Haiti through a child's eyes

I guess we will not have to go far from home for the kids to have some time to reflect.
Rosalie (I still owe a post on her) helps us with the endless chores here, was here this am. She eats breakfast with us and after breakfast the kids all wanted gum. I gave her some and she put it in her pocket. CT asked "Why whenever we give her something in a wrapper does she take it home?" I know she does not eat it while at our home. I can only guess she takes home what she can and feeds it to her family there.
Later in the day when she worked through lunch. We had tons of laundry today and she refuses to stop until she is done with a job so the kids wanted to make her a snack to take home. It really bothered IS that she did not eat lunch and I thought it was really sweet. They do not see people go without very often in the States. I am sure there are people who do, just not right in front of us all the time.
This evening while we were were playing on the deck we were watching people walk up the hill with the stuff they were selling all day on their heads. CT said "When I get older and am really rich, from being an escapeologist, I am going to come back here and just buy everything from these people so they can have money for their families.
Finally, today I feel like we are getting settled and a little outside of ourselves, at least in mentality and it feels good.

Only in Haiti

I've decided to start another section. Only in Haiti. We keep seeing these things that make us laugh. At least 5 times every car ride BJ says "Hey look at dat (fill in the blank), thats weird!"
This picture was taken while we were waiting for someone to meet us to show us the way to the orphanage. You have to have someone show you as there are no signs anywhere. A bunch of girls were sitting outside the car and IS got out to talk to them. They immediately started trying to take her CTR ring off.

I get really frustrated with everyone here thinking we are really rich and I guess we are compared to them. They think that we need to pay them.
When you find a parking spot little kids always run over and say "I watch your car" Then you have to pay them. And at church the sweet lady behind me asked me the whole time for a dollar. When I was in the internet store a man wanted money for medicine for his child. If you buy a bottle of water at the store, someone wants to carry it out and get paid for it. When what I really want to do is just drink it. But I figure it is good security. It gets really hard knowing who to give to and who not to. I guess it is not for me to judge and if I have it I try to give it. Sometimes I just want to park my car where I want to and not pay someone. But how do you say no to 3 shoeless 8 year olds?

Lizards everywhere. I hope they don't have diseases or CT is in trouble!

This is a huge truck overfilled with I don't know what and a bunch of guys sitting on top. We saw the greatest thing the other day. The main road up the mountain is called Kenscoff. It is a 2 lane twisty, steep road that always has cars broken down on it. Anyway in the middle of the lane was a clump of weeds from the side of the road with rocks propping it up. It looked very deliberately placed. As we rounded the corner we realized there was a truck broken down that they were working on. Justin called it a Haitian road flare.

Getting Settled

The kids and I have spent the last 3 days getting settled. Being unsettled is really hard for me. Another lesson to learn in Haiti! I just feel like with 6 little kids things are unsettled enough and I end up with enough surprises that I do not need to be disorganized and in this state of in between, never knowing where anything is, needing something and not having it yet etc. It totally makes me come unglued.
So over the last few days the kids and I have bought shower curtains, hammers, barbed wire, a water dispenser, plywood to make a shelf, silverware, a peeler, laundry tubs etc etc etc. Nothing gets done quickly here. And we have been put through the ringer over the past few days.
For example to get internet we waited in a 10x10 room for over 2.5 hours with all 6 kids and 9 other adults. Mind you this was a tiny non-ventilated room and people do not wear deodorant here and it is HOT! By the time we left, I was almost ready to spit fire. It was all I could do to pretend to keep it together.
This was after they let us out of the holding cell and they were testing the internet, only to find it would not work! Ugh! We did get it figured out.

The drive home, 2 hours late for naps. We do have car seats, we just don't always use them yet as we are hauling stuff still.

Monday we ran errands, only made 4 stops, and were gone for over 7 hours.
Tuesday we went to a store like Home Depot. It was a ways away and we found almost everything we needed on the street on the way there.
Then today we just stayed at our new house. It was great. The kids had a blast making ant homes. I was able to unpack and Rosalie spent the day doing laundry. Vlad, who drove for us when we visited, ran around and got more supplies. He loves to spend our money and tell us what we do and don't need. For example, one of the head lights was out on the car, I asked him to take it in to get replaced. He informed me we needed to replace both as the other one would not look the same if we did not replace it and would maybe go out soon also. I guess he does not get the if it's not broke don't fix it mentality.
The house is coming along okay. It was a new build and is missing a lot of things. But we are grateful to have it and feel silly complaining that there are not things like shower rods or silverware when we look around. Since we have been here the power has been out at least 8 hours a day. We have an inverter, but it can not run the refrigerator which is not that big of a deal as dairy is a premium we don't usually buy. The hot water heater is not working which makes for really loud showers with the kids! But everyday when I watch the women and children walk down the hill with empty containers to collect water and I am just happy we have water. We have seen 2 mice in the house and plenty of evidence there are more and spiders as big as the palm of your hand. No rats yet, so that is good. I did see rat traps at the store the other day and almost threw up. They were as big as 3 decks of cards!

Office Diversity

Just a quick note on office life in Haiti. The Ex-Patriot staff at the office consists of the following: the program manager for the office is Italian-American and from Morrocco, the structural engineer is from Jackson, WY, the construction trainer is from Wales. Throw me into the mix and you can see that we have a very diverse group.

There are also about 50 local engineers and other local support staff in the office. Of course, the main language is Creole, but many know French as well, which is more commonly used in professional business settings.

I had my first opportunity to provide some training to new, local engineers that we are bringing on board. I gave them a quick introduction into retaining wall design and showed some pictures of various retaining wall types. I was very impressed with their enthusiasm for the subject and they asked some hard questions. Many of these engineers have recently graduated from engineering schools in Haiti. There is no licensure process in Haiti so once you graduate you are an engineer. I was a little skeptical of this at first, but my experience yesterday proved that many of these engineers have a solid foundation on engineering basics. They will still need to be trained in specific areas and trained for the situations that many will see while working in the field, but they have a start. More to come.

Class Notes

I forgot today was a holiday and the kids sent notes to their classes.

dear class,how big was the snowstorm?It has been really hot here.I eve
forgot all about snow it is so hot here. Yesterday we went to a
orphanage there were fifteen baby's that were so cute.Also yesterday a
tiny lizard bit me on the finger!OUCH!!Don't think i'm not doing any
school work because i am.Are new house is giant it has a bunch of
locked boxes to lock my strait jacket,handcuff, and all that good
stuff. I wish you were here.As you can see i'm having the time of my
life.
your friend,
CT

Dear Class
Haiti is great. I wish you were here. I went to an orphanage and I
held a qute little babby.We are moving to a new house today .It is a
grate house .As you can see I am having a grate time .Love IS

Ms. Lee & Class-
Here is a picture a boy from the orphanage, he looks like Spencer. I
miss you. I hope you have a good week. It is steaming hot. It has not
rained. I hope you like the picture. The road to get to our new house
is very bumpy. I miss you. I hope you have a fun time with your full
day kindies.
Sincerely, TJ

Haiti through a child's eyes

Today while we were driving up "da mtn" to our house CT said
"I feel like Jesus really protected us while we were driving."
I love that everyone is silent while we are driving. I think I am going to have abs of steel from holding them so tight while driving up the mountain and bruises from the seatbelt being locked.

The Orphanage

After church today we went to a friend of a friends' orphanage. Our church is over by 9am so we have plenty of time to do these things on Sunday and I can not think of a better way to spend the day! Our friend runs a small orphanage, 13 children at this time which is near our home. We found out today there are a plethora of orphanages here to choose from. This is not surprising as there are an estimated 1,000,000 orphans in Haiti. There are no state-run orphanages. There are an estimated 700 private run orphanages and homes. Our bishop runs one out of his home also.

I love the tender hearts in my family. Especially these two. How could you not love that sweet, innocent, tender little face. She is beautiful!

The view from my lap. How could you not want to spend your day doing this?

IS is in Heaven lugging babies around.

The kids' think this little boy looks like our friend in the States.

CT helping this little guy, who is 2, learn to walk.

Even the boys had fun playing with the kids. SF was a little more possessive and whenever we picked another child up she ran over and wanted a love. Although she is the first to break the ice wherever we go giving hugs and kisses to all.

With numbers this staggering it is hard to wrap my mind around it.
I have decided to start focusing some of my blog posts on the individual people. It is just too hard to imagine the devastation and living circumstances of these people without focusing on the individuals that are being affected.
So the first story. This beautiful baby boy just turned 1 and his birth Mama. All 13 of the children at this home are already in the process of being adopted. This little man's birth Mom comes often to visit him. It appeared to me that she loved him. She could not, however, provide for him and the father of the child denied that he was his.

Another real person story. This little girl was dropped off at the orphanage this week. I am not sure if you can tell in the picture, but her hair is red. Red hair is not a good sign. It means the child is severely anemic and malnourished. The lady who runs the orphanage said it is always so hard to get children when they are this old and have had a lifetime of hardship. They are delayed beyond measure and already so malnourished.

You can form your own opinion on this situation, I will try to refrain for now. I figure at this point instead of be critical or think of ways to change the situation, my natural reaction, I can commit to help as we can. More to follow on how you can help us as we find more opportunities to serve.