Haiti, Day 1

Today, it is hot.  Like hot.  Like really, really HOT.  It's so hot that the cold showers that I complained about back in January are now amazing and wonderful and I may want to take more than one a day.  We were out in the country today at a Haitian church called The Valley of Hope.  It's the same church we attnded the last time we were here.  I was, again, taken aback when it ended and all of the people came and shook hands with us.  Some women even hugged us.  It was a beautiful thing.  We mostly hung around the church after the service ended.  We got to visit with some of the men and boys that stayed to hang out.  The women tend to take the littler kids home after church and that leaves some lingering men and the older boys.  It was fun to watch the older boys rough house together.  They had me cornered at one point posing for super cool and extra silly pictures.  And, just like at home, they wanted to see every picture I took of them.  We even got shushed by our team leader because he was trying to talk to the group.  One of the guys on our team was trying to teach some of the young men how to do some boot camp like execises.  That was hilarious.  I think they mostly thought that he was crazy to be down in the dirt.  But afterward, one of the boys asked him if he would come back and teach them how to lift weights and get muscles. 

We got to have some time talking with the men and boys through an interpreter.  They had 2 questions: "Why do the Americans always wear those dark glasses?"  and "Why do the Americans that come always get so excited about the kids?"  It was interesting to see the cultural difference between America and Haiti in regards to kids.  I know they value and love their kids, they just don't oogle over them as much as we do ours.  Our team leader asked the principal of the school there why they let the kids go with the Americans to the river when we come to visit.  (Frank, our leader, comes with groups frequently and takes kids down to the river to play on most of those visitis.)  His answer was that they know that we are Christians and love Jesus and Jesus said to let the little children come to him, so they trust us with the kids.  It was very moving to hear him say that. 

On Friday a man in that village had passed away.  It was the father-in-law of the principal.  His wife and several of the other family members were not at church because they were greiving.  We stopped by the house where the family was and had the opportunity to give our condolences and pray over the daughter of the man that had died.  We were told he was a well known man because he would sit on his front porch and always wave as Frank would go by to the church.  At this time Shad met a 16 year old boy named Balseren that spoke very good English.  He told Shad that he learned English by reading the bible and listening to sermons in English.  He said that some day he would like to go to school in the U.S.  I walked over to take their picture and he was asking Shad what his favorite bible verse was.

We left the Valley of Hope giant balls of sweat and headed to the downtown area.  In January, we walked around all of the different monuments with a Haitian man that told us the history and significance of each one.  This time we got downtown and the whole area was fenced off as they were doing some improvements to the square.  Because Frank knows people, they let us come in and the same man as last time took us around again to explain some of Haiti's history. 

After, we headed back to the Guesthouse for dinner and, after a nice cold shower, we have been sitting here ever since.  It's still hot.  We are off to bed where we sleep with the saving grace of our own personal fan on our beds.

Becky