Tuesday

Tuesday morning we grabbed another 100 or so cans of paint and headed back to the warehouse. We were obviously pros by day 2, much more efficient, much more professional...



But in all seriousness, we were productive....due to the unfortunate texture of the building, it probably won't be completely finished being painted for another couple hundred years, but we gave the next groups a really good start.

That evening we attended another worship service at the Church of Hope, which was incredible. There was something truly amazing about worshiping in two, sometimes three different languages. No one notices the difference, its all still praising the Lord. Such a blessing and encouragement to our team.

The best news of the night came when we found out for certain that Wednesday would not involved painting the warehouse. There would still be painting, but we were headed out to the villages.

Monday

Monday morning work projects begin. The girls find out that for the first two days we were going to be painting the old MoH warehouse that is going to be turned into a kind of trades school to provide additional learning opportunities for post-secondary students. Secretly we were all a little disappointed initially, painting didn't seem like a very important job, it didn't seem like hard work, or necessary with all the other needs abounding in Haiti. But we all put our best foot forward, and then we found out a few things. 1) Painting is in fact hard work, especially when you're painting concrete the texture of stucco, especially when your paint rollers suck, especially when you're using Haitian paint, especially when the wall wall is over 20 feet high. 2) Mission of Hope is kind of like an oasis in Haiti, and it represents what the rest of Haiti could look like someday. 3) (we wouldn't fully grasp this until Wednesday): Paint, and colour is a point of pride in Haiti. It's an expression of ownership and completion. The colourful buildings represent beauty.

So we got to work



That afternoon we also got a chance to connect with our two designated translators named Smith and Villarson. Villarson also goes by the name SOG (Son of God), and he liked to just occasionally shout out his nickname to no one in particular. We bit of an SOG pep talk about evangelizing and showing Christ through our actions, and standing firm in the faith. Very cool guy, gave us a lot to think about as we compared attitudes towards Christianity in Haiti vs. North America.



After we finished work for the day we decided to visit the orphanage on the base. Visitors are only allowed in the nursery (so kids under 5ish), but that was alright with us. Adorable kids, and we learned that certain things are universal - kids like being tossed into the air :)



That night we spent some more quality time on the roof, saw some shooting stars, and looked out over Port au Prince in the distance.

Sunday - Day of Rest.....jokes.

Another bright and early 6:30am morning. Had our first experiences with powdered milk at breakfast which was surprisingly tolerable. Sunday was all about understanding the MoH vision.



After breakfast we were given a tour of the MoH campus...I don't have pictures from it all, but here are a few places of interest.

Although MoH has a clinic on site, and a few "Clinics in a Can" (essentially a portable), they are now building a hospital. From the outside it looked like a typical cement building, but inside it was just this huge maze of interconnecting rooms and hallways. I would love to see what it looks like when its completed.



Part of what Mission of Hope does is a nutrition program. They provide 50 000 meals a day to the Haitian people. Some of this is in the form of rice being brought in bulk to communities, and some of this is hot meals for every student at the school (2500). What MoH has been realizing, is that the rice economy has been suffering since so many organizations are importing rice from the US to feed everyone. MoH just built this new warehouse where they plan to store rice that will be bought from Haitian farmers, thus pouring into the economy, and then given back to the Haitian people. With the warehouse, they hope to be able to more than double the amount of meals/day they are currently providing.



We also saw the prosthetics lab, and the 3 cords workshop. For more information of MoH initiatives, check out their website http://www.mohhaiti.org/

After our tour, we went to the Church of Hope. Amazing doesn't even begin to describe our experience there. With approximately 2500 people in the congregation each week we were overwhelmed by the heartfelt worship, and presence of the Spirit.



Because the message was in Creole, we opted to join the Sunday School, which equally great. We discovered 3 things about Haitian children. A) They really like cameras, B) they really like sunglasses, and C) They (especially the girls) really like braiding our hair.

After lunch we headed out to see the off-campus villages of MoH: Bercy and Leveque. Currently these campuses are being developed so they have most of what the main campus has, a school, and orphanage, sports facilities, food programs, housing, and medical care.

Our first stop was Bercy, as we arrived the children poured out from amongst the plantain trees to greet us. We all took a walk to the ocean, with a child on each hip. It was here I realized what an asset French was going to be as I struck up a conversation with Liza (Leeza? wearing red). Being able to communicate, even if its a little rough, was such a huge blessing to me. The older kids and adults especially seemed excited to discover when a "blanc" spoke French. Admittedly, I had to often tell them to speak slooooowly, and more often than not, they laughed to themselves about my horrible accent. But language barrier was broken, and that was cool.



As we piled back onto the bus, my first pair of Crossroads sunglasses went to a fairly aggressive young girl, who may or may not have also been responsible for taking Julia's hair clips and Ashley's bracelets. Ah well, I brought them to give away.

Our next stop was Leveque, which was more developed with MoH's 500 homes program. Until recently the amount of Samaritans Purse blue tarp houses had vastly outnumbered the permanent houses, but now the colourful MoH homes are beginning to take over. Little did we know we would be spending some more time here later in the week.



On our way back to the base we stopped for an authentic Haitian meal at Gwo Papa Poul which translates from Creole to Big Daddy Chicken.

That evening the girls took some down time on the roof of our guest house. Time to journal, read, pray, reflect, and take photos of the beautiful sunset over the ocean.

Headed for Haiti

February 18th 2012: 5am - I leap out of bed to answer our wake up call, and we pack up and head down to the lobby. It was a wonderful surprise when the continental breakfast that opened at 6 was conveniently already stocked with donuts and yogurt and apples. Due to our 19 pieces of luggage (not including carry-ons), our airport shuttle had to make two trips. The girls and I took round one and began chatting it up with out shuttle driver. Wouldn't you know it, he's from Haiti. I guess you can read into that as little or as much as you like, but we just enjoyed chatting with him about our trip, and his growing up in Haiti. It was a good start to the day.

After a smooth check in, and some early morning gellato we boarded our 757 to Port au Prince. I'm not exactly the biggest fan of flying...especially the descent, so I took lots of pictures on the way down to distract myself :)



During our 3 1/2 hour flight we learned that there was going to be a Carnival going on in Haiti while we were there....apparently this is a typical thing that happens in Southern countries right around the start of Lent. We weren't going to be in the same area that the carnival was taking place, but people on our plane were PUMPED! Lots of excited French and Creole chatter as we arrived, and musicians serenaded us as we disembarked on the tarmac.

If you ever fly to Port au Prince, I have one piece of advice for you - BEWARE RED SHIRTS. These men may claim that its their job to look after your luggage, they may try to rip the luggage tags out of your hands...they may even call your sweetheart of a roommate a bitch, but whatever you do HOLD ON TO YOUR BAGS. On the other hand, some of the airport employees were super nice, and we chatted with one man who was showing us pictures of his kids, and I got my first taste of what the Creole/French/English language barrier would be.

By the time we made it to the school bus provided by Mission of Hope we were already sweating. While we waited for the other group that never arrived we snapped some photos of the airport still damaged from the 2010 quake...



....and we listened to the sounds of Haiti, including car alarms, car horns, car horns, car alarms, and car horns.

On our drive to the Mission of Hope campus which was about an hour out of Port au Prince we all were surprised by different things. In 2005 when I was in Oaxaca, Mexico teaching English I had my first experience with the Third World. The tarp and tin houses, the colourful buildings, the crazy driving, the markets, and the smell I was "used" to. Not that I was at all desensitized to it, rather I was prepared for those aspects. I was however surprised by a few things. First: Holy garbage! The streets are lined with it, the banks of the rivers are covered in it. There is no government funded waste disposal system, and the Haitians don't quite understand the idea of a dump, so the entire city is a dump.



As we got more outside of Port au Prince the country opened up around us, and I realized I also wasn't expecting Haiti to be so beautiful. It's an island in the Caribbean, its attached to Dominican Republic, but I've never thought of it as scenic. Well it is....



It really is...



In the middle of our trip, our bus driver pulled the bus over next to a mountain. He pointed to a little cross in the distance. He told us that the cross marked one of the mass graves just over the mountain that was filled with bodies from after the earthquake. Our stomachs churned a bit as we thought about that. Its only been 2 years, there are reminders everywhere of it. This is still a country that is mourning.



As we rolled into the MoH campus, we were still really uncertain of what to expect. we had no details on our work projects, or on what our living situation would really be like. We unloaded our extra suitcases in the donations room. We were so thankful to Ray of Hope in Waterloo that Julia and I have been fortunate enough to connect with this year, for their generous donations of clothes and shoes, as well as Grantham MB Church in St. Catharines which provided a lot of toiletries and 3 cords supplies.

On to the guest house. To our surprise, the accommodations were way more luxe than expected. Pillows - what?! Screens on the windows - what?! Working shower and toilet - WHAT?! So with our minds at rest about a few things, we went and explored the base before settling down for our first meal -- Lasagna made with tortillas, and the picky eater in me said "Alright...we can do this" :)

How it all Started

Last February my roommate Julia and I were bemoaning the way we had spent our reading week. That, coupled with the fact that we hadn't been able to get settled into any volunteer jobs made us feel a little restless to go and do something. We were chatting about the way it feels after a long day of hard work, like real physical labour, not just mental exhaustion. And then the idea began to form, we're young, we're fit, we're broke, and we're aching to serve. Our minds began to turn towards the idea of venturing to Haiti when Julia's aunt informed her of an opportunity. Things really began falling into place, and we could feel God directing us as we planned.

At the end of summer 2011, Julia and I had really been praying about what the trip was meant to look like in terms of other people. God had put some names on our hearts, and through a few conversations we realized some of those people felt God tugging their hearts in that direction as well. Soooooo when it all came together we had a team of 11 people who, for different reasons all signed on for a Reading Week trip to Haiti. Thanks to generous donations and church, family, and friends, it also didn't break the bank, and many of us were able to travel for free, or practically free.

February 17th 2012 at 11:30 am we met at the Vineland carpool lot, hopped on a limo bus and headed for the Toronto airport.



We flew from Toronto to New York that Saturday, and thanks to prior flight complications, we had to wait until the following morning to fly to Port au Prince. So we hit up a cheap Comfort Inn, ordered in some food, took what we thought we be our last shower for a long time, and got some solid zzzzzzs.

I Love You

Well, happy Valentines Day everyone.

I'll admit that I have mixed feelings about the whole occasion....the fact of my singleness.... combined with the fact that it isn't actually a holiday so I don't get time off school/work etc....combined with the fact that I am no longer in elementary school where we all got to give out Valentines....makes the day less than anticipated in my world.

Not that I hate it, couples do cute things, cute movies come out, and there's an abundance of chocolate. I think its great that we have a day set aside to celebrate love (although the history geek in me wonders where this whole Cupid love thing came from when the origins of Valentine's Day are a tribute to saints that were martyred), but the bigger issue I have with the day is the narrow view of love that is taken. Perhaps more than just romantic love should be celebrated on this day....that way everyone would have something to celebrate.

But lets talk about love for a minute...I really wish we would stop devaluing this whole romantic "love" thing. I mean, I've only ever done this whole singleness thing, but I've observed a lot of relationships and let me tell you something....Let me tell you what won't be real high on my 'to-do' list upon entering a relationship: this. This whole saying "I Love You" business....and future man better have been given some insight into this, because I feel quite strongly about the matter.

I'm not saying we shouldn't love people, and act lovingly and speak lovingly. I just think our world has forgotten what it means to say "I love you" to someone. In the context I'm referring to, that phrase is pretty powerful. "I Love You" isn't just gonna slip out of my mouth one day, it won't be flippant, it won't be a surprise, and it won't be taken back the next week. To me, "I Love You" is the expression of a commitment. Saying it is a choice. I'm all about choices, and recognizing that almost everything in life is a choice, and owning the choices that you make. When I say "I Love You", it will mean "I am choosing to love you. I am choosing to love all of you. I am choosing to love you whatever the future holds. I am choosing to love you more than myself. I am choosing you to love, and only you". If that sounds intense, if those sound kinda like wedding vows, then I am communicating the message properly. Love is intense, and in my opinion saying I love you should be pretty much synonymous with saying I will marry you. Because if you're choosing to love someone, like really love someone, then there really shouldn't be anything that could break that commitment....not annoying habits, not time, not changes in appearance, not anything.

So future man I'm thinking about you today, and hoping that you aren't saying "I Love You" to some other girl. And when we find each other, please do not be offended or surprised if these three little words don't spill from my mouth on our 1 month, or 6 months. Currently the plan is to only say them to one person, every day, for the rest of our lives.

I Do.........not think this is a good idea

I think it would be one of the more difficult things in life to attend a friend's wedding, whose marriage you don't support or see working out. Its hard enough to watch friends enter into relationships that don't seem right, let alone committing your forever to that person. But I'm worried that's what you're gonna make me do. I'm worried you're going to invite me to watch you make the biggest mistake of your life. When the invitation comes, because I'm guessing it will, I'm just going to cry. I'm going to cry for the difficult and less than ideal future you are choosing for yourself. I wish I could understand your choice, that would make this easier. Before the aisle and bells and vows I need you to explain to me what you see in that person. I've tried to figure it out on my own....but thus far nothing about them adds up to "The One". The whole situation gets me so riled up everything time I think about it. I pray that either my eyes are opened to the passionate, kind, personable, smart, Godly side of this person that I have never seen before. Or I'm praying that you have a change in heart....soon. And I'll admit that lately my prayers have more often resembled the latter.