Hey! I've posted a bunch of video clips from my most recent trip to Haiti. It happened to fall over 10-10-10, which is the date of the One Day on Earth project. I submitted these clips to them so they might appear on the documentary they are producing showing what was happening all around the world during that 24 hour time period.
Here is the link!
Friday, November 12, 2010
Tuesday, November 9, 2010
Friday, October 29, 2010
Friday, October 8, 2010
Haiti Update #4
Hello!
I hope you all are having a fantastic week! Thank you for all your prayers and support and e-mails. I think the supposed food poisoning opened the door for some other bugs so I’m still struggling a bit health-wise but on a positive note, Seguin is absolutely beautiful and I did have one day that I felt pretty good and was even able to help out in the clinic instead of being the patient. I finally broke down and started a couple different antibiotics yesterday morning when things got worse instead of better so I think I’m on the up and up now. We went for a hike through the mountains and national forest today and I did fine. Clayton’s puppy came with us- Ti Chen – which translates into “little dog.” I’m trying to figure out if the best part of the hike was when Ti Chen charged a sheep that subsequently did a flip and somersault in the air or when it started sprinkling and a beautiful rainbow appeared on our already gorgeous backdrop. It was awesome.
In case you’re interested in taking a look at Seguin, I will be posting some photos at this address: http://jnomides22.blogspot.com/. There you will also find a link to my Picasa site with other photos. I will let you know when I am actually able to do this as right now I don’t have access to internet that will allow me to upload stuff. Tomorrow I head back down to Jacmel so maybe then…
Anyway, I want to spend most of this e-mail talking about the history of the clinic I mentioned above, as well as some of what is going on here now. There are many of you receiving this who actually may be interested in coming down and working/visiting/supporting this place so feel free to e-mail me if you have any questions about opportunities. If you don’t want to know about the clinic, you can skip to the last paragraph. ; )
So the clinic here in Seguin is called Cloud Forest Medical Clinic (recently named when it was reopened after the earthquake). It was originally built by Farsight Christian Missions from 1998-2000 and staffed by a young American physician’s assistant (Theresa) who lived and worked up here for eight years before she moved to another part of Haiti. Farsight Christian Missions initially came to Haiti and partnered with Pastor Roro to build a church in Seguin in 1996. It’s a small world because I actually was introduced to Pastor Roro awhile ago through his connection to Pastor Daniel and his wife Marlaine, the ones I’ve been working with in Jacmel for the past four years. My friend Kyle, the one I’m up here with, first came to Seguin in 1996 with Farsight because the director of the organization is a member of Kyle’s church. He continued to come back with his youth group in middle and high school to help with various projects Pastor Roro had going on in Port au Prince.
In 2001, one of the men who had been on the original Farsight trip to Seguin in 1996 and had led many of Kyle’s youth group’s trips to Haiti decided to start another organization, Raincatchers. Kyle was asked to be and remains on the board of directors. Since that time, they’ve built over 600 water collection systems. Part of what Kyle is doing up here now, in addition to training community health workers, working in the clinic and other projects, is investigating these systems. He began to travel to Seguin for the Rain Catcher’s projects 2-3 times a year starting in 2001. He never intended on going into the medical field but when Kyle met Theresa in 2003 and returned a couple of years later to do a photo project on her and her work. The short story is that he ended up scrapping the story and helping out in the clinic for three months, returned to the states and changed his classes to pre-med so that he could eventually apply to medical school. Kyle continued to travel down and help out in the clinic whenever he could from 2005-2008.
In 2005, Farsight shifted focus to their projects in Costa Rica and Pastor Roro’s supporting organization, Haitian Christian Outreach, bought the clinic in Seguin. The clinic remained open until Theresa felt called to leave in 2008. In 2008, yet another organization started a community health project which included building latrines, water filtration systems and running mobile clinics. Kyle was asked to visit each of the homes that had the water filtration systems. Now, there are over 400 homes with these systems. He also continued to work with Theresa at her new location near Leogane.
With the clinic closed, quite a few organizations and individuals ventured to Seguin after the earthquake in January, including Humanity First. Among those individuals on the Humanity First team was Clayton Bell, now a recent medical school graduate who ended up returning in June after Clayton and Kyle were introduced and teamed up to reopen the clinic. There was a Haitian doc up here for awhile too who left recently to take care of his sick sister in the Dominican and never returned. Margaret is a Haitian nurse who sees patients here as well. Other physicians come in and out for short term trips but one huge need is to find another Haitian physician to staff the clinic. There are other projects going on up here too, including an orphan relief program also sponsored by Humanity First, who have committed to supporting Clayton and the clinic for at least a year. Qasim (Haitian) is the one who is running this program; he lives here at the clinic as well.
The clinic is pretty busy. Its officially open Monday through Friday and there is a usually good crowd gathered outside the door by 8am. Having said that, people still arrive whenever so in a sense, this place is always open because there really aren’t any other options. For example, there was a young girl brought here a couple of nights ago after being hit in the face with a rock, a fight that happened after a funeral of all things. Her shirt was soaked in blood and it was no small feat trying to hold her down while Kyle sutured up her face. These guys don’t really get a break since they live right above the clinic.
Anyway, pregnant women, patients requiring chronic care, REALLY sick patients, orphan children and school kids from the school next door and the local Catholic school are all seen for free. Otherwise, patients are charged 50 gourds for the first visit (a little over $1) and 25 gourds for each subsequent visit.
On a more personal note, I could seriously spend hours just sitting on the roof of this building looking at the countryside. Being up here is way more relaxing than the time I usually spend in Jacmel. I know that a lot of people picture Haiti and see piles of rubble and starving children and deforested hillsides but man oh man, that’s not Seguin at all. The land is so beautiful; it doesn’t even look real, especially when you look up at the national forest and the fog/cloud cover. Kyle says it reminds him of Jurassic part; I would have to agree. A couple of mornings ago I was watching these hills and saw the most joyous funeral procession. Perhaps those words don’t typically go together but in this case, its perfect. Everyone was dancing and singing and the people carrying the colorful coffin over their heads were spinning it around and dancing too…celebrating life.
That’s enough for now. Tomorrow I head down to Jacmel to see the kiddos at the orphanage and hopefully meet up with Marlaine. I’ll continue to keep you updated! Thanks again for all of your support…
With love,
Jen
I hope you all are having a fantastic week! Thank you for all your prayers and support and e-mails. I think the supposed food poisoning opened the door for some other bugs so I’m still struggling a bit health-wise but on a positive note, Seguin is absolutely beautiful and I did have one day that I felt pretty good and was even able to help out in the clinic instead of being the patient. I finally broke down and started a couple different antibiotics yesterday morning when things got worse instead of better so I think I’m on the up and up now. We went for a hike through the mountains and national forest today and I did fine. Clayton’s puppy came with us- Ti Chen – which translates into “little dog.” I’m trying to figure out if the best part of the hike was when Ti Chen charged a sheep that subsequently did a flip and somersault in the air or when it started sprinkling and a beautiful rainbow appeared on our already gorgeous backdrop. It was awesome.
In case you’re interested in taking a look at Seguin, I will be posting some photos at this address: http://jnomides22.blogspot.com/. There you will also find a link to my Picasa site with other photos. I will let you know when I am actually able to do this as right now I don’t have access to internet that will allow me to upload stuff. Tomorrow I head back down to Jacmel so maybe then…
Anyway, I want to spend most of this e-mail talking about the history of the clinic I mentioned above, as well as some of what is going on here now. There are many of you receiving this who actually may be interested in coming down and working/visiting/supporting this place so feel free to e-mail me if you have any questions about opportunities. If you don’t want to know about the clinic, you can skip to the last paragraph. ; )
So the clinic here in Seguin is called Cloud Forest Medical Clinic (recently named when it was reopened after the earthquake). It was originally built by Farsight Christian Missions from 1998-2000 and staffed by a young American physician’s assistant (Theresa) who lived and worked up here for eight years before she moved to another part of Haiti. Farsight Christian Missions initially came to Haiti and partnered with Pastor Roro to build a church in Seguin in 1996. It’s a small world because I actually was introduced to Pastor Roro awhile ago through his connection to Pastor Daniel and his wife Marlaine, the ones I’ve been working with in Jacmel for the past four years. My friend Kyle, the one I’m up here with, first came to Seguin in 1996 with Farsight because the director of the organization is a member of Kyle’s church. He continued to come back with his youth group in middle and high school to help with various projects Pastor Roro had going on in Port au Prince.
In 2001, one of the men who had been on the original Farsight trip to Seguin in 1996 and had led many of Kyle’s youth group’s trips to Haiti decided to start another organization, Raincatchers. Kyle was asked to be and remains on the board of directors. Since that time, they’ve built over 600 water collection systems. Part of what Kyle is doing up here now, in addition to training community health workers, working in the clinic and other projects, is investigating these systems. He began to travel to Seguin for the Rain Catcher’s projects 2-3 times a year starting in 2001. He never intended on going into the medical field but when Kyle met Theresa in 2003 and returned a couple of years later to do a photo project on her and her work. The short story is that he ended up scrapping the story and helping out in the clinic for three months, returned to the states and changed his classes to pre-med so that he could eventually apply to medical school. Kyle continued to travel down and help out in the clinic whenever he could from 2005-2008.
In 2005, Farsight shifted focus to their projects in Costa Rica and Pastor Roro’s supporting organization, Haitian Christian Outreach, bought the clinic in Seguin. The clinic remained open until Theresa felt called to leave in 2008. In 2008, yet another organization started a community health project which included building latrines, water filtration systems and running mobile clinics. Kyle was asked to visit each of the homes that had the water filtration systems. Now, there are over 400 homes with these systems. He also continued to work with Theresa at her new location near Leogane.
With the clinic closed, quite a few organizations and individuals ventured to Seguin after the earthquake in January, including Humanity First. Among those individuals on the Humanity First team was Clayton Bell, now a recent medical school graduate who ended up returning in June after Clayton and Kyle were introduced and teamed up to reopen the clinic. There was a Haitian doc up here for awhile too who left recently to take care of his sick sister in the Dominican and never returned. Margaret is a Haitian nurse who sees patients here as well. Other physicians come in and out for short term trips but one huge need is to find another Haitian physician to staff the clinic. There are other projects going on up here too, including an orphan relief program also sponsored by Humanity First, who have committed to supporting Clayton and the clinic for at least a year. Qasim (Haitian) is the one who is running this program; he lives here at the clinic as well.
The clinic is pretty busy. Its officially open Monday through Friday and there is a usually good crowd gathered outside the door by 8am. Having said that, people still arrive whenever so in a sense, this place is always open because there really aren’t any other options. For example, there was a young girl brought here a couple of nights ago after being hit in the face with a rock, a fight that happened after a funeral of all things. Her shirt was soaked in blood and it was no small feat trying to hold her down while Kyle sutured up her face. These guys don’t really get a break since they live right above the clinic.
Anyway, pregnant women, patients requiring chronic care, REALLY sick patients, orphan children and school kids from the school next door and the local Catholic school are all seen for free. Otherwise, patients are charged 50 gourds for the first visit (a little over $1) and 25 gourds for each subsequent visit.
On a more personal note, I could seriously spend hours just sitting on the roof of this building looking at the countryside. Being up here is way more relaxing than the time I usually spend in Jacmel. I know that a lot of people picture Haiti and see piles of rubble and starving children and deforested hillsides but man oh man, that’s not Seguin at all. The land is so beautiful; it doesn’t even look real, especially when you look up at the national forest and the fog/cloud cover. Kyle says it reminds him of Jurassic part; I would have to agree. A couple of mornings ago I was watching these hills and saw the most joyous funeral procession. Perhaps those words don’t typically go together but in this case, its perfect. Everyone was dancing and singing and the people carrying the colorful coffin over their heads were spinning it around and dancing too…celebrating life.
That’s enough for now. Tomorrow I head down to Jacmel to see the kiddos at the orphanage and hopefully meet up with Marlaine. I’ll continue to keep you updated! Thanks again for all of your support…
With love,
Jen
Sunday, June 6, 2010
Resources
Sometimes the internet is so completely overwhelming to me, especially when I'm trying to find good resources for something specific. Fortunately, a friend of mine sent this link to me and I think its pretty legit. Just wanted to share...
http://www.k4health.org/toolkits/haiti_relief
http://www.k4health.org/toolkits/haiti_relief
Friday, May 28, 2010
Back "Home"
I arrived safe and sound back in North Carolina late Tuesday night. Its definitely strange being back and I am experiencing a mix of emotions that I can't completely untangle right now. Its nice but I don't quite feel myself either. I miss the kids and Haiti in general but I also am pretty nervous about starting med school back up again next week after being away from it for two years. The sounds here are so different; its much more quiet. The smells too, for better and for worse.
The day before I left Haiti, Monday, I spent a lot of time visiting with my friends and saying my goodbyes. I took Deborah with me to see Gwen and her kiddos and in fact, she stayed with me most of the day. People were quite amused to find me walking down the street with a little Haitian child in tow; they had a lot to say, nice things though. We had a lot of laughs. My language skills have improved dramatically over the course of the last three weeks. In case you haven't been following, Deborah is one of the kiddos who arrived in the orphanage after the quake. She's 4 and absolutely precious. Speaking of the orphanage, I spent a few hours there in the early afternoon, saying my goodbyes to the kids and snapping a few last photos. I got a great one of Tana eating a mango (above). Oh man I will miss the mangos. Later, I packed up my things while Deborah wandered around my room picking up everything. I've also posted the photo I took when I put her in my suitcase, where she just laid until I took her out.
That evening, all the older "kids" at the orphanage came over to the guesthouse for my goodbye dinner. Michel set a large table and we enjoyed a nice meal of fish, rice and beans, potato/beet salad (my fav), plantains, tomatoes etc. It was really really fantastic. He's such a good cook. Lots of laughter and hugs and maybe some tears (on my part). After everyone left, I sat in the rocking chair on the porch and Deborah climbed on my lap and started singing. I began singing to her and we just sat there and rocked until she fell asleep. We stayed that way for a long time afterward.
The trip back here was pretty uneventful and really long. We (Pastor Daniel and I, along with Silas, Stephana and a couple of others who accompanied us) left Jacmel at 3 am. We were supposed to leave at 4 but apparently, there was going to be a "demonstration" in the streets of Port au Prince (some sort of protest against the president, Preval, who is requesting a longer presidency) and Pastor, who had a 9am flight, wanted to be sure we made it to the airport in time. My flight wasn't until nearly noon and we arrived at the airport by 5:30am (half an hour before it even opens) so there was a long wait involved for me. I tried to switch my flight but no go.
Waiting gets easier by the way...for some things at least. That is amazing to me that I, one of the most type A people (when it comes to waiting for stuff anyway) can so quickly adapt to the Haiti pace. Twenty-four hours of travel from a place essentially just off the coast of Florida and I was completely chill the whole time. I didn't even feel the need to try to fill the time with something "productive" like some attempt to get work done during those large chunks of times I spent waiting in the airport. I just sat and watched and processed. Wish I had some more time to do that now actually...
Monday, May 24, 2010
Saying goodbye
“Saying Good-bye”
May 24, 2010
The weather cleared up yesterday afternoon and I was able to with a group of the older “kids” to the big public beach. I put “kids” in parentheses because most of them are in their early twenties or at least late teens. It was pretty awesome and also much more crowded then I expected. Apparently people in Haiti like to head to the beach on the weekends as well. We swam for awhile and then listened to some incredible music- just some guys jamming out in a grass hut/gazebo. The best I can describe the music is a Caribbean/Reggae Bluegrass blend. I wish I had gotten some of it on tape. Riding back to the orphanage in the back of the truck as the sun began to set was nothing short of amazing and it made me really not ready to leave. Not to mention, Enel, one of the guys at the orphanage is probably one of the funniest people I’ve ever met so he kept us laughing the entire trip; it felt good to laugh.
Back at the guesthouse, I just hung out for the rest of the night, learned a new card game (its cool that you can play card games even with a language barrier) and played with Deborah, one of the girls at the orphanage who has been hanging out at the guesthouse for the past couple of days. I’m particularly sad to leave her. She’s four and a little live wire. She is actually sitting here with me now watching a movie. Last night a couple of the teens were over here watching a movie as well and Deborah fell asleep in my lap. Every time I moved a bit she wrapped her arms around my neck and cuddled closer. Man, if I could take her home with me… Her sister has been living at the orphanage for 6-7 years apparently but Deborah came after the earthquake, during which her father died. Her mother is still alive but she can’t take care of Deborah in addition to her two brothers so the brothers stayed with mom and Deborah came to live here with her sister Emma. As soon as I get home (tomorrow!) I’ll post some photos of her.
May 24, 2010
The weather cleared up yesterday afternoon and I was able to with a group of the older “kids” to the big public beach. I put “kids” in parentheses because most of them are in their early twenties or at least late teens. It was pretty awesome and also much more crowded then I expected. Apparently people in Haiti like to head to the beach on the weekends as well. We swam for awhile and then listened to some incredible music- just some guys jamming out in a grass hut/gazebo. The best I can describe the music is a Caribbean/Reggae Bluegrass blend. I wish I had gotten some of it on tape. Riding back to the orphanage in the back of the truck as the sun began to set was nothing short of amazing and it made me really not ready to leave. Not to mention, Enel, one of the guys at the orphanage is probably one of the funniest people I’ve ever met so he kept us laughing the entire trip; it felt good to laugh.
Back at the guesthouse, I just hung out for the rest of the night, learned a new card game (its cool that you can play card games even with a language barrier) and played with Deborah, one of the girls at the orphanage who has been hanging out at the guesthouse for the past couple of days. I’m particularly sad to leave her. She’s four and a little live wire. She is actually sitting here with me now watching a movie. Last night a couple of the teens were over here watching a movie as well and Deborah fell asleep in my lap. Every time I moved a bit she wrapped her arms around my neck and cuddled closer. Man, if I could take her home with me… Her sister has been living at the orphanage for 6-7 years apparently but Deborah came after the earthquake, during which her father died. Her mother is still alive but she can’t take care of Deborah in addition to her two brothers so the brothers stayed with mom and Deborah came to live here with her sister Emma. As soon as I get home (tomorrow!) I’ll post some photos of her.
Rainy Sunday
“Rainy Sunday”
May 23, 2010
This entry is going to be a mix of really random updates. It’s a rainy Sunday afternoon and I mostly just feel like sleeping, not writing. Last night I watched Avatar with Pilingo and Enel. These are two of the guys at the orphanage who can speak English pretty well. Its funny that this is one of Pilingo’s favorite movies; he kept telling me over and over again.
Before church today, I had a nice quiet morning. Its been hard to find that here so it was really nice and needed. Two more days; its kind of killing me. I don’t know what to feel but I do know that it doesn’t feel good. Church was wonderful though and, those of you reading this who have experienced it would probably agree with this, hearing the kids sing is something else. I should have expected it but of course Pastor Daniel put me on the spot before he started preaching. “Is there something you’d like to say?” I should have learned by now that I ought always to have something prepared. A few of the GVN people showed up for the church service as well so I was able to properly introduce them. They’re interested in continuing to help out at the orphanage, including construction work & programs with the kids. After the service, I went with Pastor Daniel to drop them off at their compound, which is not far from here, and they showed us around a bit. They make these really cool benches and give them away to organizations etc. in the community and would love to give some to Faith and Love in Action. Very cool.
After that, Pastor and I came back here to eat and then he took me to show me a piece of land that he would like to build a church and school on. Its really close to the orphanage and guesthouse where I’m staying. He has been praying for God’s will about this property for awhile. He told me a bit about his vision and I assured him I’d be praying along with him. We’ll see what God does. I think I mentioned this but he has started five other churches, none of which are near Jacmel. He would like to see this one as the “central” church, where pastors and church leaders can come for seminars, etc. The school would be where the kids at the orphanage would go, along with kids in the community.
I certainly have learned a lot about the needs here over the past week. I suppose I should consider my time here a success then, as that is what I set out to do. Its hard not to feel discouraged at times though. There is so much… At the same time, I’m learning a lot about childlike faith and about God’s love. Sometimes that is all you have to hang on to.
May 23, 2010
This entry is going to be a mix of really random updates. It’s a rainy Sunday afternoon and I mostly just feel like sleeping, not writing. Last night I watched Avatar with Pilingo and Enel. These are two of the guys at the orphanage who can speak English pretty well. Its funny that this is one of Pilingo’s favorite movies; he kept telling me over and over again.
Before church today, I had a nice quiet morning. Its been hard to find that here so it was really nice and needed. Two more days; its kind of killing me. I don’t know what to feel but I do know that it doesn’t feel good. Church was wonderful though and, those of you reading this who have experienced it would probably agree with this, hearing the kids sing is something else. I should have expected it but of course Pastor Daniel put me on the spot before he started preaching. “Is there something you’d like to say?” I should have learned by now that I ought always to have something prepared. A few of the GVN people showed up for the church service as well so I was able to properly introduce them. They’re interested in continuing to help out at the orphanage, including construction work & programs with the kids. After the service, I went with Pastor Daniel to drop them off at their compound, which is not far from here, and they showed us around a bit. They make these really cool benches and give them away to organizations etc. in the community and would love to give some to Faith and Love in Action. Very cool.
After that, Pastor and I came back here to eat and then he took me to show me a piece of land that he would like to build a church and school on. Its really close to the orphanage and guesthouse where I’m staying. He has been praying for God’s will about this property for awhile. He told me a bit about his vision and I assured him I’d be praying along with him. We’ll see what God does. I think I mentioned this but he has started five other churches, none of which are near Jacmel. He would like to see this one as the “central” church, where pastors and church leaders can come for seminars, etc. The school would be where the kids at the orphanage would go, along with kids in the community.
I certainly have learned a lot about the needs here over the past week. I suppose I should consider my time here a success then, as that is what I set out to do. Its hard not to feel discouraged at times though. There is so much… At the same time, I’m learning a lot about childlike faith and about God’s love. Sometimes that is all you have to hang on to.
Saturday, May 22, 2010
Thinking about home
May 22, 2010
Saturday
I need to finish telling you about yesterday. In the morning, after my crazy run, I met up with the Global Volunteer Network (GVN) people over at the orphanage. A crew of about 10-15 of them came to check out the place and also to help with the retaining wall. A bunch of them seem really interested in supporting children in the orphanage, which is really awesome! I’m excited to get home and get rolling with some of these projects. Its hard to get much of anything done here because of the lack of consistent internet access. I have to either go to Hotel Cyvadier (which is quite a nice little hike) or go mooch off internet at my new friends’ house- Gwenn and Nick. Anyway, one of the GVN people came back in the afternoon to color with the younger kids so I spent some time doing that with her too, which was a lot of fun. Its awesome to hear about other people’s perceptions and ideas; helps me to think outside of the box a bit.
On a different note, and I can’t remember if I mentioned this before, but everyone is more and more refusing to speak English to me so they can help me learn Creole. Its been tough but really great. I’m understanding more and more. Even the younger kids are really trying to help me. I will have to try to keep it up and find someone to practice with when I return.
I can’t believe I’m going home in three days! I’m so full of mixed emotions I have no idea how to process it all. Its been tough being down here quite honestly, for so many reasons I can’t even being to untangle right now and should probably save for a more personal venue anyway. For now, suffice it to say I’m kicking myself for not scheduling more “free” time between when I get back to the States and when I start back up my last year of medical school (June 1st). I don’t even know where I have to report to next Tuesday. I keep having to remind myself that God’s mercies are new every morning, every moment actually and that somehow I’ll get through this all. At the same time, the thought of leaving here is also devastating, mostly because I want so badly to figure out to live here and be comfortable and not be derailed by my emotions and fatigue and everything else I’m feeling but can’t necessarily describe. I’m just frustrated. As I said, I really feel caught between two worlds at the moment, maybe more. I wish I could turn my brain off for a little while.
I’m going to close for now because I don’t have much planned for the day, nothing else interesting to write. Tomorrow after church I’m going to go with the older kids living in the orphanage to the beach so I’m pretty stoked about that…
Saturday
I need to finish telling you about yesterday. In the morning, after my crazy run, I met up with the Global Volunteer Network (GVN) people over at the orphanage. A crew of about 10-15 of them came to check out the place and also to help with the retaining wall. A bunch of them seem really interested in supporting children in the orphanage, which is really awesome! I’m excited to get home and get rolling with some of these projects. Its hard to get much of anything done here because of the lack of consistent internet access. I have to either go to Hotel Cyvadier (which is quite a nice little hike) or go mooch off internet at my new friends’ house- Gwenn and Nick. Anyway, one of the GVN people came back in the afternoon to color with the younger kids so I spent some time doing that with her too, which was a lot of fun. Its awesome to hear about other people’s perceptions and ideas; helps me to think outside of the box a bit.
On a different note, and I can’t remember if I mentioned this before, but everyone is more and more refusing to speak English to me so they can help me learn Creole. Its been tough but really great. I’m understanding more and more. Even the younger kids are really trying to help me. I will have to try to keep it up and find someone to practice with when I return.
I can’t believe I’m going home in three days! I’m so full of mixed emotions I have no idea how to process it all. Its been tough being down here quite honestly, for so many reasons I can’t even being to untangle right now and should probably save for a more personal venue anyway. For now, suffice it to say I’m kicking myself for not scheduling more “free” time between when I get back to the States and when I start back up my last year of medical school (June 1st). I don’t even know where I have to report to next Tuesday. I keep having to remind myself that God’s mercies are new every morning, every moment actually and that somehow I’ll get through this all. At the same time, the thought of leaving here is also devastating, mostly because I want so badly to figure out to live here and be comfortable and not be derailed by my emotions and fatigue and everything else I’m feeling but can’t necessarily describe. I’m just frustrated. As I said, I really feel caught between two worlds at the moment, maybe more. I wish I could turn my brain off for a little while.
I’m going to close for now because I don’t have much planned for the day, nothing else interesting to write. Tomorrow after church I’m going to go with the older kids living in the orphanage to the beach so I’m pretty stoked about that…
Crossing cultures with a spider
Crossing cultures with a spider
May 21, 2010
I forgot to write about the spider last night! I haven’t had a run in with a tarantula in a couple of years so I guess I was about due. Kerri and I were sitting on the porch at the guesthouse last night and all of the sudden she started freaking out and pointing at something crawling toward us. At first I thought it was a rat (yes it was about that size) because we had just finished talking about rats but then I saw all those hairy legs and I’m pretty sure I screamed and scrambled to get out of the way. A couple of the younger girls from the orphanage were hanging out at the house inside and ran out to see what the commotion was. They started screaming and jumped up out of the way as well, grabbing my waist and pushing me in front of them as a barrier. Kind of a bonding experience. Apparently fear of these things crosses cultures. Stephana was a champ. She grabbed a broom and started trying to shoo it off the porch. That took awhile though and I’m sure the entire scenario would have made for an excellent video clip, with all of us trying to help but also screaming and jumping out of the way as the giant, hairy tarantula attempted to avoid the broom. Stephana eventually managed to save the day; I won’t go into the fat of the spider.
Speaking of rats, my run this morning was also quite amusing. I started off walking with Stephana to meet her friend that she usually walks with in the morning. After that, I took off to run (“kouri” nan Kreyol) a few miles by myself. The first odd thing was when I kept hearing people yell my name “Jenny-fer” that I’m fairly certain I’ve never met before. I thought will all the foreigners running around I would be a little less conspicuous but I guess not. After that, this crazy (literally) guy started following me. I had to stop at one point because I wasn’t feeling well and he started trying to talk to me. I looked up to discover that HE was wearing a very nice dress and wouldn’t shut up. I told him that I didn’t know him and decided that that was a good time to turn around and head home. As soon as I did that, a massive rat came barreling across the street right towards me. I literally had to hurdle over it.
Global Volunteer Network
May 20, 2010
Its strange. I’m homesick and have been feeling very ready to go back but I was just looking at photos of my dog and my house and all of the sudden I got really sad and not ready to leave Haiti at all. I am trying to process all of this and I think the bottom line is that I feel very caught between two worlds right now. I’m ready to be down here full time and its challenging to feel like such an outsider when my heart is attached to this place.
Anyway, moving on to what is happening here, this morning I met up with some with the Global Volunteer Network that I initially made contact with at Hotel Cyvadier, where we stayed last week. I honestly don’t know a great deal about their organization yet but they were really excited to come visit the orphanage and see what they could do to help. I gave them a tour and they wanted to come back with some more people tomorrow afternoon to run a program with the kids. Also, a bunch of people plan to come tomorrow morning to help with the retaining wall. (For those of you reading this who were just here helping with this endeavor, yes, we got more cement so work on the wall continues.) One of the women also mentioned that there are some people interested in sponsoring some of the children potentially. We’ll see if anything pans out but speaking with them was certainly encouraging.
Its kind of nuts here… all the NGOs and individuals and other organizations crawling all over the place. I feel comfortable with my role here because I’ve had a relationship with the Faith and Love in Action people for years now. I often stop to think, however, how all of this work should be fitting together. I hate that there are so many of us doing our own thing when we should be working collectively. It does take a lot of effort to network to collaborate but I believe that its totally worth it. Otherwise, we’re wasting so many resources. I wish I had time to just chill down here for longer and talk to all the white people running around doing who knows what.
This afternoon I went back to the orphanage to continue my task of getting photos of all the kids. I also handed out gift bags that people at Branch Creek Community Church put together for the kids. Unfortunately, this project happened before the earthquake and there have been a bunch of new editions to the orphanage and I don’t think we had a complete list of kids anyway to begin with so unfortunately not everyone got one. I’m not exactly happy with the fact that the team left me to hand these out because I had a bunch of unset kiddos on my hands. I was really stoked when I saw one of the kids handing out his candy to everyone else though. So sweet!
I’m going to try to get up and run in the morning which means 5am. Time to call it a night. :)
Its strange. I’m homesick and have been feeling very ready to go back but I was just looking at photos of my dog and my house and all of the sudden I got really sad and not ready to leave Haiti at all. I am trying to process all of this and I think the bottom line is that I feel very caught between two worlds right now. I’m ready to be down here full time and its challenging to feel like such an outsider when my heart is attached to this place.
Anyway, moving on to what is happening here, this morning I met up with some with the Global Volunteer Network that I initially made contact with at Hotel Cyvadier, where we stayed last week. I honestly don’t know a great deal about their organization yet but they were really excited to come visit the orphanage and see what they could do to help. I gave them a tour and they wanted to come back with some more people tomorrow afternoon to run a program with the kids. Also, a bunch of people plan to come tomorrow morning to help with the retaining wall. (For those of you reading this who were just here helping with this endeavor, yes, we got more cement so work on the wall continues.) One of the women also mentioned that there are some people interested in sponsoring some of the children potentially. We’ll see if anything pans out but speaking with them was certainly encouraging.
Its kind of nuts here… all the NGOs and individuals and other organizations crawling all over the place. I feel comfortable with my role here because I’ve had a relationship with the Faith and Love in Action people for years now. I often stop to think, however, how all of this work should be fitting together. I hate that there are so many of us doing our own thing when we should be working collectively. It does take a lot of effort to network to collaborate but I believe that its totally worth it. Otherwise, we’re wasting so many resources. I wish I had time to just chill down here for longer and talk to all the white people running around doing who knows what.
This afternoon I went back to the orphanage to continue my task of getting photos of all the kids. I also handed out gift bags that people at Branch Creek Community Church put together for the kids. Unfortunately, this project happened before the earthquake and there have been a bunch of new editions to the orphanage and I don’t think we had a complete list of kids anyway to begin with so unfortunately not everyone got one. I’m not exactly happy with the fact that the team left me to hand these out because I had a bunch of unset kiddos on my hands. I was really stoked when I saw one of the kids handing out his candy to everyone else though. So sweet!
I’m going to try to get up and run in the morning which means 5am. Time to call it a night. :)
Thursday, May 20, 2010
Hanging out at the Faith & Love in Action orphanage
May 19, 2010
Before Marlaine left to go back to the States early this past Tuesday morning (I guess that would be yesterday…I kind of have no sense of what day it is), we had the opportunity to sit down and chat for a little while about continuing the newsletter she used to write a couple of years ago. This is a project I asked to take on and part of the reason that I decided to stay an extra week and a half after our team headed back to the home on Saturday. During our conversation, I was particularly thrilled when she asked me how I plan to stay connected to Haiti over the next four years as I finish up med school and get through residency. Its worth mentioning at this point that I find Marlaine absolutely amazing. She’s tuned into things that I haven’t even admitted to myself and has a gentle, wise way of bringing issues into the light which have long been bubbling just beneath my surface. I really needed those hours that I was able to spend talking about the future (and even the past) with her. She’s incredibly encouraging but also practical. I guess those things aren’t mutually exclusive but sometimes I tend to separate them in my mind. This week I’ve been spending time at the orphanage, taking photos of and trying to get to know all the kids and teens and young adults (I think the oldest “kid” at the orphanage is 24.) Marlaine’s niece Stephana has been a tremendous help and I’m enjoying getting to know her as well!
Before Marlaine left to go back to the States early this past Tuesday morning (I guess that would be yesterday…I kind of have no sense of what day it is), we had the opportunity to sit down and chat for a little while about continuing the newsletter she used to write a couple of years ago. This is a project I asked to take on and part of the reason that I decided to stay an extra week and a half after our team headed back to the home on Saturday. During our conversation, I was particularly thrilled when she asked me how I plan to stay connected to Haiti over the next four years as I finish up med school and get through residency. Its worth mentioning at this point that I find Marlaine absolutely amazing. She’s tuned into things that I haven’t even admitted to myself and has a gentle, wise way of bringing issues into the light which have long been bubbling just beneath my surface. I really needed those hours that I was able to spend talking about the future (and even the past) with her. She’s incredibly encouraging but also practical. I guess those things aren’t mutually exclusive but sometimes I tend to separate them in my mind. This week I’ve been spending time at the orphanage, taking photos of and trying to get to know all the kids and teens and young adults (I think the oldest “kid” at the orphanage is 24.) Marlaine’s niece Stephana has been a tremendous help and I’m enjoying getting to know her as well!
The Team Reunited- Thursday May 13th
The Team Reunited
Thursday late morning/early afternoon (May 13th), the Carrefour/Lamentin team made the journey over the mountains and joined the rest of us in Jacmel. We all crammed into Hotel Cyvadier and enjoyed some R&R. Well actually, Thursday wasn’t too relaxing for the Jacmel team because the medical people still had a clinic to run from the afternoon into the evening at the orphanage and the construction team kept on pouring the remaining concrete into the forms for the retaining wall. Friday morning a bunch of us went to hang out with the kiddos at the Faith and Love in Action orphanage and say our goodbyes. Late in the afternoon, our 35+ person team minus two of us who have remained here in Haiti headed back over to Lamentin to spend the night before flying out the following morning. It was fun getting to spend time with the rest of the team, if only for a little while, and to hear their stories and about their experience, which was quite different from the Jacmel & Marbial teams.
Thursday late morning/early afternoon (May 13th), the Carrefour/Lamentin team made the journey over the mountains and joined the rest of us in Jacmel. We all crammed into Hotel Cyvadier and enjoyed some R&R. Well actually, Thursday wasn’t too relaxing for the Jacmel team because the medical people still had a clinic to run from the afternoon into the evening at the orphanage and the construction team kept on pouring the remaining concrete into the forms for the retaining wall. Friday morning a bunch of us went to hang out with the kiddos at the Faith and Love in Action orphanage and say our goodbyes. Late in the afternoon, our 35+ person team minus two of us who have remained here in Haiti headed back over to Lamentin to spend the night before flying out the following morning. It was fun getting to spend time with the rest of the team, if only for a little while, and to hear their stories and about their experience, which was quite different from the Jacmel & Marbial teams.
Wednesday, May 19, 2010
Medical Projects
May 18, 2010
Mobile Medical Clinics
The medical leg of this trip became an intense project for a few of us well before we left the United States. I will try to post some photos of what my house (aka a temporary warehouse) looked like but that may have to wait until I return home. Suffice it to say that we brought several hundred pounds worth of medical supplies into the country, some of which were very useful for our own purposes and many of which we were able to donate to people in Les Cayes (a place where we’ve run medical clinics in the past) and also to a Haitian surgeon (Victor) who works at a hospital here in Jacmel.
Once in country, the medical team, which consisted of one MD, four nurses, a physical therapist, an extra set of hands with some experience helping out at mobile clinics and myself, traveled with the rest of the Jacmel team over the mountain. We initially planned on heading up to Marbial- where our Jacmel contacts founded and support a church and school- on Monday but the river was too high. Perhaps I should back up. For those of you who don’t know, Marbial is outside of Jacmel and up in the mountains. It’s a really rural area and also where Marlaine grew up. Unfortunately, the church was severely damaged in the earthquake and this is where we typically run the clinics from. In addition, there is no money to pay the teachers at the school. To get to Marbial, you have to drive up a river bed for an hour or so then hike for about an hour and a half. It’s a pretty intense and exhausting journey actually, but fun (well I suppose that depends with whom you are talking). It’s the rainy season here in Haiti and therefore not the ideal time to be traveling up to this area so when we tried to leave on Monday, we had to turn around because the river was too high. Thankfully, although we had to shorten the duration of the clinic, we were still able to go up there the following day and set up camp for the night to continue seeing patients on Wednesday. We were joined by the Sri Lankan UN, which was a trip. Among that entourage was another physician so we had three providers (this is including myself… shhh… don’t tell my attendings back home.) Two of the nurses joining us (one of which was my sister) have experience running these clinics in Haiti so I think everything went as smoothly as possible given the circumstances. As the church was so damaged, we set up shop in another slightly less dangerously damaged building with walls half intact and tarps stretched out over top to make a roof. It worked. We actually set up our tents in the church anyway when it came time to go to bed that night. I have to check with my sister to get the final count but I know that we say over 300 patients in two half day clinics.
For those of you who are curious about the specifics, we try to provide everyone (minus pregnant women) with a de-worming medication (Albendazole) as well as vitamins, particularly the children. We had a large enough supply of prenatal vitamins for all the pregnant and nursing mothers. In addition to this, we treat various infections and do wound care. Well, the nurses do wound care and I have to give them mad props for this because we saw some nasty infections. I was amazed with the way Kristin, my sister, held one woman’s foot on her lap while she cleaned out an infected area unlike anything any of us had ever seen before. As always, this clinic was a rewarding experience, particularly because we got to pray with a lot of people. When we had to pack up and go though, it was heartbreaking as there were at least a hundred, if not more, waiting to be seen. Pastor Daniel, who had come with us up the mountain, wanted me to be the one to tell them that we couldn’t see anymore people that second day, which was really tough. Another difficult thing with these mobile clinics is that we really can’t do anything with many of the things that we see. For example, we diagnosed a couple of women with advanced breast cancer. One mother brought us a really sick baby, less than a year old, who most likely had malaria and was severely dehydrated, too weak to even try to eat. The mother said she was breast feeding two other children (not her own) and had three kids and a sick husband at home. Because of this, even though we begged her to let us take her and they baby to the hospital, she refused. All I could do was cry and pray for her as we held her then handed her back to her mother, most likely to die within the next 24 hours.
As I said, the Sri Lankan UN soldiers, many of whom I met during my previous trip to Haiti a coupe of months ago, came to the clinic as well. They didn’t spend the night but did return the second day early in the morning to “help.” I put that in parentheses because although the doctor did see patients, the rest of them (maybe 7-8?), despite the fact they had guns and would have been very useful for crowd control, spent more time taking photos than anything else. One of them sent me his photos so I’ll have to try to post them too when I get home and have better internet access. Seriously though, every time I turned around, they were taking photos while people were sneaking in “doors” they weren’t supposed to be coming through. I must say, however, that I was grateful for the help carrying our bags and big, heavy containers up the mountain and they were, at the very least, entertaining. They kept stopping to take pictures of themselves with the big backpacks heading up the mountain.
After we finished up the second day, a couple of us waited to ride back with the UN guys after the rest of our team climbed into Pastor’s truck. (This is after the hour and a half hike.) They started cooking food for us on these little metal things with fire and also pouring flavored sugar into our hands to eat. Yes. Bizarre but very entertaining. Once we climbed into their truck, the UN guys proceeded to try to talk to us in English but it quickly became apparent that that was going to be the extent of the conversation because they didn’t understand anything we said in response. This was evidenced by the fact that after everything we said, they said “no problem.”
In addition to the Marbial clinic, we also held two half day clinics (one on Monday since our Marbial trip was postponed & one on Thursday) to screen all the kids at the Faith and Love in Action orphanage. There are a total of 81. I think we probably saw the majority of them plus some other random people in the community who are loosely connected to the orphanage. I’m not sure; all I know is that people kept coming in after we had “finished” seeing the kids. The kids in the orphanage are relatively healthy but there are a lot of funky skin infections and rashes that were difficult to identify.
There is probably more to write but for now, I’m going to close so I can post this entry. Feel free to e-mail me with questions!
P.S. I’m not proofreading any of this so hopefully there aren’t too many typos. Sorry if there are; no time!
Mobile Medical Clinics
The medical leg of this trip became an intense project for a few of us well before we left the United States. I will try to post some photos of what my house (aka a temporary warehouse) looked like but that may have to wait until I return home. Suffice it to say that we brought several hundred pounds worth of medical supplies into the country, some of which were very useful for our own purposes and many of which we were able to donate to people in Les Cayes (a place where we’ve run medical clinics in the past) and also to a Haitian surgeon (Victor) who works at a hospital here in Jacmel.
Once in country, the medical team, which consisted of one MD, four nurses, a physical therapist, an extra set of hands with some experience helping out at mobile clinics and myself, traveled with the rest of the Jacmel team over the mountain. We initially planned on heading up to Marbial- where our Jacmel contacts founded and support a church and school- on Monday but the river was too high. Perhaps I should back up. For those of you who don’t know, Marbial is outside of Jacmel and up in the mountains. It’s a really rural area and also where Marlaine grew up. Unfortunately, the church was severely damaged in the earthquake and this is where we typically run the clinics from. In addition, there is no money to pay the teachers at the school. To get to Marbial, you have to drive up a river bed for an hour or so then hike for about an hour and a half. It’s a pretty intense and exhausting journey actually, but fun (well I suppose that depends with whom you are talking). It’s the rainy season here in Haiti and therefore not the ideal time to be traveling up to this area so when we tried to leave on Monday, we had to turn around because the river was too high. Thankfully, although we had to shorten the duration of the clinic, we were still able to go up there the following day and set up camp for the night to continue seeing patients on Wednesday. We were joined by the Sri Lankan UN, which was a trip. Among that entourage was another physician so we had three providers (this is including myself… shhh… don’t tell my attendings back home.) Two of the nurses joining us (one of which was my sister) have experience running these clinics in Haiti so I think everything went as smoothly as possible given the circumstances. As the church was so damaged, we set up shop in another slightly less dangerously damaged building with walls half intact and tarps stretched out over top to make a roof. It worked. We actually set up our tents in the church anyway when it came time to go to bed that night. I have to check with my sister to get the final count but I know that we say over 300 patients in two half day clinics.
For those of you who are curious about the specifics, we try to provide everyone (minus pregnant women) with a de-worming medication (Albendazole) as well as vitamins, particularly the children. We had a large enough supply of prenatal vitamins for all the pregnant and nursing mothers. In addition to this, we treat various infections and do wound care. Well, the nurses do wound care and I have to give them mad props for this because we saw some nasty infections. I was amazed with the way Kristin, my sister, held one woman’s foot on her lap while she cleaned out an infected area unlike anything any of us had ever seen before. As always, this clinic was a rewarding experience, particularly because we got to pray with a lot of people. When we had to pack up and go though, it was heartbreaking as there were at least a hundred, if not more, waiting to be seen. Pastor Daniel, who had come with us up the mountain, wanted me to be the one to tell them that we couldn’t see anymore people that second day, which was really tough. Another difficult thing with these mobile clinics is that we really can’t do anything with many of the things that we see. For example, we diagnosed a couple of women with advanced breast cancer. One mother brought us a really sick baby, less than a year old, who most likely had malaria and was severely dehydrated, too weak to even try to eat. The mother said she was breast feeding two other children (not her own) and had three kids and a sick husband at home. Because of this, even though we begged her to let us take her and they baby to the hospital, she refused. All I could do was cry and pray for her as we held her then handed her back to her mother, most likely to die within the next 24 hours.
As I said, the Sri Lankan UN soldiers, many of whom I met during my previous trip to Haiti a coupe of months ago, came to the clinic as well. They didn’t spend the night but did return the second day early in the morning to “help.” I put that in parentheses because although the doctor did see patients, the rest of them (maybe 7-8?), despite the fact they had guns and would have been very useful for crowd control, spent more time taking photos than anything else. One of them sent me his photos so I’ll have to try to post them too when I get home and have better internet access. Seriously though, every time I turned around, they were taking photos while people were sneaking in “doors” they weren’t supposed to be coming through. I must say, however, that I was grateful for the help carrying our bags and big, heavy containers up the mountain and they were, at the very least, entertaining. They kept stopping to take pictures of themselves with the big backpacks heading up the mountain.
After we finished up the second day, a couple of us waited to ride back with the UN guys after the rest of our team climbed into Pastor’s truck. (This is after the hour and a half hike.) They started cooking food for us on these little metal things with fire and also pouring flavored sugar into our hands to eat. Yes. Bizarre but very entertaining. Once we climbed into their truck, the UN guys proceeded to try to talk to us in English but it quickly became apparent that that was going to be the extent of the conversation because they didn’t understand anything we said in response. This was evidenced by the fact that after everything we said, they said “no problem.”
In addition to the Marbial clinic, we also held two half day clinics (one on Monday since our Marbial trip was postponed & one on Thursday) to screen all the kids at the Faith and Love in Action orphanage. There are a total of 81. I think we probably saw the majority of them plus some other random people in the community who are loosely connected to the orphanage. I’m not sure; all I know is that people kept coming in after we had “finished” seeing the kids. The kids in the orphanage are relatively healthy but there are a lot of funky skin infections and rashes that were difficult to identify.
There is probably more to write but for now, I’m going to close so I can post this entry. Feel free to e-mail me with questions!
P.S. I’m not proofreading any of this so hopefully there aren’t too many typos. Sorry if there are; no time!
Monday, May 17, 2010
Jacmel & Marbial
Jacmel – Faith and Love in Action Orphanage
Another Haitian organization we partner with is Faith and Love in Action / Aid International (US 501C-3). This organization runs a boys and girls orphanage located in Jacmel, along with three schools located in St. Rock (PAP), Les Cayes and Marbial. I am particularly close with the Haitian couple who founded this organization, so much so that I call the woman (Marlaine) my Haitian mother. These are actually the people that I’m currently staying with and the orphanage I’m working with for the remainder of my stay in Haiti. (More about that later.) To summarize, our team worked on four major projects in and around Jacmel: (1.) A gardening project, (2.) post-traumatic stress group counseling and training, (3.) construction at the orphanage – a retaining wall and (4.) a medical clinic in the orphanage and Marbial. Just so I don’t lose anyone, I’ll try to write about each separately.
Gardening Project
This idea was thought up by one of the many awesome women on our team. We ran it by Marlaine who was really pumped about it and Aisha and Alisha worked with her to plan and plant a garden nearby the orphanage. The idea was to not only create a sustainable source of food but also to teach the kids how to tend it. I’m not sure about the details of what all was planted but from what I do know, it sounds like this project was a huge success, but I guess we’ll have to wait and see if anything grows. Aisha and Alisha said they learned a lot from the people with whom they planted the garden and it turned out that they didn’t have to do quite as much work as expected! If either of you are reading this and want to provide more details, feel free!
PTSD Counseling
This is another project that I can’t provide a whole lot of detail about but I’ll at least summarize and Elisabeth, if you’re reading this, maybe you can jump in. There is a growing body of literature documenting the importance of mental health interventions following an earthquake, particularly for children. One of the members of our team, a therapist, has a passion for this type of work and she spent some time planning with Marlaine to determine the best way to address this issue for the kids and teens at the Faith and Love in Action orphanage. Early in the week, Marlaine, Elisabeth and her husband Matt held a meeting with the kids to introduce what Elisabeth would be doing throughout the week, namely group counseling sessions with some individual sessions at the end of the week. Among other things, the idea was to give the kids a place to discuss what happened, identify and also to provide some training on how to care for one another. From what I understand, its really challenging to try to do what Elisabeth was doing within a short week but the kids were incredibly, even surprisingly open about their experiences and I think it was a really valuable time for everyone involved. I personally can’t wait to hear more about it; because we were all busy with our separate projects, I did not get a chance to debrief with Elisabeth so I don’t have many stories yet. However, Marlaine just told me that she met with the kids last night and they said they learned so much from Elisabeth and they keep asking when she will be back. Watch out guys; there are a lot of people praying for you to move to Haiti. :)
Retaining Wall Construction Project
The Faith and Love in Action orphanage sits beside a rather large ravine. During hurricane season, this turns into a quite dangerous situation. In fact, I believe that it was Hurricane Gustav that recently turned this ravine into a rushing river which scooped out part of the foundation of the girls home. There are several construction projects waiting to be completed at the orphanage, including the second floor of the girls home but first things first- a retaining wall for this ravine. There were some initial frustrations with this project because it took awhile to get the concrete for the wall but once work got started, it definitely got started. And from what I heard, carrying buckets of freshly mixed concrete to pour into the forms for the wall in the hot Haitian sun is nothing short of extremely intense, hard work. Just hearing about it made me exhausted.
Medical Clinics
Our last major project was medical work. I’m again having issues with the internet so I’m going to wrap up for the night and include the details of the medical work in a separate post (hopefully tomorrow). For this section, I’ll be able to provide more detail as this was the team that I coordinated most heavily. But for now, good night!
Another Haitian organization we partner with is Faith and Love in Action / Aid International (US 501C-3). This organization runs a boys and girls orphanage located in Jacmel, along with three schools located in St. Rock (PAP), Les Cayes and Marbial. I am particularly close with the Haitian couple who founded this organization, so much so that I call the woman (Marlaine) my Haitian mother. These are actually the people that I’m currently staying with and the orphanage I’m working with for the remainder of my stay in Haiti. (More about that later.) To summarize, our team worked on four major projects in and around Jacmel: (1.) A gardening project, (2.) post-traumatic stress group counseling and training, (3.) construction at the orphanage – a retaining wall and (4.) a medical clinic in the orphanage and Marbial. Just so I don’t lose anyone, I’ll try to write about each separately.
Gardening Project
This idea was thought up by one of the many awesome women on our team. We ran it by Marlaine who was really pumped about it and Aisha and Alisha worked with her to plan and plant a garden nearby the orphanage. The idea was to not only create a sustainable source of food but also to teach the kids how to tend it. I’m not sure about the details of what all was planted but from what I do know, it sounds like this project was a huge success, but I guess we’ll have to wait and see if anything grows. Aisha and Alisha said they learned a lot from the people with whom they planted the garden and it turned out that they didn’t have to do quite as much work as expected! If either of you are reading this and want to provide more details, feel free!
PTSD Counseling
This is another project that I can’t provide a whole lot of detail about but I’ll at least summarize and Elisabeth, if you’re reading this, maybe you can jump in. There is a growing body of literature documenting the importance of mental health interventions following an earthquake, particularly for children. One of the members of our team, a therapist, has a passion for this type of work and she spent some time planning with Marlaine to determine the best way to address this issue for the kids and teens at the Faith and Love in Action orphanage. Early in the week, Marlaine, Elisabeth and her husband Matt held a meeting with the kids to introduce what Elisabeth would be doing throughout the week, namely group counseling sessions with some individual sessions at the end of the week. Among other things, the idea was to give the kids a place to discuss what happened, identify and also to provide some training on how to care for one another. From what I understand, its really challenging to try to do what Elisabeth was doing within a short week but the kids were incredibly, even surprisingly open about their experiences and I think it was a really valuable time for everyone involved. I personally can’t wait to hear more about it; because we were all busy with our separate projects, I did not get a chance to debrief with Elisabeth so I don’t have many stories yet. However, Marlaine just told me that she met with the kids last night and they said they learned so much from Elisabeth and they keep asking when she will be back. Watch out guys; there are a lot of people praying for you to move to Haiti. :)
Retaining Wall Construction Project
The Faith and Love in Action orphanage sits beside a rather large ravine. During hurricane season, this turns into a quite dangerous situation. In fact, I believe that it was Hurricane Gustav that recently turned this ravine into a rushing river which scooped out part of the foundation of the girls home. There are several construction projects waiting to be completed at the orphanage, including the second floor of the girls home but first things first- a retaining wall for this ravine. There were some initial frustrations with this project because it took awhile to get the concrete for the wall but once work got started, it definitely got started. And from what I heard, carrying buckets of freshly mixed concrete to pour into the forms for the wall in the hot Haitian sun is nothing short of extremely intense, hard work. Just hearing about it made me exhausted.
Medical Clinics
Our last major project was medical work. I’m again having issues with the internet so I’m going to wrap up for the night and include the details of the medical work in a separate post (hopefully tomorrow). For this section, I’ll be able to provide more detail as this was the team that I coordinated most heavily. But for now, good night!
Lamentin & Carrefour
Haiti short-term mission trip: May 8th – May 15th
Lamentin/Carrefour
For those of you who haven’t been following this blog or receiving my e-mail updates for the past few months (since the earthquake), Grace International is one of the Haitian organizations that we partner with in Haiti. The Grace International compound, which includes a school, church, girls orphanage and hospital, is located in Lamentin, which is just outside of Port au Prince. The Grace International people also run a boys home in Carrefour (which is beside another church they’ve planted). Members of Branch Creek Community Church, the church in PA which this short term trip was run through, have been supporting the boys in this Carrefour orphanage for many many years. As I mentioned in my previous post, a little more than one third of our team stayed in Lamentin and Carrefour to do some construction projects and a vacation Bible school type program there. Unfortunately, there are a lot of details that I don’t know about yet regarding the specifics of these projects. Someone on this team, however, did show me a video of a wall being pushed over so I know for sure, if nothing else, that they at least did some destruction.
Lamentin/Carrefour
For those of you who haven’t been following this blog or receiving my e-mail updates for the past few months (since the earthquake), Grace International is one of the Haitian organizations that we partner with in Haiti. The Grace International compound, which includes a school, church, girls orphanage and hospital, is located in Lamentin, which is just outside of Port au Prince. The Grace International people also run a boys home in Carrefour (which is beside another church they’ve planted). Members of Branch Creek Community Church, the church in PA which this short term trip was run through, have been supporting the boys in this Carrefour orphanage for many many years. As I mentioned in my previous post, a little more than one third of our team stayed in Lamentin and Carrefour to do some construction projects and a vacation Bible school type program there. Unfortunately, there are a lot of details that I don’t know about yet regarding the specifics of these projects. Someone on this team, however, did show me a video of a wall being pushed over so I know for sure, if nothing else, that they at least did some destruction.
Sunday, May 16, 2010
Back in Haiti!
Saturday
I arrived in
Our team, consisting of 35+ people, left yesterday afternoon, all headed back to their respective homes in the US and Canada. As I alluded to, its going to take a lot for me to process everything that happened over the past week, which was a lot, due in large part to the size of the team. We were divided between two different sites in the beginning- Lamentin and Jacmel. Some of those staying in Lamentin also worked and stayed in Carrefour and the medical portion of the team in Jacmel spent some time in Marbial (Marbielle). So I guess in total, we did work at four different sites. Since travel within the country is somewhat difficult, particularly trying to transport that number of people to all these different places, this trip proved to be the most challenging logistically. I think everyone made it back safely though and they all seemed healthy and fairly happy here.
Furthermore, I’m really pleased (and I hope God is too!) with what we were able to do over the course of the week while we were here. I speak for myself but I think also for many members of the team when I say that I’ve been blessed and humbled and learned a lot even in this short time and despite the fact that this place is so familiar to me. As I see myself here long term after I finish residency, its been cool to continue to try to learn as much as I can about Haitian culture and life here. I’ve gotten the opportunity to talk to many long term missionaries and my Haitian friends. I feel like I’m always asking everyone a million questions but I don’t want to have any romantic ideas of what living here would be like. I want reality; I’m ready for this to be home.
I spent the first four days in country visiting with my friend Marc and learning what a typical day is like for him here. Marc essentially grew up in
Marc also helps out at a feeding program three times a week at an orphanage run by an amazing family. CNN actually just ran something about it this past Saturday. I’ll try to find a link to post about it. The bottom line is, I had a blast basically hanging out and playing with a lot of amazing kids. I also met some incredible people doing other short term work with the orphanage so it was a cool time.
Anyway, going back to the team we had down here, I met up with the
From this point on, I’m going to post the events of the week in several separate entries so this one doesn’t get too long. Unfortunately I’m not going to be able to write much about what happened in Carrefour and Lamentin as all of my time has been spent in Jacmel but maybe someone on one of those teams will and I can copy and paste it here so you all can learn more if you’d like. For now, I will at least try to summarize the stories I was told when the team was reunited for a night here in Jacmel at the end of the trip.
More to come!
Thursday, March 18, 2010
Marlaine's update (3-18-10)
From Marlaine on behalf of Faith and Love in Action:
It has been one week since I wrote this update but I couldn't send it because our internet system in Haiti had not been working. Daniel and I were unable to reply to email, so we apologize for the inconvenience.
We want so much to thank our friends and family for their constant prayer and financial contributions that enable us not only to provide for the kids at our homes, but for the group of kids in our waiting list and the people that we are assisting presently.
Everywhere you go, people are living in fear of the aftershocks and the rainy season. Most of the people are under sheets and tarps, nothing resistant to rain.
Children Homes
Little by little, the children are overcoming their fear from the earthquake experience. They sometimes gather inside the buildings for a meeting, to pray together or to have service. They play inside, but they don’t have the courage to sleep in the houses yet. Last week, we took 2 days to take the kids camping in a remote area on the way the Marbial. They really needed relief from the tarps and tents they have lived in for the past 2 months. On this trip, they were able to play, swim in the river ( benyen nan dlo), run around, play music and have a barbecue. I was particularly glad to see how happy Renel was during our time outside the compound. He played football, music, danced and just had fun with the others. As some of you know, he was in one of his college courses when the earthquake occurred and it is still difficult to believe that he somehow made it out alive. Only 2 other classmates made it out alive and only 8 students from the entire university survived the earthquake. Renel is working every day to help other people living in the camps in the area and he is sometimes working with Daniel in the restoration of the buildings. Very soon, he will be able to share with many his testimony. Vanessa is working with him to apply for transfer to an American university and we pray this will work out. There are also four others applying for school in the States. Since all the schools collapsed, the older kids in the Homes have been helping with relief efforts on the compound and outside. They have accompanied all the food distribution trips and head up distributing baby foods and diapers to sick children at the Jacmel hospital.
We are still camping outside. It is very windy, but thank God, it is not raining this week. At the same time, we are all happy, teasing each other and glorify the Lord.
Children Schooling
We are trying to put the middle and high school children in the homes back to school this week. We are working closely with their school representatives to make this happen. Again, we pray that some resistant temporary shelter could come to us soon that we could be some kind of help to some private schools in the community including the ones that our children attended. Vanessa is now looking for overseas school for the ones who had already started college in Haiti. All of their schools collapsed and it seems to be the most difficult thing to be back on track. We strongly believe that the Lord has His way for these young people to have again the hope of education.
Marbial
Exactly 2 months after the earthquake, most kids are still at home with nothing to do. Most schools collapsed and it is unsure when they will be able to rebuild and to reassure that children will be able to attend school again. We finally realized even the cement blocks stand at the school wall building in Marbial have to be pulled down. We will have to start all over --- but last week, we put our efforts together to reopen the school by faith. Just under tarps, 150 children showed up last week, and I really believe that they are more this week. Since tarps will not last long we are praying to get some temporary shelter soon that could help improve the situation before the school rebuilding process. Some of our young people at the homes are up at the mountain this week to help in the school. They are helping with coordination as well to compiling information on the students and their families' needs and how we could better serve the community of Marbial in their crucial needs after the earthquake. It makes Daniel and I so happy to witness the children from the homes (many of which come from the Marbial area) now giving back to the people and being so excited about it too.
We are emphasizing water purification, agriculture, and tree planting projects for Marbial at this time. As the planting season is approaching, we would like to distribute seeds as black beans, pigeon peas, corn and vegetables in the next 3 weeks to 600 families. We have 100 pounds of black beans seeds available to take up there now. Our friend Teri from Alberta ordered some vegetable for us in Florida as well but it is limited to just one package of a kind. We welcome any agriculture ideas that you might have to help in our efforts for the people to be self-sufficient. We are continuing the food distributions, but also want to give these communities the tools to cultivate their land.
Past Events
It was a blessing to have Bob Jones from Kingston Christian Fellowship in Ontario Canada with us since my last trip to purchase foods in DR. After almost 5 weeks of being a great hand in helping our children and the Haitian people, Bob flew to Canada last week and every one missed him so much. Lou Palocci is a nurse from that church who came on 2 different occasions with Bob’s team in Haiti and helped with medical care as well as providing medical supplies to our doctors in Haiti. She had deployed all her efforts to get the medical supplies on time that the Sri Lankan UN doctor needed to help us care for the people. Kim flew all the way to Florida to deliver the medical supplies. It was a great help and we appreciated that so much .
We were so blessed last week to have a quick visit from our friends in PA. Bill Moore is an engineer who has been involved in construction missions in Haiti for over 20 years. His friend Blaine also came, and he is working in construction and involved in missions in Haiti as well. They came specially to inspect the buildings at the Jeune’s ministry in Carrefour and visiting us as well to inspect our buildings in Jacmel as well. We are optimistic that the Children Homes' buildings can be used again after some restoration and repair. We are waiting for the final recommendation of the engineers. We know that many of you were so concerned about the damaged condition of the buildings, we just want you to know that there is hope that our buildings can be repaired and not be pulled down.
Trip Events
The team also included Kathy Nomides and her daughter Jennifer, who will be graduating from medical school this May! Jennifer is our adopted daughter, the love of Christ just bounded us together with her and her parents over the past years. They have organized medical teams to work in Marbial, Les Cayes, and Carrefour on many occasions. Jennifer and her parents were already planning such a trip for May before the earthquake hit. This recent trip helped them to better assess the needs and how they will better serve with the team coming in May.
Jamie Taylor and His friend Jeff will be with us from BC Canada. Jamie and his wife Marci have become such a great blessing to us and the people of Haiti. They are now coordinating a sponsorship program for the children in Haiti and Marci is our Adoption Representative for Canada. Jamie and Marci adopted 2 beautiful children from our Home over the past 8 years and they are part of the Faith and Love Family. Please keep these upcoming trips in your prayers!
Thursday, February 18, 2010
Faith and Love in Action 2/17 update
2/17 from Marlaine:
Once again, our trip was a great success and we want so much to thank all our friends that stand with us in this difficult moment with your fervent prayers and your financial support! All the children at the homes are doing fine, except 3 girls with a kind of skin infection, especially for Natacha. But, we are so blessed to have a Sri Lankan medical doctor helping to check up on our kids on site. The kids are happy, keeping their strong faith and are so positive for their future even in a crisis like this. Everyone is still staying outside and a couple of more tents are still needed. Compared to the extreme damages in Leogane, Port-au-Prince, and other places, I can say that Jacmel was so blessed. There are many that have been killed or injured, houses and buildings leveled (in places like “Bord de Mer” and downtown) and so many are sleeping on the streets. In the remote villages and communities, so many people died from landslides and falling rocks. Despite this, Jacmel is fortunate and there are so many more survivors!
We were in Marbial on Saturday and distributed about 12,000 lbs of food with the help of a Sri Lankan military battalion based in Jacmel. There are still places further north of Marbial where help will never arrive unless we do something. I know where these villages are very well and just need the opportunity to help them. Daniel also went up to St. Rock with a truckload of food for the communities up there. Part of the school we have up there collapsed and many families have moved into the front and back yards since their homes are gone. As you all know, it is not an easy situation and it is not something that will be solved rapidly. We continue to rely on your support to continue food distribution to the city of Jacmel, to the remote area of Marbial and the surrounding villages, in St Rock, and in Cayes Jacmel. Over the past week, we have been able to reach people that had had no access to any help at all since the earthquake. We distributed what we could but people are hungry and need medical attention. Some places with no means of transportation will need to be reached via helicopter.
I am back in FL preparing for the next trip to Haiti and trying to make sure Daniel and others on the ground are receiving supplies to distribute and help more people. We have so many pictures and there will be dozens posted on the website over the next few days! Daniel and the boys have traveled to Jacmel, Port-au-Prince, Carrefour, Delmas, Petionville, St. Rock, La Plaine and many other cities to locate friends and family as well as give out what they could load into the truck. I’ve attached a few pictures to this email but there is no space for all of them!
I ask that you continue to keep Haiti in your prayers. I have never seen things as bad as they are now and the people’s suffering is more than ever. I know God has a plan and I pray He continues to use us to help these people.
God Bless,
Marlaine
Once again, our trip was a great success and we want so much to thank all our friends that stand with us in this difficult moment with your fervent prayers and your financial support! All the children at the homes are doing fine, except 3 girls with a kind of skin infection, especially for Natacha. But, we are so blessed to have a Sri Lankan medical doctor helping to check up on our kids on site. The kids are happy, keeping their strong faith and are so positive for their future even in a crisis like this. Everyone is still staying outside and a couple of more tents are still needed. Compared to the extreme damages in Leogane, Port-au-Prince, and other places, I can say that Jacmel was so blessed. There are many that have been killed or injured, houses and buildings leveled (in places like “Bord de Mer” and downtown) and so many are sleeping on the streets. In the remote villages and communities, so many people died from landslides and falling rocks. Despite this, Jacmel is fortunate and there are so many more survivors!
We were in Marbial on Saturday and distributed about 12,000 lbs of food with the help of a Sri Lankan military battalion based in Jacmel. There are still places further north of Marbial where help will never arrive unless we do something. I know where these villages are very well and just need the opportunity to help them. Daniel also went up to St. Rock with a truckload of food for the communities up there. Part of the school we have up there collapsed and many families have moved into the front and back yards since their homes are gone. As you all know, it is not an easy situation and it is not something that will be solved rapidly. We continue to rely on your support to continue food distribution to the city of Jacmel, to the remote area of Marbial and the surrounding villages, in St Rock, and in Cayes Jacmel. Over the past week, we have been able to reach people that had had no access to any help at all since the earthquake. We distributed what we could but people are hungry and need medical attention. Some places with no means of transportation will need to be reached via helicopter.
I am back in FL preparing for the next trip to Haiti and trying to make sure Daniel and others on the ground are receiving supplies to distribute and help more people. We have so many pictures and there will be dozens posted on the website over the next few days! Daniel and the boys have traveled to Jacmel, Port-au-Prince, Carrefour, Delmas, Petionville, St. Rock, La Plaine and many other cities to locate friends and family as well as give out what they could load into the truck. I’ve attached a few pictures to this email but there is no space for all of them!
I ask that you continue to keep Haiti in your prayers. I have never seen things as bad as they are now and the people’s suffering is more than ever. I know God has a plan and I pray He continues to use us to help these people.
God Bless,
Marlaine
Monday, February 15, 2010
Friday Feb 12 update from Marlaine
Friday: Today is the beginning of the 3 days of national prayer that the government announced a month after the earthquake. In every corner of the country, people consecrated themselves to pray according to their faith.
UN personnel (from the Sri Lankan base) came with us early this morning to test the road to Marbial before they transport the food for us to distribute to the people. We made it as far as we could in the river bed with their truck and our truck. We were supposed to return as soon we had shown them the road and they had figured out which trucks would be able to make the trip. But instead of turning back, the commander asked to accompany us on foot to go to see the damage of the communities in the mountains and our school. The soldiers were so touched as they saw the needs of the people and they were amazed to see the number of people in such an isolated place. On our hike, we found more than 200 people all over the road. There were many more gathered at what was left of the school. They were waiting to get food, but unfortunately the food will get there tomorrow and not today. A lot of people died in Marbial because of landslides, the rocks coming from the mountains killed some people and injured many. The people have not been visited since the earthquake and have had no access to help. They are hungry and had lost hope.
The military has also agreed to provide security as we travel with the truckloads of food from Jacmel to the mountains of Marbial.
We thank all our friends that keep Marbial in their prayers and we are so grateful for your financial support that enable us to purchase so much food in the Dominican Republic to provide relief to many people, families, churches and orphanages in Haiti. Below are some pictures that we took today in Marbial. I will send another update about how distribution goes tomorrow. Please keep us all in your prayers!
Sunday, February 7, 2010
From a friend and teacher at an international school in Port au Prince)
"Last time I wrote to you I asked you to pray about an orphan situation....I literally stopped writing an update to check out what was going on. I do not want to kick anyone when they are down but it involved the lady who has been on the news for child trafficking. Long story short we gave her some advice for about 3 days. I want the people (children) who need help to get it but there are correct paths that people must follow. I am glad for the wisdom God gave me and some others here at the school. I am saddened because the parents and workers who have followed the correct procedures now have a tougher road. I still know that God loves each orphan and cares for each one personally. I would ask you to continue to pray that each child gets the love and care (while still following the appropriate steps) they deserve.
I just returned from a 4 day medical trip to Jeremie Haiti. Jeremie is a remote town on the far west of the southern peninsula. It is a city of about 80,000 and has had 20,000 more people move there since the quake. Many are taking a tough 12 hour truck ride and others are going by overcrowded boats. The team of doctors were able to see many cases that would not have gotten care. There were a few "life-saving" operations as well. One lady had a compound femur fracture in her right leg and fractures in her left tibia and fibula. She had gotten to Jeremie on a board in the back of a truck. The doctors were able to set her bones correctly and give her the hope of walking correctly again.
One of the growing needs in Haiti is going to be getting needed medical attention where the people are. While there I was able to visit 4 other small hospitals...There are many people in those regions that need care as well but are staying at home. The hospitals are just not able to give much care. We are working now to figure out ways to get aid and supplies to the necessary locations. The trip was productive in meeting doctors and the main hospital in Jeremie for future trips.
God continues to be at work here. There are so many questions that have no answers but I know He is here. I can see Him at work in so many ways each day. One of the most humbling things has been the Haitian people continuing to praise God each night. I am not a singer. Each night in both Port-au-Prince and Jeremie people join together to sing and praise God...people who lost their homes, their jobs and possibly loved ones. It is such a lesson to me that these people have not allowed their current surroundings to change their passion and love for God.
Here are a few prayer requests/concerns I want to share:
1) Nurses are needed. If you know of nurse teams or individuals interested in coming please let me know. Most operations, etc have been done....good follow up care is needed to help the people heal.
2) Please pray for the many people without homes. Tent cities have been set up. The rainy season is coming and there will be other health concerns as the rain comes.
3) Good organization of the aid and supplies coming. I know so many people in the States want to help in many ways and all want that help to get where it needs to go.
Thanks again for your prayers, support and all sorts of emails that make me smile.
From Vanessa (Faith and Love in Action)
February 6, 2010
Hello!
Quick update: Marlaine left for the Dominican Republic late last night and arrived in Santo Domingo at 4am. She met up with Bob Jones and they headed to Pedernales, the port city in the southwest of the DR. There, they purchased close to 30,000lbs of food and supplies to load on the navy vessel heading to Jacmel. The ship is not yet full so they were unable to sail for Jacmel tonight. Pray that more organizations get supplies to the ship or that we are able to purchase more to load on the ship! As of now, the ship can take on an additional 25,000lbs.
Once in Haiti, the plan is for Marlaine to stay a few days to oversee distribution and assess current and longterm needs. Bob Jones will also be remaining in Haiti for some time. And as you know, Daniel has been in Haiti for the past week and will be staying for a few more weeks. He has been able to travel to Port-au-Prince and different areas in the country, so he will have much to share when he gets back!
Please keep their travels and activities in your prayers! Pray that the ship is able to leave for Jacmel as soon as possible.
God bless!
Hello!
Quick update: Marlaine left for the Dominican Republic late last night and arrived in Santo Domingo at 4am. She met up with Bob Jones and they headed to Pedernales, the port city in the southwest of the DR. There, they purchased close to 30,000lbs of food and supplies to load on the navy vessel heading to Jacmel. The ship is not yet full so they were unable to sail for Jacmel tonight. Pray that more organizations get supplies to the ship or that we are able to purchase more to load on the ship! As of now, the ship can take on an additional 25,000lbs.
Please keep their travels and activities in your prayers! Pray that the ship is able to leave for Jacmel as soon as possible.
God bless!
Tuesday, February 2, 2010
If you'd like to volunteer in Haiti...
The following organizations are either current partners of Merck or are members of Partnership for Quality Medical Donations (PQMD) and are seeking medical volunteers for their relief efforts in Haiti. However, if you know of other organizations that you think may qualify, please forward us information and we will let you know about their eligibility.
Partners In Health
+1 617-432-5256
http://standwithhaiti.org/
Project HOPE
Contact: M. Miriam Wardak540-837-9471
mwardak@projecthope.org
Catholic Medical Mission Board
http://www.cmmb.org/
Heart to Heart International
http://www.hearttoheart.org/
International Medical Corp
http://www.imcworldwide.org/
Be The Change International
Contact: Emily Riegel at emily@
http://www.
Monday, February 1, 2010
From Marlaine 2-1-10
2.1.10
Hello,
We pray this note finds you well! The past few days our hands have been really full and we are sorry that we were behind on the updates. Thank you so much for your patience! Daniel left for Jacmel on Friday and made it there safely . We were so blessed to find a private charter flight that to take him with supplies to Jacmel for free. His presence is a great comfort to everyone on the compound and he is trying his best to manage the difficult situation they all face. As you know, the needs are very intense and people feel hopeless. I am planning this week again to return to the DR to purchase more food and supplies. Our goal is to ship 200 bags of rice (110 lbs each) with the navy ship as well as other supplies like tarp and propane. More people are coming to the compound for food and supplies everyday and we want to meet those needs. I spoke with Edese yesterday (one boy in the homes) and he spoke about his one fear: that he will not be able to continue his education and make the difference he had wanted to make. Like some of our older kids, he had been in his first year of nursing school and we will need to figure out what the next step will be. Please keep Edese and the thousands of students whose schools have all collapsed!
Four kids from the homes: Judeline, Kenlove, Ermiline, and Aulain were on adoption process and flown to Canada on Saturday and united with their new families! Praise the Lord!
Thank you so much for your continued support and prayers!
God Bless,
Marlaine
Saturday, January 30, 2010
Interview about her work in Haiti (my mom)
Click on the video link on this page:
http://www.wfmz.com/news/22251408/detail.html
Another article:
http://www.thereporteronline.com/articles/2010/01/29/news/srv0000007458319.txt
http://www.wfmz.com/news/22251408/detail.html
Another article:
http://www.thereporteronline.com/articles/2010/01/29/news/srv0000007458319.txt
Photos of Jacmel (First set)
All the kiddos at the Faith and Love in Action orphanage in Jacmel!!
Streets of Jacmel
Transporting supplies from the ship. (see Marlaine's e-mail below for full story.
Unloading supplies from the Navy ship to take to Jacmel.
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