My time in Haiti: Creating a "new" home

This is my second day at Grace Village. The fist day was a little overwhelming, but good. I was immediately greeted by the cutest children and they were very excited to show me everything at the place. They sang songs for me and showed me their new place!

Jean (a man who works for GV) got me all settled and then left for the day. He speaks English and is very good at his job. This meant when he left I had to try to communicate with my very little creole. FanFan arrived around 0900 back from school. He is going to school to be a youth pastor and does a fabulous job with the children. He speaks English and was very helpful when he got back. He helped me figure out some things and got me hooked up on the internet. Unfortunately the internet only worked for little while so I was not able to do anything on the computer. I am also waiting to get a phone from my friend Shirley this weekend, so then hopefully communication will be better!

The place here is truly beautiful. The facilities are incredible and the view is breathtaking. I will post some pictures of what it looks like where I am staying.

I started my day today by waking up at 500am! I could not believe how early it was. To my surprise I started smiling right away because I could hear the children and FanFan worshiping and signing in the feeding center. It was so amazing to hear them sing so early and have that be the start of their day.

I got up, got ready and then started getting the children ready for school. It is amazing that they are up at 0430am, but still have trouble to be ready for breakfast at 0700am! I was hurrying all of the up and looking under beds to find missing shoes. I got to take them to school today and it was great to see where go to school. One girl Chrisaline, had a really swollen and pussy eye. I put some ointment on it the night before, but in the morning she had trouble opening it. I was able to take her to the clinic and get some medication for it. It was fun taking her out! We had fun taking pictures of everything and trying to teach each other creole and English.

The children are done with school around 0100. I went with Andy, another Haitian to pick the children up. I had spaghetti for breakfast with the children and rice and beans for lunch! I am really trying to eat what they do to see a little more with what they eat and what they get for nutrition.

After lunch we had tutor time for the children and then play time. I ran until I could not move my legs anymore! And I thought I would not get a workout in here! I also taught the children how to do spiders on the swings. They got a really big kick out of it!

I am starting to get to know the names of the children, girls are a lot easier then the boys.

I ate dinner with them which was chocolate which is boiled, sort of like hot chocolate, but Haitian style and bread. The children had so much fun teaching me how to eat it. I think I was just amusing them, they laughed so hard!

I am not going to have electricity much longer so goodnight!

I have updated my prayer request so please look at them and keep the prayers coming!