The One where I move to Haiti

The Internet has been down for the past week. 

And still not fixed after 6 hours of 2 guys working on it...

There is a lot to catch you up on. 

I typed a little every day, which adds up fast.

Wednesday 28 Sep

I made it to Haiti! But not without a bit of an adventure ;)

Candice and I had a layover at JFK, so we decided to spend a day and a half in NYC and stay with my friend who lives in Manhattan.

I took Candice around the city, visited the clinic I had my internship at last summer, and met up with an old roommate.

We had to leave for our flight to Port-au-Prince by 4:30am. It would take an hour and a half on the subway. 

3 people managed to sleep through 3 alarms.

I woke up to Candice telling me we are late.

I look at the clock—it’s 5:30am.

Well, that’s a terrible feeling to wake up to.

AN HOUR LATE FOR THE AIRPORT!

My friend of course lives on the opposite side of Manhattan and JFK is on the opposite side of Queens.

Not exactly close.

We threw our things into our backpacks, I hugged my friend goodbye and we ran out the door praying to catch a cab quickly.

Praise the Lord we caught the first one I tried for.

However, we still had all of Manhattan and all of Queens to drive through.

I was praying for no traffic.

And guess what, THERE WAS NO TRAFFIC!!

We made it to the airport at the same time we would have if we would have taken the subway. CRAZY!!

Only by the grace of God did that happen!

So, here is our speculation, we either slept through the alarms because of God or because of the devil.

Did the devil try to keep us from making our flight?
OR

Were we supposed to take a taxi and not the subway because something would have happened on the subway?

Was it a means of protection? We were warned about taking the subway in that part of town at that time of night, but me being me decided to plan to take the subway anyway.

Was it because the subway wouldn’t have gotten us there on time for some reason?

We don’t know, but we do know God’s hand is all over this regardless of why we slept through the alarms!

Once we got our bags from storage, made our way to the terminal and checked in, I started to get nervous about the weight of my bags.

One was 49 and the other 51 when I flew from Iowa a couple of days ago.

I had this feeling the scales would be different.

I began to pray for mercy from the agent checking in and weighing my bags.

Well, my feeling was right. 

One bag said 52 and the other 54!!

WHAT???!!!

I just prayed knowing there was nothing I could do.

Well, the lady was very sweet and asking me about why I had a one-way ticket.

She was interested in what we are doing in Haiti.

And guess what

SHE LET THE BAGS GO WIHTOUT SAYING A WORD ABOUT THE WEIGHT!!

As I was leaving she said her daughter wants to do missionary work too.

Talk about God answering prayers.

Of all the agents I could have gotten, God gave me one who had mercy on me because of her daughter. Praise Jesus!

Being here feels completely normal.

Like I’m home.

Imagine walking along, minding your own business when all of a sudden a creature you don’t want to exist outside of a zoo appears. 

Yes, I am talking about a HUGE, FURRY tarantula.

Fortunately, we keep Celissa around to kill these kinds of things.

You can enjoy the photo—her hand gives perspective of its’ size.

Thursday 29 Sep

The Dominican to Haiti is like America to Mexico.

Everyone wants to go there for work, school, life.

The other day we were filling up with diesel for the generator.

It took a while so many cars and trucks came and went.

One particular truck that stopped was CRAMMED full of people.

And I mean they had people in every nook and cranny a person would fit.

Friday is market day and the borders are more open. 

Each Haitian on the truck pays US $50 for a ride to the border where they will pass and hope to live a life in the Dominican making money to send home. 

However, if they are caught, they can be killed. 

Friday 30 Sep

Most of my contract for Lifeline requires me to help host teams that come from the states.

Today our first team arrives.

I think it will be a good.

I wonder what they will think—there are 4 girls living here ranging between 18-25.

Adrian is 18 and from Ohio. She has been here for 3 months.

Celissa is 25 and Haitian and has been staying with Adrian for 2 months. 

Now there is Candice who is 23 from California and me who is 22.

Oh! And there is a 2-year-old Haitian who calls us all mama.

Adrian has been primarily raising him.

I feel like this could be a sitcom-

4 young ladies and a toddler all living together hosting teams every few weeks. 

Saturday 1 October

Lifeline has a clinic open during the week.

When it is not open, people can still come for medical assistance.

One of the team members brought a little girl, Kimberly, with a gash on her leg this afternoon upstairs to Celissa.

Celissa is training to be a nurse

I happen to be sitting on the porch with her at this time.

It turns out the gash was old and infected.

We brought Kimberly down to the clinic to numb and clean the infection.

I carried her little brother down to the clinic who was with her. 

It was obvious he had an extended abdomen and reddish hair.

I went ahead and gave him a deworming, chewable medicine.

When I sat him down in the clinic, I watched him breath to confirm my suspicion that he was struggling to breath.

I went and got a stethoscope and listened.

It sounded like crackles with a bit of wheezing.

Because I am only an EMT, I had Celissa listen when she was done with Kimberly.

She confirmed what I heard.

She is afraid there is water in his lungs.

There is not much we can do right now.

It is worthless to take him to the hospital on the weekend.

We would take him Monday, but the bus is broken down which means the team needs to use the truck and we have no transportation.

We have asked for the mother to come to Lifeline tomorrow to talk to her.

We are willing to give her the money to take him to the hospital but Celissa says she has done that before and they just pocket the money and not take the child.

Of course we don’t know what the situation is here but we will hopefully find out.

This little boy is God’s precious child.

He is in His hands.

The situation is frustrating to me because I feel like there has to be something I can do.

But God is in control, God’s will will be done.

That I must have faith in.

If I don’t, than I will exhaust myself quickly in Haiti.