wednesday (jan 20th)
we made the decision to go. cara, kendall, rachel, gideon and i would be leaving friday for cap haitien (on the north coast of haiti) to take supplies to a couple, johanne and chris, who work for emmanuel’s wish foundation and are starting emmanuel’s wish orphanage. we would do everything we can to supply the orphanage with immediate needs and prepare the place for about 50 children.
we ran to puerto plata to buy some supplies we didn’t have already and had some beds made for the kids (this means having foam mats cut and rolled). we met at rachel’s to decide how to spend thursday preparing and made bags for every kid to have for their things.
our bag-making system at rachel'sin short- we ran around like crazy people getting ready from the time we got up almost to the early friday morning hours. rachel met gideon at the airport because he'd just gotten in from canada to make the trip. we were thankful to have all day to prepare (no school) because it was a holiday.
friday
5am- wake up! cara, kendall, and i left for rachel’s to finish packing her truck.
stars out, sun starting to come up, we were on the road. rachel’s truck and mine and cara’s car (good ol’ negrita). drive, drive, drive to dajabon where we would cross the border.
dajabon in a word on friday (market day): MADNESS. it took us FOUR hours to cross the border. in the middle of papers being checked, being sent from this office to that office, back to another line to pay this, another line to pay that.. in all that i was wondering how on earth chris was going to find us. he was supposed to meet us to drive us in but how would he find us in this mob of people? our cars could only move inches at a time bc there were so many people BUT he did! praise God. we were definitely the only gringos there, but i wouldn’t have known where to start looking.. thank you, Lord.
we started following chris and an hour and a half later we were in cap haitien. dusty, dusty. people moving everywhere. waiting at their house was johanne and their beautiful daughter, hannah. we unloaded negrita and rachel’s truck, ran to the store for something for dinner (no refrigerator makes it hard to keep things!), ate at the house and went to bed.
"driving" through the mob of people at the border
the border at dajabon
rachel's truck finally in haiti!
the stuff we brought from the DRsaturday
after stopping by johanne’s old house to get a phone number, we went to a hospital where people from port au prince were being brought. across the street was a makeshift hospital (a school building- no more room in the hospital), which is where we went to give them chris and johanne’s information in case they need somewhere for kids. a man took us into some of the rooms. i don’t have the right words to describe it really. we can’t possibly understand their places or pain. i wish i could do more but the only thing i could even think to do was tickle one sweet girl who was playing with her bedpan. A smile won’t fix anything but maybe for a second relieve a bit? acknowledgment? no words. i still don’t know why we were taken to see what we did.
we left the hospital and went out to the site where chris and johanne are building a church. it was beautiful out there! after the church site, we got a late lunch/early dinner and then went into town to go to the haitien market. tons of people all over- it was wonderful. we bought some more sheet sets for the orphanage beds. thank goodness johanne was there to help us figure out how many gouds= haitien dollars= pesos= american dollars..
rachel and one of the sweet kids at the kresh
driving.. can you find the road? :)
site where they're building the church
the market downtown in cap haitien
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