A Wonderful Day

Stuck deep in the mud! No way to get it out by itself. I was eying a couple of oxen that squeezed by the truck but was told it they would not be of any help without having their yoke. The owner was just moving them and disappeared as quickly as he came. A few onlookers fast became a crowd and as always there were more opinions than people. We tried a few suggestions but the truck stayed stuck. We always carry some straps with us and I asked all to line up and pull together as in tug of war. It took some convincing but a bunch of them finally grabbed the strap which we attached to the truck. Slowly and with a lot of moaning the truck moved forward and out of the deep rut. A shout of victory erupted! We had beaten the mud and confirmed that Haitians can do great things together! On we went.

Just a few minutes further, the road became too steep to drive. Now an exhausting hike in the hot sun followed and before long the Haitian women in our group decided to stay back in the shade of a tree. Half an hour later I had to give up as well. I was sweating up a storm and it was just too hot for me to continue. Mark, Jeff and Fonbwen, the leader of the feeding center, went on. The destination: a plot of land with a hundred bananas trees we donated and that had been planted in an effort to encourage the local families. We needed to see how things were taking shape.  Since last November we had been talking with the leaders and made plans to join forces to see if we could improve the food situation around the centers. Parents would participate by bringing in water for the banana trees whenever they brought in their kids for a meal. The leaders would provide the land and work it. Finally the day had come to see how it was taking form. Earlier that morning we had paid a visit to another feeding center. Their bananas looked wonderful! The 78 year old man who was working the garden had shared his joy over this new idea! He just loved it. But now I would not be able to see this garden.

Disappointed I started following a local man who walked to his nearby house and began a conversation with him. He opened the gate to his yard and invited me to come in. A nice big mango tree offered some shade. Although I was just trying to cool off a bit by standing under the tree, a woman quickly came out the house with a chair and urged me to sit down. The customary greeting took place and several persons popped out of the house to see the stranger. Soon we were involved in a lively conversation about the challenges of living in their area! A tall man, dressed in a ball cap and a nylon jacket, entered the yard. He carried a large machete, looked upset in my direction and was quick to share with those present that he did not like white people. What was I doing here?  My new friends took up for me. It was okay they said, I was a good “blan”, the term used all over Haiti for white people. When I asked him how he was doing his attitude slowly began to change and he calmed down. Looking around me I had noticed that the people were as poor as everyone else. Just a simple stick and mud house, no more than 15 by 12 feet, and it probably was home to at least seven or eight people. A large wooden mortar and pestle to pound corn and a few rickety homemade chairs of which she had given me the best one with the least holes. That was the extent of their possessions. The conversation went on and soon it became clear to me that they would like to see a mission doctor come to their community. They could not afford to go to the hospital in the nearest city, something I had been painfully aware of for many years. Knowing that a medical team was about to come with me in October, I promised that we would come to the feeding center so they would have a chance to see a doctor. Smiles came all over their faces even the big guy cracked a grin! It felt so comfortable with them.

Right at that time, a girl maybe 18 years old, came through the gate and without hesitating walked up to me. With a bright smile, she stuck out her hand and greeted me. Then she bowed down and kissed me on the cheek. I was completely surprised. What a welcome to a total stranger! These people may have been very poor but oh, how rich in love they were. I started to realize that ending up in that yard was maybe not a coincidence. What a joy it would be to come back in a few weeks and take care of their sick. What an example of love I had run into, a treasure hidden deep in the mountains of rural Haiti. What a wonderful day!

 

 

 

Chloe

The garage door opened. A somewhat hunched over woman, pushing herself forward in a wheelchair came out and rolled towards me on the driveway. “Chloe”, I asked and with a smile on her face she acknowledged. She appeared way into her 70’s and was missing one leg. A cigarette was clenched between two fingers. Somewhat puzzled I looked around to the possible location of the wheelchair ramp she had requested over the phone that morning. The two story house was standing on a perfectly flat lot in a neighborhood that looked flat as a pancake, something that had made me doubt the address before I met her. Not exactly the place I had in mind.

It was supposed to be the place where my first ever mission work team was to spent a whole week working on my first project! My boss would have a field day! He had reluctantly agreed that I would organize this new program which I expected to become a major new activity at our camp, that a few years before almost went belly up. My dreams had been big but now that finding a suitable work site became a large obstacle, I was afraid that his hesitation would prove to be justified. We had one more week before this team of 20 young people and their leaders would be upon me and I dreaded not having meaningful work for them.

This morning the phone on my desk had rung and Chloe's first words had given me new hope, “Hello, do you guys build wheelchair ramps”? I had jumped on the occasion and into my truck to check out this welcome project. On the way I had been saying a funny little prayer. “Lord enlarge my territory for you”. Not that I had such a lofty goal but just two weeks ago at a bible study at church, a friend had discussed this little book called the Prayer of Jabez, based on a tiny little verse in I Chronicles 4:10. It was the section of the bible my father would always skip while reading at the dinner table because it was so boring. Page after page just names,nothing more. I guess I was not cut out for biblical family trees. Now someone had not only taken time to read it but he wrote a book about it as well. His advice in short was to pray just as Jabez did and to see what blessings would come. Now that is stuff I do not care for much and I had only slightly nodded when the friend who was teaching had asked all those present, to do this. Honestly I was not planning on it but during the week I thought of it a few times and made my own little prayer out of it. So also this morning on the way to Chloe, we needed a project and I was running out of time.

Her sweet smile with her nicotine stained teeth took me by surprise. She had to know something I did not  and I was a little anxious to find out why I had made this actually way too long trip to get to her house. It‘d better be good. She greeted me like I was an old friend and soon she was sharing all her problems with me. They ranged from a husband who died ten years ago, to loneliness and to physical problems causing her to have surgery the coming week to improve the circulation in her remaining leg. Happily she showed me her foot which was already turning black. I pushed the wheelchair inside and she gave directions to the kitchen where the project was needed. But a quick glance through the sliding door leading to the backyard patio was enough to know that I still had a problem. This job was at best five minutes work for one person. All she needed was a new piece of plywood to help her bridge the slight gap between the patio and the kitchen floor, just too much to cross with the wheelchair without getting stuck. This was not a project and I had to find something else. Chloe asked if we could repair this and I quickly promised to fix the problem for her. She wanted to unlock the door for me so I could go outside and see what was needed but I was suddenly in a hurry to get out of there. Measuring the plywood was not necessary. But she insisted and I’m so glad she did, because I was on the verge of walking away from one of the most awesome experiences in my life.

 So I pushed her unto the patio which was covered with a little porch that limited the view of the back yard. She told me to turn around on the little path in the yard and so I did. At that moment when I caught my first glimpse of the back of the house, it was like Beethoven’s Fifth started playing in my head. The house was sided with “Georgia Pacific” siding. A recall on that product had been around for years as it was literally falling apart and Chloe’s house here was a good example of that. In my excitement I walked up to the wall and triumphantly stuck my fingers through the wall! “Chloe, your house is all rotted” was all I could bring out. Here was the project enough to keep an army of kids busy for a week. What a gold mine!

Poor Chloe burst out in tears. She was sitting slumped over in her chair, sobbing. What an insensitive remark I had just made. I had broken her heart. She did not know what my plan was and I should have been much more careful in bringing this news to her. We were going to fix her house but she did not understand that yet. Through her tears she said “I know, but I have no money! Can you give me a loan?” I cringed, she had been thinking all that time we would ask money for our work. She did not understand the reason why we were doing this. I felt so bad and explained to her why and how this was going to work, that a team would come and pay for all of this and do the work for free, just out of love. Chloe started to get it and stopped crying just long enough, to start all over again. This time it seemed she was crying about something else and I tried in vain to calm her down. She sobbed “You don’t understand why I cry” and I begged her to stop and explain it to me. It was not a good thing for me to leave an old woman totally upset after my visit plus at this time I was getting pretty sad myself from her crying.

Through her tears she started talking. She explained how lonely she had been for years. Her only contact in this world was the mail lady who checked on her from time to time. She had only one sister but they had not talked in twenty years. After she got into the wheelchair, she had not been able to drive to church anymore and the people there rarely picked her up. It was so heartbreaking to hear. “And now” she said “you are coming with this news and it is just too much for me”. Saying that she broke out in tears again and she was shaking her head in disbelieve. “You won’t understand it“ she kept saying and I pleaded for her to try me. “Just this last week” she said “They picked me up for church and we were early so I got to go into the bible study and they were talking about something, I have to show you, inside”. When she continued to speak, my knees were turning into rubber and my face flushed. “It is a little book, called the Prayer of Jabez, they told me to pray it and see what would happen, you just don’t understand!”

I cry easy, even now when I am writing this,  but that time it was uncontrollable. We both cried in the backyard and then we prayed together.

What happened after that day is still very hard to understand to me. Chloe agreed to us doing the work even though she could only be there for a few days since she had to go to the hospital for her surgery. The love that the kids showed to her the first two days was heartwarming. Chloe herself loved them back as much and there was no sign of the bitterness that had controlled her life before we came. Her surgery went well and I called the hospital that night to make sure she was doing okay. The mail lady opened the house for us the rest of the week and the work was finished on time. Everyone was happy! Imagine how happy I was. The team went home and the next week I went back to my other responsibilities. The next Wednesday I was on my way to visit a lady from church who was dying from cancer and who was treated in a downtown Atlanta hospital. While passing by the road that led to the hospital where Chloe was staying, something in me said “Go see Chloe”. Over the years I have become sensitive to that kind of a thing and I decided that I might as well go see her since the visiting hours downtown were unrestricted, a little later would not matter.

I found Chloe sitting up in her bed, with the same broad smile as the first time I met her. She was sitting like a “Princess” , with a straight back and in good shape. We had a wonderful time. She told me she had called her sister and she asked me to read some from her bible. We read the 23^rd Psalm and also from John 15 about the House with the many rooms. She was so touched by that. It reminded me of my father who had passed away several years earlier. There was peace and serenity in the room and I was glad I had taken the detour. After half an hour or so I went on to my other visit and told Chloe I would be back soon.

The next Monday my phone rang on my desk and I was surprised it was the mail lady. She told me that I had forgotten a ladder in the back yard and asked me to come pick it up. I agreed to do that one day soon but she insisted I would do it the next day. Somewhat puzzled I asked why the hurry. She told me they wanted it gone so they could close on the house the day after. My mouth fell open. “Why” I asked, we just fixed up the house for Chloe and I did not expect her to sell it right after we did the work. “You don’t know?” she asked. “Know what” I said and her answer took my breath away. “Chloe died”.  In utter disbelief I asked her when that happened and when the funeral would be. “We buried her last week” was her response and told me that she had died on Wednesday night. “What time did she die” I could barely bring out. She answered”They don’t know for sure but when the nurse came in at nine that evening she was gone”. I’m pretty sure Iwas the last one to see her alive.

The next day I went to pick up the ladder and I asked the mail lady if I could have Chloe’s copy of the Prayer of Jabez, it was still laying where she showed it to me. I am keeping it to remind me of that wonderful encounter I had with one of God’s precious people and that I almost walked away from it.

Poor?

They pull on my shirt and one after the other reminds me quickly that I promised to read them another story from the new children’s bible. They love the pictures and then the stories. Their eyes sparkle when I do different voices or ask them silly questions to see if they understand what I’m reading. They do and what a great feeling it is to have six, seven or eight of these little faces poring over the pages with you, making sure they don’t miss an iota.

The story is about worrying or better how not to worry. The pictures show  flowers that have little pants on and little t-shirts as well. They have to laugh so hard, but they are getting the meaning. God is taking care of us.

Now that seems a little farfetched to us. We observe from our relative rich lives how little the kids in Haiti have. Those of you who have gone with me to mountain villages and feeding centers often come back with a lot of hurt in your heart. They seem so poor. And then the orphans, you see their dorm rooms and you see nothing! No piles of toys, no piles of clothes. They either wear their school uniforms or the one or two outfits they have, and I use that word liberally here, when the uniforms are being washed. That’s it! Maybe they are pulling and old Spam can turned into a car with wheels made of bottle caps on a string, or they might roll a wore out car tire through the yard, occasionally knocking over a small child, much more you will not find.

But no games now for the ones who sit and intently listen to the story. You see their little brains working overtime.

Now we are talking about people who are in need, the people who are poor, and I am bracing for what they will tell me. I ask them if they know any needy people, anyone who is poor. They glance at me with a puzzled face. Yes! They know some people outside, in the village, who are poor. Not a single one of them considers themselves as poor. I have to ask them. Their faces are so precious; am I kidding? They are not poor. We have clothes and a pair of shoes! We eat every day! We are not poor! But outside.. there are poor people!

After doing this work for 22 years I sometimes wonder if it really matters.

 I think it does!

 

Matthew 6:28-29

How is Fred, and how is Mark?

Nothing could have prepared me for being an “Opa”. We have two beautiful granddaughters and I can’t find words for the emotions they stir in me.

I still remember how it felt when our own girls started calling us mommy and daddy. Ma-ma-ma or da-da-da. I was sure I heard them say it, probably long before they actually did. It feels like nothing else to have that connection. Now, with the granddaughters it’s the same thing all over again, just different words and it come mostly via Skype or on the phone. Every time it makes me tear up with happiness.

Would you believe that when one of our orphans in Haiti calls me papa that it moves me that much too. They don’t call just anyone that and none of them ever remembered their real father. It makes me feel all the more aware how much they crave parental love.  

The other day I was doing some work on my laptop and that is usually a “group activity”. A ton of kids hang on my shoulders to either see what I type on the screen or even better, look at pictures. No matter who is in the picture they want to know names and what the occasion was. If the person in the picture did ever visit Bohoc, they will say it even before I can. They never, ever forget you! You are part of their family now and they want to know all about you. It blows my mind how they can keep up with it.

Not only the kids but many of the adults in town will come to me and say things like: How is Doug, when is he coming back? When is Sarah coming again? How is Ms. Beth? Believe me they will ask about so many, you have no idea!

That’s what I mean with relationships. You are part of their life now and I hope they are part of yours. They love you! You know their circumstances and their needs. That’s why I jokingly tell new team members that their life as they know it, is about to get ruined. You can never forget this anymore, you are a different person.

Oh, there is Hope!

I like the analogy of God shaping us like a piece of soft clay. No matter what we turn out to be, His finger prints are on us. Some of the events in my life seem to be more forming than any other regular time. Last Wednesday was one of those days. I woke up to the sound of eager mission team members preparing for the day. I am not a get up early person and almost decided to snooze a little longer but for some reason I did not and slid down the ladder that connects my bed to the floor. I dressed and stuck my head out in the cool morning fog that awaited me outside. Almost instantly the laundry lady came to me and her face showed a lot of concern instead of the bright smile she usually has for me. Tears were in her eyes and she asked me to come along quickly to see Cardouche, a family member of her, because he was ill. I was glad that we had a doctor on the team so I did not have to do this alone. I pulled Doug from behind his breakfast that he was enjoying with most of the other team members. We quickly followed the lady who walked ahead of us taking a narrow path leading to Cardouche’s hovel. The family had always been poor as dirt. We ducked into the little house and it took our eyes a moment to get used to the darkness inside. There on the floor, outstretched and seemingly unconscious was the sick man. For some reason or another, the family had laid him on the dirt floor the night before. We picked his body up and laid it on the only bed in the house. His pulse was erratic and all over the place. His breathing was labored and rattling. It was clear that he was about to expire if nothing was done. He might have had a heart attack or suffered of congestive heart failure but it was impossible to determine that on the spot. We decided he had to go to the hospital which in Haiti is easier said than done. First and for all the family had no money, not even a penny. Transportation would cost money, not to think about the expense of being in the hospital. This was most likely the reason he was still home. The family hoped that we would take care of the expenses. I decided we would take care of the situation. Something had to be done quickly. We hurried back through a small crowd of curious neighbors. I asked Jeff, the driver for the orphanage to get the truck and come with me. In the mean time I went back and talked with the wife and son of the sick man. Jeff showed up shortly thereafter but was not driving into the garden of the little house and waited on the road. Cardouche had to be carried to the truck but just at that time nobody seemed to be able to help. I reached over the bed and picked him up but although he was a skinny man he was tall and must have weighed well over a hundred pounds. I carried him out and about to hurt myself, I jelled out to one of the older orphan boys who was watching me from the road. He hurried over and helped me carry Cardouche to the truck.

Right then the family showed up and crowded in the back seat with the sick man. Pauluis our director appeared out of nowhere and slid in the cab as well. As careful as one can drive over the bumpy Haitian roads, Jeff tried to get to the hospital as quick as possible. The sick man moaned and groaned constantly. About halfway the hour long trip, he started to talk and it was clear that he was seeing things. “Papa, papa, papa” he cried out followed by as much more soft and reverend voice saying “Jezi, Jezi”!, (Jesus, Jesus) I have thought long about this and whatever the explanation, I am sure that dying people are in a state of mind where they seem to be between this life and the hereafter.

We reached the hospital and got a gurney to wheel him into the emergency room. The reason I know that it was the emergency room was because it was written on the wall. Not because anything inside gave me a hint.

When he was laying on a bed inside everyone seemed to be busy talking to the nurse and I had a minute alone with Cardouche who seemed now far gone. Long time ago, when my dad was dying in the hospital and unconscious,he seemed to be very encouraged when a preacher read him the passage of John 15 where Jesus said he was going to prepare a room for us in heaven. I leaned over the bed and whispered the same thing in Cardouche’s ear and I was thankful for God teaching me Creole. I will never forget his reaction. From the depth of unconsciousness his voice was very clear and outspoken! “Wi, Wi”! (yes, yes) he said and it seemed to confirm something he was very aware of at that moment. After that he was just as far gone as ever and from what I know he never came to anymore.

The next morning when we heard the news of his death, the family asked again for help to get him back home. We had planned to go out with the team to do a clinic in the mountains and the truck would be needed for that. I just knew that our plans were about to fall apart if things were just left to happen. I quickly decided to go along and make sure that the process would move expeditiously. When arrived at the hospital things got difficult. I had expected that the body would at least be in a pine box or so, but that was not the case. Apparently when you are that poor in Haiti you are just on your own.  The orderlies laid the body wrapped in a dirty sheet in the bed of the truck. There were two knots in the sheet, one over the face and one over the feet with the toes still sticking out. The family put a pillow under the head. What an effort in futility.

We started the truck and at the last minute all the family members crowded in the cab. No one was sitting with the dead man. This is Haiti, fear of death all over.

The drive back was very upsetting to me. I know the dead man was not feeling the rough ride but it hurt my sense of decency. Dead people are not supposed to bounce in the back of a truck and arrive huddled in a corner. That’s not right.

As soon as we got within hearing distance of the house the wife started wailing. The windows were down and the wail was quickly taken over by the neighborhood. In Haiti this is a form of sympathy with the family. It is very common that the wife as well as other female family members get completely hysterical doing this. The wife had to be held down after she was going bonkers in the yard next to the house. What a difference with the ride back home when I had heard her just softly crying and although I know it is part of the custom it unsettled me very much. When unloading the corpse I had to hold back my tears. The suffering of these dear people was so clearly visible and I felt powerless.

We paid for a simple casket and the next day half of the village followed the procession walking down the dusty road to the cemetery. Things were as they are supposed to be.

Now a few days later I can look back and see how every family goes through these circumstances at some point. Whether rich or poor we all will die one day and our family is going to be shocked by it. We might have a decent funeral or we might end up shoveled in a mass grave like so many Haitians were after the earth quake. But what is essential is to know that Jesus went ahead to prepare a room for us. I have seen my dad’s face and I witnessed Cardouche’s reaction. They both confirmed to me what they knew to be certain. He is alive and waiting for us.  

 

Where did you learn that?

Did you ever stand still by the things in your life that have always been there or that you have always known? I am talking about simple things like how to open and close a water tap. How to screw in a light bulb. How to flush a toilet or how to take a warm shower. These are all things you learn from your parent(s) when you grow up.
When I was four years old I went to kindergarten. Not that I particularly liked it but I went. From that time until I finished high school it was a recurring activity in my life. No choice, whether I liked it or not. I never once thought about the expense of school. That was not my problem. Mostly the schools were free, you just had to buy some stuff for it. My parents paid for the stuff.

Now imagine growing up in Haiti. Your parents have no money. They have no paying job, they just work hard in the garden to grow some food. They might have a pig or a goat and hope to sell it when they need money urgent like for medical help or for school. Not for all of their kids, are you kidding! maybe just for one.

Schools costs a lot of money. You cannot go if you have no shoes or uniform. You have to pay tuition, got to buy books and stuff. The government does not pay for that. So if the pig lives and gets sold you might, just might, go to school. If the rains don't fall there is no grass for the goat or much for the pig to eat. They'll die or get sold for very little money. Forget about school that year. Someone needs to go to the hospital: Oh well, now school is beyond the horizon.

This is why I run into people of all ages, all the time in Haiti who have virtually no education. They break the light bulb when you ask them to change it. They destroy a nut while trying to loosen it. It does not occur to them that they might have to turn the other way. They break off a door handle because they don't understand the working of it. It drives me nuts sometimes.

And yet the solution for the problem is simple. Education! From when they go into kindergarten until high school is finished. Maybe even college after that. I'm dreaming, I know.

And all that lacks to do it is money. Just a little money.

One thing I never learned in school. Why was I born in a country where that problem did not exist.

Everything Is Possible.

Haven't blogged in quite a while. Not that there was nothing to write about. On the contrary it has been crazy busy. Now there is so much to tell you that I have to break it up in pieces. Just to make sure you don't fall asleep and drool all over your computer. Here we go:

Last week I was talking with some of the masons who help us build the refugee houses in Lakos. We had to make a budget and order the materials for house number two. When I asked how much gravel they ordered for the first one, they shrugged. Didn't remember that. Well, I started to explain how you can calculate that. They followed along until we decided we needed 70 cubic feet of gravel. Their response was "well it only comes in a large truck". They did not know how much one of those carried. Now since a few months  we have a brand new flatbed truck. It is small enough that it can drive all the way up to the building site, whereas the big truck only can dump the gravel  on the main road a quarter mile or so away. So I suggested that we would fill our own truck up at the river where the gravel is sold. I did the math and figured that two loads would suffice. They all shook their heads and said, that was not possible because we could only buy it with a big truck. I asked why this was and if we could not try to make a deal with the people there who could even make a little more profit selling it in smaller quantities. The savings for us would be to use our own truck and not having to pick it up from the road where  it would be dumped. To make a long story short, it took a lot of convincing before they accepted the plan and then the first one said, "I get it, Hein is trying to tell that we can save a lot of trouble by using the small truck, It will work!"  This is something I run in a lot. There are ways they do things. They just never think about how you could overcome problems or how it could be done better and maybe less expensive. These were relatively young people who went to school. That is the problem. Haitian schools do not teach students to be creative or how to find solutions on their own. They memorize tons of things, mostly useless facts. They learn math but don't know how to apply it. There is fear to do things in a new way. For Haiti to climb out of their problems we need many people who can be innovative, who dare to take risk and try new things.
This experience made me more than ever determined to start a new school for our orphans, for children in the community who do not get a chance to use their brains because they are poor, because they cannot pay
for uniforms.
Hopefully we will get the money it takes to do this. We are working on it. Oh, if you happen to have $250,000, we will even name the school after you or someone you want to honor with that. I am not joking. I did that once last year, the next day I had the $30,000 we needed. Learned my lesson, everything is possible. With God.