ONE WEEK AND WE ARE STILL ALIVE!!

Bonswa! Well, it is setting in that we are really in Haiti! Yesterday was Kath and my first creole lesson with a school administrator named David. We learned (well we went over) the Hatiain alphabet which has 11 vowels, 3 half vowels, and 20 consonants. For anyone having trouble adding, that is 34 letters – ours has 26 ;) Most of the consonants sound much like they do in English until you put them with vowels. We were told that the consonants purpose was to get the vowels to speak. So there are not many words that end abruptly rather they have a softer ending made with a “ou” or a nasal “n” sound. Lord willing we will pick it up!!

I have also found the medical clinic to be pretty third world. When you have a kid come in with a fever and a stomach ache in the U.S you will usually just assume it is a virus that has to run its course. So you give them some symptom reducers like Tylenol or Advil and tell them to drink a lot. Here you never just assume it is a simple virus. Essentially every kid and adult that comes in with a fever, chills, etc. is sent home with some chloroquine to treat Malaria that may reside in their bodies. As far as symptom management, well these people live in survival mode and not really comfort so they tough things out pretty well. Dr. Kris has made several diagnoses that seemed great to me, but then she would say “but we can’t do that here, so we will do what we can”. It is different than in the states to say the least, but at the same time the patient doctor interaction is very similar. People come in sick wanting to feel better and trusting in the doctor. So Kris tries to help them with the tools she has and the knowledge she possesses.

Life here is interesting. After the first week we are feeling more and more settled in. It has been a great first week. God has provided for us in a large part because of your prayers and emails! Thank you all so much. This week has given us hope for the rest of our time here. We can make it in the heat, inconveniences, and different food. The kids are great. Luckily sports are an international language, volleyball is played with your hands, and soccer is played with your feet. It is nice to be able to connect in some way!! So we still don’t know exactly what God has in store for us but we are excited to find out.

(the first picture is Kathleen standing on the stairs that lead to the roof of the building where the church meets 4+ times a week)

(the second picture is me being "komik" with our group of kids that play with us every afternoon)

Have a blessed day!

Kids...everywhere!!!!!!!!!!!

Thanks for reading our blog!! Sometimes the internet is very shaky so it's unsure how often we will be able to update, hopefully often. (no pics today, they won't go through but hopefully soon!) It's so nice to be able to communicate with home. Kris reminded us that back when she was in Haiti as a young girl there was just snail mail to depend on...and it often took many weeks!
Anyway. God's been immensely faithful to us even these first four days. We've heard stories of His faithfulness back at home too, and it's so cool to see how He is the same here and there. The last two days we have spent most of our time settling in, making our house more homey, spending time with the Thede's, and trying to learn Creole. Thankfully, we have many willing teachers, literally right outside our door much of the time! In the afternoons, kids start to trickle in and sit around yelling "How are you" and other English phrases they've learned through our windows. (no personal space in Haiti! :) So the last few days we have gotten to share some of our toys we brought over...playing frisbee and soccer with the kids. Although we can't communicate very well with them yet, they get a kick out of trying to teach us. Tomorrow we start our official Creole lessons with our teacher, David! We are really excited, hopefully it will be as exciting as we think, and not totally overwhelming! haha.
Yesterday and Monday Chris was able to go to the clinic and get a taste of medicine in the Haitian countryside. I will let him write a bit about that experience as he gets a few more days under his belt. But it's been eye-opening and really interesting, and he is learning a lot! I have started helping with Eli and Anna's school in the mornings while they go to the clinic, which isn't as intimidating as I thought :) It can be challenging, but it's fun getting to know them.
Well, our internet time is coming to a close, so we are going to sign off! But thanks again for your prayer and interest and everything, we wouldn't be here without you. Thanking God for you!
PS..Please pray that we will have wisdom knowing how to spend our time here! And that we will really know what God wants us to do. Should we spend everyday playing with kids? or just learning the language? or doing something we can't forsee?!? thanks!

Our house, and a few other things!

Our second day has been a good one! We went to church this morning, and had to stand up front to be introduced. Kris translated for us as we greeted the church family and told them we are glad to be here to serve the Lord with them. They were all very smiley and friendly! Then Kris also translated the sermon for us, so we could understand most of what the pastor was saying.

We also got to watch the Jesus film (in French...so we just enjoyed the visual aspect haha) with a building full of kids this afternoon. Anna is a huge help as we try to communicate with people since she speaks both Creole and English.

We are falling in love with our house also. It is just the right size for us! Minus the rather uncomfortably large spider we encountered this morning, we are starting to feel more at home.

This week we will start doing some of the things we were anticipating before we left. Chris will have the opportunity to go to the clinic tomorrow, and I will begin my first attempt at helping teach Eli and Anna. (I am nervous!) But we are excited to start our first week. Please pray for Cory as he is traveling to Port au Prince this week.
Here is a shot of the inside of our house...it's hard to get a good picture in there! But that's our bed with a mosquito net, and as you can see we have nice curtains.

We will upload another picture of the house when we can. The top picture is of Chris and Anna and a few kids we met around the compound. There were about 10 kids pushing their faces against our door the first day we were here...they are very curious!

First days in Haiti

We have arrived in Haiti and just spent our first full day here. WOW..talk about a lot to take in and process! It is truly a different world down here. We are doing well...but it is a lot. It's really hot and there are people around constantly...most of which we aren't able to really communicate with. But we had the opportunity to meet a lot of our neighbors and they are so kind and receptive. They are more than willing to help us with our Creole too! So we have learned many new words already. Also, the Thede's have been so wonderful to us...inviting us to eat with them and treating us like members of the family, which is such a blessing.
Here are some pictures of our like house--La kay Cheri. We love having our own little house, we're so thankful for that! And suprisingly, we love the cold showers!! (very refreshing!)

So we tried to upload some pictures....but for some reason they aren't loading. We will try to have them up tomorrow!!! SORRY!!!

Anyway, we are using the Thede's living room and internet so we should probably get going (everyone goes to bed by 9...it's too dark to stay up!) But we will try to have some pictures tomorrow. We are depending on God to carry us through each day. It's hard to depend on him so much, but we know he's faithful and he's HERE. more later!
love to you all!

Plan B...actually about Plan E...

We are now going on to our 17th day of delay...and the 5th scheduled departure date! What is going on?? If we are still in the States in November...we might rethink going to Haiti...

However, we are sure that God is in control! And we ARE thankful that they didn't try to fly us through a hurricane or something. (we were delayed due to weather) So we are working on patience and enjoying an extra day in Florida, though we are anxious to get to Haiti.
Interestingly, our three Haitian taxi drivers have given us various bits of advice and Creole phrases that might come in handy. There seem to be many Haitians in this area, we even heard a conversation in Creole at McDonald's last night! So we feel we are at least a little closer to Haiti than we were :)

Now we are scheduled to leave Friday at 11:15 am. Please pray that this will go smoothly!

Oops....

As our plumbing is being worked on in Haiti, we encountered a little plumbing project of our own this morning. I happened to knock a little bottle of soap into the toilet as it was flushing (too much information? I don't know haha) and thought it surely wouldn't go all the way down...but sadly, it did. Good thing I married a handy man! He had the pleasure of removing the bottle while I did what any good wife would do--took pictures :)




The Thedes have had quite a time breaking and fixing cemented in pipes, trying to find PVC pipes, and digging up a drain which will allow us to have a working toilet when we arrive (we are thankful!) So maybe God is helping prepare us in case we encounter unexpected difficulties with our plumbing....


What a great husband I have!

Wishing and Waiting...

So much for plans based on man's timing :) Kathleen and I were scheduled to leave Aug. 4, but it was not to be. After putting holds on flights, waiting for insurance companies to mail our needed paperwork, and getting ready to go to Minnesota to meet the new in-laws we decided not to force it and take a one week rain check. This was done with much prayer and still disappointment. We are ready to go, but it seemed that nothing was going the way it needed to for us to get to Haiti. The one week delay has now turned into a two week delay until Aug. 18 (and that is not definite). Now, we wait. Kris Thede told us from the beginning that we were going to need flexibility this year, but we didn't think we would need it untill we got TO Haiti. But the Lord works in mysterious ways. Who knows what He has protected us from or will do with the time we have in the states. We are prayerfully trusting that this will glorify Him.... it is his show.


Because we didn't leave on Monday we were able to spend some extra time in Wisconsin hanging out at Grandma Heneghan's house with Kathleen's parents. We started off the week going to see Kathleen's Grandpa and Grandma Moody in Minnesota. It was the first time I had met them. We spent the day listening to stories and learning about the Moody's life. It was a great day trip.


Then my parents came up for a couple of days (thinking it was the last time they would see us). We were able to go climbing at Devil's Lake one day and spend another day on Lake Redstone... both days were gorgeous. It is always a joy to spend time with family! We are thankful we will get to do more of that because of the delay.



left: That's my beautiful wife on a climb called Watermarks at Devil's Lake

Below: The climbing group Caleb, Jon, Kath, Chris, and Ron

So until we leave we will be continuing to finish up Wedding thank you cards and getting ourselves ready for Haiti. This week we were able to obtain 70 suture kits for the medical clinic in Haiti from Parkview Hospital. They were very generous to give us these much needed supplies. We are excited to see what else is in store for the remainder of this crazy year.