Haiti Day 3

Monday started off bad and never recovered... We (the girls) never heard the alarm clock and so we were in a rush to get down stairs for breakfast.  After I ate, I wasn't feeling to good, but didn't want to miss anything.  We went to the MDL school and met with the principal Ivans and took a tour of the school.  Then we sat down and talked to Ivans about the community.  This conversation was hard. Up until Monday we spent most of our time with the orphanage kids and overall the orphanage kids have it made.  They have a safe home and people who love them and taking care of them, they have clean clothes and 3 warm meals a day.  They also get to go to school and are pretty spoiled in comparison to the kids who live in the community. The needs of the people in the community are overwhelming. Education is not free and the majority of the children in the community don't go to school.  Families can barley afford to pay the eqivelent of $7 American dollars a year rent to live in the tent city. Jobs are sparse and the Father's of the households are embarrassed that they can't provide for their families and often leave.The community doesn't need handouts they need people to teach them a job skill, educate them, give them useful strategies for building a business.  Ivans had some great ideas and has already seen results in the few people he has been able to help.  This man was pretty amazing.  A single man who lives in the community, his phone number written on his front gate, often spends his free time checking in on families, praying with people in the community and spending time with the kids.  He told us as we go out this week if we wanted to bring water or food to a family that we needed to eat or drink with them.  Haitian's are tired of "white people" coming in and handing them hand outs and seeing no result in the long run.  We talked about specific families in the community and left with heavy hearts and tears in our eyes.  Ivans agreed to take us to pray with some of these families later in the week.  

After our meeting with Ivans we split up, Andrea and I went to the transition house.  This is part of MDL after the kids turn 18 they go to the transition house and learn a skill before they are sent off on their own. We spent some time with Mikerline she does a lot of the beadwork that is sold in the gift shop at the guest house, she is also learning how to sew and has made purses to sell.  Andrea and I both taught her how to make fabric flowers to add to the purses or other items like a headband.  I enjoyed getting to go to the transition house and spending time with Mikerline.      

After lunch we took a walk over to the Apparent Project.  Rose and I had heard about the AP before our trip and were excited to hear that it was only a couple of blocks away.  When we got there we met the owner and she told us her story.  She came to Haiti to adopt a child and learned that many of the women were needing to put their child up for adoption because they had no way to provide for them.  She started the Apparent Project to help these women who wanted to keep their children  and have a way to make a living to support themselves.  There is even a place for these women to bring their kids to work with them and play or sleep while they work.  As a Mom and a woman in the process of adopting, I loved this idea and want nothing more than to see this idea flourish.  We met many of the women and even met one in the Ravine when we went later in the week.  We happen to walk by her as she was assembling the special AP tag to her work.  We also learned that designer Donna Karen has purchased many of the AP items to sell in their spring line as well as  Macy's will be selling AP items in their stores this year. We each bought a few items and then headed back to the house. 

When we were finished at AP it was about the time the kids were getting out of school so we headed over to the boys house.  They were working on their homework and Cindy invited us to help them.  I enjoyed tutoring the boys each day and I even learned some more French in the process.   By the time the homework was all done it was time to get ready for the feeding program.  It was my first experience with it and boy was it hard.  The kids line up about an hour or more before the program starts and there were several fights on Monday. It was crazy inside the program, kids hitting and even biting us.  I was overstimulated.  I later heard that it was just an off day and not normally this bad.  The hard part came later as I began to see the kids who were severely malnourished.  Orange hair and yellow eyes.  It was hard to watch.  I went to help a couple of the girls who helped run the program scramble to find more bowls because the guard let in 17 extra kids.  I lost it when we were scraping food of off the plates to try and make these 17 extra bowls.  It was a really hard day for me. I found it extremely hard to leave the feeding program and head back tot he guest house for dinner, I could barley bring myself to eat after what I saw.

The evening got better when we went to the girls house again for worship.   We arrived early and got to watch them play cups and I let one of the big girls play with my hair.  As we sang they would sing a song in Creole and we would sing it in English when we knew the song.  Estaline sat in my lap and didn't like me singing the words in english, she would say "no" and I would laugh.  She also made sure my eyes were closed each time we prayed.  She fell a sleep in my arms and I enjoyed every minute of snuggling with her. 

 At the Apparent Project

 Taylor getting water to wash the dishes with.

 Tutoring Ti Schi

 Kids lined up for the feeding program.

 Ivans leading the kids in a song before they ate.

Haiti Day 2

 Sunday I woke up feeling refreshed, we went to bed early, probably the only night the entire trip that we did and I got 11 hours of sleep.  We ate breakfast and loaded up in the cars and headed to Port-Au-Prince Fellowship for church.  After church we went for a walk across town to Epid'or  It is Haiti's version of fast food.  I had pizza and it was great.  We decided to get ice cream for dessert, but by the time it was ready it was time to go.  We took it to go and quickly learned that was a mistake.  Dessert in Haiti is a luxury... walking back to church with our ice cream in hand was heart breaking as we walking past Mom's with children clearly hungry begging for a bite to eat.  I quickly hid the ice cream and didn't have the heart to finish it once we were back in the cars.

When we got back from church we took a little rest and then headed to quisqueya a local church by the orphanage where the kids get to play once a week on a grassy area. The only grassy area in their neighborhood I saw all week.  We brought the indestructible soccer balls we bought and put them to the test. (Later in the week, I stabbed one of the balls with a knife and it didn't pop!)  We were impressed that the balls really were indestructible.  When it started to get dark we walked back to the guest house where we were followed by a street kid from the park.  His shoe broke while playing soccer and he asked us if we could help him fix it.  We tried but it was clearly unfixable.  It broke our hearts once again.  We went inside and asked if we could give him a pair of shoes, we happened to bring some gently used shoes in our stuff to give to the orphanage kids.  But we were told we couldn't give him the shoes because we would be cheating his family out of an opportunity to earn or provide for him.  It was so hard to wrap my brain around this idea, but as the week went on, it made perfect sense.  We can't solve the problems in Haiti by just giving hand outs all the time, we need to allow the families opportunities to work and learn how to provide for their family.  After dinner Rose, Andrea and I helped Cindy make a cake for Yvenel's 10th Birthday.  We brought the cake over to the boys house and sang to Yvenel and watched him open his presents.  We all enjoyed celebrating his Birthday.  Then we walked over to the girls house where we joined them in their evening worship.  It was beautiful to watch and the little ones crawled in our laps and fell asleep.

 The popular way to get around town is piling as many people as you can in the back of your truck.  Lucky for me, I found a seat with a seat belt on this trip. 

 Here is my view of part of our group in the car in front of us. 

 At the guest house Monday -Saturday there are two Haitian cooks employed to feed all the guests, but on Sunday they have the day off.  Sunday evenings a few of the girls from the girls home come in and make pizza for the guests.  This is Christella making pizza for everyone.  

 Andrea and Peterson headed to play soccer.

Yvenel and his sister Estaline.

Lauren was always surrounded by kids.

 Anytime the kids saw a phone or a camera they gathered.

 Getting some snuggles in with Estaline....

 She even wanted to share her lolly with me.

 Finished cake for Yvenel! 

 The Birthday boy! 

 No plates or napkin used, just your hands...

Which makes it very tempting to do this!

 Sweet Estaline and Wadnika worshiping.

    

Haiti Day 1

Our team Jim, David, Rose, Lauren, and Andrea. 

I had the opportunity to go on a short trip to Haiti the week of Thanksgiving, thanks to a generous donor who wanted to have some houses built in Haiti before the end of the year.  When the opportunity came up Freddie didn't hesitate in saying yes, knowing it is a place we both want to invest in as we continue the process to adopt a child from Haiti.  I wish that he could have gone with me on my first trip but look forward to going together in the future.  

We left Friday afternoon and arrived in Port-Au-Prince, Haiti in the morning the next day.  I was the only one out of the group of us who had never been to Haiti before.  I have to admit I was totally overwhelmed when I stepped off the plane and into the airport.  It was complete chaos to me.  Crowded, hot and filled with what felt like millions of people begging you to hire them to collect your bags.  Luckily we had a plan.  The Orphanage that we would be serving at and staying at had a go to guy who was waiting for our arrival and was appropriated named Big.  Big walked in like he owned the place and everyone backed off.   I plan to name drop his name on future trips to Haiti.  Just the sight on the faces when we told people we were with Big was funny alone.  Big gathered our bags and lead us to our car.  Where we met Marval our driver. Marval works at the orphanage with the big boys in the boys house. We loaded our items in the back of the truck and climbed in ourselves and Marval locked us in.  It was a little weird I'll admit but I quickly learned I wasn't in America anymore.  The drive to Maison de Lumiere was about 30 minutes and the sights reminded me what yo would see while watching the Amazing Race.  Overwhelming, devastating, crowded, trash everywhere, nothing like anything I have ever seen.  Concrete everywhere, merchants lined up and down streets, tents city's on what seamed like every corner, rubble piles and broken down buildings that are still in use.  It seamed strange yet beautiful in it's own way.  The reality of it all was overwhelming to me and I began to cry.  I know that I can't save this country and I didn't come to try, the reality of what I saw was just to much.  

Marval was very sweet to drive us carefully over the rocky roads, there are only paved roads near the airport everything else is rocky, ruble, trash filled roads.  Hard on cars and hard on your feet,  another reality that was hard to wrap my head around, kids walking around on these roads with no shoes.  

When we arrived at MDL we noticed Peterson, a boy that Andrea sponsors so he can go to school.  He heard we were coming and had been waiting for us.  It was sweet to see Peterson and Andrea reunite.    The guest house was literally an oasis in a dessert, it was the most beautiful building around.    We ate lunch right away and then were excited to go see the kids at the Orphanage.  The School and the boys and girls house are just around the corner from the guest house so we made our way to the boys house first.  They have a large play area that is called the Ben's and is connected to their house so everyone seams to gather there.  The first person I met was Yvenel (Eve-nel)  He was sweet and had an adorable personality.  We talked for a while and he told me that he loved my teeth.  He melted my heart. Most people tease me about my crooked front tooth and I am very sensitive about it.  He has no idea how sweet his comment was to me. He immediately became my favorite and over the next several days he remained one of my favorite for many other reasons.  He followed me around that first day and enjoyed me taking photos and playing with him.  Yvenel never forgot my name the entire week and always made sure to give me a big hug every time he saw me.    I also got to meet Chabine, she lives in the girls house and when I first heard about Child Hope International in Haiti, we decided to sponsor a child and I let Isabelle pic from all the photos, she picked Chabine because she liked her blue shirt in the photo.  It was a highlight for me to get to spend time with her during the week and get to know her, she was a little shy but always made and effort to come find me each day.  Chabine walked Rose and I over to the girls house so we could meet the other girls.  Rose had been to MDL earlier in the year and was eager for me to meet Estaline.  She is one of the youngest little girls in the house who has quite the personality.  Estaline also happens to be Yvenel's younger sister.   I enjoyed meeting the kids and playing with them that first night.  We headed back to the guest house for dinner and I had my first Haitian meal, Chili and cornbread, it was so yummy!  

Here is the room where I slept with the other girls from my team.

 This is the truck we drove from the airport in.

 A bank we walked past everyday on our way over to the boys and girls houses.

 Some street kids looking in on us at the boys house. 

 Emmanuel and Keso playing marbles.

My new friend Yvenel

 The view from the front of the boys house.

 Rose and Estaline.

 Chabine and I. 

 Rose always had a crowd of boys around her, they loved her iphone and all the videos she had her kids record for the boys and girls.  

 Sweet Estaline.