On Monday the Minnesota team was sent to Lilavois to become acquainted with the children and work on the outdoor kitchen project. The interns stayed back at the guest house to tackle a few assignments regarding Luly. We were assigned to find out as much information as possible about the village via internet. We used google earth to locate the village of Luly and it ended up directing us about a mile West off shore. We obviously knew this was incorrect and ended up "driving" National Route One through google earth and eventually found the correct path to the village. It was quite intricate and took at least 10 sheets of paper to produce a rather large map. Stephanie and I continued to search for info on Luly, but unfortunately after 2 hours of deep digging we couldn't find a thing. We all concluded our wanted information must come from the village people. This raises concern because I'm fearful of inaccuracy. Randy once told us Haitians hate sharing bad news; they only want to share good news. I am hoping the people of Luly are honest and refrain from telling the "white people" what they want to hear because this may lead to false findings. In order to assess the needs of the people of Luly we need honesty and willingness to participate. Our approach is most important because we must respect the culture.
Yesterday the Minnesota team went back to Haiti Teen Challenge to start painting and finish clean up from the flooding. We were assigned to stay home to search harder for information on Luly. Steph and I searched all morning while Alex and Andrea went to the new house to hang up a very heavy white board. Unfortunately, Steph and I failed at finding any information and decided to help mount the board instead. Afterward a success with the white board, Randy picked us up to head to Wahoo Bay to meet up with the team.
Wahoo Bay is a resort where many Americans vacationed before the earthquake. Tourism has been down since but Wahoo attracts the UN on their days off, Dominican Republicans, wealthy Haitians, and occasionally Americans. It takes over an hour to reach Wahoo from the guest house depending on traffic. It's a hard route for me to travel because in order to reach the beautiful resort we must pass the largest tent city in Haiti. I believe Randy said over 300,000 people are expected to live there soon. The government is forcing thousands of families living in tents in the city to relocate to the countryside. The countryside is very limited in resources. Food can be scarce unless otherwise grown, water must be delivered in by NGOs (Non-Governmental Organizations) everyday, and jobs are hard to find. Every time we drive by I'm sad, I'm mad, I'm curious; How can the government sleep at night when so many of their people are out of basic resources? Where did the billions of dollars worth of foreign aid go? Why hasn't the government figured out a plan yet? What about the children? What about education? What about the elderly? WHY?!! It's so frustrating and I don't mean to be negative but people need to know what's really going on. It's wrong and something needs to happen hopefully sooner than later.
It's important to see both the positive and negative of Haiti. Wahoo Bay is beautiful and I'm glad World Wide Village gives teams the opportunity to relax and see the hopeful side of tourism. Tourism use to be a big source of income for the country. Take a look at my photos below. I hope it will intrigue you to consider Haiti not only for a mission trip but also for vacationing. It's truly a paradise.
Photo by Andrea Beaty. Steph, Alex, and I on the water.
Andrea took this one too. It reminds me of The GOONIES!
Photo by Andrea
Andrea watching the beautiful sunset
Alex, another intern.
I love this photo.
Hard to see but photo of me, Steph, and Alex
The next morning we left Wahoo around 9am and visited Williamson and Luly. These two villages are very close to each other and are a primary focus in our projects this summer. We gave the team a quick tour of both then headed back to Lilavois to work on projects. Half of the team got straight to work on the roof of the outdoor kitchen and the other half worked on a pile of dirt, literally. Around 6 truck loads of dirt were dumped on the grounds a few days ago and our job was to flatten the mounds to increase the level of the ground. Increasing the height of the ground will help deter standing rain water and reduce the amount of mosquitoes. By the way, I'm happy to share the standing water has cleared up from the heat. It was nice not having mosquitoes at our ankles all day but the heat was INTENSE. I didn't realize how much hard work went into leveling ground. In the States we could accomplish this task in no time with machinery but here everything is by hand it takes time and muscle. It seemed like we did a lot of work but it looks as though we didn't make a dent in the dirt mound. We are heading back tomorrow to hopefully finish at least ONE mound.
Karissa from Minnesota
Joey and Alex
Alex working on the roof
The children are very disciplined. They wait until all the food is dished out, pray, then eat together as you can see below.
Andrea's short term hair do.
So after work the children sang songs and danced to show their thanks. It was odd but very funny when Lesly, the owner, and another older girl fetched these two little girls shown. The children started playing the drum and sang while these two danced in sync on their hands and knees. I wish I would've got a video. I did get a video of the children dancing and singing to us which I will post sometime tomorrow.
Tonight was the last night for a few members of the Minnesota team. Three members are staying back for one more week while the others will head back early tomorrow morning. Tonight, as a farewell, we dedicated a big thank you to the president of World Wide Village, Randy Mortensen. Alex made a great video of our appreciation which I'm hoping he will post to his blog soon for you all to see. I will post a link for all to see when available. Pray for safe travels for Randy and the team tomorrow!
My body says go to bed and my mind says I Must Go To Bed...
Goodnight!
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