just Kim, Henwing (the interpreter), 4 patients (and family), and myself until the am arrived. It is really amazing how much needs to be done in the middle of the night for people that are recovering from operations, I mean, Kim was bouncing from bed to bed for the majority of the night, I just kind of observed and consoled the patients and family member(s) when they did not understand what was happening. At about 2 Sonel woke up and was really confused and his dad was in the next room sleeping so mine was the only familiar face that he saw. He got himself so worked up that he began to vomit and have diarrhea. Once we cleaned him up, I talked and played with him until about 3, which is about when he calmed down and we gave him some medicine and he was out like a light. The other patients in the room consisted of an 11 yr old that had reconstructive knee surgery that is getting pretty good on her crutches and young women who in February had a colostomy done because a bull mauled her in the behind and today she had the colostomy reversed. She is having a difficult time recovering; the third person is the lady who came in for the emergency c-section and gave birth to a healthy 6 fingered baby girl. In the outside recovery room is a family with several burn victims, and an old gentleman who broke his leg and was in a great deal of pain and about 4 Kim had to put a catheter in because his leg was in too much pain to sit up. This was lengthy process because the first catheter did not fit due to the fact that his prostate was enflamed, so she had to try a second type of catheter which worked. At about 445 I met Erin in the courtyard and she, Maureen, and I saw Melissa off because Monday was her last day here for a while. After that it was breakfast time so I went upstairs and mingled with the coffee drinkers.

Monday, October 8, 2007

2007-10-09T05:39:00.001-07:00

Today was day one for the medical team, so there was a lot of buzzing and activity really early, like before 6. I got to eat with the group this morning since I did not have to be in the dish room because the Haitian ladies are here Monday through Friday and I don’t want to step on their toes. So after breakfast I helped sort and put away more of the medical stuff that the group brought in. At 9 Melissa, 8 of the people from the teams, and I got a rescue board and went to Sonel’s to load him up and bring him to the mission for his surgeries. I will have pictures of that experience as soon as I can get them from someone that took their camera and was not carrying a teenager on a stretcher. Well we made it there and back again with no issues or incidences, thank the LORD, and Sonel was really excited to get to wheel around the mission and talk with everyone. We were having so much fun that we lost track of the time and were hunted down by people that needed to do his pre-op examination, oops. So it was to the recovery room to wait for his turn for surgery. So I spent the day talking with him and playing with him and with the rest of the people in recovery and learning about the whole process of the medical team. I got to meet a lot of the team also, which I loved as much as playing with the patients. While I was talking with Heidi, one of the recovery assistants, she said that people were able to go into the OR during surgery to watch procedures and I was like, “nice, I am going to see if I can go in during Sonel’s.” Since it was a while before his operation, Carmen told me to ask again closer to the procedure, and I told her that I was going to be in the recovery room until they wheeled him in so she would not miss me. We had a really good time in recovery, with all the people that have been praying for him stopping in to meet him and play with him for a while. He was having the time of his life and loving all the attention, especially from the ladies. ;) So he was supposed to go into surgery at 4 but there was an emergency c-section that came in that had to go first so he did not go in until 7 and I got to go in with him and watch, WOO-HOO. What a new and interesting experience this was and Dr. Dell was so chill about everything and him and Judy explained every step as they were going and answered all kinds of questions. The extents of his sores were unbelievable and it was amazing that both Dell and Judy said they had never seen sores that bad before. The worst sore was about the size of a silver dollar pancake and was about 2 inches deep and indented an inch each way under the skin. All the dead tissue that was cut out was amazing and I am glad that he could not feel anything. Dr. Dell said that next week when he closes the wounds he is only going to have to graft one of the wounds; the rest of them will be able to be closed using their own tissue and skin. After the surgery he was really sedated so Mike, Teresa, Erin and I just said a prayer of thanksgiving for a successful operation and then called it a night in recovery. So I went up to the dining hall with about an hour left of generator time so I sat down to check my email and start my journal and did not get to do either of those things because my computer has become the most popular commodity on campus. After a long day of medical work I decided to go to bed right when they turned off the generator. Peace.

Sunday, October 7, 2007

2007-10-08T19:31:00.000-07:00

So today since we did not make it to the far west yesterday, we went to La Fordge to listen to Mike preach. The church was really nice and small, only about 45 or 50 people there including the 17 people in our group. The service was about 2 hours and Mike preached a really good message and I found out that Vogley is a really powerful translator. After the service on our way home I got the chance to make a business transaction with one of the local boys who sells necklaces. It was really funny because he was running behind the truck trying to sell this necklace. When we got home, we ate lunch and I got to do more dishes, WOO-HOO, and then the guys got ready to try and go to the far west again. I opted not to go this time because I wanted to stay here and try and get well, so I just passed all the stuff that Miss Pat wanted off to a young man named Jordan. Since I was not going to the far west, I went to Sonel’s with Melissa, Erin, Dr. Dell and two of the other members of the new group. It was really encouraging to have Dr. Dell there, because he knew just what he was going to do to help heal his wounds and it seemed to lift Mel’s spirits a little as well. The visit took a little longer today because of the diagnostic from Dr. Dell, but that is ok because Sonel is the man and since we had 3 new people with us, the trip home took longer as well because of stopping to talk with the locals and the photo opportunities. On the way home Judy, one of the new ladies, asked me if she could go to the class room when the school is in session and observe because she is a teacher, and I handed her off to Erin because I don’t know what is going on in the schools these days. She also wanted to know if she could walk around town and see some of Haiti and what the life of the Haitians is like, because the last time she was here she did not get to leave to compound at all. So, on Wednesday I am going to take a group of people into Port-de-Paix to see the town on market day and we are going to spend the first half of the day seeing some of the city. We got back at about 3 and I went into the kitchen to help Cathy cook dinner and keep the kitchen clean. We had a very good ham, scallop potato, pee salad, and cornbread dinner. After dinner and cleanup it was devotion time, and while they were having devotions almost all of the rest of the luggage showed up, and from 745 to 915 it was mass chaos as the suitcases were unpacked and things were attempted to be organized and sorted and put away. I don’t think they got quite as far as they wanted to and since the generator was scheduled to go off at 10 they bagged everything up and called it a night. I sat up and talked with Erin while she worked on my computer and then I did about half of my journal and went to bed at about 950ish. I got woken up at 1115 by Roland because Melissa wanted to call T-man to check on Lucinda, who has Malaria. After that, I went I made it to my bed and was done for Sunday. Peace.

Saturday, October 6, 2007

2007-10-07T18:19:00.000-07:00

I am sick so I did not sleep very well plus it rained so that kept me awake, but oh well, it happens right. I got up at 7 today instead of 6 and we had cold cereal for breakfast, which was wonderful, because I love cereal. After breakfast I got ready to go to the Orphanage and the Far West with Jim and Philip, who had repairs to do at both of those places. I loaded up all the stuff I got for Miss Pat and the guys got all their stuff around and at 9 we headed west to the Orphanage. I was not feeling the greatest when we got there so I went into Heather and Janiel’s living room checked my email and took a nap. When I woke up it was almost 1230 and I learned that Jim had forgotten something and sent Israel back to the mission to get it, and while he was gone it had rained and we could no longer go to the Far West because the water level of the river was too high. So we decided to go downtown to Aresis for lunch, burgers and fries, WOO-HOO. When we got there, we got out of the truck and the driver took off to do another errand before we could check to see if the restaurant was open. As it turns out, IT WAS NOT OPEN, and we got stranded at the Viro Plaza until the driver returned. Fortunately, the convenient store was open so we went in there and got some little things to hold us over until we got back to the mission and ate real dinner. When the driver got back and picked us up we headed back to the Orphanage to pick up our things and headed back to the mission. We stopped in La Ponte for ice cream on the way home and it was REALLY good. When we got back to the mission I realized that I forgot my I-Pod at the Orphanage and it did not really bother me because it was in a safe location and I did not need it anyway, but it bothered Roland because he uses it more than me so we went all the way back to the Orphanage to get it. While we were gone working at the Orphanage, most of the medical team and the other group showed up and there was a lot of activity going on around the campus. So from 230 to dinner it was organize, meet and greet and unload luggage. Dinner was spaghetti tonight and it was interesting to watch 60 people get in line to eat. I helped serve because it is easy to get to talk with everyone that way. After everyone was through, it was dish time, YES, and I found out how much I take the dishwashing machine at the Camp for granted, when I washed all the plates, cups, and silverware. It was ok though because while I was washing and talking with the lady that was helping me I got the chance to get some things off of my chest and vent a little. For devotions tonight we had a group meeting with Jodi and Janeil about what is going to be taking place while the groups are in and what everyone had in mind of what they were going to be doing. The meeting lasted until about 745 and then it was shower, unpack, and mingle time for everyone. Most of the people took showers and went to bed and the rest just sat in the dining hall and chatted about this, that, and the other thing. By 845 there were only about a dozen people left and that meant it was journal time for me, so here I am writing in my journal and listening to the low rumble of several different conversations, and trying to not focus on my stuffy/runny nose, sore throat, and pressure headache. And now, since it is raining and I cannot get any signal anyway and I am done with my journal, I am going to go to bed. Peace

Friday, October 5, 2007

2007-10-06T09:28:00.000-07:00

We had a very nice rain storm during the night that brought the temperature way down and made it real easy to sleep. I got up and worked on some more laundry and did my journal and then had breakfast. After breakfast I went to the food depot and inventoried 2 totes and a chest that were supposed to be opened last February and did not arrive until after that group was gone, so I inventoried everything so that we could email the person that had them sent in a see what she wanted us to do with it all. We are hoping she tells us that we can use it because some of that stuff will help us out in the kitchen while the medical team is here. After that I helped Erin clean out a propane refrigerator that is also going to be needed during the surgery groups stay. Those things took me until about 11 then Melissa was ready to go to Sonel’s, so Mel, Roland, and I headed out. We got there and found that the bad bed sore was looking better today than it did yesterday and Melissa is pretty sure she knows where she went wrong and now we will see how this changes the condition of things. We got back after lunched was served and they only saved 2 plates of food instead of 3, we improvised. After lunch I helped in the OR for a little while and got around most of the list of things that Miss Pat needed us to get for her. At this time I was starting to not feel good so I took it slow for the rest of the afternoon. During the afternoon Erin and I folded the bed sets that were left over from the last group and re-organized the shelf where they were all at. At 3 I went down to Mike and Teresa’s to use their printer and scanner to take care of some stateside stuff and worked on that until dinner. After dinner I got some medication from Melissa and did some relaxing before and during devotions, which I managed to stay awake for. After devotions, the Grants, Melissa, Erin and I played Shanghi again. I did not win this time either, but that is ok because I don’t worry about winning. After Shanghi, it was about 930 and I was ready for bed so I headed that way only to be stopped twice to talk with people, so I did not actually get to bed until about 1130. But I am here now so, Peace.

Thursday, October 4, 2007

2007-10-05T08:12:00.000-07:00

Good morning everyone. This morning I got the chance to talk with Jim Jackson, who has been coming for about 13 years and is an electrician. We chatted about everything going on with the mission and I heard some stories from the past and we talked about some of the Haitian cultures we observe while here. While we were chatting I got to witness the nervousness of the coffee drinkers while they waited for it to be ready. It was funny to see them all huddled around the spot where the pot would be, they were like kids on Christmas when it finally came out. After breakfast I spent about an hour in the OR with Carmen, Jordan, Robin, and Sarmone working on organizing all the stuff that people so nicely just let sit out instead of putting it back where it belonged. At 9 Melissa, Teresa, Mike, Vogley, Roland and I all got in the truck and headed to Port-au-Paix because Mike had a meeting with one of the pasters, Melissa, Teresa and I wanted to do some shopping downtown, and we all wanted to visit a women in the hospital who went there Tuesday because Dr. Joseph thought she needed a C-Section. We stopped at the Orphanage to see if Erin and Heather wanted to go and to check on Ne Ne, who was accidentally pushed off the slide and hurt her right side. Heather was not there and Erin was babysitting so Roland, Soni, me and the two ladies started our walk to the market with the intention to meet Vogley and Mike at 1115ish at the town square. Just as we got into the heart of the market Mike called and said that the pastor did not show up because he was stranded in the far west and they tried to catch up but failed so they were going to be ready earlier. So we decided to meet at Aresis, and we got there at about 1045 and as it turns out Mike and Vogley did not arrive until 1115 anyway. When they showed up we all went to the hospital and visited two women; the first one was a former nurse for the mission named Feliciany, who went in for a C-Section also, her and her baby were healthy and happy. The second women we visited was Madam Gesner, who is the one that Dr. Joseph thought needed a C-Section but as it turns out she was still very much pregnant when we got there, so we just visited for a while and took off. We decided to go to lunch at that pizza place again since Mike and Teresa had not been there yet. This was a new experience for all of us though, because they second pizza that we got had sardines on it and it was really strong and not very good. It’s ok thought because we got ice cream on the way out to get the sardine taste out of our mouths, and the ice cream was REALLY good. We stopped back at the Orphanage to pick up Heather, Ne Ne, Josiah, Erin and all their stuff, and to drop off Soni, we were there for about 20 minutes playing with the children and getting all loaded up. We got back to the mission at about 3 and after helping Heather get all of her stuff to the house I went back to the OR to help organize some more while waiting for Melissa to be ready to go to Sonel’s, which I thought was going to be 5. As it turns out there was a little miscommunication between Mel and the house keepers about what time their little party was going to start so she decided to go at 420 instead of 5. So I went down to get Mike and Teresa and only came out with Mike because Teresa was in her Creole lesson. So Mel, Mike, Erin and I headed out to Sonel’s, Erin did not make it very far though, because of the slippery, muddy terrain, so she decided to go Friday. The three of us had quite an interesting time making it there without falling on our butts, in the mud, but we succeed and got there in one piece. We should up to Sonel in his wheelchair and not in his bed, WOO-HOO. However, we also showed up to his one wound looking worse than it ever has been and found out that the dressing came off yesterday and his dad put the old style on instead of the new stuff Melissa was testing. The infection/dead tissue is almost down to his bone and the sore is about the size of a coffee saucer. Please keep that wound in your prayers that it does not hit his bone before the doctors get here and can cut out some of the dead tissue and maybe once they see it think of something different to try and heal it. The new tenant was at the house today so I am wondering when Sonel and his dad will be out of the house. That one sore was the only one that Mel changed today because they other ones look good and the dressing and meds she put on only need to be checked every 2 days, so after that we prayed and played for a little while and headed back for dinner. We got back at about 530 and Melissa got ready for her party while the rest of us prepped for dinner. Dinner was spicy today and for once I was not the only one that thought so, but it was still good. After dinner we had devotions and hung out in the dining room trying to get the internet working, which eventually I figured out Jose’s system and got it up and running for us. J After that we were all spent some time emailing, chatting, and watching the game cast for the UK v. SC game. I also got the chance to look at Erin computer which, when she got back today and tried to use it for the first time in a week found out that the screen was inoperative, all she gets is a blank all white screen. Rolgard had her plug it in to the office monitor to make sure that all that was wrong was the screen, and fortunately everything else worked. So from 8-10 we passed around my computer and everyone got done what they needed to before the power went out. Now it is time to finish the OR sheets that are being washed, get my bed around, and hit the sack. Peace.

Wednesday, October 3, 2007

2007-10-03T18:41:00.000-07:00

What a wonderful night with the rain on the roof, very refreshing. Got up and caught up on and posted my journals, and then finished and folded my laundry before breakfast. After biscuits and gravy Melissa and I went to Sonel’s and found the one bed sore had taken quite a downhill turn, and the person that is renting the room had all their stuff moved in, which means that they paid already and we are wondering when Sonel and his dad are going to have to be out of the house. When we got back I spent a couple of hours helping two of the ladies and a young man work on organizing the OR and the recovery room. It was a lot of fun, because I got to organize and I LOVE to do that. We worked until lunch and then, after lunch and cancelling Erin class for her because she is still at the Orphanage, Roland and I went downtown to try and buy some stuff that I wanted to take home and some things that Miss Pat needs for her house. We found NONE of the things that I set out to buy, but that is ok because we are going to Port-au-Paix tomorrow and I know I will find everything there. We got back at about 230 and I went back to helping Carmen, Robin, and Jordan organize. They recruited Sarmone while I was out, so I only helped for about 40 minutes because there were too many people involved. So I came up to the dining hall and chatted with some of the other people that came in with the group, and checked up on my email until dinner. I had time so I showered before dinner today and then after dinner and dishes I helped Carmen hook up a wireless adapter to her laptop and then we had devotions. During devotions, T-man came up and stole Melissa away, because her little baby was coughing a lot and running a fever. Mike and I went down to see them after devotions and her fever was down to 101 from 103 so we had a prayer for her and headed back. Mostly everyone went to bed early again because it was a long day and another one was in store, I however am not ready and was chatting with some of the gentlemen about how to get to places in Port-au-Paix and how long it takes to get to Miss Pats and Beau Champ. Highlight of the day was this amazing chocolate cake with white icing that Melissa made for desert, it was phenomenal. Well that about does it for me today. Peace.

Tuesday, October 2, 2007

2007-10-03T13:06:00.000-07:00

Today we got up early and quickly packed only the essentials, because we were catching the 7am tap tap to the river so that we could go home. It was a really nice ride and one of the more comfortable trucks I have been on. When we got to the river it was a little high and the truck we rode on does not cross it, they are a ferry from the river out through the west. So we rode one of the boats across and paid what I thought to be a little much but it was ok. After that we walked from the river to the taxi station, which is almost to the Orphanage. All of us except for Erin, took a taxi to the mission, she took a moped to the Orphanage to send some time with the children and to go to Sunlight and visit some of her friends. We got back to the mission at about 10 and Melissa decided that we would go to Sonel’s at 1 today instead of 4. Until then, it was showering, laundry, and catching up on email. At Sonel’s we found out about a fly in the ointment. His aunt and uncle needed money to send their two oldest to school so they are going to rent out the room that Sonel is in, so they are making him and his dad find another place to live. I can understand that they want to educate their children and Sonel’s dad does not have a job so he cannot pay rent, so no we are trying to figure out where we can find them a room and rent. As far as his wounds go, two look good and the other looked worse today than it did Saturday, which did not thrill the nurse, because it looked as if Sonel was spending more time in bed than he was supposed to. We got back to the mission at 230 and it started pouring at about 250 so we just made it and it poured until about 330. Someone that was not so lucky was the Grants, who were about 6 minutes from the mission when it started to pour and because they were on their four-wheeler, they got DRENCHED. They were ok with it though, because they made it back from the far west in one piece. Between Sonel’s and dinner I did some laundry and took a little nap and talked with a few friends of mine stateside. A seven person group showed up at 430ish, just as I was taking a walk to buy some phone cards, and when I got back it was almost dinner time so I just chatted and got acquainted. After dinner I helped two of the ladies find their totes, which were not where they left them when they were here last. With a little bit of moving some stuff and a little bit of re-organization we found them and got everyone settled in. At this time is was about 8 so I took a shower and sat down to post my weekend journals and do my journal for today. I was pretty tired from the day in the sun, all the traveling, and whatnot, so I only made it until about 10, and was ready for bed, so that is what happened. Peace.

Monday, October 1, 2007

2007-10-02T19:10:00.000-07:00

Ok so today was officially the start of the rainy season, and it did rain at about 2am so I believe them. I got up today with the impression that I would be in St. Louis by like 3 or 330, so I took the tent down, put my sleeping back away, and packed my bag. After breakfast, we were going to go to this private beach/cove area and hang out, but Miss Pat had a few things she needed us to do first, and since she hardly asks for anything we had no problem doing them. She and Teresa made some homemade bread, which was doubly good because Teresa wanted to learn how anyway, Melissa ran the Clinique from, 8-1030, Mike and I fixed a bed frame, and Erin helped with all of the above, and also photographed the whole morning for us. At 10 Mike took Erin and Teresa to this private beach on the four-wheeler, came back got me and then went back and got Melissa, and the 5 of us hung out at this private beach for about 2 hours before we got T-stormed out. The water was SO clear I could not even believe it and the coral was amazing, Mike and Teresa took their snorkeling gear and we all got to see the fish, coral and critters on the bottom. What an amazing time this was, and to boot we also got to see the monument that Christopher Columbus left when he touched down in Haiti so long ago. When we got back to Miss Pats we found out that the truck that was coming to get us got stuck in the mud and had to turn around and go home because of the rain so we decided to just stay another night in the far west, which was ok with everyone but Roland because he is a city boy. At about 445, Mike, Vogley, and I took the four-wheeler out to see if we could find the mission truck since we had not heard if it had gotten free yet. We did not find it but we did find the place where it was stuck and the tire tracks leading back to the main road. Having gotten that piece of information we took the long way home to test out the four-wheeler a little more. It is amazing how muddy you get on that thing and how hot the steam off of the muffler is. We got back at about 545 and got much needed showers right before it began to rain again and got all the leftovers around for dinner. At about 630, this young man showed up with a cut on his hand from a machete, he got while he was gardening. Melissa stitched him up goo though and sent him on his way. After dinner it was Shanghi time again however because of the lack of sunshine today we did not get to finish because we ran out of power. I think the most amazing part of the far west was the crabs, which were so big that sometimes I thought a kitten was running across the floor. The Haitians get really excited when one is spotted because these are so big that there is a lot of meat and it must be really good. So it was an early night for us all, which after today turned into a blessing. So I caught up on my journaling and put my tent back up and headed to bed. Peace.

Sunday, September 30, 2007

2007-10-02T19:09:00.000-07:00

Today after a wonderful night of rest in the rain but in the tent, I got up and got ready for church. After breakfast, and when everyone was ready, Janeil, Heather, Ne Ne, Josiah, Tailan, Mislin, Na Na, Roland, and I went to La Fonte for church. It was about a 30 minute ride and a gorgeous morning so very enjoyable. When we got there we found a crowded church and a few of the gentlemen went and got us some chairs from, I don’t know where, and in we went. It was a really nice service and Janeil got to preach, which was really impressive because he switched between English and in Creole during the sermon. He preached from Ephesians 2 about being dead and having no purpose, living a life without Christ. After church I got together with the preacher and we took pictures of all the children that attend school, because their school is getting ready to open and their pictures are going to be sent out to get sponsorship for them. This was in interesting process for several reasons, the first of them being, the fact that lighting was a very difficult thing to get right. Second none of them would smile, except 2, so they look like prison photos. And lastly, because no one from the church is really associated with the mission we had to figure out a way to remember what child is which, and the system they came up with makes it look more like prison photos. Oh I forgot to tell you that after church Janeil and family left because he had to be at the airport at 2 to fly to the states for a convention. So it was me, Roland, and a slew of Haitians. Well we finished at about 1 and the preacher was nice enough to call us a taxi (moped), and since it was like a 5 mile walk, only 30 Haitian for the 2 of us, I was in my Sunday best, and had my computer bag, I was ok with that. However, when the driver showed up, and according to Roland, saw me he said it would cost 100 Haitian for the ride. We said, no thanks, and started walking, and when he saw that he was going to lose the business he dropped it to 40, but we still kept walking until he said ok 30. When we got on this moped, we went about 6 feet and were walking again. He was a bad drive and almost tipped the bike, and the part of the seat I was sitting on was slippery and I about fell off. Oh well, walking is ok with me and it only took about 2 and a half hours. On our way back to Miss Pats we passed these boys who were directing a donkey with coal on its back and one of them was talking and watching us and the donkey lost all the coal all over the road. We went over to try and help and they did not want any, so we kept on going. When we got back to the house, we found that everyone had been sleeping and that Mike, Teresa, and Vogley had just shown up on the 4 wheeler. After showers and lunch, we all went to the bay for a little swim. Vogley was very excited for this because it was only the second time he had ever been swimming, and it was a very nice day for it. We were at the bay for about 90 minutes, floating around chatting and playing with some children, and just relaxing, when the rain clouds rolled in and we had to leave. We got back just in time to clean the salt water off and get dinner ready. After dinner and clean up we sat down to play Shanghi, and man what a good time that is after a long day of working. We were lucky that we got to finish the game right before the solar went off. After that it was time for bed, but I was not tired so we once again went to this night club to hang out, and I almost got the dance with some of the locals but Roland would not let me. I had a really nice conversation with a drunken guy about what was going on with him; all he really wanted me to do was buy the next round though. Too bad for him, because I did not, however I did see something very interesting. A few of the guys were playing dominos and the guy that was losing had a cinder block tide around his neck and was standing; NO THANKS. Well, after getting some more pitas it was time for bed. Peace.

Saturday, September 29, 2007

2007-10-02T19:04:00.000-07:00

Today was a good day, slept really well, woke up to the silence of a Saturday, and was not tired. Although we have to cook for ourselves on the weekends, we managed, thanks to Heather and Erin, who made Cream of Wheat for everyone, minus the little ones, who got cereal. After breakfast and dish duty, I chatted with Vogley while I waited for Mel to get ready to go to Sonel’s. We had to make our visit early today because we were going to be leaving for the far west at 11 or as soon as Erin was done with her class. Once we were all packed up and ready to go we checked the tires, filled one with air and headed off to the Orphanage. We had to stop there so that I could get a few things and Heather could drop off her suitcase. Being that we left there at close to 1, we stopped at that pizza place I went to on Wednesday, when we went to Saliens-Myette. It is so good there, and for the people who had not been there they were very surprised at this place. We had two pizzas and this time got ice cream on the way out. I however, opted for an apple since I had not had one in a very long time. After check out and drink refill we started the long haul out to Miss Pats, which was great this time because we had luggage sliding all over the place. We made it ok though and got unpacked and showered and acquainted while we were waiting for dinner time, it was about 3 when we got there. Roland and I took a walk around the village looking for his friend that works for Miss Pat and through this I got to see some more of the beach clubs and a talk with a few more of the locals. Having no success I decided to go back to the mission and set up my tent so that I could actually use it. Roland offered to help me, which I appreciated because I would have had quite an interesting time trying it by myself. After it was up, it was pretty much dinner time so I washed up and we ate. Because of the long travel day we took a relaxing chat night over any activity. At about 10, Roland and I were really board, so we walked to this “night club,” to hang with the locals and see what the far west night life was like. As it turns out, it is just a sad and depressing as the day life. This was a pretty nice place though; they had a big sitting area/dance floor, and a place to play a DVD while people were partying. The lady selling the refreshments was really friendly; the lady selling some food at the door WAS NOT, and she was not a very wise business women. We bought some food anyway though and headed back to Miss Pats. Now it is bed time. Peace.

Friday, September 28, 2007

2007-09-28T19:36:00.000-07:00

What a wonderful night of sleep I had and I actually got cold during the night, WOO-HOO. Before breakfast today I folded my laundry and chatted with Vogley about the day, and then we had some very good corn cake and leftover biscuits and gravy. After breakfast Roland and I took a walk around St. Louis to find an internet café so that I could make sure that the reason I could not access the internet was not my computer, because I would not be a happy camper if that was true. As we were on our way to our second stop, we were taken on a detour by a gentleman that wanted to show us his “school,” which turned out to be a church that was used as a school because they did not have a school. As it turns out he has some Haitian friends in the states that had sent him some money for school stuff and to pay the salary of the teachers as long as he did not charge the students and what he wanted me to do was give him money to build a few class rooms so that the children did not all have to be in the church sanctuary at the same time. Roland politely told him that he had to talk with Janeil if looking for money to build a school and to him that meant that I did not want to help him, so after that little discussion/argument I said, ok we are done and we left. After our second failure, we took a couple of mopeds to what turned out to be the greatest place in the entire world. These guys have this photo studio and international phone call shop and because of the international aspect of it they have high speed internet but do not charge for it, so I fired up my computer and found out that it was working beautifully. That made me feel really relieved and I got to get everything done that I needed to and so did Roland and I met this really cool young man named Peter. After we were done we headed back to the mission for lunch, and since we were a little early so I went down to Mike’s house to borrow his tape measure, a level, and a step ladder because Erin and I decided that the supply closet needed more shelves and I am going to build them next week, and then I GET TO ORGANIZE EVERYTHING!!! I am way super excited about that. After lunch Teresa and I joined Erin and Melissa in organizing a ridiculous amount of baby stuff for Heaven’s waiting room, the Baby Orphanage, and the Birthing center. There is so much stuff you just don’t know what to do with it all, but the girls are amazing at figuring that mystery out, I am just there for moral support really and to lift heavy things, of course. The girls decided to go to Sonel’s at 330 today so we cleaned up everything and headed to our boys house. When we got there he was in his new favorite toy and LOVING it. He said that he spends more time in this new chair than he does in bed, which is really good for him because it will help to heal his bed sores. Unfortunately we had to put him in bed so Mel could change his dressings. He showed us, his improvement on his arm workouts and I think he is going to be stronger than me pretty soon. I was telling the girls when we put that bar up that I was jealous because Americans have to be motivated to go to the gym and we put one right over his head for him. When we got back to the mission we had enough time to properly get ready for dinner and we found that a few of the girls from the Orphanage were there hanging out with Heather and Ne Ne so I hung with them for a while. After dinner, the interpreters went to do their own thing, Heather and Janeil turned in with their little ones and Mike, Teresa, Erin, Melissa, and I got some popcorn, soda, and the brownies that Teresa made and sat down to play Shanghi. It was a really long game tonight but a really fun game, because Mike and Teresa are practicing Creole so the whole time they are saying random phrases and words. Also, Mike was singing about 60 seconds of the most eclectic variety of songs you could imagine. We had to break in the middle for a very sad incident that poor Melissa had to deal with. She went to the birthing center to check this ladies blood sugar and could not find the equipment she needed so had to defer her to the hospital, and while she was down there a lady gave birth to twins that were like 2 months pre-mature and died almost right away. From hearing that I found out a couple other cultural differences, one of which I am not discussing. While we were playing cards, Jose came over and got the internet working for us, so after Shanghi, we all went our separate ways to get online and send out all that we needed to and check up on everything. Now I am going to go to bed. Peace.

Thursday, September 27, 2007

2007-09-28T08:00:00.000-07:00

Oh, what a night, I was up until 340 with really bad intestinal issues and a little bit of a migraine. When I finally fell asleep at 4, the 2 hours of rest that I did get were solid, thank the Lord. Once I got up, it was water water water, and a little bit of food, but not a lot. After breakfast I played with Den, one of the children in Heavens waiting room, and we took a wheelchair ride. After that Roland and I went downtown to exchange some American money in to Haitian, for Melissa. Then, since I am such a nice guy, I spent a couple of hours helping Mel make layettes, which I found out is just a glorified name for new born care packages. It was fun because we actually got to make one of the components of the package since we did not have any in stock. After that is was just about lunch time so I laid down for a little while but did not sleep. After lunch, I spent a little more time in Heaven’s waiting room and about 45 minutes reading a learn to speak Creole book. At about 230 it got really cloudy and lots of thunder sounded so, I decided to go to Sonel’s early because we had a new wheelchair for him today and I did not want to get caught in the rain with it. Fortunately, Melissa and Teresa decided to go early as well, but unfortunately we did not make it all the way to the house before it began to rain. We got really close, but no cigar. When we got there Sonel told us that we should not have come today because he did not like it that we were wet. I am really glad that we did go though, because we were there while it was raining and got to see how dry he stayed while it rained. I am forever fascinated by the Haitians for their ability to take the simplest of things and make and maintain a dry living environment out of them. They all really like his new chair and he said that he uses his bar quite frequently during the day to move himself around and exercise. While we were there they rain finished and we got to walk home dry, however they ground was muddy and wet and it was almost as amusing watching the ladies attempt this terrain as it was watching them make it their while raining. When we got back I was just going to get in the shower when I heard that Navis, a Haitian young man that lives in the far west, spent 7 hours at the hospital today. The doctors thought that it was a reoccurring incident from his TB episode. So I went to visit him since he was at his aunt’s house and she lives very close to the mission. His spirit was high, however, he almost has no voice and is coughing a lot, and is pretty much skin and bone. The doctors told him that he has to stay in St. Louis for a couple of weeks and rest and eat A LOT. When I got back I showered and chatted with some of the other interpreters about their day, and then we had a very wonderful lasagna and green beans dinner. Melissa and Erin made a really good desert to go along with it, and they made it pretty much at the last minute. After dinner we had devotions and now since the internet is still down I am done writing this journal and I am going to bed. Peace.

Wednesday, September 26, 2007

2007-09-28T07:56:00.000-07:00

This morning I did not feel very good so I did not do a whole lot today. I got up and wrote yesterday’s journal because the internet was not working last night so I did not feel like messing with it. I got that done around 730 and had breakfast, and then I went downstairs and hung out with Erin and the children in Heaven’s waiting room. We were down there for about an hour and around 930 I had a real bad headache and stomach issues and decided to try to sleep it off. I woke up at 1230 to the lunch bell and was not feeling any better, so I tried to eat a little, no luck. After lunch Erin, Melissa, Heather and Ne Ne went to Port-au-Paix to visit the Orphanage and Sun-Light academy, and all the interpreters were gone on errands as well, so I had the afternoon pretty much to myself. This was nice because I wasn’t feeling good anyway, so I just lounged around and watch a movie. I spent just about an hour with the Heaven’s waiting room children, watching a Disneyland sing-a-long, and playing with them during bath time. When the ladies got back they changed bags and we headed to Sonel’s, and since we did not leave until 440 we decided not to take him his new wheelchair because of how long it would take to show him how to use it. So Melissa changed his dressings, I gave him a flashlight so he could read at night, and I finished his pull-up bar. When we got back it was time for dinner and I still did not eat anything, because the headache and stomach issues were still around. Oh well, I will power through it, “Eye of the tiger,” style. After we were all done eating, we had devotions and hung out chatting about what is taking place and since it is raining no one is in the mood to stay awake. So I am going to try and go to sleep. Peace.

Tuesday, September 25, 2007

2007-09-26T05:58:00.000-07:00

Well this morning after a wonderful muffin breakfast, I relaxed for a little while and talked with Mike. At 8 Erin and I went to the dungeon to try and assemble what wheelchairs we could based on the pieces that were available. Since we get several boat shipments, you never know what is going to come in so we have like 30 wheelchairs and about 18 foot rests some that have no matches. It was fun and we accomplished what we needed to because we were looking for a wheelchair for this boy’s grandmother. Erin also found a different wheelchair that will be perfect for Sonel, so as soon as it gets a tune up we are going to take it to him. After that I thought it was time to go because Janeil said that we were going to leave around 830 for Beau Champ and the Far West, however, he was giving Mike, Joe, and Andy a tour and they had to go get gas for the truck so we did not end up leaving until 1045. That was ok though because there was another group of American Missionaries here talking with Melissa about coming back when the surgical team is here so that some of the members of their church can get looked at. The run a school and a church downtown and were very nice and I took them on a tour of our facility because the young couple had never been on campus before. At this point I cannot remember their names; I will have to get back to you on that. Well, at 1045 Janeil, Mike, Andy, Joe, Roland, Wisley, Benna, Jeffery, two other gentlemen I don’t know, and I all left for our day of traveling and visiting. To give you a little more on Mike, Joe, and Andy, they run this company called C3 Ministries. Basically, what they do is travel to poorer foreign countries and find established local churches where they can front the money to build an Orphanage or children’s home and then leave the monthly “backside” support of the children and the staff to either a stateside church or the local native church. They are really an amazing group of gentleman, I mean you have a Lawyer, an Eye surgeon, and a retired Propane business man who have a little money and want to use it for the betterment of the kingdom, and boy do they have fun while they are doing it. Ok so away we go, we stopped at the Orphanage to pick up a cooler to put drinks in and Wisley needed something from the house. When we got into Port-au-Paix it was about time to eat, so while one of the Haitians was getting ice and drinks the Americans and Wisley went to this nice little restaurant hidden in the back of a convenient store and had pizza and the guys talked about all that is going to be taking place with the partnership of C3 and the NWHCM. We were there until almost 1, which was ok with me because I’m chill like that. Well, we finally got out to Beau Champ and the construction of Mike and Teresa’s house was not as far along as I thought but I have nothing but confidence that it will be done by January. While Janeil gave the guys the tour and the story of future plans I played with the children, using a football and a Frisbee that Andy brought with him, oh yeah and we also played with my camera. It was really funny watching them try to figure out the Frisbee, and we started to play kind of like dodge ball with it. Andy also gave them all starbursts, which of course, they loved. After we were done their we took a different road than I was used to and went to this 10+ acre plateau called Saliens-Myette, where we have a “church” built already. This location is the future site of the children’s home, church, and school, Janeil and the guys walked around the grounds and discussed the prospects of the land and getting everyone on the same page. Once I again I got to be the entertainer while the guys were talking business, after the starbursts, these kids got the concept of the Frisbee a little quicker. I ran into a child that did not like white people, and found it out the hard way, I picked him up and he threw a fit. We were there for about 90 minutes and had a great time with the children and the parents that were there, they had a wonderful time trying to catch the long bombs that Joe was sending out. After we were done at Saliens-Myette we went to the church in La Fonte, which is the dark church photo and my website on the Saliens-Myette page. By the time we got there it was 6 and I called Mike to tell him where we were and that we would not be back for dinner, and we spent about 40 minutes there talking with some of the locals and a few of the pastors. That was a really nice church and little village, although the bathroom was only 4 and a half feet tall so I decided to wait until we got back to the mission. We stopped at the Orphanage on the way home and dropped off everyone but the Americans, Wisley, Roland, and the driver. Andy also had a new outfit and a football for the little boy that he sponsors. After about 30 minutes we finally headed home, and we arrived at the mission at about 9, to find everyone already in bed except Erin and the interpreters. Fortunately, they left some food for us and we showered and sat down to unwind and eat. After we ate, the C3 boys hit the sack because they had to leave at 5am Wednesday morning to go to the airport, and that makes for a long day of traveling. I stayed up for like another hour chatting and emailing and now I am ready for bed. Peace

Monday, September 24, 2007

2007-09-24T19:39:00.000-07:00

Ok, so today I slept in until 630, which was nice, and then we all woke up to a little surprise. PANCAKES were ready for us, prepared by one of the Haitian ladies that cooks when Heather and Janeil are here. After a wonderful breakfast, and clean up was over, I set my day of what I needed to do to build Sonel’s pull up bar. First thing, I had to go to Sonel’s and get several measurements before I could do any cutting. Since everyone else was busy, I got to go there by myself, which was nice because it was quite and quick. After I got back, I found Vogley and got my pipe and wood and we headed to the maintenance shed to cut everything. This turned out to be a VERY difficult and time consuming process because today just happened to be the day of generator problems. It was on and off all day and not working for most of the day. With this distraction I decided to use this down time to go downtown and find some rope to hook the bar up with. This was a very easy process that Roland and I completed quite efficiently and we even managed to have time to buy some REAL bananas, since the last time we purchased “bananas” they were the wrong ones. We got back just about in time for lunch and the generator was on so I real quick cut the pipe and almost all of the wood that I needed. To better help you envision this project here is what it entailed: a 3 foot hollow lead pipe, a 12 foot piece of ¼ inch rope, a 7 ½ foot board, and 4 3 inch blocks of wood. I put pictures on my website of it in use if you want to look they are in the St. Louis link. Ok so after lunch, I babysat a two year old American girl named Ne Ne for about 2 hours, while her mother got a little rest and recharged. This is one of the funniest little girls I have ever babysat. We colored and took a walk and colored some more. At about 2 I took her to go see her cousin, who had just finished school. She played with her for about an hour which gave me enough time to finish cutting the wood I needed for Sonel’s. Unfortunately the generator was inoperative so I had to hand saw cut the rest of the 3 inch blocks. What a glorious time that was, it had been a very long time since I had cut something by hand. Oh well, it was well worth it and I would do it again in a heartbeat, and plus, I had nothing else to do anyway so why not, not waste that time block. So now it was 4 and time to go to Sonel’s, so Melissa loaded up the meds she needed and I got my wood, pipe, and rope and Mike got the power drill, the screws, and the step ladder. I passed the pipe and the rope off to Vogley and Mike put the blocks in his back pack to balance the weight and Teresa carried the step ladder. By the time we got to Sonel’s we had half a dozen followers wondering what we were going to do with all this stuff. Sonel knew and was ready for action, when we got there he was already in his chair, which made Melissa happy because it is good for his bed sores if he is not in bed. So Mike and I moved his bed to the other side of the room so that Melissa and Teresa could change his dressings and Mike and I could install the bar at the same time. Mike let me do most of it because, he said it was “my project,” which I never thought of it like that because I just wanted something for Sonel to be able to work his good muscles with. It was a fun process, because Sonel’s dad and uncle helped out a lot and we got to see how they do some of their constructing. Well with the finished product installed we put the bed back and had Sonel try it to make sure that it was the right height and position. He was so excited, and said that he could feel his muscles being worked, which was good. We were at Sonel’s a little later today so we got back just about 10 minutes before dinner, which after that work was very wonderful. We had a few visitors today that we got to meet at dinner and spend the night getting to know. Mike, Joe, and Andy, who as I understand it go all over the world starting children’s homes and orphanages and then donating to them to help them run. They are really nice gentlemen and are looking forward to working with the NWHCM in the far west. At 7 we had a group devotion and then chatted for about 35 minutes before everyone called it a night and went their separate ways. I took that time to get on my computer and catch up on emails and write in my journal. Now as it looks like it is going to rain and the boys would like to turn off the generator, I am going to go to bed. Peace.

Sunday, September 23, 2007

2007-09-23T19:57:00.001-07:00

So today, I got to start the day off with a tap tap ride, because Roland and I had to go back to the Orphanage for junior church. It was ok though because I like mingling with the people, plus it was early so it was neither as crowded nor as many stops as normal. We had a little time to kill when we got back to the Orphanage, so I dropped my stuff of in my room and walked around talking with the children about where I had been, what was going on, and when I was coming back. We started church at about 915 and like all other weeks the children were already singing and seated when Roland and I got into the chapel. Today was an easy day, even though my count was 145 kids. We started out with some songs, then I read a few verses, we told the visitors about Noah (from last week), and I told the children about Sonel and we prayed for him. After all that I let the children sing special music for about 30 minutes. Once we were all sweating, I called it a morning and gave them each two pieces of candy, and sent them on their way. We hit a bit of good luck today, in that Soni had to go to the mission to take them some food so we did not have to tap tap back. So while we were waiting for Soni to be done in church we went downtown to find Tang for Mike and Teresa, and a clock for Sonel’s house so that his family would know when to re position him and how long he has been in his wheelchair. Shopping in Port-au-Paix on a Sunday turned out to be WAY more difficult than I thought it would be because instead of opening later on a Sunday like in the states, businesses just do not open at all. So 45 minutes and three strikes into our journey we found Tang, not orange like we were looking for, but Tang none the less. So now it was about 1145 and we were going to walk back to the Orphanage, have lunch and head out with Soni, when I remembered that we did not get a clock yet. So we turned around and began, what turned into, a long hour and a half process. This process encompassed about half a dozen denials, 3 redirections, and A LOT of walking, and a break for cold drinks. It was all good though, because it lead us to this bulk depot where the owner did not have any clocks but had a cousin with a shop that did sell clocks and he called him and asked If he would open real quick and see us one. He said yes and we quickly headed over there and checked out his stash. He had 3 different styles, none of which were digital, but one was a tire and had wrenches for the hands and it was kind of cool and not a bad price, so we got it. While we were browsing at these clocks Soni called and told us that he was done picking up the food and waiting in the town square for us, so we high tailed it over there and caught the truck to the Orphanage. At the Orphanage we moved in double time because we had little time to work with, so we stuffed our faces, grabbed what we needed for St. Louis, loaded up two air conditioners that Heather and Janeil needed and started the trip to the mission. We got there to find almost everyone taking a much needed Sunday afternoon nap. The only American awake was Erin and that was because she was trying to calm one of the Heavens waiting room boys. As soon as he was better she joined the napping club, which meant I got a little bit of actual quite alone time. At about 345, people began to emerge from there slumber and we all got ready to go to Sonel’s. Today we took him; the clock, an English to Creole picture dictionary and the leftover candy from this morning for him and his cousins. We also took him a couple of new visitors, which he loves because more people want to meet him and know him. Mike told another story today and we played with the ball and the clock and the radio. Ne Ne, Heather’s two year old daughter, went with us today and was an absolute riot passing out candy and taking pictures. We were there for about 90 minutes and got back tired and sweaty and ready for dinner. Mike and Teresa decided to eat in their house today, so Erin and Melissa made the rest of us, biscuits and gravy, eggs, and fruit cocktail. It was REALLY good, and clean up was AWESOME because I got to do the dishes again and it made me feel like I was at church camp. After dinner nobody lasted very long before they called it a night, so I sat down to do my computer thing and chatted with Vogley about some English words and what they meant. He is really a good learning and wants to know all that he can to do his job the best that he can. At about 915 or so pretty much everyone disappeared and I find myself in the dining hall alone and it is once again quite. Now it is 1030 and my eyes hurt and I am ready for bed, long day of building exercise equipment tomorrow, so I am going to bed. Peace.

Saturday, September 22, 2007

2007-09-22T19:42:00.000-07:00

So today was Tony’s memorial, so I spent the morning wondering who all went to see him off, so to speak. Since it is the weekend, we Americans have to cook for ourselves, because the Haitian ladies that cook during the week have off. Erin woke up in the mood for pancakes so, I decided to help her make breakfast for everyone. Little did we know that a simple thing like making pancakes and coffee would result in more time spent and dirty dishes than most other meals. Before we attempted the pancakes, she was making coffee, and because of some extra coffee drinkers arriving yesterday, she decided to use the bigger pot. As it turns out it is a little harder to use that pot because of the size and the condition of the stove. So with our first defeat of the morning attempt number two was with the normal size pot, which turned out wonderfully. So next to the stove is a good size flat grill that I was excited to use, but found out that it takes like an hour for it to be ready to cook on, so we decided to use the regular oven. This normally would be an ok decision, just get a pan, spray it, and have pancakes, well not in Haiti. First we couldn’t find spray, so we used butter, and then found out that the stove slants one way so all the butter burnt in one corner of the first pan. Second, some of the burners don’t work and none of them work at the same pace, so the first pan got real cooked before we could get food on it. So we moved on to another pan and tried to administer the butter differently and succeeded but found out after the first two cakes were on their that there was not enough butter on the pan. During this time I found some vegetable oil, so when we got out our third pan, we used oil. A little too much though, and the first cake was like a grease ball. I dumped a little off the pan, and then managed to get about 12 cakes out of the batter we had made. We decided to not mix anymore batter though, because by this time no one was even awake yet. So we enjoyed them did ALL of our MANY dishes and moved out to the dining hall to check emails and blogs. After a while of just relaxing on my computer I spent some time with the interpreters watching some kung fu movie and just hanging out. I got a chance to talk with Heather and Janeil after that, which was nice because they made me feel better about working with the kids and learning Creole, and being a part of the future of the mission. I decided that I wanted to go to the market today to get some fruit for the week, but when I went to get Roland, they were just putting in Constantine and had never seen it so I let them watch that first. I actually joined in a little, even though it was in French. That was ok, because I have seen it enough to know what they were saying. After Constantine, we had a wonderful lunch prepared by Heather end Erin, chicken salad, pineapple, crackers and chips. Roland, Vogley, and I finally left for the market to pick up bananas, oranges, mangos, candy, and Tang. We found all but one of those things; Tang is going to have to be a Port-au-Paix purchase. We stopped back at the mission to drop off the food before we went looking for the Tang and we lost Vogley, because he wanted to rest before we went to Sonel’s. Roland and I walked all over to find Tang, but we failed, and almost every vender told us to go to Port-au-Paix. By the time we had exhausted all possibilities we did not have enough time to go back to the mission before the rest left for Sonel’s so we took another route and just met them there. We actually beat them there, which was good because we got Sonel out of his bed and took him outside on his wheelchair to hang out with us. He had quite a group of visitors today and was really excited about that. We found out that the air mattress that we took a couple of days ago must have a tiny pin hole in it because it was completely flat after only two days. Fortunately, he still had the egg crate that I donated to him so he was still laying on a soft surface. While we were there we sang, danced, and Mike told a story from the Bible, which Sonel loves because Mike tells them so well, it’s like you were there. When we got back to the mission we all showered and got ready for dinner, which was prepared by Mike and Teresa. We had BBQ chicken, coleslaw, green beans, Jalapeno cheese potatoes, and cake for desert. It was very very good, except the potatoes (cause of the Jalapeno cheese). While Erin and Melissa were cleaning up they got attacked by these ants that bite hard and their bites burn a little instead of itching. They were all over one of the trash cans and it must have gotten bumped by the girls because something rattled their cages. After, I did the dishes and helped put everything away; I sat down at my computer to journal, chat with some friends, and help Vogley understand some English words that were new to him. I was doing all of those things until about 1115 and then I went to bed. Peace

Friday, September 21, 2007

2007-09-21T18:54:00.000-07:00

So today started off with the tiniest hint of a headache and just the faintest bit of nausea, which according to Melissa I was a little dehydrated. So, I drank lots and lots of water today. After the breakfast block of time I sat down at my computer and had a digital meeting with the board for the Hike for a Cure Foundation. This was our first meeting and I am the president and it looks like we are going to be accomplishing great things, in the very near future. Since enough time had passed for all the morning preparation stuff I set out to find Melissa to get her to change my bandage for me. Had I known that she was going to hurt me I would have avoided her, just kidding, it only hurt because of what she was putting on. At about 1030 Erin and I went over to the baby orphanage to watch them play in this new toy that they got. When we got over there, we found out that it was only partially assembled and incorrectly assembled, so we proceeded to attempt to fix it for them, while they were in it. To better help you in vision this, it was an igloo shaped toy that they children got into and played inside of. After we finally understood how this assembly worked, we got it all squared away and found out that it was missing one piece, which we have reason to believe is in the room that the whole thing came from. We spent some time playing with them in their new toy and chatting with the staff, about where best to put it. After the baby orphanage, I got a task from Erin that had needed done for some time. They built this little train for the Heaven’s Waiting room children out of barrels; however when it rains the water just sat in the bottom of the cart and attracts bug and smells really bad. So what Erin wanted me to do was drill holes in the bottom of the carts so the water would drain, it was a lot of fun because I got to use a power drill. That led just about up to lunch, so we all enjoyed a nice Haitian lunch. After lunch I spent about 80 minutes talking with Vogley, about American stuff and what English words mean and the differences between our cultures. At about 115 Roland, Melissa, Mike, and tap tapped to the La Pointe hospital to visit a young girl who as it turns out had typhoid and has been in the hospital for several days. She was very excited to see us visiting her and Roland and I went out to the market and bought her some chicken and a Tampico (which is a fruit drink) as a little celebration of being better and getting to go home. After our visit Melissa took us behind the hospital to an establishment called the House of Hope, which is where they take children for 9 to 12 months for TB treatment. The ladies that run that facility were very nice and gave us the rundown of the place and a little tour, and the children that we ran into were full of smiles and joy even in the condition they were in. Before we caught a tap tap back we visited the 7 Brothers ice cream shop and got a cup of soft serve ice cream, which by the way is REALLY good. Since it was 245, the schools were letting out and it was nearly impossible to find a ride that could handle all four of us. Finally Melissa had the bright idea to walk about 40 feet down the block so that we could catch a ride before they filled up instead of trying to do it while they were already full. When we got back to the mission, we found a very disappointed Erin, who did not go with us because she thought that Heather, Janeil, and the kids were going to be back and she wanted to see them, and they had not yet returned. So it was about 315 and we were planning on leaving for Sonel’s at 4, so we rehydrated and got some supplies and got ready to go. To our joy, the Owens family finally showed up at about 345/350ish, and we all helped them unload while saying our hellos. At 405ish, Melissa, Vogley, and I took off to Sonel’s to get him all newly bandaged. He was of course; really excited when we got there, but for some reason he looked a little less happy today. His wounds looked good but not as good as they did yesterday. I got to help Melissa with the dressings today, which was cool to get to see what that process entails. We got back to the mission about 20 minutes before dinner so I took a shower and chatted with Erin and Heather while she was feeding the Josiah (her youngest). Dinner was really good tonight, mashed potatoes, peas, and beef stew. I loved it, but I was the only one, because I guess they had it a lot over the summer and were tired of it. After dinner we talked with Heather about what has been going on with them while they were in the states and us while we were here, and all that is getting ready to take place. At about 730 it started to rain, which made everyone happy because it hasn’t rained in a few days and now it is 9 and it is still raining and the rain has been so severe that half the dining hall floor is covered in water, it is CRAZY. Well I am done with my journal now and my eyes are really heavy so I am going to go to bed now. Peace.

Thursday, September 20, 2007

2007-09-20T21:23:00.000-07:00

Well today I woke up and got the worst news that I could have gotten while I was here. A very good friend of mine died on Wednesday and I really really want to be in the states right now to go to his memorial. For those of you who are Williamsport residents, I am sure you have dealt with him several times. His name was Anthony Mazzei, aka Tony, aka the old door man at the movie theatre. If you have not read it yet or would like to read it, here is the link for his obituary, http://www.sungazette.com/obituaries/articles.asp?articleID=22659. He lived such an amazing life and was a volunteer and made everyone else’s lives easier up until his last day. I am very sad and will miss him a lot. Mike and Teresa made breakfast for the Americans today and we shared scrambled eggs and muffins in their house this morning. It was really nice to just sit around and talk in English and fellowship. After breakfast I spent some time responding to some emails and talking with Erin about what is going to be going on today. Some guys were here today repaving some spots in the dining hall and it was shooting concrete everywhere. It was kind of fun to dodge it all day, made it like a game. At about 10 Roland, Vogley, and I decided to get rid of the rest of the toys that I brought in with me. So the first stop we made was the nutrition program. They all loved getting toys to play with while they waited. The children got cars or animals (based on gender) and the adults got bracelets that say I love Jesus, I also passed out 2 or 3 blow up beach balls for them to hit around. After we were done there we went down to see the granmoun (nursing home). They almost all got bracelets because I figured they would not want cars and animals. However, I ran out of bracelets with 4 to go so I handed out a few animals. I also left them a few beach balls and most of them posed for a picture. After that it was lunch time so we took a little break and during lunch Mike and I decided that we are going to wait to finish T-mans windmill because neither of us are sound enough electricians to be comfortable with hooking it up ourselves. The 1st week of October there is an electrician coming in to work on some things for the mission so we are going to see if he can help, or T-man said he knows someone who might be able to do it so we passed it off to him, we just did not want to risk ruining his machine. So between lunch and going to Sonel’s house, I chatted a little bit with some friends about Tony passing away, and then at 230 Roland, Vogley, and I took a walk into town to finish giving away the toys and beach balls. It was really fun to do, but also very sad because they are just all over you wanting one of everything you have and to be fair you can only give one thing to each child, and when you run out you have to say no. So we did our best to be very discrete about it so that we did not have to turn any kids away. We got back to the mission at about 330 and found Melissa just about ready to go to Sonel’s. Before we went however, I had her bandage my burn from yesterday because it turned in to a really big blister and was a little dark. She said it was fine, but wanted to cover it up and antibiotic it anyway. After I was all patched up, we gathered everything we had for Sonel’s and Mike, Teresa, Vogley, Melissa, and I headed on down to the house. Our contents for this trip included: all Mel’s medical supplies, an egg carton (for his bed), an air mattress (to go under the egg carton), some cookies for him and his family, peanut butter for him (protein), and a radio (that we all pitched in and bought him). While we were there Mike read a devotion for him, and Mike and I talked with his father and his uncle about the best way to hook up an exercise bar for him so that he can stretch and strengthen his muscles. He was really super excited about his new bed additions, his cookies, peanut butter, and especially his radio. He had asked for that like a week and a half ago but the cheapest one we could find that was good quality was 60 Haitian dollars and that is easier to split 4 ways instead of only 2. After we played ball for a little bit and danced and he was in fresh bandages, we headed back for dinner. Dinner was all American tonight; we had green beans, cheese noodles and chicken wings. It was really really good, not that the Haitian food is bad, because believe me, it isn’t, it was just nice to have an American meal. After dinner we got around and the 5 Americans played Shanghi, which is really just apparently, Rummy and Phase 10 used as a model when they were created. It was a good time and took about an hour and a half. I came in second, which really just means I was the first loser, but I was still pretty happy about that because it was my first time playing. I told them I was going to teach them hand and foot, and then we could really get into. Well that pretty much finished the night out for most of us, a little conversation took place after that but really we went our separate ways. I hung with Roland a while, while he was checking his mail and the news and then finished my journal. Since, right now it feels like my equilibrium is not right or the Earth is spinning wrong I am going to take to Ibuprofen and go to bed. Peace

Wednesday, September 19, 2007

2007-09-20T07:17:00.001-07:00

Today I switched it up and had an American breakfast, Maple and Brown Sugar Oatmeal. After breakfast, I did my journal and then kind of just hung around and talked with Vogley until about 10. Roland and I then went downtown to the market, because I needed to look for a little radio that we wanted to give to Sonel. It was quite a hike to the market but it was nice to see some of St. Louis. When we got there it was price shopping time. I can best describe the market as a HUGE outdoor flea market, and from what I hear, Saturday is bigger than Wednesday. After checking with several different venders we found the radio we were looking for. We found this letter 4 ban radio for 60 Haitian dollars, which is like 9.50, so I thought that wasn’t too bad. On our way home we stopped and got some pitas and a sprite. The pitas are so good, I can’t even stand it. We decided to take mopeds home which for me resulted in a tiny burn on my leg from the muffler, but no blister or anything so it’s all good. After lunch we hung out in the dining hall talking about what was going to happen for the rest of the day, and then at about 2 I was recruited for another task. T-man, a local vender that works with the mission, asked me to help him put together and install a windmill that he bought to power his house. That was quite an interesting experience because it is always difficult to find the right tools. It was nice to be able to spend some time with T-man, and talk about what he plans to do and all that he has done. Once we figured out the wiring and got the windmill mounted properly we cemented in the pole and moved down to where the batteries and the inverter will be. However, because it was 345 and I was supposed to go to Sonel’s house at 4 we decided to call it a day. The girls showed up at about 415 and we headed to Sonel’s. Today along with changing the bandages Melissa had to weigh him and take his measurements because someone is going to send a brace for him. Getting his measurements was interesting because we had to move him around and sometimes it was quite painful for him. We were really excited to give him his radio but I came to find out that the new batteries I opened were no good so we could not give it to him today. I took some measurements for a pull up bar that we are going to build for him so that he can exercise while he is in bed. Once everything was recorded and we played for a little bit we headed back for supper, which was really good but a little spicy. After dinner activity was nothing but normal, we all sat around and unwound and chatted about this and that from the day. They want to play this game called Shanghi, which I have never heard of but they say, is really easy to learn. We did not play today though because some of the gang was really tired from long nights and a long day. So we just looked at pictures, laughed, and fellowshipped for a while. At about 9 I went for a run, which was really good but really really dark. After that I took a shower and chatted with some PA folk and pass out. Peace

Tuesday, September 18, 2007

2007-09-18T18:42:00.000-07:00

Ok so today, when I got up I cleaned the house that I have been using and gathered all the dirty laundry and collected everything I need for my 5 days in St. Louis. I could only take my laptop bag and my briefcase though because Roland and I went via tap tap. It was ok though because Wisley was coming later and he brought the rest of it for me. When we got to the mission, I did my journal from the previous day and updated my website and then went to Sonel’s house with Melissa and Roland to change his dressing and take out his catheter. When we got to the house we learned that his father had gone out of town for two days so Melissa could not show him how to put another catheter in, but she took out the one that was in any way to see if he could pee without it in. After we changed his dressings and got him in a diaper and gave him water, we told him we would be back later and headed home. After lunch, Erin and I spent some time working on website pictures and chatting about this and that. Around 230 Wisley showed up with my luggage and also Mike and Teresa’s, which they were very excited about, because they had a lot of things for other people that they wanted to give to them. Around 3 I went to hang out with Roland for a while why we waited for Melissa and the Grant’s so we could go to Sonel’s again. While we were waiting, I helped Roland and Vogley (the Grant’s interpreter) clean out their room. At about 4 we all went to Sonel’s house, packing toys for him and he cousins and some more Ensure (meal replacements). Melissa was really excited because he peed without his catheter in. He was really excited that so many people were coming to see him, and we had so much fun playing with some of the toys that we took him. He was thankful for something to do while he lays in bed all day. Mike and I are going to look into building some kind of pull up bar for him so that he can exercise while he is in bed and we are going to get him a radio so he can keep up on what is going on in the outside world. After we played and prayed we headed back for dinner. Dinner was really spicy tonight but really really good, and we all actually ate at the same time so it was good to just get to hang out with nothing to worry about. Dinner is pretty much the end of the organized night for most of the people because of how much goes on during the day. So everyone went their separate ways for the evening and I remained in the dining hall, journaling, updating, configuring, and researching. I hit the sack around 11. Peace

Monday, September 17, 2007

2007-09-18T08:14:00.000-07:00

Today with still no power we were roughing it. After sending the children off to school, we ate breakfast and got ready to go to the airport to see Maureen off. Instead of walking, we decided to hang out with one of Roland’s friends and wait for the mission truck to pass by and we would just hop on. Finally after waiting about an hour they showed up and we headed to the airport. While we were there, the truck that we came in (which was not a mission truck by the way) was asked by the police to move from where it was parked. While the driver was moving he hit two mopeds and we had to call another driver. While we waited at the airport we relaxed with some Sprites and chatted about Maureen’s upcoming trip and what was getting ready to take place within the mission. When her plain finally touched down we were surprised to see Mike and Teresa Grant getting off that flight. They were as excited to see Maureen as she was to see them. After all the hellos and small talk and goodbyes, Mike, Teresa, their interpreter, Roland, and I all got in the truck and headed for St. Louis. The only negative aspect of that airport run was that Mike and Teresa’s luggage did not come on the same flight as they did. They were ok thought because they have stuff in their house at the mission. The ride back to the mission was a good time to get to chat with Mike and Teresa about what they will be doing and what I was doing and all the get to know you chat. When we got to the mission I took some time to catch up on some internet business and chatted with Diana, while I waited for Melissa to boss me around. At 3 Melissa, Erin, Sarmone (sp?), and I took a metal bed frame and a mattress to a house about 1 mile from the mission. There is a little boy there named Sonel (sp?) who fell out of a Mango tree in June and broke his back and is paralyzed from the waist down. Up until we took him this bed, he had been lying on the ground and had some really bad looking soars on his hips and back from being on the ground. Erin, Maureen, and Melissa have been going there daily to treat his soars and doing some PT with him. The mission also gave him a wheelchair so he can get around and keep the bloods flowing and what not. His dad has been shown how to tend his wounds and is doing a really good job at helping them to get better. Sonel is such a fun little boy it is a shame that he is restrict for life now. Once we got back to the mission I just hung out for a little bit chatting with Jose, Jody, Larry, and Diana. Roland and I are going to be spending a few days in St. Louis this week and I asked Jose to leave me a list of things to do while he was gone if he needed to. Although, I think Melissa is going to fill my time up pretty good with things that Maureen left for her to get done. At about 530 Wisley showed up in the flatbed to talk to Larry about something and drop off some supplies for the mission, so we did not have to take a tap tap back to the Orphanage. We left at about 6 and headed back to what we thought was going to be a power filled home but found out that it was not. On the way back we had a little frog related incident, in that a little frog landed on the hood of the truck and Wisley just about jumped out of his skin. I have never seen a grown man afraid of a tiny frog like that. It was quite hilarious, and Roland did not let him forget about it even through breakfast this morning. So via candlelight and a bucket of water I did some dishes and took a shower, then ate dinner and spent some time with the children. At about 830 everyone was ready for bed so we all passed out. Peace.

Sunday, September 16, 2007

2007-09-17T11:52:00.000-07:00

Today we woke up to still no power or water, but after getting some water from the well we managed to get showers. I talked with Roger for a little bit about what was going on and apparently he is having a problem with one of his two generators and has everyone on a 12 hour on and 12 hour off power schedule. He said that he is waiting on a part from Miami. After talking with Wisley about this we went over and asked him if we could have our 12 hours from 6pm-6am, since that is when the children are home and showering and working on their homework. After all that was taken care of Roland and I had junior church. Today, I tried a new system to see if the kids stayed focused a little better. We sang 2 songs, read some scripture, and then sang 2 more songs. This was the system until all 9 scriptures were read. After that I told them the story of Noah and the Ark. They were very interactive during the story and seemed to enjoy it. After the lesson I opened the floor to special music and all the children wanted to sing but I capped it off at 8. I think maybe every other week I am going to do an hour of just special music, because the children love getting the chance to sing in front of everyone. After church we had lunch and had a little incident with four of the boys that Wisley said have been a problem for some time and he wanted to know what I thought about how to handle it. I told them what I thought was a good idea of how to teach them some respect lessons and they did not seem to like that idea because it was an inconvenience for the children. I did not have time to ask him why he thought that punishment should be convenient, because Larry needed me to bring a sewing machine to St. Louis, but sometime I may ask him that just to see his perspective. Roland and I spent about 2 hours in St. Louis before it started to look like it was going to rain, at which point we caught a tap tap back to the Orphanage. On the ride back, we were in a tap tap that had a speaker in the back and the music was so loud that I thought it was going to crack my glasses. It was funny, when it was time pay for the ride instead of shouting over the music I simply motioned to the driver who I was paying for and the other Haitians thought I did not know how to say who I was paying for. I guess they just assumed that I was going to shout over the music to be heard, but I didn’t. J Once we got back and after dinner we hung out in the courtyard until dark and then Roland and I walked into Port-de-Paix to find an internet café and something to eat. The café was a little difficult to find because of how early things close on Sundays but we managed to find one that was open. It was really nice and only 5 Haitian dollars for a half hour, which I did not think was bad at all. The cloudy, rainy weather was giving them a little trouble with getting a signal but we managed and got everything done that we needed too. The restaurant was really nice and very packed; we were there for about an hour. The music was just as loud as it was on the tap tap, but unfortunately you had to speak to communicate so it was shouting time. After that we walked back to the Orphanage and I got a shower and cleaned up my room a bit. I spent about another hour with the children and now am going to go to bed. Peace.

Saturday, September 15, 2007

2007-09-16T13:03:00.000-07:00

Today we woke up to still no power or water at the Orphanage, poor Roger Alexander and his generator problems. So we had cold breakfast and hung out with the children until it was time to go to the airport to pick up Jose, Jody and their children. We left at about 10 and hung out at the airport until they arrived, which was about 1045. There was a really nice café at the airport where we all had something cold to drink while we waited and learned about his hotel/resort that is going to be opening in Port-de-Paix. When all people and luggage were loaded up in the trunk we drove past this house that Larry rented for some of the local street boys to sleep in so they do not have to sleep on the street. He is starting this program called, Waves of Mercy, which is an outreach for the kids that live on the street and are too old to start at the Orphanage and too rebellious to fit in at a school. We got to meet some of the boys and they were so excited and grateful to be shown the Grace of God by someone who does not know them from Adam. Once back at the mission base, I just hung out in the dining hall working on my webpage and doing some emailing. Roland hung out with the other interpreters and watched a movie and the Owens and the Castillo’s went into Jose’s house to be together and have some lunch. We were at the mission until about 4 o’clock at which time Wisley showed up with Erin, Maureen, and Melissa who had spent the night in the Far West at Miss Pats. About 20 minutes after they arrived it started to pour, so we got in the truck and headed back to the Orphanage. We know however that this rain storm would cause a 40 minute trip to take just about 2 hours. The rain was so strong that any puddle or little stream that we normally drove right through became a fast moving current or huge puddle. I can only describe this trip as white water rafting in a flat bed truck. Any truck that was able to make it across the current became the new tap tap for however many people it could hold. Any other vehicles and people were stuck wherever they were until the rain stopped and the water subsided. It was so much fun to play in the water and help people make it through. I was a muddy mess by the time we got back to the Orphanage. We arrived back to find that we were still without power and water and had been all day. With this in mind we just used the rain as a shower and got all cleaned up and ate dinner. Then we spent the remainder of the night hanging out via candle light until it was time for bed. Still not having power by bed time it was amazing to see how dark it is without the presence of traffic lights, street lights, head lights, or even the neighbors light. I did not want to sleep on the roof since it had rained so hard and it was too dark to set my tent up so I slept in the heat of my room and I am sure that I lost several pounds sweating during the night. I was giving a glimmer of hope around 11 because the power came back on. It only stayed on for about 15 minutes though and I was back to sweating. It is ok though because after all that happened today I was ready to pass out. So I did. J Peace.

Friday, September 14, 2007

2007-09-15T09:46:00.000-07:00

Today was a full day at the Orphanage, after breakfast, I worked on some stuff for the Owens’s in the house and worked on my webpage for a little bit. All of the children were otherwise occupied and most have actually started school by now, so I spent until lunch by myself just working on upcoming events. After lunch I went down to the courtyard with my learn to speak Creole book and studied it for a while. The children began arriving home so that meant that I was no longer studying alone, I had help and was also teaching English. It was a lot of fun because I am starting to be able to have little conversations with the children; we laugh a lot more than we did. Tigens and I did a little structured English but not a lot; we mostly talked about what he would like to send to his sponsor. Erin, Maureen, and Melissa stopped in on their way to the Far West to see Miss Pat, which was fortunate for me because I had something for them to give to her. We chatted for a little bit about Fordge and swimming there and what was going on with them. Once they left, I hurried the children along with their lunch because we wanted to take them swimming today since they haven’t gone in a while and it was hot. While they were finishing lunch I blew up 8 beach balls for them to take and play with. This turned out to be a HUGE disaster because the children thought that I was just giving the 8 kids I chose to carry the balls, balls and no one else. Even though I clearly explained that they were for everyone, they were still mad because they could not carry a ball. When we got to the water I found out that when I say share and play with these, that really means use them as floatation devices. No one was sharing them so I took them and deflated them earlier than I would have liked. That did not make people happy and I heard about the whole situation all night. When we got back, it was more Creole-English conversational fun. At about 6 Larry asked me if the power came on later on the weekends because the latest it has ever come on has been 530. I did not think it should have been that late with no power so we sent Wisley over to check and he was told that the generator was going through some battery issue and hopefully would be back on before long. So we waited. While we were waiting, I had a few of the boys teach me how to play dominos. It was interesting to try to figure out their scoring method and to see how they punished the losers. We played that until almost 730 and it was really fun, but when the cook calls, you go eat. After dinner I went into the house to see if Larry and Diana needed a flash light and we wound up talking until 930 about the mission (past, present, and future), the Haitian culture and lifestyles, and our stateside family and lives. It was really good to talk with them and hear different perspectives on everything that I have been feeling and experiencing and what not. At about 945, they turned in and since the power was still out most of the children were already asleep so I decided to just change, journal, and hit the sack. Oh, one thing I forgot to mention was that I was going to go to town today to try and find some cooking salt for the popcorn but as it turns out there was a whole bunch in the storage depot, so I did not have to buy any, WOO-HOO. Ok, now I am going to go to bed. Peace

Thursday, September 13, 2007

2007-09-13T21:15:00.001-07:00

Today I spent the morning mostly working on some stuff in the house for Larry and his wife. At about 9 we went to Forges to drop off a load of benches at one of our schools. It was really fun because I had not yet been to that part of the county or seen this school. We had to go through this little town to get there and I was amazed at how many people and stands were set up for a non market day. The road on which we traveled to get where we were going consisted of the creek, fields, and sand. When we got to the school/church I found the most crystal clear creek water I have ever seen. Roland and I will be returning to swim with the locals in the very near future. For today however, I simply waded out to the middle for some photos and to spend some time in some non dirty, non salty water. We toured the school and the church, unloaded our cargo and took off. We stopped at the market I mentioned earlier because one of the gentlemen with us needed some things. It was good we stopped though because there were two young boys that needed a ride and fortunately they knew Roland so it was not a problem. The driver was in quite a hurry because he also had to go out to the far west today. However, since he is such a nice guy he stopped at the mission for us so I could pick up a few things, popcorn oil, light bulbs, and a TV cable. I only found one of the three things, the popcorn oil, which was the most important one so that was a good stop. Back at the Orphanage, I spent some time talking with Larry and his wife about things to come, and then spent like an hour working with Tigens on his English. He has started letting me try to say some of the Creole as well, I think it is helping a lot. One of the parents asked me if I would teach him English as well so I will be starting with him very soon. Once Tigens and I were done some of the other kids wanted to help me speak Creole as well so we read from a Learn to Speak Creole book for a while. At about 4 Diana (Larry’s wife) asked Roland and I to go downtown to try and find a spool of Teal thread that she forgot in the states, she is making curtains for someone and needs to finish. This was quite the experience, because the Haitians did not understand what Teal was and they use really old sewing machines so their spools are either really small or the ones that are big on one end and get smaller towards the top. After failing at 4 different shops we gave up, bought light bulbs and a 12 pack of sprite, and went back to the Orphanage. When we got back I took 6 of the boys up to the house to let them read an email response from Rachel Buck, a previous intern at the Orphanage that they had emailed last week. They were all really excited because they miss her a lot, and are already planning what they can send her next. After that it was popcorn time, but first I went to the seven eleven to get a little more oil, because yesterday the owner said he had a little bit I could have. From 7-830 three of the boys and I made 3 batches of popcorn each for all 5 families and the children ABSOLUTELY loved it. And what is better is that one of the boys found like 2 gallons of oil in one of the storage depots from when they machine was here before. Now I have like a week’s worth of oil. However, I ran out of salt tonight so I have to go on a mission to find that tomorrow that is ok though because I can make popcorn without salt. I thought the night was going great, we were jamming to some Reggae, making popcorn having a great time, until, while I was cleaning out the machine I touched a part of it that was a little warm and burnt three of my fingers on my right hand. My pinky, ring, and middle fingers now have a “/” on the top portion of them. It is ok though, because I am used to popcorn machine burns and comparatively, these were nothing. I found some burn cream and band aids and am back in action. Bed time now, have a great (insert time frame). Peace

Wednesday, September 12, 2007

2007-09-12T20:59:00.001-07:00

My goodness, today I got up at 5 and was so excited to go running. I did not know that I was going to be stood up by both Roland and Wisley, who had equally lame excuses for not getting up. Wisley, who suggested 5 am in the first place, said he did not get up because he has to help his wife get the children ready for school. I would have been ok with that excuse except for the fact that the children do not get up until 630. Roland on the other hand did not have an excuse I was ok with. He said that I was supposed to have woken him up. He is 36 years old and has a cell phone with an alarm clock on it. Oh well, at least I got to see the whole waking up process today, what chaos that is. At 10 Roland and I went downtown to the Digicel store to see if they got a shipment in since last week, so I could buy the phone I wanted. They, of course, did not and were still not interested in making a sale, so we went to Voila (another phone company) to see what they had to offer. The branch we went to did not have the phone I wanted however, he called their other store to check with them. They had it in stock so we walked to that store to purchase it. When we got there and got the paperwork done, we started to enter in the two phone cards I bought, only to find a new “fly in the ointment.” Apparently with the new versions of the model I had, Viola and Digicel are having a problem with a cord in the phone that is making it not possible to add minutes. That is really not that big of a deal in Haiti because only the caller gets charged minutes in a phone call, never the receiver. He told me that he thought the problem would be fixed by 3 so I took my new phone and two phone cards and we headed back to the Orphanage. On our way back we saw Larry, his wife, and a couple of guys going to work with a street ministry we are trying to start. We got about 2 3rds of the way back and decided to take mopeds the rest of the way. This I think, even though is considered the most dangerous way to travel, is the best. We got back to the Orphanage at about 1 and most of the kids were done with school and hanging out in one of the trucks sitting in the courtyard. I went to upload some pictures to my website and put my phone and camera away and then went down and sat in one of the trucks with the children for a couple of hours, talking, laughing, and being children, it was really relaxing. At 4 Roland and I took a walk through some territory that we went through the other day but did not have a camera so we were doing in with film this time. Plus Roland had never been to these parts so we were checking out new territory for him, expanding our knowledge of the place. The scenery was AMAZING, and the views of the villages, towns, and Port-de-Paix were unmatched. It was because we were above everything; I mean standing on rooftops and all. We walked for about an hour and a half, taking pictures, talking with people, and enjoying the land. It started to rain so we turned and quick footed it in the direction of the Orphanage. It quickly stopped raining though so we went through town to stop at a Viola shop and ask them how long they thought it would take to fix this issue, because I still could not put minutes on my phone. They were not sure but were optimistic it would be before Friday, so we thanked them and moved on. We had two other reasons to be downtown, one was for popcorn oil and the other was for Haitian Bibles. The store that we went to did not have either of those things but gave us a good suggestion as to who may. When we got to suggested market, he had cooking oil but not popcorn oil and no Bibles, but it worked out to our advantage anyway because one of the mission trucks passed the market as we were leaving so we did not have to walk back to the Orphanage. We passed quite the fender bender on our way and it was amazing to see the poor UN Police guys trying to direct traffic, deal with the accident, and keep pedestrians moving instead of gawking. We got back to the Orphanage a little after 6 and I went to the apartment to say hello to my new temporary roommates and see if they needed anything. Larry Owens and his wife are staying at the Orphanage for a few days while they are here so they are, of course, staying in Janeil and Heathers home. It is ok thought because I like them a lot and as it turns out they do need me to do some things so it’s all good. Larry told me about this street ministry he is trying to start called, “Waves of Mercy.” It really sounds like a great opportunity for community outreach and I am looking forward to helping in any way that I can. After dinner and trying to get the internet and TV working the Owens, Roland and I went to the 7-11 to check one last time for popcorn oil. Unfortunately, we did not find any so I had nothing to give the kids tonight and they were sad. By the time we got back I was pretty beat from all the walking and being up early and doing a bunch of things at once, so I kicked off my shoes and called it a night. Peace

Tuesday, September 11, 2007

2007-09-11T21:18:00.000-07:00

Today I spent most of the morning working on my junior church lesson and talking to my friend about losing her job. At about noon I made my way outside and played with some of the girls that did not start school yet, because of the uniform thing. Some of the other children started getting home around 1 and most of them were back by 2. All of that time for me was spent in the courtyard chatting and playing and being hung on. At about 130 me and one of the little boys went around and fed all the dogs, which were really really hungry. I think the children are beginning to see how much nicer the dogs are when they get to eat too. At 2 I went outside the gates and sat with Roland for about an hour just watching all the after school traffic, the crowd from our feeding program, and the other regular traffic, and chatting about this and that. We went inside at about 3 to get the children ready to go swimming because we were supposed to take them yesterday and did not, only to find out that they were playing us. They are not allowed to go swimming during the week when school is in session because of their homework and they knew this but did not tell Roland or me. So, since we were not taking them swimming we decided to tag along to St. Louis, which was good because I needed some things anyway. We got there at about 4, and hung out for about an hour and 45 minutes. It was nice because we got the rest of the stuff from the boat that went to the orphanage, and I got to talk with Larry Owens some more. He made me feel better about not knowing Creole all that well yet, because after 28 years he still needed an interpreter. It was so cool to see how excited some of the Haitians were to see him and his wife there, since they have not been around that much anymore. Well we got all of our stuff loaded up and tied down and got on the road to the Orphanage. On the way back we passed a funeral march for a 13 year old girl that died in a car accident last week. It was really sad, to be right next to all them while they were walking to the cemetery. Larry was telling me that accidents happen a lot because of how close together the cars come and how fast they are going and the fact that most of them do not have licenses or have ever even rode a bike before let alone drove a truck or a moped. Back at the Orphanage I immediately began making dinner (popcorn) for the children and missed their devotion time again. After their meal was over I headed to my room and chatted for a bit about stateside affairs and hit the sack. Roland, Wisley, and I are getting up at 5 to go running. Peace.

Monday, September 10, 2007

2007-09-10T21:45:00.000-07:00

I woke up still feeling under the weather and an hour late due to forgetting to set my alarm. Oops. I got to catch the tail end of the going to school process and as it turns out some of the kids did not go today because their uniforms are not done being made yet. I also found out that in Haiti the schools are not full days until like Wednesday or Thursday of the first week. After the kids that went to school were gone and breakfast was over, I spent some time listening to some Creole CDs that one of the interpreters made to help people learn. It is a very hard language and should be quite difficult to learn. I spent about an hour doing that and then decided to take a run to try and feel better. I got outside and was stopped by Roland who said I was not allowed to do that without an escort so he went and changed and we walked (he wouldn’t run) the 8 miles to St. Louis. It was quite the long hot walk; it is amazing how differently you feel here when doing something like that. In the states an 8 mile run/walk makes me feel better, but today it only made things worse. We arrived at the mission 2 hours and 40 minutes later, and just in time for lunch, which I did not participate in. I fellowshipped with everyone who was eating but after they all went their separate ways I escaped to the dorm and took like a 2 hour nap. I was awoke by Maureen who was concerned about my health and thinks that I am not eating enough and am getting dehydrated. I told her, I would try and eat more often but less quantity because all they do here is eat and I am sick of eating. After our medical discussion Roland found me and was ready to go. I ran into Larry Owens (the former president of the mission) and we chatted for a couple of minutes about what is going on and what is to come. I liked getting to chat with him and look forward to Wednesday because he and his wife are spending a few days at the Orphanage. I saw Erin take the Heavens waiting room children for a ride in their train today, at some point I will video tape that for you so you can see it, it was really cool. We decided to catch a tap tap home because it looked like it was going to rain and we did not want to walk in the rain. Back at the Orphanage, I played some soccer with the boys and chatted with Tigens until dinner and then it started POURING. We had an interesting incident tonight with two of the older boys. They got into a fight and one of them hit the other in the head with a rock, so the victim found a 3 and a half foot lead pipe and was going to beat the other with it. Roland was not having any of that though and quickly counseled both of the boys. After that while we were hanging out under cover from the rain Roland and I found out a disturbing fact. The children only eat two meals a day, which is not that big of a deal, except their second meal is at noon. Some of them are up until 11 or 1130 and that is a long time to go without food. I emailed Heather to ask her about this. In the mean time though, I made them all popcorn for a bed time snack. You would have thought it was Christmas, the way they were going on about it. I myself don’t really like popcorn, so I just watched them enjoy it. After that I was ready for bed so I called it a night. Peace

Sunday, September 9, 2007

2007-09-09T19:50:00.001-07:00

This journal is going to be very brief, as I did not do very much today at all. I was up for most of the night with a pounding headache and a very unsettled stomach, I was pretty unresponsive today. Once I was up and around I noticed that the clock on my phone was wrong and I had gotten up 80 minutes early, which did not thrill me at all. My first junior church meeting was today and I wasn’t really all that nervous, which is good because I did not feel very good. I got my bible, notebook, and the toys that I brought down for the children and went to the chapel. When I got there I was pleased to see that some of the older kids took it upon themselves to lead singing and talk with the younger ones until we started. This was good because Roland and I had some other things to take care of first. When it was finally my turn I started out by giving them my ideas for the program and what I hoped they would bring to it and get out of it. I then asked them what they would want to learn about and to my surprise got my first four lessons chosen for me, Noah, Jonah, David, and Joseph. Once we were all done explaining and getting on the same page I read them a couple of verses on respect and obedience. I am going to use those verses of core themes for the program. After about 35 minutes I gave out the toys and bracelets I had for them. It was really like Christmas, for such simple things. After that, they got to get new tennis shoes for school, which was a very sad and happy time for them. Sad because some kids did not get new shoes because they had shoes already, which is unfortunate but they don’t get 150 pairs of shoes in. I then went up to my room to sleep until the power went off, and came to find that it does not go off on Sunday. After lunch Roland and I spent 3 hours in my room chatting about various things while he was emailing some people and catching up on the news. About an hour later, I came out of hiding, still with a headache, and accompanied Roland for dinner. I did not eat anything though, but still hung out while he ate. Since I did not have “toys” for the older kids, and they are being a big help with discipline and with junior church, I decided to buy them cell phone cards so they could call people. A 15 minute phone card is only 1.50 so I was ok with that. After I gave those out I was just about spent for the day so I called it a night. Now I am going to get to bed early because I am getting up to help send the kids off to school. Peace

Saturday, September 8, 2007

2007-09-09T05:52:00.000-07:00

Today, I got up real excited to go to Port-a-Licky, showered ate and was ready to go. As it turns out we had to go to St. Louis to pick up Erin and the boys, so Soni, Roland, and I caught a tap tap and headed for the mission. This tap tap was probably the most uncomfortable ride I have had so far, because they really broke the record on number of people you can fit in the bed of a pick-up truck. Most of these people had some kind of carry-on with them as well so that took up extra space. I am certain that the shocks on this truck were completely gone because of how rattled I was when the ride was over. Once we got to the mission we had to wait maybe a half hour for some of the guys to get ready and the truck needed gas, so I just sat and talked with Maureen and Erin while we waited. Maureen unfortunately, did not go with us because she is still working on organizing all the stuff from the boat and did not have the ability to take the day off. Finally, on the road we stopped at the Orphanage to pick up some more guys that wanted to go and I needed to drop off some Junior Church material and pick up a photo ID, which I did not need after all. I also changed into sandals because Maureen said we might be doing some swimming and I was not going to deal with wet socks and sneakers. We had to go past Miss Pats on our way there so we took out some supplies that she needed and dropped them off for her. She did not accompany us either because she said that there was not enough to do. After we left her house, we drove for about another hour on some of the most ridiculous dirt roads you can imagine. Roland was in the front navigating for Soni and missed a turn so we drove the wrong way for about 10 or 12 minutes. After we got turned around and were heading the right way, we came upon this huge stone wall with two swinging metal gates in the middle of it. This was the entrance to Port-a-Licky, which is where they thought we were going to need ID but I guess that because one of the guys with us knew the guy at the gate, we did not. Once through the gat the road got a lot better and for the first time I saw street lights. I found out Port-a-Licky is not a town or village at all, it is a 12 room hotel/resort that is going to become a HUGE residential area. The website for this project is www.nkfz.com. When we got parked and out of the truck, the manager of the facility gave us a very descriptive outlook on what is to come and how long it will take. He spoke both Creole and English, so Erin and I got to hear what was happing also. After he was done with his presentation we went to the restaurant and got some drinks and then walked around the grounds for a while taking pictures and enjoying the silence of the area. At the bottom of the grounds are cliffs that overlook the crystal blue water of the ocean. I REALL REALLY wanted to go cliff diving but I did not have sneakers to climb back up the rocks. L We were there for about an hour when this tiny rain cloud appeared and Soni said that we had to go. In Haiti rain clouds equal emergency evacuation, because when it rains, chances are you get stuck where you are at. He was in such a hurry on the way back that it was a very uncomfortable ride. On our way back to the mission, we stopped for ice cream and took a little detour to see some really huge upscale housing in La Pointe. Rogard, one of the interpreters, said they belonged to the owner of the Texaco gas station in La Pointe. Back at the mission we found Wisley was there because he had gone to the airport to pick up Larry Owens and his wife and a young lady named Melissa Curtis, who comes in 3 or 4 times a year for a month to help the doctors. We spent just about an hour there during which time, Larry and the Haitians had a meeting and Erin Maureen and I chatted and chilled and made dinner. By the time we got back to the Orphanage I was not feeling well and just wanted to take a shower and go to bed. That did not happen though until 930ish, because Roland and I spent some time going around to the families and telling the parents not to send the children to church in the morning. We also spent some time talking with some of the older kids about maybe helping us out with getting the little ones to listen and respect better. Once all that was settled I was really not feeling well so I took a shower and went to bed. Peace.

Friday, September 7, 2007

2007-09-07T21:04:00.000-07:00

So today when I got up, I showered at breakfast and hung out at the slide for a while. At about 10 we went to the Far West. Because of the rain storm last night, the river was higher than we would have liked, but we ventured it anyway. When we got to the other side we stopped at a different place this time to buy some gravel and it amazed me at how many people just wanted to come along so they could watch and input an opinion every now and again. What was interesting is that some children wanted to watch and wound up getting yelled at by the adults, who were also not doing anything. We bought some sugar cane today, which is makes a very good snack, but the Haitians must think that someone is going to take it from them because they eat it like it’s going out of style. I took my time snacking on mine and they keep asking me why it was taking so long. Because of the rain the water was so thick that it resembled chocolate pudding, yet they were right in there washing themselves and their clothes. YUMMY!! Anyway, now we were off to the far west. We stopped in Augustine on the way to drop the gravel off. Augustine is this little community where we are building a school. There we got to see they surface area where the school is going to go. It looks like it is going to be a good size. Then we made our way out to Miss Pats for lunch and to pick up some sand for the school. While we were at Miss Pats Roland and the boys went into town to visit some people and I stayed back and chatted with Miss Pat about this and that. She is looking for someone to move out there and take over because she said that she is ready to go home soon. I felt bad for her because she has been doing this for quite some time and she feels like it is work now. While we were sitting there, the clouds rolled in and some really nice formations started up. Miss Pat said that for the past three days the same thing has been happening but they have not gotten any of the rain. She was not happy about that because they needed some. After the truck came back and they loaded up the second load of sand, we all got in and left Miss Pats. We got to Augustine and just as they were finishing unloading the sand, it started to rain. It POURED pretty much all the way back to Port-de-Paix. Roland and I were DRENCHED, because we had to ride in the back of the truck. We LOVED it. When we got into Port-de-Paix we were turning a corner and this Motorcycle tap tap tried to sneak around us when there wasn’t enough room. They almost got hit by us and were not happy about it. They caught up to us and the passenger argued and complained about it with Roland and Soni for almost a half hour before Soni just yelled at him, said he was done and got back in the truck and we left. It was amazing that they expended that much energy arguing over something that wasn’t that big of a deal. Oh well, back at the orphanage, after showers and dry clothes, we ate and went outside to take some pictures for Heather. It was at this time that I saw the first real disciplinary action. Loudia, one of the girls whose picture I have been trying to get, has been giving us a really hard time with smiling and looking nice. So Heather told me to have Wisley or his wife handle it since she is in their family. This girl was arguing with Wisley’s wife so she got whipped with a belt. Needless to say she was not arguing after that, however we did not take her picture today because she is allowed time to compose herself. For the remainder of the evening we just sat around and joked with each other, wrestled, and playfully fought with one another. However, the night finished with a huge feeling of frustration and an interesting argument/discussion. We are supposed to go to Port-a-Licky tomorrow and the crew from St. Louis along with Roland and I still had no idea what was going on with rides and departure. Wisley was the organizer for this trip and has put off on communicating with everyone until we absolutely made him tell us what was going on. Apparently he told one person, who no one knew was going, about a big change in plans and did not tell anyone else. That was the interesting argument/discussion; the frustration once again comes from the attitude of the Haitian adults and the children alike. It just feels that the longer I stay here the less sorry I feel for the Haitian people and the less love for them and the children I have. I do not want to feel this way, but their complete lack of disregard of anyone but themselves. The disrespect is unbelievable, and it feels as if no one is concerned about the greater good of the people. This feeling seems like it is not going to go away, because it is an extension of what I was struggling with before. I am at my wits end just about. I am going to go to bed now. I look forward to the day tomorrow, there should be lots to journal about. Peace.

Thursday, September 6, 2007

2007-09-06T20:26:00.000-07:00

Today, I got up and finished doing my journal since I feel asleep doing it last night. I started taking my medicine for my tongue today and it doesn’t seem to be getting better, although earlier today it felt good. I spent a few hours on my computer doing my journaling and emailing some pictures and information to Heather. As I was leaving Heather and Janiel’s apartment I shut the door on Sonson’s thumb. He is a three year old that is always right behind me and I did not know he was there. He recovered rather quickly though. Then I went across the street to Sunlight Academy to talk with Roger, the gentleman who runs it about a power situation with one of his generators. As it turns out they must have gotten it fixed because we had power all night, which I was very thankful for. After that I had took s few more pictures and we all got ready to go swimming. Swimming is turning out to be more trouble than it is worth. The kids do not listen very well and are too hard to control when they are that spread out. We got back to the orphanage at 230 and called Erin to see when they were leaving St. Louis to pick us up for our ice cream outing. Today was Erin’s 24th birthday and she wanted ice cream. They arrived at about 430 and Roland, Erin, Soni, Rogard, Sergo, Mislan, Taylan, Abby, and one other girl whose name escapes me, and one of the pastors all went out for ice cream. It was really good although it took a long time to make because they don’t always have the machine on to make it. While we were waiting for it to be ready we went to the store and Sergo bought Erin some Russell Stover chocolates and you would have thought it was Christmas with how big of a smile she had on her face. After we all enjoyed our ice cream we had to go to the airport to see if a letter we were waiting for was in yet. As it turns out it was not and there is a good chance it will never be, because it was supposed to have arrived Saturday. We got back to the Orphanage at about 630 and said good-bye to the St. Louis crew and I went to my room to see if we had power. We did, HOORAY!! The children were all in the back watching the championship game in a soccer tournament that had been going on for a couple of days. I took my video camera back and filmed and took photos and chatted with one of the older boys about things. After all the celebration from the winning team and the trophy presentation, several of the guys and I went to one of the common rooms so that they could write a letter to Rachel that I emailed to her. While we were doing that it started to REALLY thunderstorm, I mean awesome lightning, thunder, and HARD rain. I loved it. Once they got their letters done and Roland helped me type them. I then took and bath and my medicine and now I am going to hit the sack. Think happy thoughts because I am going to try sleep audio learning with some Creole CDs. Peace

Wednesday, September 5, 2007

2007-09-06T07:47:00.000-07:00

So after I got up today, I got busy taking some pictures, watching the kids play, and doing some emailing. At about 1015, Roland and I went downtown yet again to price shop for cell phones and I think I came to the decision that I am not going to get one. After the day I had none of you would either. First we went to the store that was closed yesterday and they had a good selection but none of the phones I wanted were in stock. The only one that was, was WAY too much money. So, we went down the road to the store that we were at yesterday so I could ask them some price questions. This was the most frustrating and worst cell phone experience I have ever had. First of all, this store had two security guards at the door; one is a shotgun and the other a metal detector. In the one room to this store there were three cases with various cell phones in them, totaling at about 35 phones. Of all those I liked about half a dozen. Here is where there was a problem; I was looking at all these phones, however they only had one of them in stock to sell. Normally, I would accept that, however they couldn’t even tell me when they would be getting a delivery. Second, there were no prices displayed so when I asked them how much a phone was, instead of telling me they kept telling me they did not have any. When I finally got them to understand what I was looking for and the information I wanted, it went a little smoother for a while. That is until they brought out some phones I was not interested in and started to try to sell me those. The final thing that has lead me to now phone hear was their inability to tell me anything about the phones and which one is the better phone and what not. It was clear they did not know anything about cell phones except how to sell them. So I did not buy anything yet, I did however have her order something for me and if she has it next week I may reconsider. After we were done with our disappointing trips to the cell phone store we went back to the Orphanage for lunch. I spent some time with the children and Benna and I took apart one of the water purifiers from Miss Pat’s and cleaned it and changed some of the older dirty pieces. Hopefully, when I try it tomorrow it will work. If it does than in order to fix the other one I must order some more parts. At about 345 I decided to walk to the 7-11 to buy some shoe laces for my church shoes. Roland was outside so he decided to go with me. We did not find anything at the 7-11 so we decided to walk to the market. We ran into the gentleman who lost his house, wife, and one of his children. Roland told him everything he needed to do and all about how we were looking for him the other day. He decided to take us to his lost home, and I am very mad I did not have my camera, because the scenery was picturesque. Roland and I are going to walk that same route again some other time so that I can take some pictures for you all to see. When we got there we meet his two children and some of the rest of the community. His oldest son has a bump on his leg that the doctors told him was a cyst. It really just feels like extra muscle and he said that he is not in any pain. He is going to St. Louis in October to have the American doctor that will be here look at it. They are really excited about coming to the Orphanage. While we were there we meet another gentleman that took us to see some of the other children that are having the same issue with the “cyst.” Once we walked around enough and the gentleman knew when he had to be at the Orphanage by, Roland and I headed to our original destination, the market. On our way to the market I almost bought something that I am sure is going to make me mad that I did not. It was, “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles,” for the original Nintendo, and the lady was only asking 10 Haitian dollars for it. THAT IS LIKE 1.40 in America. DANG!! The “market” was what we Americans call a flea market. Only it was really really big. We found what we were looking for though so that is good. On our way out we witnessed something very bold. One of the vendors called us over and told us to look around and buy something. That was ok because I needed something from her store anyway. I bought some powered lemonade to increase my Vitamin C intake. A nurse friend of Wisley’s wife bought me some Vitamin c supplement and another medicine that will help with my tongue issue. We stopped at this little club on the way back and got something to drink and sat with a gentleman that Roland knew, while he ate dinner. He was a poor fella that was trying to make it, so we bought him dinner and sat and talked with him while he ate. It was a good thing that we were there because some gentlemen from Nicaragua that only spoke Spanish and English were giving the bar tenders a hard time because they only had American money, wanted to buy liquor, and didn’t know the exchange. Fortunately Roland speaks English and Creole so he played as the middle man in this little situation. After that was settled we went back to the Orphanage, we ate dinner and I played with the children for a little bit. I really don’t feel very well though because of this thing with my tongue, which is making it a little difficult to talk, so I went to my room to read and relax. I took a bath and started working on my journal until I accidently fell asleep in the middle of everything. Oops. I woke at about 2am to find that I had ignored about half a dozen people on instant messenger and had a bunch of gibberish on the screen from sleeping on my keyboard. Good times at the Chalet Orphanage. Oh well, that is it for today. Peace.

Tuesday, September 4, 2007

2007-09-04T20:12:00.000-07:00

So today I got up, BEFORE Roland yessssssssssssssss, and had breakfast. Once we were done with breakfast we headed downtown to see if my cell phone could be activated with a Digicel chip. Only in Port-au-Prince can this be done and since I cannot convince Roland to take an 8 hour bus ride there, we will have to go shopping. We caught a tap tap to St. Louis, so I could take a look at what material they had there for lessons for my junior church program. When we got there we decided to check out this cell phone store in town because Roland knows one of the ladies there. She only had a Sony Ericson model and was asking 264 Haitian dollars for it. NO thanks. Once at the mission, I said my hellos to Maureen and Erin, got the unpacking and organizing update, dropped off some meds, and made my way to the supply closet. What a train wreck of a room that was. This closet, which is probably 10 feet deep and 12 feet wide, with shelving units on the left coming out about 1 foot and a half, and about I said 50 mattresses on the right side coming like 3 feet out. In the middle of all this were boxes, bags, tarps, tents, and totes of just the most random stuff that you could ever imagine. I’m talking from toilet paper, to balls, to crafts, you name it, and it was there. So since I could not see the stuff I was looking for I decided to organize for a little bit. I started by stacking a dozen mattresses that were just thrown in the middle on top of everything. After that, I organized the floor mess, and let’s just say that now there is a floor and you can get around in that room to find what you are looking for. I found the box I was looking for, so the next time we go to the mission in a mission vehicle I am going to borrow it. I had lunch with Erin and Maureen and we chatted about all kinds of various mission things going on and traded stories of the week. It was good, having a little American time. Thursday Erin and some of the interpreters are coming to Port-de-Paix for Erin’s’ birthday to take her out for ice cream, so I think Roland and I are going to join them. As it turns out, we are actually going to go and get them so they don’t have to tap tap it down. While we were on our way back to the Orphanage I got to impress the Haitians and show them how we roll in America. The tap tap was crowed and a lady got on and had to stand in the middle, so I immediately got up and exchanged her places and Roland said that they other Haitians were surprised at that because if I had not been on that ride she would have stood the whole time. Back at the Orphanage, Roland and I changed into swimming attire and took the children swimming since I promised them yesterday and did not deliver. This time was different because Roland and I swam with the children, something that neither of us will do again. Two things lead to my decision to not want to swim anymore. One, the salt water was so bad and burned the eyes like nothing you would believe, and two holding kids while I am trying to tread 15 feet deep water is quite difficult. After swimming we headed back downtown to do some price shopping on cell phones. In all of Port-de-Paix there are only two Digicel phone retail places. I was amazed at that fact. The first one we went to Roland likes better but it did not turn out to be such a nice experience. They have some really nice phones and seem to be pricing them correctly, however their one flaw, which made me leave without purchasing, is that all the phones are locked in a case and they will not get one out for you to hold and see and determine if you like it. I am sorry but I cannot make a purchase like that without seeing if I like the phone first. So we went to check out the other store, and come to find out that at 430 they were already closed. So, since I was not ready to go back to the kids yet and bummed about no phone, we walked around for a while. It was a really good thing we did to because Roland ran into an old friend of his and got to go back to his house and talk with him for about an hour and a half. The place that this gentleman lives is not nice but definitely has A LOT of potential. It is this hotel/apartment complex. It has an internet café in it and a radio station. I liked it a lot. After we were done there we went back to the Orphanage, and got ready for dinner. While dinner was being prepared we went around and took some more of the staff pictures. This process is taking way to long and giving me way too many gray hairs. We got a lot done today though so that’s good. After dinner and after I had my tongue looked at, I retired for the evening to work on Miss Pats water filters and email the staff photos away. Yesterday at some point I noticed a lot of bumps on the bottom of my tongue and it felt like it was either raw or burnt. It did not go away by today so that is why I had it looked at. I am most likely just going to let it go. I am sure it will work itself out. Well I am going to bed now. Peace.

Monday, September 3, 2007

2007-09-03T20:07:00.000-07:00

First, for those of you who have been keeping up on my journals, I realized today that I did not journal about my first travel day. I did that today for you and posted it. It should be the first one on the list, Wednesday, August 15, 2007. Enjoy the read. Ok so today was really a very chill day and kind of a Matt day. I got up at 7 this morning because I was told that some of the children started school today. That did not happen and they were all still sleeping when I got up, so I did some emailing and watched some videos on my computer and fell back asleep for about 30 minutes. After I showered and had breakfast, Heather needed me to take three of the children’s pictures for their sponsors. It was really easy because they love getting their picture taken. Once that was done and they were emailed away, I spent some time outside with the children and talking with Roland about the Junior Church program. At about 10, Wisley came back from running some errands and said that Soni was going to go to the Far West today to take some stuff to Miss Pat. Since I had not been out there in a while, Roland and I decided to tag along. We did not leave until about noon, so we just sat around and talked and played for a while with the kids. Also, one of the boys, Roland, and one of the Pastors wanted to check their email, so we did that and surfed the web via my laptop. Before we left and after we go back I experienced a different frustration that showed me a part of the Haitian culture that differs from ours. I have been trying to take pictures of the staff for the Orphanage website for about a week but every time we go to ask the Haitians to pose for us they say that we have to come back after they clean up. When I tell them that it is for the website, they think they must look clean and neat. I don’t understand why they just can’t smile and be done with it. While we were at Miss Pats, she told me what she tells her staff when this situation arises. She says, “No photo, no program.” Translated that means, pose for this action shot, so the sponsors can see the program in action or it will not be around much longer. So she tells them that the sponsors don’t want to see a well dressed, clean person, they want to see the staff working in the programs they are helping to keep going. I really liked that approach and am going to try it and see what happens. Well the trip out to the Far West was just like every other, except this time we were in the big truck, I’m talking like a 15 foot bed. We loaded it up with wood, rebar, and Miss Pats supplies off the boat and headed out into the traffic jams and people. This truck is the more dangerous one to take because the horn does not work on it so there is no warning for other drivers. It was a fairly incident free trip out except for two things. One, there was a slight detour due to bridge construction. Now when I say detour, I mean they went over 10 feet, made a path through the dirt, and cars went around. Two, there was this little dog that would not get out of the road and ran in front of us for about ½ a mile before he got tired and moved aside. When we stopped to unload the rebar, I was amazed at how hard the Haitians make every task. Instead of putting the rebar on top of the wood when the truck was loaded the rebar was on the bottom and needed to come out first. So instead of just getting two guys and lifting the wood for the couple of seconds it would take they unloaded all the wood and then had to reload it when the rebar was out, AMAZING. We saw this really big brush fire on the side of the road and a car that looked like it caught on fire. It is funny that when something happens to a car they just let it sit where it dies and people pick away at the pieces until there is nothing left. While we were at Miss Pats we got the see the feeding program they do there. They feed about 18 Gran Moun (old people) a day. They looked real grateful to be getting a meal. I also got to put some of my fix it skills to work. Miss Pat has a couple of water purifiers that are not pumping water like they should be, so I took them back to the Orphanage with me and am going to take the motors out and clean them and empty all the pipes and what not. It should be fun, I have worked with water filters before and I like to fix things for people. The next time I am at Miss Pats I am going to get her internet working for her. Jose started it but had to go to the states so he did not finish it. We spent about an hour at Miss Pats and then headed home. Only one incident to speak of on the way home and that wasn’t until we were in Port-de-Paix. There was a tap tap parked the wrong way on a one way street and causing quite a traffic jam. Unfortunately for him there was a UN truck in the line and the driver got out and was very IRATE. Needless to say, the tap tap moved very quickly. Once back at the Orphanage I took a few more staff pictures and made one of the little boys cry because he did not want to get his picture taken with his family. I stayed in my room until about 830 and then went back outside to play with the children only to find that it is TV night, and they were all in their family common rooms watching TV with each other. Seeing this as a sign for a relaxing night, I found Roland, chatted for a bit on what time we were going to St. Louis tomorrow and then hit the showers and retired to my journaling and emailing for the night. It is bed time now. Peace

Wednesday, August 15, 2007

2007-09-03T20:02:00.000-07:00

Breakfast was amazing; I ate at this little diner with my parents, my two sisters, my two nieces, my two “brothers,” and ex-coworkers friends who are like family and their daughter. After we ate we went to the Harrisburg airport to check get this process started. Of course, none of my bags were overweight and they were able to check my luggage all the way through to Port-au-Prince. Once they were checked and gone, we went up to where the security check point line begins and hung out for about 30 or 40 minutes and took some pictures and said our good-byes. Once I was through security, I found my gate and relaxed for a while, checked my email and just thought about the upcoming adventure. The first flight left a lot to be desired. It was only like an hour and a half long, but the plane was three seats wide and a little cramped. I of course, went right to sleep so it did not bother me at all. When we arrived in Chicago, I very calmly, made my way to my next gate, once again having no trouble with security. When at my gate I found this little café and got an apple and some milk for lunch. The next flight was going to be a little longer because it was from Chicago to Miami. It took 3 hours and 20 minutes for this flight and the plan was a six seat wide plane and thankfully I slept for this flight also, because there was a family behind me that was having a really bad argument and I felt bad being able to hear them. When I got to Miami, I was ready to be done flying, which was a good thing because I was due to spend the night at a hotel. After making my way to the shuttle bay, I had to wait about 35 minutes for a shuttle to my hotel to show up. I got on when it was empty and no less than 5 minutes after I got on did it fill with people. The driver was not very good and I think was more concerned with the radio than the road. I was the first stop thankfully, and tipped him and got off. Check in was a piece of cake. I was supposed to be meeting Miss Pat, a full time missionary in the Far West, at the hotel and flying in with her, so I was going to take my stuff up to my room and come back down and eat supper and wait. Coincidently, when the elevator opened she was on it, coming downstairs to see if I had checked in yet, funny how timing works sometimes, isn’t it. Well after we said our hellos, she made sure I didn’t need anything and we set a time for departure in the morning and went our separate ways. I dropped all my stuff in my room, turned the AC down real low and went to the café to get some dinner. The chicken salad I had was really good and the rolls they had there were VERY good. I spent the remainder of the night emailing people, chatting on instant messenger, and on my phone. The next morning we got to the airport in Miami and found our gate and sat down to wait for our flight. Miss Pats last breakfast in the states consisted of Star Bucks coffee and a Danish, mine was a muffin and some MILK. The plane ride to Port-au-Prince was the nicest of them all; it was an eight seat wide plane and VERY comfortable, I still slept the whole way though. The airport in Port-de-Paix was crazy, because of the custom lines and all the people looking for luggage and the lack of traffic control. Thank goodness the mission sends someone to meet us. Once we got our carryon luggage and checked our regular luggage we headed off via tap tap to the outgoing airport. This was a very small and busy airport and the plane that took us to Port-de-Paix was a two seat wide plane and was SCARY. It only held like 30 people, and only went up about 15000 feet.

Sunday, September 2, 2007

2007-09-02T18:15:00.000-07:00

Today I got up at 630 because Roland told me that we were going to go to church with Soni, out past St. Louis, and had to leave at 7. Well 650 rolls around and I find Roland still sleeping. Interestingly enough, apparently at some point last night Roland found out that due to other errands needed with the truck, we were not going to go to that church after all, which means I could have slept until 830 because the church we go to is right next door, no one told me about the change though so I had two hours to twiddle my thumbs. Fortunately I am a master of time passing (and there were children awake). Once I got to church I found out the real reason why we did not go to the other church. I feel that God wanted me to see what goes on with the children so I can make a change for the better. The first time I went to church there I was sitting with the adults and had to kids sleeping on me. This time, however since there were twice as many people in attendance, I decided to stand in the back for some and stay in the balcony with the children for some. While I in the balcony I came to realize the trouble that they go through with the children. The whole time I was there they were running around, fighting, talking, sleeping, etc. One poor guy gets the privilege of trying to keep them all quite. Roland said that last week, the children were so bad that they got yelled at from the pulpit. So I have decided to start a junior church program for the children and hold it during regular church so that the parents can enjoy the service and the kids can get something out of Sundays as well. Another reason that I think this will be a good idea is that I found out today that some of the kids do not attend church because they do not have any “nice” clothes and it is no allowed by Haitian culture. Roland is graciously going to translate for me during junior church and hopefully I can get some of the older kids to lead worship and possibly even teach down the road. I am going to be talking to Erin and some of the other translators about maybe coming once and a while and doing like special music or a special lesson or something. Please pray about this for me and if anyone knows of a good place online to get lesson plans, I would appreciate the help. Moving on, we were about half way through church when the plumber came over and told Roland and I that he cut the pipes in the area we thought my glasses were and found nothing, but thought he saw something further down in the pipe so he cut that piece too and still found nothing. Having wallowed in this defeat for about a minute we determined that they had to be in the mud right outside of the last pipe. Changing out of my church clothes, I geared up to go feeling around in elbow deep sewage. IT SMELLED TERRIFIC!! Well the good news is that I FOUND MY GLASSES, and even more exciting is that they are PERFECTLY IN TACT and I am wearing them right now, (after letting them soak in bleach water for about 3 hours). Once I decided that they were clean enough, I took some time to work on the popcorn machine that I brought back from St. Louis with me yesterday (along with lots of popcorn seed and oil and salt), can’t wait to make popcorn. This machine is so dirty and greasy and oily and filled with old popcorn kernels I can even take it. I took what parts off that I could and let them soak in soapy bleach water for a couple of hours as well. While they were soaking I spent some time outside with the children, talking, hanging out in the big truck, walking around to feed the dogs and just enjoying each other. We thought that we were going to go swimming today and came to find out that on Sundays Haitians go down to the beach after they get drunk and start fights, so NO swimming on Sundays. After that Tigens and I worked on some more English, and today the difficulty was the “H” sound in “hurt,” and the “O” sound in “comb.” It is funny to hear them pronounce every letter instead of letting some remain silent. Also, I often have to call on Roland to explain how to make sounds, because I just can’t do it using motions and body language. We worked for about 30 minutes and then Tigens had to go to a meeting. Roland and I took this chance to take a walk through Port-de-Paix to look for a gentleman that is going to be bringing his children to the Orphanage. Apparently, in the recent past the roof of his house fell in on him and his family and killed at least one of his kids and I think his wife. His other two children are in the hospital right now with injuries from the accident and are going to be seen by the next surgeon to come in and work with the mission. After walking around for about an hour and a half and asking a dozen people, who were very helpful, how to find where he lives, we come to find that he is not home. He and his family went to visit a relative, in Chalet. One of his neighbors is going to let him know that he needs to come to the Orphanage to talk with Roland or Wisley. When we got back to the Orphanage it was just more playing and hanging and cleaning for me. At about 7 we sat down with Wisley (who had been gone all day) and had some soup. We chatted about all the updates Wisley needed and I asked him what he thought about the junior church idea. He said he had been wanting to start that for quite some time but never had the time to get lessons around, so he was thrilled I wanted to do it. At about 8 I retired to my room to look for lessons plans and put some camp stuff online. Early morning tomorrow cause school starts. WOO-HOO. Peace.

Saturday, September 1, 2007

2007-09-01T18:26:00.000-07:00

So I woke up today showered ate breakfast and carried kids around until about 10 when the plumber showed up FINALLY. After much deliberation between me, Roland, and the plumber, we collectively decided that my glasses were still stuck in the pipes and where that location would most likely be. He is going to have to replace 5 pieces of the pipe (mostly corner joints). I asked him how much parts and labor were going to cost me and when he said 200 Haitian dollars, I almost kissed him. For all of you that are wondering, that is 28 US dollars. I had to borrow the money from Wisley until I get some more spending money. Wisley told me I did not have to pay though, because he has money from Kentucky that is for when things go wrong or break at the Orphanage. I think I may still try to pay them back though. After we sent the plumber off to buy parts I went back to carrying kids, playing with kids, etc. Wisley’s wife went to the market today and because of that she got back after 12 and did not want Roland and I to wait to have to eat so Wisley gave us some money and we ate out for lunch today. We went to this little place called La Creole. It was really good; they had two entrée choices, chicken and goat. I got the chicken and Roland got the goat. The met came with potato salad, rice, and a vegetable. The sauce that they put on the meat was REALLY REALLY hot. About 30 minutes or so after lunch we went to St. Louis to take some food supplies to them. While we were at the mission I helped Erin organize and put away some of the supplies from the boat. She was telling me about all the stuff they had been doing over the past couple of days. Man I am not jealous of them. We spent about an hour at the mission, and then headed home. Spent about an hour and a half with the kids then had some really good Haitian spaghetti again for dinner tonight. After dinner Wisley, Roland, and I walked to the Seven Eleven down the road. The guys were amazed that I went bare foot. They just can’t understand that Americans walk bare foot in places other than their own homes. We went to the store because on Sunday Haitians only cook for lunch so Wisley wanted to buy me some food to eat tomorrow. I explained to him that I have plenty of food at my disposal, but if he would like to buy me some different kinds of drinks, I would LOVE that. We got a lot of Snapple and Gator Ade. I am very excited. I also finally asked Wisley if it would be alright if I only ate lunch every day. I really like the food, it is just so much. He was very ok with that, which made me feel good. After our trip to the store, I took a shower and am calling it a night early because Roland and I are going to church past St. Louis tomorrow so we have to leave early. Peace.

Friday, August 31, 2007

2007-08-31T21:34:00.000-07:00

So today started just like the past several days. No rescue from the plumber, my poor glasses. Anyway, after my healthy breakfast (Pringles), I went outside and carried some kids around. At about 930 Tigens and I worked on some more English, only this time we got a couple of spectators / participants. It is getting really fun and difficult at the same time to explain to him what the English words are and how to use them in context. We worked for about 2 hours and then I needed a break, so I went to my room and worked on some computer stuff. The power went out at about noon, so I went back out to the playground. I had been looking for Roland all morning and finally he came strolling through the gates. He said he went to St. Louis on a ride along with one of the other drivers, and got stranded there because of some car troubles. When he got back, we ate lunch and, since it was like 95 degrees today, we took the children swimming again. This time however, their big thing was, taking gallon jugs and putting them in their pants and using them to float above the water. I was really happy to see them treating the dogs nice, they were playing fetch with them using empty water bottles. We spent about 40 minutes there and by that time most of the little kids were done swimming and wandering around looking for critters so they were getting hard to control, so we left. When we got back to the Orphanage I laid down on one of the slides and pretended to sleep while some of the girls chatted around me. This took place for about 30 minutes, until it began to rain. I was the only one who did not run for cover. I stood out in the rain until I was completely drenched and then found some of the girls that were talking about me while I was “sleeping” and grabbed them and took them out in the rain to get soaked as well. That sparked a big water fight, which was really cold. After our epic water battle, I changed and chilled for a bit until dinner. Dinner was interesting because we had the same thing the children had, they are like pitas with chicken in the middle. They were REALLY REALLY good. The caused a little bit of a miscommunication though between me and Wisley’s wife Christine. Before we ate I was sitting with the children while they were eating and they were feeding me what they were eating. Her sister in law saw me eating with them and she thought I liked their food better than the food Christine had been cooking for me. OOPS!! Then Roland and I helped Wisley unload a crate full of shoes, clothes, and hygiene items that showed up on the boat. They are for the children for school. I can’t wait to see their reaction. I GOT TO DRIVE TODAY TOO!!! I learned a new meaning to the phrase tight squeeze. Roland was in the passenger seat and praying the whole time. For all you reading this that would worry about that, all I did was drive from the back of the Orphanage to the front. I did not even leave the Orphanage complex. To finish my night, some of the children and I watched some music videos on my computer. I had been promising them that all day so we spent about an hour watching videos. After my computer battery died, I went to my room for the night. Peace.

Thursday, August 30, 2007

2007-08-31T06:52:00.000-07:00

Today was a good day, although when I got up there was no water for me to take a shower with (except a little water I had in a bucket in my bathroom, which I used to wash my hair and brush my teeth) and the plumber still did not come to rescue my glasses. It is ok though, because I spoke with him myself today and, he will be here tomorrow. After breakfast, I spent some time playing with the little ones. One of the older boys, Tigens, asked me to help him with his English lessons today so I did that until about 10. Roland and I then decided to take a walk and site see for a while, so we walked to Port-de-Paix and went to some areas that we never really see when we are doing mission errands. It was really cool, because we got to see some of the nicer parts of the city. For instance, we went to the place called, Enterprises Canaan, which was a two level restaurant with a 70 person movie theatre in it as well. The guy that runs it was very nice and gave us a tour. After we had some Sprite at Canaan, we walked to what I named the medical mile. It was a street that had only Pharmacies and Clinique’s on it, because the dead end it was leading to was the Hospital. The Hospital was broken up into several different buildings; offices, morgue, pharmacy, lab, surgery, etc. We did not go into any of the buildings though because I did not want to be nosey at a Hospital. We passed by several different churches on our walk today; Mormon, Catholic, Jehovah Witness, and of course Christian. We also saw a public school and a private school. Once we got into the market part of city, it got busy. For a couple of days I have been seeing people carry around slushies. Being that is was so very hot and humid, I wanted to try one. I come to find that they are called Fresko here. It is really neat how they make them. The person who is making them has their own cart that they push around with two blocks of ice on it and 8-10 different syrup on it. They use, what to me looks like a cheese grater, to shave the ice, creative. While we were walking around drinking our Freskos, Roland said that the locals were commenting on how they were surprised that a white man was drinking their stuff. We took a walk to the other part of the docks and saw what goes on there. While we were there the clouds rolled in and it looked like it was going to rain. As we were walking back to the Orphanage it did in fact begin to rain. Oh well though, we both refused to speed up our pace. When we got back to the Orphanage, and after we ate, I spent some more time doing English with Tigens and playing with some of the children. At about 5 Roland and I walked to a round robin soccer scrimmage. It was just 4 on 4 with no goalie but it was a lot better than the boys at the Orphanage because these guys actually worked as a team to get goals. I filmed a little bit of it which got some nasty comments and gestures from the players and fans so I stopped. We were there for about an hour and then headed back for dinner and more activity with the children. After dinner I just chilled outside until about 830 then took a shower and retired for the evening. Peace.

Wednesday, August 29, 2007

2007-08-29T19:33:00.000-07:00

One thing that impressed me about yesterday that I forgot to mention. When they were working on the truck, it appeared that in order to weld two metals together they used the sparks off of jumper cables because they did not have power to run their welding machine. I thought that was really quick thinking and inventive. So today, still no visit from the plumber, crossing my fingers that my glasses are lodged in the pipe somewhere. Ate breakfast and spent some time with the children this morning watching music videos and talking about what kind of music and movies they like. It is funny to hear them tell me what they like because the whole sentence is in Creole except the name of the song, artist, or actor/actress. At about 10 we road along with Wisley to drop off the daily regiment of food we provide to this feeding program of about 150-200 kids. It runs Monday-Friday and we take food there every day for them. It was at this house that I got yelled at for the first time for taking pictures. When I want to photograph something and we are at a shop or house or near people I ask Roland if it is ok, so that he can ask the people for me. So I did just that and Roland said I could (without checking first, because he knew the guy). However, one of the ladies that work at this house was not happy about that because in Haiti it is disrespectful to not check with the owner of the house first. Rightfully so, and had I known that they all spoke very good English at the facility I would have asked me myself. As it turns out the gentlemen did not care even a little bit and according to Roland, the lady that yelled at me thinks she is big stuff and can yell at anyone. It did not bother me either way. I had a very pleasant conversation with both of them and left happy and encouraged. After stopping at one more place while Wisley went in to talk to someone, we went back to the Orphanage. After lunch, since it was so hot today, we took the kids swimming again for about 45 minutes. It was a different experience this time because, since it has not rained in a couple of days the tide was about 20 feet further out than it was last time and the non swimmers (me and Roland) could walk out to where the kids were swimming and not get out feet wet. Also, with the tide being that far out it gave the little kids the opportunity to go hunting for critters. Unfortunately, I did not have my camera, so that scene will have to be at a later date. Sorry. After the pool, I did some laundry and hung out outside at the playground for a while, until everything went south. While I was in my room doing laundry, one of the dogs got into a bowl of the kids food (it was down where he could get it though) and the kid kicked at him and got growled at in return. After counseling him and disciplining the dog, we moved on. Wisley later asked me if I would take over feeding the four dogs that are at the Orphanage, and since I was already upset that they don’t get attention, I GLADY said I would. After I fed Duke (a big, gorgeous black lab), I tried to round up the three little ones; Sam, Snots, and Nikko (the one who got into the food earlier). Snots, for some reason will not eat and is very no responsive to most things. Nikko, however, who sleeps in my room during the day and escapes there when the kids are mean to him, ate A LOT, and I believe enjoyed every bite. All was going well until two things happened; first, Sam and Nikko do not know how to share very well so they were fighting over the food until I separated there piles of food. Second, the kids noticed the dogs eating and decided that they wanted to play with and/or eat the food also and since you should never bother any animal when it is eating one of the children got bit. It wasn’t really any big deal, just got cut a little. The issue arises when all the other kids pick up rocks or brooms or sticks and begin to throw stuff and hit the dogs in retaliation. After I calmed Nikko down, cleaned up the leftover food, and put Nikko in my room, I went to find Roland to express some frustration. As I came to find out Roland was having his own disciplinary fun. Apparently there had been some teasing that took place between a kid that was playing soccer and one of the boys that was sweeping the courtyard. When the teaser was disciplined by one of the parents he started swearing at her and Roland was not going to have any of that apparently, which is why when I got there I saw him shouting and the teaser was in timeout. After that incident Roland and I both wanted to have a chat with the children. I wanted to talk to the staff as well but I don’t know if that will happen. We got mostly all of the kids in the church, and had what seemed like a useless talk with them. Please don’t misunderstand me, I LOVE the kids and the Orphanage, but I am very strongly feeling that the staff does not want to teach these kids’ life lessons and behaviors, they just want to make sure they get an education and three meals a day. That of course, is wonderful, but without teaching them things like respect and discipline how do we ever expect them to be examples to non believers and other Haitians. I want kids to leave this place, well educated AND respectful, but I am not seeing much willingness from the parents to participate in that vision. When I spoke to one of the parent couples, the other day, the dad said that because the kids have only been in their families for a year that it would be a long process for them to be disciplined. Come on, I think a year is a pretty long time, especially when they never leave here. Also, in the short time that I have been here, Roland has been the only person that I have seen in the courtyard with the children and definitely the only person that has disciplined them. Ok, that is my frustration for the day. I am going to be speaking with the main “mama” of this place to see what she thinks about this whole thing, because I am also feeling that my frustration comes from the American in me and the fact that I don’t really know yet how discipline works in Haiti. At one point today, I could have just gone down town, and bought a dozen wooden spoons and went to town. BUT I didn’t. Please be praying for peace of mind for me, and clarity for whatever is going to take place. After that little “talk,” some of the kids and I sat around and listened to music and then I took a shower and went came to my room. I am going to bed now. Peace

Tuesday, August 28, 2007

2007-08-28T19:55:00.000-07:00

So after a very good night of rest, I got up all excited for the plumber to get here and get my glasses for me. While I was waiting for him to show up I managed, with the help of one of my metal hangers (sorry mom), to get the towel out of the drain. So, the plumber was supposed to be here at 8 and by the time Roland and I were done eating breakfast and 10 had rolled around we figured he was in St. Louis doing some work. Not wanting to put off our day any longer, we walked to the tap tap (taxi) station to catch a ride to St. Louis. This was the most interesting taxi ride I had ever taken. Try and envision this: a two door Mazda pick-up truck with a six foot bed. Put planks of wood around the edge of the truck bed (for people to sit on), and then put two men in the front with the driver, a father mother and there toddler in the small backseat those things have, and then 8 women and 10 men in the bed of the truck. This was the way I rode 9 mile to St. Louis today. About have way there we had to stop because the driver wanted to make everyone pay in advance because he was afraid that the young man with him was going to mess something up with everyone getting on and off. It was interesting to see everyone yelling about when they got and how much they owe and what change they need. Once we got to St. Louise we had to walk a bit to the mission because the taxis only go into town not to individual destinations. While we were walking to the mission this guy stopped Roland and asked him if he could bring his children to the mission when one of the surgical teams was in. Apparently, his roof fell on him and his family and killed one of their kids and injured the other two and he wanted them to be looked at. Roland brought him to the mission with us to talk to Maureen about it. I don’t really know what happened with that. We had lunch at the mission and hung out for a good while, I spent most of it chatting with Maureen, Erin, and the interpreters. At like 230, Reno (the local con man) came into the mission to see me because I bought something from him in April when I was here. He tried to tell me that I promised him I was going to bring him a portable DVD player or a portable CD player. I did not promise him that. We straightened everything out. It’s all good. At about 245 Sergo showed up with a load of supplies and what not off the boat. One of the crates was marked truck shop, so Chuck came up to tell them where it goes. At about 4 Roland and I left and walked downtown to St. Louis to go to the docks with Sergo to pick up some more of our stuff. When we got to the docks it was just as crowed as before, but Sergo managed to find a parking spot. So we just had to wait no until we can fit our truck back into the loading zone. While we were waiting Roland and I checked out some of the sites and mingled with some Haitians. It was fun to see what they did during the day when the boats were here, making everything crowded. We stopped at this Disco club, which had not opened yet and chatted with the owner. It looked like it does well when they are open, pretty nice inside. The next thing I got to do stunk real bad. We were watching all the activity and noticed two guys trying to steer a wheel barrel full of sticks and twigs. Well, it did not go over so well, cause over it went. While we were on our way over to help them gather it up some of the sticks fell in a hole designed to filter rain water back out to the ocean. I had the pleasure of getting in this hole to get out the sticks and MAN WHAT A SMELL. So, it is finally our turn to load up and when we got into the loading zone, the amount of stuff they had for us was amazing. It is going to take at least I say four more trips to finish. This time we loaded up 8 palates stacked with baby formula and 3 other little palates of miscellaneous stuff. Once again as soon as people saw all that food they wanted some of it for free. I get kind of scared in that situation because hungry poor people in America equal a mob and a mob can be very dangerous. As quickly as we can we headed out and began our trip home. About half a mile down the road we had to stop because something was wrong with the truck and Sergo wanted to get it serviced by someone he knew was reliable. It took them like an hour and a half to fix it, while the rest of us were just standing around chillin. Finally back at the orphanage, Roland and I ate some dinner, I got some of my laundry back, the rest will be done tomorrow, and I took a shower and went to my room. While I was checking my email and talking to my dad, I found out that at 1230 am on Tuesday, August 28, 2007 my grandfather died and his service is on Thursday. I am really sad that I will not be able to attend but I am very thankful I made time for him before I left. Now I am going to bed. Peace.

Monday, August 27, 2007

2007-08-27T18:23:00.000-07:00

So today started out good but did not finish so hot. I got up feeling pretty good and very well rested. I did not go to any other locations today, so I got to spend the whole day with the children. We sat around for most of the day, just simply relaxing. I got to experience their version of time out today. One of the girls was throwing rocks at another, so she got put in time out. At the Orphanage, time out is making them go into the middle of the courtyard and get on their knees on the stone and stay there. It is supposed to be painful physically (because of the stones) and mentally (because everyone else can see them). She was not happy at all and we all heard about her unhappiness they whole time she was being punished. Then we had a little incident with one of the boys getting a tiny cut on his leg. His experience with the nurse, however, would have made you think we were cutting it off. Once he was calmed down Roland and I went around to the different family locations and took some pictures of the workers for the Orphanages website. That was really funny to do because the Haitians like to be warned about photo time so they can put on their Sunday best. However, Roland is such a smooth talker that we got some of them to pose today. One interesting thing I learned about the families is that they always wonder why people want to take their pictures and then they never get to see them. So I am going to have them pose as a family for me on Sunday and take family portraits for them and have them developed and framed when I am in the states for the holidays. They are all really excited about that. When we went to one of the families to take their picture, they were not ready but they wanted to chat for a little bit. It was nice, because they told me how excited they were that an intern was coming to stay at the Orphanage. They also told me what they would like me to do for them and asked me my thoughts and dreams for both the children at the Orphanage and the “parents.” I had not really thought about it from that perspective before. I really expected to walk in here and just help them entertain and be a positive influence, but some of these family leaders are looking for advice and criticism. I guess since this “family thing” is only a year in the making, most of these “parents” are “new parents.” They are looking for ways to change an already conditioned group of children. When I say conditioned, I mean up until this family system the kids were watched by one or two people total and not much order instituted, so it is a challenge to try and change them now. I guess it is a good thing I am here then, because I like whipping kids into shape. After lunch, I spent the rest of the day with the kids’ playing cards, laying on the slides, or just sitting and watching the big boys play soccer. By the time dinner came around I was ready to be done. So after dinner I retired to the apartment. Here comes why the day did not finish out so well. Since I have not been feeling well, I decided to stay in the apartment instead of my room, because they have a fan and more comfortable beds. Well I decided to take a bath tonight instead of a shower. No big deal I thought. So try and picture this, they do not have a drain or a drain plug in their bathtub, just a very deep hole, leading to the pipes, that is like 2 or 3 inches in diameter. And to clog this hole they use a hand towel. Well once I was in the tub, I took my glasses of and tossed them in the water to soak. Also, not a big deal, except that when I was done in the bath, I pulled the hand towel out, forgetting about my glasses and down the drain they went like a bullet from a gun. Shocked and confused at what I heard I reached for the drain with the hand that had the towel in it and down the drain the towel went. So now their tube is still full of water, I am down one pair of glasses and a hand towel, and the plumber has to come in the morning. Silver lining, if there is one, is that I brought two pairs of prescription glasses and a pair of prescription sunglasses, WOO-HOO. Ok I am going to bed now. Peace.

Sunday, August 26, 2007

2007-08-26T19:55:00.000-07:00

So today was not a great day but I still loved it. First of all, because I was up all night until about 630 this morning, by the time I fell asleep I slept right through church. When I managed to wake up all I got was a splitting headache. I spent most of the day with the children just simply sitting around and relaxing. We had a little incident with one of the dogs attacking one of the boys. He was fine though, just got scratched a little bit on his leg. At a about 3:45, Roland and I went along to St. Louis with Sony because he had to take some people to church and drop off some equipment. We spent the rest of the night at the mission base hanging out with the other interpreters and Erin, Maureen, and Chuck and his wife. It was really relaxing and nice to talk with everyone to learn a little more about them. We got to walk around downtown a little while waiting for Sony to meet us and go back to the orphanage. On our way back to the orphanage Roland and I chatted about the differences in American laws and government and Haitian. I really enjoyed this day of relaxation however I still don’t feel very good. I have figured out the reason for my sickness. It is either the fish that I have been eating of the cola that I have been drinking. So I am going to politely eliminate those two things from my diet and hope for the best. So one of the girls, named Nerland, at the orphanage got back from vacation a few days ago and today she gave me a 10 lesson English/Creole textbook to use to help with my transition. I am pretty excited for school to start up next week so I will have a little more time to study. Sunday is no more. Peace.

Saturday, August 25, 2007

2007-08-25T19:45:00.000-07:00

Before I get to today I need to add a few things from yesterday that I forgot. First, I forgot to tell you what happened while we were swimming and why I do not swim with them. The little boys use the edge of the beach as their toilet. GROSS. Second, we got diesel for the big truck and I wanted to share with you all how the monetary system works and how much diesel is here. We paid 250 Haitian dollars for 9.6 gallons of diesel. 250 Haitian dollars is 35.someting American dollars, which amounts to $3.66 per gallon of diesel. Ok now back to the present. Today was a VERY VERY long day. At about 11, Roland, Sony, and I went to Boshawn (again no idea how to spell it). It is in the very far west and took about 2 hours to get there. Mike and Teresa Grant just became full time missionaries with NWHCM and they are going to live out there and minister. On our way there we stopped and got two loads of gravel to take for their house, which is not built yet. On the shore where we picked up the gravel there were Haitians men with like 3-5 gallon buckets going out into the water and scooping sand and dumping it on the shore. Then two men with a sifter would sift out the gravel and make a sand pile and a gravel pile. It is interesting to see how efficient they are without the use of machinery. Once we got to Boshawn, we dumped the gravel at the building site and went a little further down the road to get a couple of loads of big stones. Because we were going to do two two load trips of stone, Roland and I waited at the stone sight while Sony took the first load back to the building site to dump it. About 20 or 30 minutes later a fella comes over to us and says that Sony got a flat tire and is stranded on the road. So we walked to where the truck was and come to find that he hadn’t even made it back to the building site to dump the stones. Apparently a flat tire in Haiti is much more of a big deal than it is in America for several reasons. One, the truck we had did not have a spare tire on it or a jack in it and the tire iron it had did not fit on the nuts to remove the flat tire. Second there is not AAA to help us. Ok on this truck there are the 2 tires in the front and then 4 on the back, two on the drivers two on the passenger’s side. So what they decided to do, was take the flat tire and put it in the back where there are two tires and take one of those tires to the front so that we could drive home. What seemed like a simply solution turned into a four hour process. Since we did not have the tools we needed to fix this flat, we had to rely on the generosity of others. I have come to find out that Haitian generosity only extends until they are ready to leave. Having said that, we had to change jacks three times and tire irons three times. Also adding to the lengthiness of this process is the fact that every Haitian male helping wants to be the boss and has to try everything himself. I decided that by the time we were putting the tires back on it was a strongest man competition, not changing a tire. Oh well, the job got done and because of how long it took we decided not to go get the second load. We just went home, and arrived at the orphanage at 8:30. I then took a much needed shower and ate some dinner and retired to my room. I think I am not feeling well, so I am going to go to bed now. I am taking the day off from food tomorrow since it should be a fairly easy day being Sunday. With just drinking water I am hoping to clean out my system. We will see. Peace.

Friday, August 24, 2007

2007-08-24T18:29:00.000-07:00

Wow, today was full of so much stuff I just can’t stand it. I got up feeling better today than I did l did when I went to bed, even though I did not have a very restful sleep. I told someone something last night that I was really afraid to tell him because I knew it was going to disappoint him and I do not like to do that, and since I could not see his reaction I can only imagine it to be as bad as I thought. Moving on, I spent the first 2 hours with the children just sitting at the playground hanging out and then some of us went to St. Louis to take food supplies to the mission. While I was at the mission I got the chance to sit in on one of Erin’s music classes. It was interesting to see her trying to teach a music class with an interpreter. She claims to be able to do it herself, but is afraid that when they ask a question she would not be able to explain the answer in terms they would understand. After her class was over I spent some time with one of the interpreters, Jocelyn, just chatting about this and that, getting to know him a little better. They are all really nice guys and very intelligent. It makes me wonder what Americans would be like if, like these guys, we utilized the much vaster amount of resources we have to learn. I went to the baby orphanage for a while today to spend some time holding some of the babies and chatting with Erin, who was there with one of the boys from Heavens waiting room who likes to play with the babies’ toys. It is amazing how quickly Haitian children fall asleep when they are being held and how entertaining it is for them to just be held. On the way home from St. Louis, we got into a little bit of a disagreement and almost a fight with another driver. Apparently, one of the rules of the road is that if you want to pass someone you must honk so that they know you are approaching. Well, a car behind us did not do that and we moved left to avoid a pothole while he was next to us causing him and us to fish tale a little. He did not like this at all and stopped right in front of us and he and his passenger got out and started shouting. No one got out of our car though; Roland simply explained that Sony (the driver) did not see him because he did not honk. Understandable since Sony is driving a dump truck. Finally getting back to the Orphanage, after lunch Roland and I took the children swimming. We spent about an hour there and it was really funny because most of the little buys immediately took all their clothes off to swim. The “beach” was littered with so much trash it made me really sad. There was even a pig tied up right next to where we were at. I’m sure as most of you would expect with a group this size a few of the 8-11 year old boys got in trouble for dunking and being inappropriate. After swimming I spent some more time just hanging with Roland and the kids. Today we got my computer out and played some music that they like so I could hear them sing along. I found out what a difference in taste we have. I have over 900 songs on my computer and they liked about 6 of them. Oh well. At this point I was getting tired, so I laid down on one of the swings and took a little nap. And of course, I had a child lying on my stomach sleeping as well. Roland got me up at about 4 and told me we were going to the dock to get our stuff off the boat that had come in. When we got down to the dock, I was amazed at how many people were there. I would say close to 200 people just standing and waiting to see their stuff and waiting to have room to bring whatever vehicle they have in to load it up. We waited until about 5:15 to back one of our trucks in and start loading up. While the driver was backing the truck up, he clipped the side of someone’s store and shifted the whole little kiosk like 6 feet. It really wasn’t that big of a deal, one because only like a 10 inch piece of wood got broken off, and two we easily put the kiosk back where it was. As it turns out, there are not supposed to be shops in that particular location because, not only is it the port for the boats, it is also the bus station, so there is a lot of traffic. Our first truck got loaded up with I’d say like 20 wheelchairs for the mission. Once we had all those loaded we brought in the second truck and all the fun began. In this truck went 5 big palates of meal replacement drinks and powered substances. It would not have been so bad if the guy driving the loaded had known what he was doing. First problem was that instead of just dropping the gate and loading them from the back, he took off one of the walls and loaded them from the side. Ok, I can almost be ok with that except that he did not push them all the way in, so we could not put the way back on. So now we have got 5 palates that are stacked to high to begin with, and a truck missing one of its walls. Still, it would have been ok, but once again the loader pushed too hard against one of the palates and knocked the top two layers of product off the truck. As we were picking the product up some other Haitians came over, and I was like, cool they are going to help. WRONG, what did they do? Stand by and constantly ask for handouts. All I kept saying was no and I seriously though I was going to get jumped. So we finally have everything on the truck the only way it was going to go on after all this mess and I decided to ride in the back with it so that I could monitor the palates. Good thing for that, because we were about 10 minutes into our trip when the top half of two of the palates quickly began to slide like it was toppling. Quickly as I could, I banged on the top of the truck to get them to stop. Once out of harm’s way, we called Wesley and he brought the other truck and two more guys to help us get this load home. We moved about 60 boxes to the smaller truck and one of the other guys and me sat in the back of the big truck the rest of the way home. The place that we stopped to wait for Wesley and load up the rescue truck was this little town square typesetting, and there was a Christian revival going on. There were bands, a few speakers, and about 150 people dressed in their Sunday best and praising the Lord. It was really neat to get to see that. Finally back to the orphanage and with no product loss, AMAZING. Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that while we were at the dock it started rained and then it rained again when we were loading up the rescue truck. We opted to just cover up the product and unload it in the morning since we did not get back until almost 8. After a day like that I decided to shower and retire to my thoughts. Have a great day/night/both. Peace.

Thursday, August 23, 2007

2007-08-23T17:12:00.001-07:00

Today I got invited to the staffs’ morning devotional meeting. It was in Creole of course; however it was still an uplifting thing to be a part of. I did not recognize the song they were singing so I could not sing along in English. When they say prayers it is amazing how into it they get. The person praying is so passionate that everyone else stands and is very faintly prayer out loud also. After breakfast I spent some time with the kids while some of the workers filled the missions’ dump truck up with all the garbage at the orphanage. Every day I get to witness a new cultural difference. Today involved the disposal of the garbage. In America if you don’t have a garbage man you have a landfill that you can take your garbage too so it is properly taken care of. Americans also have recycling center, to reuse our recyclables. In Haiti there are not garbage men, landfills, or recycling centers. We simply filled the dump truck up, drove through town, across the river like we were going to the far west, and when we got about 6 miles out, the driver found an open area and dumped the garbage at the side of the road. Judging by several other piles of trash that is how things like that are taken care of. Another thing I have been noticing is the “rules of the road.” Honking your horn in America, to me, has also been a sign of anger or frustration. In Haiti, however when you lay on the horn, it means “I am coming, move or get hit.” I’ve always felt like I have been a pretty good judge of body language and eye contact. And it is interesting to wonder if I am reading correctly when I see it from the Haitians. It seems that in most of them I get the “wow an American is here and happy to see me” look. However every now and again, I get the “stop acting like your better than me and give me something look.” I can’t wait to be able to talk to someone who has given me both looks and see what they are thinking. When we got back to the orphanage we immediately got into the other truck, which already had 2 Haitians, a Haitian baby and 3 Americans in it and 2 Haitians in the bed, and went to St. Louis. The 3 Americans consisted of a gentleman named Chuck Graham and his wife. Chuck is a mechanic that comes in like 5 times a year to service the machinery for the mission and I am not sure what his wife does. The other American was a young lady by the name of Erin. She is I think 25 or 26 and has been here since June and will be here until the end of October. She has duel majors, one in culture studies of sociology (I think) and a music instruction major. She just got back from a little vacation in Port-au-Prince. We had lunch there and then went to Ansafalure (no idea how that is really spelled, could look it up but I am really lazy right now) to drop off one of the Haitian pasters wife and children and to buy some food supplies. We did not buy the food however because the shop was too expensive. It was a worthwhile trip though because these 2 young Haitian ladies asked us for a ride to Port-de-Paix because they had just been robbed. On the way back to the orphanage we picked up a Haitian family that was on their way home. We don’t usually pick people up, however their children are in our nutrition program and the parents are too old to have to walk that distance. Once back at the orphanage I decided to lay down because my head was splitting and I didn’t feel all that well. After dinner I let Wesley wife, who as it turns out is the nurse for the orphanage, look through the medical supplies I brought down with me. She is able to use mostly all of it for the kids. Praise God. I spent a good amount of time with a couple of the girls learning some Creole. It is a lot of fun because we do an exchange, they teach me the Creole word and I say the English equivalent. For all you finding Nemo fans I have my own little squishy, and I will take him home with me and he will be my squishy. After that I retired to my journal and am going to spend the night organizing the rest of the stuff I brought down for the children. Peace.

Wednesday, August 22, 2007

2007-08-22T20:29:00.001-07:00

We once again tried to go to the far west today and SUCCEEDED!! HOORAY!! It was a very interesting trip to say the least. As you will see from the pictures (which should be ready for viewing Thursday night) they do not have a bridge to get across the river you just drive in the water. Good times. The house that we went to is only 15 miles from the Orphanage, but it takes almost 90 minutes to get there. Darn those country roads. The scenery was beautiful and so full of possibilities. When we got to Ms Pats house, she was taking measurements of the kids that attend the church she goes to. I did not get a chance to talk to her about why that was, but I am guessing they are making outfits for them. Several of the men that came to the house with us and I walked to the beach so I could get some pictures. As we went through the village I was amazed to see how little they had and yet how big their smiles were. We stopped at this one shack because we were going to buy some fish, however we did not know if Wesley wanted hard or raw fish, so we made no purchase. As we were heading for the beach we walked through a “beach club,” that was owned by a friend of Roland. It was nice, they had several tables to sit at, a big lounge area with a disco ball in the middle, and were serving drinks. The ocean was beautifully clear if you managed to swim out far enough. Right off the sand it was a little dirty but not as nearly dirty as the beach in Port-de-Paix. After lunch with Ms. Pat we chatted for a while and were kind of rushed out of there because it looked like it was going to rain and if you are in the far west when it rains you are stuck in the far west until it is hot enough to cross the river bed. On the way back we stopped to get 10 bags of charcoal for the orphanage, as soon as we had them loaded up it started to pour. We were only about 10 minutes into our trip at this point so it looked like we might run into an issue when we got to the river. As it turns out, we drove out of the storm so no big deal. When we got back to the orphanage and after I changed out of my wet clothes, I spent some time finishing a book I had brought with me. While I was reading one of the three year olds fell asleep on my chest. Middle of the afternoon in Haiti and no air conditioning or fan, man was that a hot situation. Oh well. At about 430 I went outside for a while and sat on the playground and let the kids sit around me and chat with each other. Right before dinner is when all the fun started. I was looking for Roland so we could go eat and the kid that was helping me, for some unknown reason, decided to run up to one of the dogs and kick him in the ribs. I was SOOO mad I could have back handed him. Don’t worry I didn’t. I took him to his “parent” and let them to the discipline. After dinner I got all the kids together and, through Roland, we had a little discussion about how to treat animals and that if they did not want to see the mean angry side of me they better be nice to the dogs. I hope they took it seriously but kids will be kids. I told them if they feel the need to abuse something to come and find me and abuse me. I said, “Trust me; there is nothing you can do to me that hasn’t happened to me already.” I am afraid I may have sparked their creative thinking. Oops. After the talk I took a shower and retreated to my journaling and email because I needed a wind down. That’s all the fun for today. Good night. Peace.

Tuesday, August 21, 2007

2007-08-21T18:46:00.000-07:00

We tried to go to the far west today to see everyone and take them some supplies but to our disappointment because of the rain and the fact that they have no bridges the water level was too high for us to cross. Oh well, maybe next time. We stopped in Port-de-Paix to buy 25, 94 lb bags of cement and get some gasoline. The gas was an interesting system, it kind of works like propane tanks (except they are 2 and a half feet tall and weigh like 100 lbs or so) where you take the empty ones back and get full ones in return (for a small fee). We also had to stop and get gas for the truck. Gas stations in Haiti are all full service and it seems that each pump is operated by a different group of people, like it is their own pump. When we got back to the Orphanage, we unloaded the cement and gas tanks and headed back to town to buy paint for one of the ladies in St. Louis. We took the paint to the mission base and spent about an hour there, had lunch, and picked up Jose, the full time missionary in St. Louis. His wife, Jody, is the daughter of the founder of the mission. When we left we headed to the Airport in Port-de-Paix to drop Jose off because he is going to the states to be with his family until October. When we got back to the Orphanage I spent some time just relaxing, playing cards and listening to Creole. Later I played soccer with some of the older boys. It was interesting because they use goals that are like a foot and a half wide and a foot and a half tall and no goalie. It was really frustrating actually because they don’t assign positions and instead of working as a team they try to be fancy with the ball. They really aren’t as good as they think, although I did not tell them that. I was really in kind of a chill mode today so I don’t have that much to report. Sorry. Going to bed now. Peace.