Haiti follow-up

Hi, everyone!

                Hope the summer continues on in prosperity, fruitfulness, rest… hopefully we’re not too busy jumping from one busyness to the next to reflect on our lives. I’ve lately been doing a lot of that – especially since my trip to Haiti. In a land of such desolation, in the face of such tragedy, I find hope very much alive; alive in people’s stories and eyes… hope dies hard. Interestingly, I just read in Psalm 119:116b, “….And do not let me be ashamed of my hope.” It’s easy to equate hope with naivete. Let’s refuse to belittle hope in this way, as it alone has sustained and it alone will propel people like those in Haiti towards a better future.

                We arrived in Haiti and I immediately hit a brick wall… of humidity. We had late luggage and even later pickup (about 3 hours late). As you know, I was accompanied on this trip by brothers Jimmy (28) and Jason (15). We sat outside arrivals, in a breezeway of sorts, next to a cellphone cart and a trash pile. We finally trekked to the team house after enduring a brief but devastating tour of downtown Port au Prince (tragic). We set up tents on a concrete slab and planned the week.

                First, a word to the state of Port au Prince: I barely recognized it. Stacks of rubble 10 or 12 feet high piled in the medians, having simply been shoved there for lack of anywhere else to put it. Roads completely cracked down the middle. Tent villages are proliferate, “Red Cross” and “UN” and “UNICEF” logos everywhere, billowing like flags of Western philanthropy (for which the people are nothing but grateful, if a bit greedy). One tent village is built on top of a mass burial ground (150,000 bodies). People still wander the streets in droves, looking lost. There is such a feeling (again, still) of disorientation. So many homes were lost, so many people displaced… no one knows where to go or what to do. We found a teenage boy left for dead on the side of the streets – severely malnourished with wounds from what appeared to be abuse. We got a truck and took him to get medical attention but as we talked to the translators about it, he shook his head and said, “this is very common for us.”

                The first-hand reports we heard of the earthquake included the following: People simply ran out into the streets… hurt people, dying people, people missing limbs, people having babies, all in the street. There was no medical triage: it was first come, first serve and there was nowhere else to go. The congestion consisted not only of Port au Prince residents but anyone on the outskirts who could make it on foot into the city, seeking help. Finally the stench of rotting flesh overwhelmed, resulting in the necessary if somewhat insensitive mass burial movement.  

                People felt like the earth was spinning or shaking… many said they felt seasick for 3 days or more. Most of them had never lived through an earthquake, didn’t know what it was, and didn’t know what to do. In one family we met, the mother said that when the earthquake happened, she ran inside “for cover” but her 3 year old son started screaming at her to get out… he died and she escaped in time. Another woman was trapped for 2 days underneath her home before finally being pulled clear. She lost her left arm and is now afraid to go indoors.

People who had scraps to begin with now had nothing. People who had jobs are still too disoriented to find out if their employers or employment even still exists. Obviously social and economic infrastructure is virtually non-existent.

                We walked down streets and taught in a school… we fed children who shoved handfuls of mayonnaise covered spaghetti noodles into their mouths. The kids kept begging us for water; that is one shortage that is easy to forget. We visited an orphanage and gave the lady in charge school supplies and toys for the kids (that you paid for, thank you!!). She explained that over 125 children lived in the house, with 9 workers, including herself and her husband. She slept in a room with 3 infants under the age of 4 months. She said the earthquake caused such an influx of children who were displaced, not knowing whether their parents were dead or alive, and separated enough that they may never know. How can she turn them away? The boy we found on the side of the road was taken there.

                Now, I hope these accounts don’t come across as another sob story about Haiti. I understand that NONE of us have the capacity to be consciously aware of every major crisis or human rights issue on the planet at all times. However, we were all involved in this trip to Haiti: you through your contributions and I through my physical presence. And together we can at the very least remember Haiti… remember that even conservative estimations have a rebuilding of this nation between 4 & 6 years away… remember that just because there are millions of hungry and thirsty children doesn’t mean that we can forget these hungry and thirsty children.

                This trip reminded me from a personal standpoint of something: it’s easy, living here in Pennsylvania and working 40 hours a week, to come to think of missions as “exotic travels.” I tell people about my life and they coo enviously, “oh, you’ve been all over the world!” To which I have to reply, yes, I’ve been many beautiful places… I’ve also lived in a tent and slept on concrete floors… I’ve seen trash dumps, slums, projects, hovels, huts, shacks all over the world… I’ve gone to the least and the poorest and sought to brighten a corner of their lives through food and water and Christ. 

                I hope that you, friend, see this partnership of ours as something more than travel, philanthropy, or even awareness, as meaningful as all of those things can be. I went to Haiti because the people of Haiti, right now, cannot help themselves. Right now, they have the least. And Jesus, empathizing thoroughly with these very people, said, “For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you clothed me,⁾ I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me” (Matthew 25:35 & 36). I think that he approvingly reminds you and me both that “…as you did it to one of the least of these, you did it to me.”

                I may be going back to Haiti in December with a larger team. I’ll keep you posted.

LOVE and GOD’s BLESSINGS to you all! Thank you for your friendship and support.