Our first two full days in Haiti contained so many wonderful, exhilerating, emotional, sobering moments. Two days I will never forget as long as I live.
We woke up early on Miss Pat's roof. I'm an early riser anyway but when everyone goes to bed at 8:00, by 6:00 you have had enough sleep. Becky Kelley even saw what was supposedly her first sunrise!
We had over 4 hours to wait until our VBS that morning at 10:30. This would be to the schoolkids meeting at the church. This was a group of 30-40 kids (much less than the previous day). Many of them had already attended yesterday so Danielle Adamson spent the morning putting together another skit. She did a great job of instantly developing a play based on the story of Jesus walking on water and Peter's "floundering" faith.
Many of the guys and a few women decided to help the Haitian workers building Curtis and Danielle's house by carrying cement blocks from the pile made the previous day over to the house so the Haitains didn't have to carry them back. (sidebar: you don't buy cement blocks at Home Depot in Haiti. Cement bags of 100lb each are purchased in Port de Paix, 90 minutes away. A hole is dug in the ground and filled with water and the cement is mixed in these holes. When mixed, it is pored into cement block molds to set.).
We spent a couple of hours carrying block back and forth. I paused several moments to look around the countryside. I simply COULD NOT wrap my head around the knowledge that we were in a very remote section of the poorest country this side of Earth. Help of any sort was a long ways off. For some reason, looking at the mud huts and poor, dusty village in Haiti would not take form for me. It was surreal. I believe the mind goes into a "protect" mode. I really hate that it does. I am sure this happens to many people in many such situations and makes what they are seeing appear to be imaginary. Another subtle trick of Satan.
VBS started at 10:30. The kids are the lucky ones in this area. It is VERY tough for their parents to send them, even though it costs little as most of the costs are supported by the mission. We were told that many parents could only send one child at a time, usually whichever is the youngest of those old enough to attend. Thus school is increasingly not available to older kids. Several of these older kids watched from outside the school/church. This skit went well. We were impressed how well it went on short notice.
After a fish gumbo lunch at Miss Pat's we were ready to head back. Emotional fatigue appeared to be setting in somewhat. We had witnessed and participated in so many awesome and sometimes miraculous scenes and it was starting to sink in. We left about 1:30. It was a bright, gorgeous sunny day. The drive out was so picturesque. Small scattered huts, small corn plots, cactus with a few thin cows here and there. Very frequently you would see some threadbare children just pop-up out in the middle of nowhere. Obviously not the fortunate ones who attended school. We passed many donkeys with weathered Haitian women on the way to market in Beauchamp or Port de Paix. Again it was very desert like right up until we crossed the river outside Port de Paix.
Once more we drove the bus across a wide river! Weird. Women and some kids were bathing in the river. Kids were washing vehicles. Laundry was being done in the river. People gathered water at the river. The smelly, smoky market is at the river. The rivers are the life-blood of these towns in Haiti.
God then gave us a great faith experience! Right in the middle of the narrow one-way streets of Port de Paix, the bus broke down. The driver popped the hood up and a geyser of steam launched up. Initially I was concerned, a bunch of whites ("blans") stuck in a busy street in a third world country. But quickly I felt calm. All of us did in fact. Everyone of us commented on this fact. Without faith, we would be flipping out I'm sure.
We were definitely the attraction of the day down there. Dozens and dozens watched us. A few came up to the bus windows and asked for money or food. The driver had disappeared down a street after assessing the problem. About 15 minutes later he came back with the biggest Haitian we had seen the whole trip. He was either the mechanic or the defensive end for the Lions (his clothes suggested the former). He set to work right there in the middle of the street. About an hour later, he had fixed it (blown hose) and got the engine cooled down with a few buckets of water.
I couln't help but think about what an awesome faith test this was. We had been placed in an unplanned situation that could have been dangerous. God worked his power and we easily made in back to St Louis du Nord.
I hoped to finally spend a night with Lisa in the tent. Apparently they had a wind storm the previous night (25 miles away in Le Bay, it had been calm most of the night). ALL 3 of our tents were flat as pancakes when we went up to check on them. Rain looked immenent so we got the tents back up and zipped closed. The Simmons tent had a splintered tent pole but was able to stand up right anyway. The rain came, came hard, and came long. It poured almost non-stop for 4 to 5 hours.
One of our group dealing with a stomach bug had been feeling poorly and then fainted around 8:00 outside the bathroom. The staff there got some gatorade in him and gave him some Cipro. After 30 minutes or so, he looked a lot better. He just had to take it easy for a day and he was OK.
Next up, "praying against voodoo".
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