At 6:15 am, we were lat
e for church, and that's a little embarrassing when you are seated up front as special guests. But we weren't the only ones, and although worship had been going on for at least 45 minutes already, there was lots more to come and people kept trickling in. Pastor Bataille's church is an open structure with the sky as a ceiling. There were some "seats" - concrete blocks turned on end, and a few benches. Abby even tested out a "pew" of sorts: four folding chairs that were missing their seats, but a board had been spanned across them to make room for 5 or 6. It's a dedicated parishioner who sits on the end of a concrete block for hours! But most people who came in after us, brought their own chairs. And the shaded spots went first. During a 3 or 4 hour meeting, the sun makes its way across the floor, and it's hot by 7:30! I'm amazed that the women are wearing panty-hose and the men, suits and ties. We were dying in our sundresses, which, by the way, seemed entirely inappropriate. Next time, sl
eeves.The mayor of Delmas, an area of Port au Prince was the guest speaker and although I couldn't understand what he was saying, it was passionate. Junior translated and we realized he was preaching a very practical post-earthquake message: work hard, take responsibility for your own family, help others, and don't wait for the aid workers to come and take care of you. It's the message the Bataille's have been preaching. It's what Haiti desperately needs, way more than foreign aid.
Junior was telling us, and Pastor Val told us the same thing later in the week, that some of the tent cities are empty. The people leave them up (and I think they've constructed them of the worst sheets in their households to gain more sympathy!) and only get back in them when the aid workers come around with handouts. The larger tent cities are filled with really nice tents, and the people are given food and water regularly, medical care is available for free, and there is an NGO that provides port-a-potty services. That is way more than most of the poor have normally, so why would they leave? It's like all the bad things about the US welfare system, but 100 times worse.
The rest of Sunday morning was spent preparing for the opening of the clinic. Our other Durham ladies arrived, and they jumped right in. Abby and I hung around and helped a little and took lots of photos and video. There was a funeral at the church later in the day, and while we were listening/watching from a distance, we felt the shaking. Abby was lying on a bench, and thought someone was shaking it. When she turned to see who it was, the look on my face said it all. Wide-eyed, I told her we needed to get out of the building. We ran downstairs to find the whole funeral party had already calmly exited (I guess they're used to this by now), but none of our American friends had felt it. We found out later it was for real: a 4.4 magnitude aftershock.
Later, my Dutch friend Coby, met us at Quisqueya for a visit. By this time, Abby and I were thoroughly wrung out by culture shock. We'd only been in the country for about 27 hours, but with the combination of the heat, dirt, smells, chaotic traffic, and some idleness, we wondered what we were doing here and could we handle it for a week? Going to Quisqueya and visiting with Coby was the grace of God for us at that moment. She asked if we wanted to go to her home and with no shame we readily took her up on her offer. She lived up the mountain, where it was calmer and cooler. While we were there enjoying a delightful visit, it started to rain, hard. After a few hours of refreshment, she and her husband took us back down the mountain, back to our tent on the Bataille's roof, in the dark, in the rain...it was crazy ride. That visit got us over the hump, and Coby and Ad, if you are reading this - thank you so much for ministering to us! I got a lot of answers, too about micro-finance, since Ad does a lot of development work for the Dutch mission.
Monday was a day with plans. Of course, they never quite go like you think. We had an appointment with the headmaster at Quisqueya to introduce Junior to the school and Steve Hersey. Junior's fiance is hoping to teach there. The appointment was at 9, fairly late in the day in Haiti, and it seemed to take forever to figure out a ride. When we finally arrived at 10:30, Steve wasn't at all ruffled - he said, "I knew you'd show up eventually." I guess being punctual for a job interview (of sorts) isn't highly valued! No one has a watch in Haiti... We talked to Steve, recounted those first days after the quake, talked about Junior and Joycelyne's plans and then toured the school. At lunchtime, we headed over to Epi D'or, a popular restaurant that is also a bakery. They serve pizza and sandwiches, and even have a section called "Mc Epi" where burgers and fries are on the menu. :) It was great.
We headed back down to the Bataille's and did more photography and helping out at the clinic, which was in full swing. Then home for dinner and resting. It was a reward at the end of the day to sit with friends and talk about all that the Lord had done. A good detox time, we downloaded all that we had experienced, and we worshiped together.
Tuesday morning, Pastor Val came and picked us up to take us to the orphanage. We packed up our tent and air mattresses, and then went by the church to gather up the rest of the stuff we had brought for the kids. I don't think we actually left PAP until close to noon, so we got on the road at the hottest and most crowded part of the day.
The orphanage is in Leogane Province, in a small village called Bongnotte. It is twenty miles
from PAP; it took us three long, hot, dusty hours to get there.I'll spare the details of the drive but it included stopping for 15 minutes at a time in traffic that wasn't moving, the hot sun pounding us through necessarily open windows, leaning in to avoid being splashed by nasty, nasty puddles, and passing the most hideous of "homes" made of rusty corrugated tin placed in the center of the road. Appalling.
When we were finally able to get beyond the chaos of the city, a whole new country opened up to us. Few signs of the earthquake presented themselves; life seemed relatively normal out here. The road had a few serious separations from the quake - asphalt ripped in half, that requred the driver to go slowly through. It was green and lush, and though still hot as the blazes, it was refreshing.
We pulled off onto a small dirt road, stopped to buy some mangoes and candy and headed up into the hills. Such a lovely place. Are we still in Haiti?
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