HAITI

Our work area stretched from Petit Goave to about half way to Port Au Prince

October 2013

Preparation

My preparation began in August when my wife gave me a mission trip to Haiti with Poured Out as a birthday present.  The purpose of my trip was to help install water purification capabilities in homes and an orphanage and school.  Most Haitians spend many hours a day gathering water from polluted sources, making from 2-4 trips per day and having to go a mile or more in each direction.  

Carrying water from the polluted stream.

Maybe next trip she will get a filter too.

We looked at website after website, checked out language CDs, researched the nation, what shots I would need, and what the weather would be like.  

Nothing I did, however, could fully prepare me for the reality of Haiti.  Haiti will be a physical and emotional roller coaster adventure if you have never been before, one that will test your strength, pull at your heart and never let you return to a comfortable life of ease without a twinge of conscience.

                                                         Day by Day

Saturday, 19 October - I checked in at the American Airlines Kiosk at O’Hare, got my boarding passes and did the auto bags check, taking my carry-on with me to the gate.  It was a large but very flexible carry-on that turned out to be too big to fit in the compartment.  I had to let the gate agent check it through to Port Au Prince but they didn't charge me for the extra bag.  A great beginning that saved the organization $40 since my second bag contained 50 pounds of fittings, a well pump and various controls for repair of an existing water house.

I had intentionally worn my Poured-Out Oklahoma disaster relief shirt so that anyone else going to Haiti with Poured Out could recognize me.  As I stood at the gate in Fort Lauderdale I met up with Glen Wegworth and Mike Mathes from Convergint Technologies.  Convergint continually impresses me with their commitment to their people and communities.  They are life savers in the truest sense of the word, giving of themselves for the benefit of others.   

As we were in our descent to Port Au Prince I looked out the window to see the biggest and brightest rainbow I had ever seen stretching as far to the left and right as my window would allow me to see.  I took it as a promise from God that the trip would be a special time for His glory.  It was.

 

A tap-tap - name so because you
tap twice when you want off.

    The ride to the compound was a    
    kaleidoscope of sights, sounds and     
    smells. Very few people in Haiti drive     private vehicles, but instead walk or   
    ride in brightly painted converted   
    pick-up trucks called tap-taps, with 
    seats and a cover in the bed.  The    
    people dress modestly, frequently   
    wearing bright colors. The aromas of       Haiti are wide in scope, from fish in 
    the market place to burning trash and rubbish (there is no trash collection in Haiti, or sanitary services) to cooking food on charcoal and myriad of other smells. We rode in the Poured Out pick-up outfitted like a tap-tap (but not nearly as colorful.) The 41 mile trip took an hour and a half of sitting on a steel frame on roads that were bumpy and rough. My education into true poverty was beginning.

Wikipedia gives a fair history of Haiti.  Suffice it to say that Haiti has been an often conquered country, and even since her independence corruption and revolution have suppressed and subjugated the people and the economy. Today Haiti is fighting to obtain a new identity and begin to regain some national pride.

Once at the Wesleyan Compound in Petit Goave we made our bunks and went to have a truly delicious supper of goat, beans and rice. (We ate two meals a day - breakfast and supper. Breakfast might include spaghetti, juice, goat, fruit, leftover cookies or cake, or spicy coleslaw.  Breakfast was the only meal with coffee but it was delicious strong coffee)  After supper we all introduced ourselves and got to know one another a little.  We sat and chatted for a while then we all went to our open windowed (screenless) dorms and tried to sleep inside our mosquito netting in the 90 degree, 80% humidity, breezeless air. When you are used to air conditioning, sleeping in Haiti is the next great adventure in culture shock. Additionally we all prayed the Steve Adams prayer, "Forgive us our snoring as we forgive those who snore against us."  

The Dormitory at the Wesleyan Compound

Sunday, 20 October - I finally got to sleep about 1:00AM and woke up at 6:30AM.  We had morning devotions, breakfast and decided to go to the English speaking church service that afternoon rather than the Haitian service in the morning.  Until then most of the 17 volunteers loaded up in the truck and headed for the “build site”.  This week, the build site was an orphanage for older boys to learn a trade and start to incorporate into Haitian society. We were building walls and installing a solar/UV water purification system there. 

The rest of us stayed behind to repair the Wesleyan Compound water house where the pump had stopped working.  We discovered that the pump had a piece of a rice sack wrapped around the pump intake and the pump had burned out.  We installed the new pump I had brought with me and the new controller, then discovered that we needed a third wire to run from the pump to the controller about 50 yards away in the water house.  Some of the crew began trenching, others began wiring and replacing the controller.

Pulling the pump to replace it 

I helped build scaffold for the masonry finish on the outside of the water house.  By scaffolding I mean 2x4s nailed to the wall and stuck into the ground with 2x4 cross members and ½ inch plywood between – not exactly OSHA standards.

The evening church service ended up being cancelled which was a big disappointment.  We had been looking forward to the service.

Honestly, though, at the end of the day I was struggling and wondering “Why am I here?  I see no Haitians I have helped, and my heart is really drawn to US disaster relief.”

Monday, 21 October – Another sweltering day.  My jeans evaporated into cut-offs.  Most of the team went to the build site, but six of us headed to the Wesleyan school at Papette, 15 miles away, to do some touch-up repair.  This was both a school and a church.  Carlee Munz explained that in Haiti you can have a stand-alone school, but if you wanted to have a church, you must also have a school with it.  No school means no church.  

Outside the Wesleyan School at Papette

My question from the day before began to be answered here. 

Our task was to redo some of the plumbing, unclog a drain, install gravity feed spigots outside the school for the community to use, correct an overflow problem, and increase the security around the solar panels. 

The Papette filters and controllers

We dug into our tasks and my task was to literally dig an embankment out so that the buckets for the community could fit under the gravity feed spigots.  The saving grace of this assignment was that I was digging in the shadow of the school wall.  After completing my task we had a design change.  We decided to raise the gravity feed spigots so that the community could not accidently or intentionally empty the storage tanks.  I filled in my dig. Sounds like a government job – dig a hole – fill it in.  

About this time recess began and the kids were all over us!  They were happy, curious and eager to try out their English on us or to force some awkward Creole out of our mouths.  They laughed at us and with us.  We stopped our important work for an even more important work - loving some kids.  Gruff, tough Al Underhill was smiling and laughing with the rest of us.  After a too short recess, which the kids tried to extend by drawing out their drinking at the taps, we went back to work.  It was very clear to me why we were here.  The reasons had all just gone back to class.

Lining up for drinks of life giving, safe water

As it got hotter and hotter, our security guard (a Haitian former policeman we call Machine Gun Mike) went to the little shop next door to get us all a Coke or a Ragaman (energy drink). I was buying for everyone so I gave him 5 one dollar bills.  He came back with the drinks but the owner wanted a different dollar bill because one of the bills was slightly wrinkled.  I never saw a Haitian bill that wasn’t totally wrinkled, but exchanged it for him anyway.  It was good for a laugh.  

Tuesday, 22 October  –   Was it hot again?  Instead of 95, I think it dropped all the way to 94.  Only five of us headed back to finish Papette.  We strung some concertina wire around the roof where the solar panels were located (they tend to disappear) and poured a cement floor for the water house.  When we were done we called our ride to the build site and found out it would take a while for them to pick us up.

We were forced to play with the school kids again!

Katy Brown and Jasmine Gerlach were immediately surrounded and began to do the rhythm game with some girls.

 Jackie Stockton had come with us and the girls were fascinated by her 
smooth silky hair.  They touched it and gently played with it for quite a while. 

I was taking photos and pretty soon Katy and Jasmine were too.  One little boy was scrunching up his nose and making pig sounds so I videoed him.  When I showed it to all the kids, they laughed and they all wanted their videos taken too, so I took several more. Recess was over again and the water lines began in earnest so that they could hang out with their new friends a little longer.  

Okay, I was hooked on Haiti by this time.  My heart was partially owned by these little ones who were so happy and open to us.   The biggest heart grab of all was yet to come on Wednesday night.

 

A Léogâne business - many have 
names with religious implications.

   
  We got picked up from Papette, drove
   the 7 miles to Leogane, investigated a
   possible new water house site with 
   Levi Adams, stopped for 12 bags of
   cement and 40 cement blocks, and
   then proceeded to the build site.

Building a wall at the orphanage

The building of the wall was going
slowly and the crews were very tired so we jumped in to help by hauling blocks and mortar to the wall builders.  They were extremely happy for the assistance and building continued in earnest.  I was carrying one block in each hand to the builders and then I made a mistake and only grabbed a single block, twisted around and – ouch!   My lower backed wrenched and I was in instant pain.  I continued to work though since I knew that if I didn’t then I would tighten up and be in misery. I did, however, slow down a bit.  Fortunately for me, we had a massage therapist, Jayme Hazen, along on the trip who has some serious skills and she was a great help at getting some relief.  That night I slept fitfully but got up with surprisingly less pain than I had anticipated.

Wednesday, 23 October - I went back to the build site with most of the crew, but several including Katy and Jasmine went to install sand bio filters on the mountain.  My day was long and arduous with mortar and block hauling, but fortunately it was only in the mid 80s so a cold snap had hit us.  The wall was finished and a raised floor poured for the storage tanks. We were there until after 5:30 that night.  It was when we got back, ate and had our evening discussions about what we had learned that day, that the heart rending moment of the trip was revealed.  

The bio-filter team had been at an extremely poor home with about 16 kids.  Some of the team were doing the installation and Katy was holding a little baby boy.  The boy’s grandfather approached Katy and asked, “Can you please take him?"  They were so poor and knew his best chance for a good life was with someone who could care for him better.  When we heard this we were all speechless, our hearts broken for a little boy and a family willing to sacrifice their beloved child so he could have a better life.  Okay, God, Haiti has your heart and now it has mine as well.  Break our hearts for what breaks yours. Unfortunately, it would be illegal for any of us to take the boy, so we are trusting in God that the bio filter will make a big difference in the health and ability of his family as it has done with others.

Thursday, 24 October  –  I was torn.  I wanted to stay with the build site because the installation of the controls and wiring and purification equipment was today (my specialty), but this was also the last day of the bio-filter installation, and I really needed to understand that as well.  Bio-filters won and I left on foot with seven other volunteers, our translator, DJ, and our security man, Matuan (sp?) or Machine Gun Mike to install three filters in the neighborhood, another two a short distance by tap-tap, two more in town but up the mountain most of the way by tap-tap and a final one outside of town up the riverbed and then up the side of the mountain. 

The Bio-Filter team after our next to the last stop - Jon, our two 
buddies, Jasmine, Kent, Machine Gun Mike, Jayme, Amber and DJ

Our first Installation

Every installation involves taking a picture of the family with the filter, recording the serial number and GPS location, setting up the filter and getting it running, instructing the family in how to use it, interviewing the family about their life, health, income and household, and giving them some giveaways like soccer balls, toy cars, candy, sun glasses, shoes, shirts, ball caps, vitamins and toiletry items. We ask the question so that when we have a followup interview we can judge the success of the filter for that family. 

When we finished the first installation the little boys from that installation followed us to the second site and brought along the toy cars we gave them.  As Jon and I set up the filter Jayme began to play with the boys and I joined in when my part was done. (We had to teach Jayme how to make little boy car noises!)   

It was a sweltering hot and humid day with a bright sun and no noticeable breeze.  About 10 minutes into the second installation Anna Yatzor was all but collapsed from dehydration and needed to be taken back to the compound.  Machine Gun Mike, Jayme Hazen, and Jasmine (one of our medical personnel) left with Anna to get her some relief.  Mike, Jon, Amber, DJ and I continued.  After 3 more installations Mike was not doing well so we took the tap-tap to the compound and dropped him off.  After another Jon was not doing well.  Jayme, Jasmine and Machine Gun rejoined us along with Carlee and we did two more filters. 

 

Jacque

    Carlee and Jacque, one of our other      
    translators, drove us up the river bed and
    dropped us off. Jasmine, Jayme, DJ, Machine
    Gun and I finished the last site and waited for
    Carlee to come back and pick us up.  After
    about a 10 minute wait, a tricycle tap-tap
    pulled up and told us that Carlee's truck broke
    down and he was there to pick us up.  We
    hopped in for a very bumpy ride along 3
    miles of river bed and 5 more miles back to
    the campground.

    As a note of interest, Poured Out has a program to train young men how to be translators.  Several  were chosen out of orphanages and given a skill they could rely upon in the future.  There are several young men in the program.  We all hold them close as family, not just translators.
                                                              
 All during the day at the various homes we got to play with kids and give them treats from the giveaways.  Watching their eyes light up was priceless.  One of the installations though I will always remember.  We had finished the installation and were handing out the giveaways.  I gave a package of candy each to two little boys and the very first thing they did was to open it and give back a piece to me and say thank you.  Another piece of my heart was gone.  One would think I would run out of heart pretty soon, but it seems to me that I had a lot more heart than I started with.

Friday, 25 October - the bulk of our work was finished.  The build site had a few clean up tasks so a small contingent proceeded there.  The rest of us boarded a small boat and headed for Trou Chouchou, Haiti, a small community to the west of Petit Goave with a beautiful beach.  The trip took about an hour and a half one way, but was worth the time.  We swam and played and took three bags of giveaways for the school there.  I knelt alongside a dugout boat on the beach to rest and put my head on it and began to pray for the whole team.  It must have been a comfortable prayer time because I woke up a while later with a sheepish looking Katy standing a short way off.  There was no doubt in my mind that her camera had just been hard at work.

The beach at Trou Chouchou

We had intended to return early and go to eat with the crew and the boys from the orphanage at the build site but this was Haiti and plans don’t always end like they are supposed to.  The dinner plans fell through and we ended up eating at a local hotel restaurant with the whole team and had a terrific time feasting on goat, pig, some crunchy mystery appetizer, spicy hot coleslaw and assorted other treats including a goat milk smoothie.

Saturday, 26 October - was a very early morning wake up.  We had to be at the airport early and Saturday the street markets are all setting up early.  We left the compound at 4:30 AM and got to the airport shortly after 6:00.  The ride was pretty quiet and it was obvious that all of us wanted to be home but none of us wanted to leave any of the others.  We sat in the airport and said our goodbyes until it was time to get on the plane. 

Good bye Lieutenant Dan and Mike.
It was great working with you.

A significant part of any trip like this is decompressing.   Everyone does it differently.  Some have to be alone, some have to be with friends and loved ones; some talk about their experience and some are quietly reflective.  I normally am very quiet and reflective after a physically and emotionally intense event.  When I got home I hugged my wife for a while and talked nonstop from the airport to the restaurant, during the meal, during the ride to my brother’s house and the two and a half hour ride home.  It is a sobering thought that cost of the meal for four of us could have paid 67% of a years tuition for a Haitian child.  

I have gotten some great presents from my wife, but hands down this was the greatest – the opportunity to make a difference in someone’s life who would have great difficulty doing it themselves.  There are too many lessons here to detail.  I hope you have gathered some of them via this inadequate narrative of an amazing thing our incredible God is doing through His people.  This is part of my decompression, and I know without a doubt that I will never be the same person I was before I went to Haiti.

An invitation -  I have been reading several amazing books lately, like Radical by David Platt and The Barbarian Way by Irwin McManus.  That is reading and learning, but a trip to a mission field is doing.  My invitation to you is to keep reading inspiring books, but then go and do where others cannot do for themselves.  God will honor that by using your faithfulness to change lives.  The first one He will change is yours.  Come and go with me.  Come and see what God is doing today.  Email me here if you would be interested in going or contributing toward a filter, a water house or even a school scholarship for a Haitian child.