Haiti

Ok so my first flight wasn’t so bad, pretty smooth flight.  Layover in Miami and then here we are in Port Au Prince, Haiti. Let me just say that the airport here is CRAZY! No rhyme or reason to anything. People are just grabbing suitcases and trying to get you to ride with them. After we all got our luggage, and met outside we walked down the road to meet up with our ride. Our mode of transportation was a caged truck with benches in the back, enclosed all the way around it. Roads are very bumpy, everyone honks their horns constantly, and there are no traffic laws! You drive on whatever side of the road you can fit down. A few young boys came over to our truck in traffic, someone asked to take their picture, and they said if you give me a dollar. Very sad, children beg for money on the side of the road for their parents. There were children with missing limbs from he earthquake. After a 45 min ride on bumpy roads, past burning trash piles, sewage, cows, and goats we made it to our compound. Very nice building compared to what others in Haiti have. We have no air conditioning and only cold water. No complaints here, just excited to see what we will do first. We unpacked had a quick lunch (sandwiches) and off to the children’s home we went. This home is ran by the people we are staying with. They have a total of 17 children and 6 of those are 3 sets of twins all around the age of fourteen months. The children were all very happy with the exception of several babies who are running high temps (pray for them) 2 of them are twins which we brought back to the compound tonight so that our host could better care for them. We  met a young man today at orphanage named Steven he is 17 and now too old to be adopted. You could see the hurt in his eyes as everyone played with the younger ones. Steven doesn’t even live at this orphanage he walks there from another orphanage to play with a four year old boy, named Matthew.  I became quickly attached to a toddler named WaNelson, that wasn’t feeling well. I held him for a long time and then Chris rubbed him with a cool rag to help with his fever. I was very hurt for him he has a horrible rash from scabies, which he was treated for several months ago. While holding him my pastor came over and told me that WaNelson was the baby that they saved on his last trip to Hait. WaNelson came from another orphanage, he was left on the ground under a tent to pretty much die. You see when orphanages are full and have 100 kids with 3 caregivers, they can't care for them all. They will bluntly tell you we focus on the well and leave the sick. Heartbreaking! He is a very sweet baby, the same age as Marley and I hope to hold him more this week!  As our day ended we loaded the truck (you remember the caged one) Well there was a driver, 2 girls in the cab holding the twins, and oh about 20 of us in the back of truck. Came home to an awesome meal, tacos, macaroni and cheese, salad, French fries, and fresh squeezed lemonade. I helped feed the twins, had a meeting with my mission group, cold shower and now off to bed. We miss Marley, Alex, Nathan, and Nick terribly, but can’t wait to see what tomorrow holds!