Weekend After Haiti

Now that I finally finished blogging our trip to Haiti, I can get on to other things. The weekend after we got back was a busy one.

Saturday, we were invited to go to the birthday party of the daughter of Ken's colleague. She will be 1 year old toward the end of March, but since they'll be traveling to India then, they had a party for her early.

Saatvika, her mom and grandmother.

The proud Daddy, Ken's colleague.

After the birthday party, we stopped by Todd & Betsy's house since we were in the area, to give Seth his souvenir from Haiti. We got both boys a wooden machete. Seth immediately wanted it put in his pants.

Then he wanted to go outside and cut things.

Ken held a piece of grass that he was able to cut through.

This is Annika's doll & chair and Saben's machete.

Monday, Presidents Day, Kari and the kids came down and we gave them their souvenirs.

Then we all went to "Absolute Air Park", a trampoline place in Arlington. We had gotten the kids 5 hours of jumping from "Groupon" back in Dec. They can use them 1 hour or more at a time, which is what we did, since it was their first time there and we didn't know how long they would want to jump. 1 hour seemed about right.

Kari, Saben and Annika on the trampolines.

Some trampolines were just for jumping, while others, like these, were used to jump into a pit of foam pieces.

Saben in the pit of foam pieces. Maybe next time, I'll give it a try, jumping that is, not going into the foam pit!

Haiti Dental Team - Day 9 (Last Day)

We had a few hours before needing to leave for the airport and these last pictures are how we passed the time. The Haitians started a game, where they had to guess who was hitting them when their back was turned, if they were wrong, then the person they guessed had done it, got to hit them.

Emily went on the roof to take a picture of the group, hopefully I'll get a copy of the picture she took when we have our Haiti team reunion in a couple of weeks.

Line up for a back rub, courtesy of the person in back of you!

Then everyone form a circle and try to sit on the lap of the person behind you.

As we started to load the truck a crowd started to gather.

Pretty soon we were surrounded.

Time to fly back to Florida.

Haiti Dental Team - Day 8 (Part 2 )

Although, most of the time I was sterilizing instruments, I got the chance to help one of the hygienists once. Her translator was needed elsewhere, so I was asked to hold the flashlight for her and to hold the patients hand because she was scared.

This is what the trays looked like when they arrived to be sterilized. (Not always with teeth on them, but often there were some.)

A nasty tooth taken out.

Pastor Mich asked this translator what he wanted for Christmas. The answer? A visa to the USA!

We gave out a lot of small balls and other toys to the children. These blow-up balls were left at the end,and the translators enjoyed blowing them up and playing with them until we gave them to some of the patients.

Clinic is over, time to pack everything up.

After dinner, one of the Haitian started a game of "crossed or uncrossed", where you pass an object around the circle and need to say when you pass it to the next person whether you are passing it crossed or uncrossed. I had played this when I was in high school youth group and hadn't thought of it in years. There's a trick to it and if you know the trick, it's fun to watch the others try to figure out what is going on. If you don't know the trick, it can get very frustrating trying to figure out what is going on!

Some good friends were made.

Randy surprised us with his rendition of the unknown comic the last night.

Haiti Dental Team - Day 8 (Part 1 )

Our last full day in Haiti, we woke up to this. We had been planning on taking the dental clinic to another church farther out that day, which would have involved all of us riding in the back of the truck and getting very wet. The trip was cancelled due to the rain, not because we would get wet, but because the roads out there were impassable.

The chickens that live in the church compound didn't enjoy the rain either.

Rain pouring off the roof.

Since we were staying there instead of going to the other church, we needed to set the clinic up again. We weren't sure how many patients we would have since we hadn't been planning on being there, but it wasn't long before we had people lining up to get treated and had to turn some people away at the end of the day, so we could get packed up to go home the next day.

Some guys moved some sand over to make a path for us between the church and our sleeping quarters. Notice that there are no children in the school yard. This is because school was closed because of the rain, it was called a rain day, like our snow days.

A few kids had come to school before it was cancelled and a lot of them stayed and were looked at by the dentists or hygienists. We had a lot of school children that were treated during the time we were there, some of them had to have some teeth pulled. This was done without parents on hand to give their OK. We marveled over the fact that the kids just came in had it done, then went home. Can you imagine the outcry in the USA if something like that was done without parental consent?

This day was considered very cold by Haitian standards. Several of the girls, especially were really cold. Luckily, this girl did have a warm jacket to put on, she looks ready for a snow day! Even some of our team put their jackets on for the first time since we had been there. The only time I felt cold was at bed time, the only covering we had on our beds was one sheet, which we didn't need most of the time. The last night, the sheet wasn't quite enough, but since there were no blankets, I had to resort to putting my bath towel over me to stay warm. I was really glad that it didn't rain until the last day! We were starting to worry about getting to the airport the next day, if it continued to rain! It would be a wet, cold ride home in the DC3,which has no heat. God was good and we didn't have to deal with that though, the next day was sunny and warm again. We definitely felt that God wanted us to stay where we were that day, it was one of the days when a guy Pastor Mich talked to, accepted the Lord, so that was pretty awesome!

Haiti Dental Team - Day 7 (Part 2 )

I'm not sure what the sign says, but it's what the church compound we stayed at was called.

Ken entertaining more kids with some hand tricks.

This house seems to be leaning a bit.

Walking down a street in Caracol.

This man was sitting in the doorway doing some sewing. Notice the sewing machine is foot pumped. I think my Mom had one of those back in the 50's.

There were several guys playing some kind of game and I was told that this guy with the clothes pins on his face was losing. He seems happy enough though. All the other guys thought it was funny that I took his picture.

This shelter looks like it was made of whatever they could scrounge up.

On our walk out to the beach, this pig's rope was caught on a branch sticking up out of the ground. Emily felt bad for it and rescued it.

Ken and friends.

These little crabs were all over in the mud, notice they only have 1 big claw, the other one is very small.

The whole group plus some of the village kids at the beach.

Some of the things we saw kids playing with reminded me of toys in the USA that were created years ago when there were no toy stores and kids made do with things they made. This boy was rolling a tire with a stick...

...these boys had a wheel attached to a stick that they pushed and ran after,...

...and these boys were playing soccer with a well worn ball.

A kind of weird thing happened on our way back to the church compound this day. We had heard that it was the start of mardi gras and all of a sudden we heard a drum pounding and a group of men in 2 columns wearing masks came running down the street. I started to take a picture but was quickly told not to, that it could be dangerous to take their picture. Because I was busy putting my camera away, I didn't notice the reaction of the kids with us, but Ken and others told me afterwards, that they all were afraid and tried to hide behind us as the men went by. Haiti is considered the world wide capital of voodoo and that's why everyone was fearful. We heard more noises of things going on later that night, but were safe in our compound by then.

Haiti Dental Team - Day 7 (Part 1 )

Ready for church in their best clothes.

A full church.

Let me see my photo!

A well worn Bible, not many had one.

Pastor Mich speaks at church, translated by Pastor Peo.

After the church service we set up a relay line to pass the food out to everyone who came to church.

Passing the food out to the kids first.

Everyone gets a plate of food.

The kids waited patiently until they were told they could eat.

Chowing down.

Passing out some juice to everyone.

Ken's special table of girls.

Collecting the garbage.

One boy made sure that his little brother got fed.

Filling the plates. Feeding the people of the church was a highlight of the trip!

After lunch Ken entertained the kids.