Oh how the days go by

Sorry! I've been a real slacker lately and haven't taken the time to write blog posts or letters. I think of ideas for great posts when I'm walking around town, doing the dishes or sitting in church (I admit I sometimes daydream with speaker is talking too fast!), but I promptly forget them by the time I come to the internet in my little closet office at the university. So, please accept my apologies! Here’s a little update.

Things are going well here. The humid season, or should I say more humid season has arrived along with hurricane season. After going for months without rain, a couple weeks ago a system set in that gives us rain almost every day and not much sun. It's good to have the moisture, but I am missing the sun a little bit.

In mid May, we had a group of 12 from Strathmore (and other parts of Alberta) here for a week. Boy were they busy! During their time here, they were able to help continue the construction of the living quarters above the depot, create an inventory for the pharmacy and depot and build a house for a very deserving little girl and her family in the community of Danda - a couple of hours from here. They did have some fun as well - we went to the beach, had a Creole class, had a private concert, watched a futbol game, and participated in Flag Day celebrations.

The next group from the Wetaskiwin, AB area arrives at the beginning of July. It's a youth group, so I'm looking forward to connecting them with the youth in the community and building some of those relationships.

Work at the clinic keeps on going! It's been busy, especially since Dr. Joselie has been away in the States to have her baby boy, Joey Andrew Monel Jules, who arrived on June 6th! We excited for them to return and to meet little Joey. We've also been working on expanding the water distribution system in the community. Now, even more families will have better access to water for their daily needs. Our hope in doing this is to prevent diseases like cholera as well as other waterborne diseases.

Married life is treating us well! We are settled into our apartment now and are getting into a routine of life together. I'm having fun cooking some Canadian dishes for Cal (he's been pleasantly surprised that I actually can cook) and taking care of the house. Marlene, who cooked for me at Mme Isaak's house, still comes to cook our lunches Monday to Friday, which is a blessing as she is a great cook and it frees up my mornings to do work at the office and clinic.

What else is coming up? Well, on June 28, Cal has an appointment at the Canadian Embassy in Port au Prince to make his application for a Temporary Residency Visa to come to visit Canada with me this summer. If you could be praying for that, we would greatly appreciate it. We are feeling positive about his chances of getting a visa, but you never know. If he gets it, we plan to be in Canada from mid July to mid August. If he doesn't get it, I will still come, but for a shorter time. While we are there, we will visit with family and friends in Saskatchewan and Manitoba as well as visit some churches giving support.

There are a few prayer requests:

• Please pray for the clinic staff and committee that they would be unified and work together for the betterment of the community.
• Pray for Dr. Joselie and her family as they welcome Joey into their family.
• Pray for Dr. Manno that he would stay healthy and get the rest he needs.
• Pray for the students in the community that are writing final exams.
• Pray for Cal and I as we apply for his visa and make plans to visit Canada this summer

Thanks everyone for your support and encouragement - it means a lot to both Cal and I.

Bondye beni nou! God bless you!

For real this time

Alright, being as I haven't posted anything of much substance in over a month - I'll do my best to catch up.

First of all, the wedding was fantastic - it went smoother than I could ever had hoped for. My friends and family all arrived in and left Haiti safely - my biggest concern. I was able to go pick up my friend/cousin Melissa in Puerto Plata in mid-April. While in the DR, we were able to make a quick trip down to IKEA in Santo Domingo with Tammi to do some serious kitchen/housewares shopping. It was a success and I must say it was definitely strange to be eating Swedish meatballs and boiled potatoes in the DR - but when in IKEA...

Melissa and I came back to Haiti in time to pick up my other good friend Rose a week before the wedding and promptly went to get manicures and pedicures in Cap Haiten. Not something I ever treat myself to in Canada, but when its only $5 US for each, how can you pass it up?

The three of us had a good time relaxing, catching up and just hanging out in Haut Limbe. We even got an afternoon of  fried fish and suntanning at the beach one day!

Melissa and I at the beach

Rose and I at the beach.

 On the Wednesday, my family (parents, sister, brother-in-law, nieces and nephew) arrived in Cap Haitien. It was great to be able to show them where I've been living and my life here. My nieces and nephew are all little blond, blue-eyed cuties so they were quite the spectacle in town where people have probably not seen many white children.

While in Haut Limbe, we prepared favours and decorations for the wedding and then headed into Cap on Friday to spend the night at the lovely Hotel Christophe.

On our way to Cap - wedding dress safely packed in the pink bag!

We woke up to a beautiful, sunny Saturday and we able to get ready in time to have some pictures done in the hotel's courtyard before heading off to the venue for the ceremony and reception. The wedding was supposed to start at 12, and I think we actually got going at about 12:45 - not too bad by Haitian standards! Even with out having a rehearsal, the ceremony went fairly smoothly and mission accomplished - we got married!!

Mme David, Mme Marc (caterers) and me.

The cake!

The ladies prepared us a wonderful meal and an extravagant cake - I had know idea what to expect! Everyone ate their fill and by 3 pm, we were all done. It was perfect and I couldn't have asked for anything to be different.

Friends!

With Alin who brought the plants and flowers for decorations.

Tammi - photographer and friend!

 On the Monday following, after my family friends boarded their plane, Cal and I went to Puerto Plata for our honeymoon for a week and a half. It was a beautiful resort with great food.

Resort in Puerto Plata

Before dinner on the last night.

We ended the honeymoon by stopping in Santiago for one night with Tammi and to do some last minute shopping for the house.

Our little kitchen.

We are back now and are mostly settled into our apartment. I'm enjoying brushing up on my cooking skills and impressing Cal that I actually know how to cook.

This Wednesday, a group of 12 arrive from Strathmore to help at the clinic, so we'll be busy! I'm excited to see what God has in store for them.

Thanks for all your encouragement and support - Cal and I appreciate it so much!

Mr & Mme Calvin Christolin

Mr & Mme Calvin

My Nieces, nephew and I.

My sister (Maid of Honour), Nicely (Best Man), Calvin and I.

 

Cal's Family

My parents and Cal's parents.

My family.

Mama Manno and I.

We're back!!

We are here - we've actually been back in Haut Limbe for a week, but it's been a bit busy catching up on things, moving into our apartment and arranging everything. We are happy to be here and get settled into regular life before our next group arrives on Wednesday.

I'm going to try to post some pictures of the wedding by the weekend!

How a trip to Cap Haitien can suck the life out of you

Anyone who has spent a little time in Haiti, will quickly learn that nothing is easy here. It's best just to work on that assumption and then be pleasantly surprised when something is easy - it'll save you years of stress and frustration.

On Saturday we went in Cap with a significant list of things to do for the wedding and for the apartment. Perhaps it was too ambitious, but it was all things that needed to get done in the next little while. Anyways, we set off at about 9 am in the truck. Now, getting to Cap itself is an adventure. It's only 25 kms away, but only a quarter of the road is paved (with pot-holes), the rest is gravel (with pot-holes) and very dusty as we haven't had any rain in weeks. Needless to say, I don't make the trip into Cap unless I absolutely need to. Along the way, we stopped at the wedding venue, paid the deposit and continued on.

We arrived in Cap. Cap Haitien is a city that was built or planned for about 200,000 people - it now contains about 1 million people. So, needless to say, it's crowded, busy and dusty! Traffic, is well, interesting. I know that it's a whole lot better than Port au Prince, but for the size of the city, it's still frustrating. Our next stop was the florists - but they weren't open. So we headed off to the hardware/appliance store to look for a stove and a fridge. After some talking and negotiating, we were able to settle on a stove and fridge. The stove is a bit bigger than I wanted, but when you only have 3 to choose from, you have to go with what you got. Driving to Port to find one just doesn't seem worth it. We didn't take them with us, because we didn't have the extra money for the stove. Cal went back on Monday to pick them up.

After that, we were off to the "stores" to find kitchen and household supplies. Mama was with us to help in our search and negotiations. Basically all of downtown Cap is one big open air market, but there are some "stores" along the side streets. We searched up and down, but Mama couldn't find anything that made her happy, so we to the main central market with all the food, clothes, shoes, supplies - basically anything you would need. After weaving our way through the "machanns" with their rice, vegetables, meat, etc, we found the kitchen supply area - heaven. We start picking all kinds of things we need - pots, spoons, bowls, knives, etc. We got a pretty good haul for about $50 US. We piled everything into a "kivet" (a large basin) and paid someone to carry it out through the maze of the crowded market to the truck for us.

By this time, I'm getting pretty tired, and hot. It turned hot here last week, so it's around 30 degrees during the day. We go to a nearby restaurant for a bite to eat and a drink and to regroup. After, we go back to the florists, they are open now. Made our payment for the wedding flowers and all the final arrangements. One last stop. To buy a mattress/boxspring. Here again, there isn't a lot of choice, unless you want to buy used - then there is tons of choice. We find a bed, make a negotiation and tie it to the truck. We're done!!!

By now it's about 3 pm and I'm wiped and a headache it starting to set in. We get home around 4, I eat the lunch that Marlene left for us, shower and fall down on my bed with exhaustion. My headache lingered around all night and into the morning. Finally, by Sunday afternoon I was feeling a bit normal again.

I shouldn't complain too much - Cal made the trip to Cap again Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. It's tiring. Good thing I have a week to recover before my trip back to catch the bus to the DR!

Sendie

Sendie Salomon

Sendie came into the clinic on Monday morning with her aunt. She is 10 years old and lives with her 4 brothers and parents in La Coup - a section of Haut Limbe. Since she was born, she has been hard of hearing. She began attending school at age 3, but has always struggled to keep up. The teachers do their best to help her, but class sizes are huge here and they simply do not have the extra time or expertise to give Sendie the attention she needs. She is able to read and write, but is very shy to speak as she has difficulties because of her hearing problems.

After Manno saw her, he called me to come and get her story so that we could send an email out to friends and supporters of the clinic to see if anyone would be willing to help Sendie so that she could see a specialist, perhaps in the DR. I wrote an email yesterday morning, not being very optimistic about what kind of response we would receive. Oh me of little faith.

This morning when I opened the inbox, we already had 5 responses from people with ideas and wanting to help financially. I was blown away and totally pumped. I showed Manno the emails and he said "this is the body of Christ - it didn't cost us any money to send an email. Can you imagine if we hadn't tried to help this little girl?". It's so true - it's so much bigger than us, God is in control and is working in the lives of people all around the world - in Haiti and in Canada and the U.S.

I'm not sure what the next step is for Sendie, but I'm excited to find out!

And the winner is...

Michel "Sweet Mickey" Martelly.

Yesterday, just after 6 pm, a roar was heard in the area as the results of the Presidential election were announced. Martelly won with 67% of the vote over Mme Manigat. Martelly is a famous Haitian rap star who is very popular with the young people. Mme Manigat is almost 80 and the former first lady of the country. I don't really know who would have lead the country the best, but I'm just glad this election process is finally over! With Martelly winning, it means there will likely not be any demonstrations or protests over the results. These were just the preliminary results, the final results will be announced on the 16th - just a week before my wedding! I'm glad that things are quite decided and that there shouldn't be any unrest in the next few weeks.