The next morning we headed back up the hill to visit the baker. It was about 9:30 and about 90 degrees out (needless to say I’m working on some fantastic tan lines). When we got to his home he was getting his fire going in the giant oven. Inside the shed all the rolls and loaves were carefully cut out and waiting to be baked. Luke talked with him for a while but since the bread wouldn’t be ready quite yet we went back to Kobe’s Aunt’s house in hopes of riding her horse and bull. However when we got there the animals were too far away to walk over and ride them. Instead we decided to visit the market in Montrouis. This was a gorgeous, sunny 15 minute hike through the hill, negotiating our way around valleys, and cutting back toward the main highway. We passed people on their way back from the market. Yellow flowers brightened up the hills and he occasional goat wandered by. As we came up to the market from the back we could see twenty or thirty donkeys “parked” out back waiting to carry people’s purchases back up into the mountains. We took about 10 minutes to walk thorough the market. The city has set up a group of permanent covered stalls but the market has expanded out on all sides. Row upon row of people sit behind their goods. Everything is divided into piles and neatly stacked. And people will sell a little of anything. There could be basil and peppers neatly stacked on a tarp and sitting out on the edge is a large plastic tub a granulated soap. Most vendors have made roofs out of large umbrellas and tarps to give themselves some shade. And everyone is packed tightly so together there’s sometimes barely room for everyone to make their way through. Out on the street side of the market are stalls with clothing. People will drive over to the Dominican Republic to purchase clothes and shoes and then bring it all back to try and sell it for profit in their town. It always feels a little weird being a visitor. I don’t want people to feel like I’m looking around to judge them or like they’re a novelty. But I figure someone who’s never been to America would be looking around just as much because there are so many new things to experience. As we left the market Luke pointed out the pile of animal insides lying on the ground where they slaughter animals. Fun fact: if you animal guts in a basket and take them out to the ocean you can use them to catch eels!
So we made out way back to the bakery just in time for freshly baked bread fruit (but still no bread). Around the back of the shed, one of Emerise’s sons was braking down rocks into gravel. This is actually a super common sight all over. On the side of almost any road you drive down there are piles of rocks. A man will post himself there and pound the rocks down into coarse gravel usually with hammers but sometimes with other rocks. Any way you can make an income is a good way here. Since the bread wasn’t ready yet we had to head back to the mission to get some work done but Emerise promised to come by later when it was ready. And sure enough, later that afternoon he came down to the mission with a wheelbarrow full of bread for us to choose from. For about $3.00 we got three loaves of bread (which made GREAT peanut butter and chocolate sandwiches later that weekend).
And yes, the story you’ve all been waiting for, CRAB ON A LEASH!
To back up, on my last beach trip I mentioned how fun it would be to bring a crab into my class for everyone to look at (they have some really cool ones here). Well Jacy Claire and Judah made that happen for me! The next day as we loaded the bus to go prep the school Jacy handed me a bucket and said, “This is for your class.” It was a five inch long redish purple crab! Jacy said they lasted longer than the clear ghost crabs. And so I acquired a class pet. The bucket was a little small for him and if we put sand in it it was too short and he could climb out. So Jacy found a big milk can that had a lid we could poke holes in and deep enough to put sand in. The crab was still hanging in there on the first day of school and the next day (Friday) I took him home with us so I could feed him (if I remembered) before Monday. My roommates didn’t like the idea of sharing a room with a crab so I put him in the office.
At the end of the day Saturday I remembered him and stuck my head into the office to check on him. I gave his can a good little shake and he didn’t budge. It was starting to smell a little (which probably had a lot to do with the old chicken bone I had put in there for him to scavenge off of) and he hadn’t had water in days (so sue me, I’m not a good crab owner) so I took him to the trash to toss his remains. I upended the can into a large trashcan only to find the crab scrambling up the trash pile and very not dead! For a bout 2 seconds I was in a quardry: do I pull him out and refill the can with sand or did I let him forage on his own? The foraging part won (cause I wasn’t really up for chasing a crab through trash) and I headed back upstairs. I told my roommates what had happened and they felt sorry for the little crab. Nikki said, “The kids are going to find him and torture the poor thing!” but my dislike of trash as still winning.
Cutting to the scene the next morning as we’re getting ready for church, Amber calls me out onto the balcony. Down below us is one of the neighborhood boys who has taken our trash out. He has a rock in one hand, pinning something to the ground and a piece of floss in the other. “Elise, HE FOUND THE CRAB!” whispers Amber, and sure enough the boy had the crab pinned to the ground under a rock. With the other hand he had made a loop on the floss and was carefully working it around the crabs body. Two minutes later the crab was officially a pet, dangling in the air by his leash since he walked a little slow and his leash was super short. Now we have a pet dog here at the mission and we keep her on a leash tied to a tree so she doesn’t get out and get hurt. So like any good owner putting safety first our friend took the crab over and tied his leash to the dogs so he could hang out under the tree too.
It wasn’t long before the mission kids discovered the crab and from then on he spent the afternoon moving throughout the yard, getting pushed around in a tricycle, and hanging out in a bucket of water. I don’t know where or when his journey finally ended but I think it’s safe to say it was a much more eventful journey than just sitting in a can waiting to die. Farewell, little class crab!
This blog was supposed to be titled: The First Week of School, Travels with Luke, and Crab on a Leash but I thought I'd get you started on the story while I finish the rest.
I’ve officially been a teacher for four days and what a stretching experience. It would be one thing to be a new teacher at an established school where things go a certain way and there’s a flow but being a new teacher at a completely new school where 75% of the students are new and in a country where education means something totally different has definitely pushed me pretty far.
- I’m learning it’s pretty easy to babysit 11 kids for 7 hours; it is another thing entirely to TEACH kids. We did a few test runs of reviewing things and learning things and it was rough. Not bad but I realized I have to work more at motivating them than at the actual concepts they need to grasp. I don’t know if it’s the same in the states, I’m sure there is crossover, but the majority of my students are very capable of learning everything they simply will not try without one on one coaching. I know there are lots of factors playing into this (like they fact that this is in their second language) but I think this will be my first and greatest challenge.
- Playground time is invaluable! These kids can run and run out in the sunshine. It’s great.
- Planning a teaching strategy is very difficult for a wide range of ages and levels of experience ranging from no English to no formal classroom experience to being privately tutored at home.
- Toro: my newest friend. It’s an incredibly over-caffeinated energy drink that helps so much for nights with little sleep.
One of the best experiences I’ve had in Haiti this far has been walking through the hills of Montrouis with Luke and Kobe. Kobe, one of our friends that lives at the mission, invited us to go see where his Aunt lived. I should start with one preface. All along our drives I could see the hills dotted with homes. There would be a few here and there, at the tops of ridges and dropping down into valleys, all in various stages of being built. Again being a suburban American had gotten the better of me and I saw all of these homes as something like the outskirts of a town; the country before you get to a city or town. But it turns out I’ve been looking at the town the whole time. All of the homes are interconnected by trails and pathways tying one house to another. Some homes are built with cinderblocks and concrete but many of the homes in the hills are made from fist-sized rocks cemented together with clay-like dirt and roofed with tin.
We followed a trail around the side of the mission and began to climb into the foothills. We wound our way from one trail to another. Since trails wind from one home to another, not so much from one central location to another so they’re very small and haphazard. We went up here and around this and through there and ended up at Kobe’s aunts home. She as so sweet and gracious and glad to meet us, a beautiful lady who’s smile revealed all the love that she had for Kobe and Luke.
From there we cut across her yard and picked up the trails on the other side. At nearly every home we passed there was one person who would shout our Luke or Kobe’s names. Every single person knew them and loved them. The people who could see us walking from across valleys would excitedly shout over, beaming and waving. It is so evident that the fragrance of Christ follows these two wherever they go. Love, humility, and joy radiate from them to everyone they encounter and they have truly become beloved in this town.
Our next stop was the home of a woman who had given up her two nephews to the mission because she wasn’t able to care for them. She was so excited to see us and talk to us and share her story. She told us about her boys and trying to raise them and about her home. She is a round lady with a sweet, soft face. Her missing bottom teeth gave a little lisp to her gravely voice as she showed us the inside of her home and described all the sacrifices she had made to keep the two boys alive before they came to live with us. Even though I couldn’t understand what she was saying I knew as we watched her that we needed to pray with her. Before we left our little group gathered around her and prayed over her and her home. And although she didn’t understand our prayers tears welled up in her eyes as we finished and hugged her good-bye.
School has not started yet for most Haitian run schools so kids are running and playing everywhere and watching white people is one of their favorite hobbies. As we wound our way to our next stop we collected two or three children, naked as the day they were born and smeared with clay. They enjoyed tagging along and watching our every move. Our farthest stop was at Kobe’s brother’s home, where we found his sister-in-law and their son. We only paused of a few minutes to say hello and hug his precious little nephew and then it was back along our maze of trails toward the mission. But our tour was not over yet.
As we rounded a corner and started to descend our last hill we heard someone call out to Luke. He was close by so we turned into his yard. Emerise is a local baker and he called Luke over to show him his bakery. To our left as we came through his yard was a low palm roof, standing about 4 feet off the ground where all his animals lived. In front of us was a large domed clay oven, about 10 feet around and six feet high, and off to the right was a long shed made of tin. The shed had a roof but only about 2/3 of its walls. Inside was where Emerise prepared all his bread. He wanted to build a real room to make bread in so that it could be cleaner but he didn’t have the money. A wide table filled the back corner, where most of the walls were. Running the length of the shed was a long thin table, maybe two or three feet wide leading up to something that looked a lot like an old fashioned crank to wring out your washing only this had cranks on both sides. Emerise was eager to show us how the whole process worked so he pulled out a huge mound of dough. Two of his sons manned the cranks and they began to turn them around and around as their father few the dough between the two large metal cylinders. This was how he kneaded all his dough. Again and again they ran the dough through the press, making it thinner and flatter and smoother every time. The two boys made the cranking look easy to Luke and Amber took turns jumping in to help and they said it took all their strength to keep the crank moving. Emerise said he was so excited that we were here and took an interest in what he did. He looked to pleased. Kobe told us that he was a very generous man, giving away whatever bread he didn’t sell before it went bad. Unfortunately we had to get back to the mission but Emerise really wanted us to try his bread so we said we would come back in the morning to get some.
We got to spend this last Sunday basking on one of the most beautiful beaches I have ever seen. To get there you leave the highway at the 87 kilometer marker and follow the dirty road out 45 minutes to one of the most impoverished spots in our area. The nearest place for this community to get water is 45 minutes back the way we came. We brought food with us and checked on some fresh water that had been sent out to them a few days before. From there we walked 50 yards down a hill. Opening in front of us was one of the most spectacular beaches I have ever seen. Small trees line your pathway down. At the edge of where the dry ground meets the white sand are clusters of low, wide-spreading trees with bright green leaves hanging on lazy branches. Dangling between the leave are what look like strings of green beads, dripping out of the tree. And visible between the trees and leave is a white sand beach with nothing but white coral and white shells sprinkled along it. It’s enclosed on both sides by cliffs that jut into the perfectly turquoise water. There are no planes flying overhead, no car noise from the road, no oilrigs off shore, and no seaweed in sight. It’s just peaceful and still and waiting to be enjoyed. While swimming in the water, eating fresh avocado sandwiches on fresh bread, tanning, and good conversations we all a part of it, the highlight was definitely swimming over to the taller cliff and then carefully climbing the precarious route 35 feet to the top so that we could jump off. The day was so beautiful and the water so inviting that I felt fearless. I didn’t think I would be excited till I started to swim over but something about the cliff just said, “You have to do this!” The first time I scaled my way to the top way ahead of the other my friend Stephen told me the Haitian’s have an expression that some women are 40% man, “and you, Elise, are part man.”
I turned out to be a terrible rock-climbing guide for my friend who were following me up. They had to depend on Stephen to help them navigate. I just got so focused on the climb I forgot where to direct their hands and feet (so don’t ever follow me up cliffs if you’re looking for guidance).
The other landmark for this week is Thursday was the first day of school! I’ll have much more to say about school soon but for now I can report that things went really well in my classroom. My students listened and were attentive and we just spent the first day getting to know each other. I have been so blessed by everyone who has been praying for me. I know this is going to be a good year for me and for them.
Things I learned this week:
- Names matter. I had the chance to spend a little more time with the women down in the fishing village this past week. We just practiced some English words and reintroduced ourselves in English and Creole. But Dr. Kerry pointed out that being remembered by name means so much to these ladies. It’s one thing to have someone show up, give you something, and then disappear. It meets your immediate needs and is definitely helpful. But to have someone remember not just that you need food but to put a name with your face means that you were important to them; it gives you significance. It reminded me that no matter where I am or what I’m doing, faces have names and names are important.
- I got excited to start getting to know my students (right now I have 11). They each have such unique backgrounds and stories and needs. It’s intimidating but it will be such a great adventure.
- Running shoes are great for killing cockroaches
- American things I love that I’ve found in Haiti: Cheez-Its, Diet Coke, and Doritos
- Haitian things I love that I can’t get in the US: sugar cane, Pumpkin soup, MANGO
I’ve been absolutely captivated by Haiti. I came into this trip knowing I can be a poor traveler; being away from familiar things and people tends to make me withdraw. But, thanks in no small part to the prayer of so many people I have loved my first week here. I’m reading a great book, A Million Miles in A Thousand Years by Donald Miller, about looking at our lives as stories. I will probably bring this book up again and again but one of the key elements of good stories are memorable moments. He puts it this way,
“I like those scenes in the Bible where God stops people and asks them to built alters. You’d think he was making them do that for himself, but I don’t think God really gets much from looking at a pile of rocks. Instead, I think God wanted his people to build altars for their sake, something that would help them remember, something they could look back on and remember the time they were rescued, or were given grace.”
I’d quote the rest but it wouldn’t mean as much out of context. Basically he says you have to put effort into the things that become good memories, that make good story and we still need help remembering them afterwards so we make alters. Those are the moments I will try and capture for both you and me in this blog; the things I need to remember that will make this trip worthwhile.
It will be hard to cover the whole first week but if you’ll bare with me this time I’ll try to update more often in the future.
I know I’ve brought it up a few times but Haiti has been impoverished for hundreds of years and it’s left the country devastated. I read two things recently that helped to make sense of it all. The first was that after Haiti gained its independence the newly freed population dedicated their nation to Satan. The second thing I read, in a totally unrelated article, was that Satan cannot create. He can only work with what has already been created. Those two statements explain so much of what I’ve seen in Haiti. Hundreds of years ago this country was dedicated to a power that can create nothing but can only abuse, drain, and waste resources and that is exactly what you see. There is no abundance, no surplus, no excess anything. There are hundreds of thousands of buildings started but never finished all over the cities and the country. There’s no clean water, there’s no affordable food, there’s no fresh air. This was really sobering for a minute but it only makes all the more evident to me that the only thing that’s going to change Haiti is God and those putting hands and feet on his love. Not only is God the creator but he sustains everything. If he can make the world out of nothing than he can certainly being new life to a desolate place. What Haiti needs is not a bunch of white people trying to make Haitians Christians. It needs Christians that so firmly believe that God loves people that they find ways to start new growth. Kerry said it perfectly, “I don’t do what I do to make people Christians. I do what I do because I am a Christian.” The prophets in the Bible wrote some beautiful poetry but I don’t think they only meant figurative streams of water and new living trees and abundant food. I think we’re to be a part of making those things physical realities, that love looks like a feeding program and putting kids in school and teaching them what it means to save money and that drinking bad water gives you cholera.
On our first Sunday here we went to the fishing village to meet the people Kerry works with and pray with them. We all got to practice some Creole and they got to practice their English. After the official “meeting” we were mingling, (trying to) talk to people and taking it all in. One of the newer women in the work program was there with her one month old daughter, Lyshmy (leesh-mee). I asked if I could hold her and I rocked her to sleep for a few minutes. When her mother came back she brought one of the fisherman with her who spoke some English and he asked if I would like to keep the baby. Having recently come from America where we jokingly offer our kids up when we’re having a long day I politely smiled, said no, and gave her back as we were heading out. It was only when my roommate brought up the story later that I realized how serious the mother had been. She was really asking me if I could keep her baby. I can’t say if it’s because she though I could provide more for her baby girl because I was American or if she wasn’t ready to be a mom at 17 or any of the other reasons that might have been going through her head but it broke my heart in so many ways. First because I could keep that baby more physically comfortable on a single mom’s salary in the states but I couldn’t imagine just walking away with someone else’s child. Second, because she offered her up so easily. And third because it seems that the hardest but the best thing to do is to teach this little mother how to be a good mother, how to work hard and trust people and feed kids and then they’ll both be better off. But she’s got to be willing.
The school was a sea of dust and disorganization when we showed up last Monday. After a few days or sorting, dusting, taping, sweeping, killing spiders, and trying to wrap our heads around organizing a school it’s starting to look great. Each teacher has her own classroom and we are so blessed to have lots of supplies. These classrooms will be filled with many adventures, especially because a lot of the elementary age kids speak little to no English. But we’ll make it work.
There have been lots of fun moments in between. Riding on the roof of the bus, getting popsicles in the market in St Marc, having my hair braided by the teenage girls who visit the mission (pictures to come), using a broom and doormats to sweep water off our balcony as the pouring rain threatened to flood our rooms, going to an outdoor revival meeting one night, sleeping on the roof, swimming in the Caribbean at sunset, listening to Joy and Kerry’s stories.
I could fill up twice this much space with stories but I’ll finish with a verse I read last night: “The wilderness and the dry land shall be glad; the desert shall rejoice and blossom like the crocus; it shall blossom abundantly and rejoice with joy and singing…. Strengthen the weak hands, and make firm the feeble knees. Say to those who have an anxious heart, ‘Be strong; fear not! Behold, your God…He will come and save you.’” - Isaiah 35:1-2
"So if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the Spirit, any affection and sympathy, complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind." - Phil. 2:1-2
We made it! After a week of team building and prayer we are finally here (but more on that later. Before we ever got here we spent a week in cross-training really becoming a team.
Big thought from cross-training: UNITY! In order to survive this first three-month stretch we need to be working together. We are the only family we’ve got. A lot of our time at training was spent opening up more and more about our gifts, our weaknesses, our biases, our hopes. That was easy enough in a quiet home on a cool beach in Oxnard, CA but when we’re tired, over worked, dehydrated, sweaty, and frustrated we are still called to be united. Philippians 2 came up over and over again that week. Our goal is to have the same mind, the sam heart, and the same love. We wrote Phil. 2 into our covenant ( the list of promises we made to one another for this journey).
Something on my mind: Haiti has an 80% unemployment rate.
Things to pray for (if you are one who prays): team unity! Getting close to people involves conflict and that’s totally healthy. Play that as we work through conflicts and challenges we would come out the other side stronger and better for it. God is at work and Satan is not excited about it! We need your prayers!
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