St. Rock, Haiti

As you know, our Bishop and his wife approached us a few weeks ago about building a school for a very impoverished area of PaP. Sunday we had the chance to visit this area. It was humbling, heart breaking, exciting, and encouraging all at the same time.

As we learned today St. Rock is actually a mountain community quite a ways out of PaP, via 4WD roads. We got another flat today too. The community has no electricity, no water, and most all of the housing was destroyed by the earthquake. There are 3 schools with each of them having an estimated 500-600 students. And at least that many kids still are not going to school.

We met with some of the community members today to ask them about their situation. They said not having electricity is a huge issue and while they have fresh spring water that they can have access too, they do not have clean drinking water as it is a very shallow spring.

We asked what most of them did for work, they laughed and said they mostly sit around. Before living here this may have been something I was critical of. After living here, I get it.

We talked with these people about a school and all said they want one and would send their children to one. How to go about this is a little more tricky. In general I do not believe in handouts. We asked if they would be able to help build the school, help gather supplies, help provide teachers and administrative staff, etc. These were all things the people were willing to do and were excited about doing. Another thing we have going for us is that there is already a Haitian board with 11 members including our Bishop who are wanting to help these people in some way. They just need the financial backing from us.

Probably the hardest part of our conversation was when they told us what they really want more than anything is an orphanage. They want somewhere to put their children, that will teach them, and care for them. A father who had 2 beautiful twin girls asked us about this. I wanted to cry. I told them that God had sent their children to them and that we would rather try to help keep families together whenever possible by educating their children and feeding them via a feeding clinic if possible. I am having such a hard time with this line of thinking. I am so grateful there are amazing, patient people who are willing to adopt from Haiti. But I wish a lot of these mothers & fathers had the resources and self esteem to try and raise their children themselves. I feel like there is such a breakdown in the family unit here. And I feel like a strong family unit is what makes the world go round. Good thing these adopted kids are going to a strong family unit!

Some of the people from the town. When we got there we were meeting with just one or two people, pretty soon about 30-40 people were gathered around asking questions and talking to us. It was a little intimidating.
The pavilion where we hope to start feeding clinics. A little run down, but with a few new tarps it should give us shade.
Some of the farmland with an old farmer standing nearby. They grow potatoes, corn, limes, mango, papaya, coconuts, bananas, plantains, manioc and a few more I don't remember.
Our Bishop, Bishop Mardy.
The plot of land that is available for purchase to build the school on. It overlooks the ocean and is beautiful and even pretty flat!
The road we traveled back had some crazy driving that ended in another flat tire.