Sue Burns.....day 5

The orphanage where we're staying is a maze of hallways and rooms.  Roughly 75 kids are here.  Another baby of an unwed mother just arrived.  By around the age of six, girls help to bathe younger kids, pouring water over and lathering them up in a basin.  The little ones shiver and tolerate it, knowing nothing else.  A young girl can haul a two year old up onto her lap and change a diaper in a blink.  The women who are caregivers begin their day at 5:30 with singing.  We hear them in the courtyard below our third story rooms.  It is so beautiful. They are competing with the roosters and barking dogs, though.  We get up around six.  The kitchen for the children is in a back common area.  They are served huge bowls full.  Some two and three year olds wander out to our dining area with their bowls, but most eat around a large table out back.  The girls help feed the littlest ones. The work we've been doing is so strenuous.  Every muscle is sore and I've got plenty of bruises.  At dinner it's all I can do to lift a fork to my mouth.  Never has food tasted sooo good!  Everyone in our group has a terrific attitude, and working along with the Haitians has been wonderful.  The process of laying a cement floor is fast and efficient when there are so many working in harmony

Yesterday when we got the tables and chairs for the school we made many trips through a very poor area. Because there is no sanitation, it's not a surprise to see someone squatting on a garbage pile or unzipping right at roadside.  Huge pigs with piglets were wallowing in the garbage and wash flowing behind the shacks.  And yet, along the streets there are so many people either selling goods or cooking foods or running little barbershops, pharmacies, etc.  Shoe-shine guys ring a bell as they walk.  They all barter because cash is short. Kids are walking to different schools in the morning in crisp uniforms, hair done up in bows.  Women look handsome and the guys often wear ironed shirts.  The level of poverty isn't at all obvious in their appearance.  Some are solemn, but many smile and return a friendly greeting, and they banter with the Haitian guys on our trucks.  The streets are where the people spend all their daylight hours.  One surprise is that we've only heard music blaring from a couple of shops/homes.  I thought we'd be hearing lots of reggae and caribbean music all the time.  Electricity is erratic, but we've mostly had it on, perhaps because it's the week of Carnival.  Traffic on the maine road is heavy and the driving is insane.  
On the rutted narrow dirty side streets, tires don't last long and any trip takes such a long time.

We've had enough breeze at night since our rooms are high up, and we sit outside on the flat cement rooftops in the evenings.  No bugs except a few flies (and one of our group has attracted any mosquitos around.)  Down where the kids are, odors are pretty bad near the bathroom (flushed by pouring a bucket of water, but infrequently because water is scarce) and in the areas where they give the baths, because the water runs down a ways and then sits stagnant.  I hear that in summer the kids are crawling with flies, but not now.  Most of the kids do have chicken pox, however.  And for a few days now, they've been passing a diarrhea bug around.  Usually there are only two diaper changes a day, but now they are using up their precious diaper supply.  Two of our crew had upset stomachs this morning, but thankfully it passed and we've otherwise all felt great.

It's a world away. The teens and young adults belonging to the parish have so many dreams and so little chance of climbing out of their
poverty. I so admire the leaders of our group, who have been committed to bringing chances to so many, for fifteen or even 25 years. It sure humbles me. Meanwhile, I miss my hubby and so wish he were here....but how special it is to see this wonderful young person in action who is my daughter. My heart is full here.