How it all began...my time in Haiti

                                                                               Mission Trip to Haiti

When? December 28-January 9 2012

Who? My sister, four people from her church (The Rock, San Diego) and myself (Crystal from Freechurch Toronto)

Where? Renmen Foundation  Orphanage, La Pleine du Cul de Sac, north of Port au Prince, Haiti

Why? To show God’s love and serve the orphans in Haiti

It first started with my sister Melanie. A speaker at her church returned from Haiti and gave a talk about his time there. Before he left Haiti, he asked a  Haitian pastor what message he would like brought back to the people in the USA. The Haitian pastor said that Haiti as a country often feels quite forgotten about and that they appreciate it so much when people come visit. My sister really related to the feeling of being forgotten about and later felt called to go to Haiti. Then the earthquake happened and she knew she needed to go more than ever. She went with an organization called Adventures in Missions, they interviewed her and placed her in Renmen Foundation Orphanage for a month in June 2010 and the rest is history. They were welcomed to return and visit again so some of the other team members and her went back the following Christmas for a surprise visit to the kids. They had a great time. She felt that if she was meant to  return again it would be because she was meant to bring others down and form long lasting relationships and ties there. The next fall (2011) a team came together from her church to go back and I wanted to join them. Partly for selfish reasons, (I live in Toronto, she lives in San Diego and I never get to see her) and also I did feel called to serve and who better to go on my first mission trip with than with my sister? I also knew they could benefit from having another person besides her who could speak the language and I love working with kids. (It is part of my job as an arts educator).

A big question emerged when I was deciding whether to commit to the trip. Why go instead of sending money? Money would be so helpful. In addition to all of the orphanage’s expenses, it costs $50 USD a month for each child to attend school in Haiti. I was starting to calculate the cost of my plane tickets, travel medical appointment, shots and travel medications and room and board. It added up to about two years of schooling for a child! Wouldn’t that be better than little old me? I could send down the money I would have spent coming and then some.  But my sister said that from her experience there, what is more needed than money is some personal attention and love. Many of the children have been abandoned by living parents. The staffing at the orphanage is limited as most of their time is taken up with  the basic care of the babies and littlest ones, as well as administration to keep the place running. So for us to go down there and just be with them and hang out with them, it would be a nice treat. It sounded so simple; I took this need for granted.

What? Loving the kids like brothers and sisters.

Some of the activities we did during our time there:
-sports
-we funded a beach day (the last time they were able to go to the beach was eight months ago)
-arts and crafts including paper stain glass and bracelets
-mural painting with some of the young adults
-manicures, washing the feet and painting the toes of the young girls à la John 13:14
- discussions about our testimonies, life, love, God and encouraging them
-building a drain for the courtyard
-they took us sightseeing into the mountains and countryside and threw us an amazing goodbye party

One of the most overwhelming moments of the trip was just arriving and being kissed on the cheek and greeted hello by over 50 beautiful kids. I felt like a celebrity! Every morning and evening this beautiful ritual would repeat itself after worship songs and prayers, with the kids getting more affectionate and the little ones coming faster and faster and kiss-traffic jamming to us.

We brought diapers (which they told us they were in a big need of, lots of new babies and small enough diapers were hard to find there), books, soccer balls, $1500 to contribute towards the rebuilding of the damaged walls that surround the compound from the earthquake.

But the main way we served them was not by building or bringing anything but as loving them as our brothers and sisters. They gave us the most beautiful goodbye party and called us their brothers and sisters. I received some beautiful goodbye cards expressing their love, which was often surprising as some of them were shy and had not spoken to me much. The biggest gift they gave me was embodying God’s peace, joy and love. They were such generous hosts to us. I knew going into this trip that often when you serve someone it is you who gets served but I was not prepared for how generously and easily they accepted me, hosted me and loved me. It was so humbling. Whatever I did for them, they did back to me tenfold. Sometimes I wondered if we were working hard enough, it felt like a vacation. But one youth complemented me, observing that I worked hard and said “Tu est génial”. They reminded me of how generous God’s love is and how it is just given freely, it cannot be earned.

What next?

I went back to Canada thinking about when I could go back to visit my new family again. My church had supported me with a hip hop for Haiti fundraiser before I left and so when I came back I gave a report in front of the congregation on my time there. In my power point I included a picture of the kids in the cage of the truck going to the beach and casually mentioned that the lady who runs the orphanage-Florence- told us she dreamed of getting a bus one day. She could take more of the kids out on outings and all in the same vehicle. And she said when they did not need to use the bus for the kids they could put it on the street and have it generate income for the orphanage as public transit. (The transit system in Haiti is rather informal). The garbage system is also rather informal and the kids wouldn’t have to pull their shirts over the faces when they drove by the huge burning garbage piles with the thick white smoke in the streets. They’d be more protected from that frequent form of pollution inside a bus, and safer. I casually mentioned this in my presentation but didn’t think much would come of it. It is quite a bit of money and seemed like such a huge project for our church. I didn’t expect anything to come of that. But a few days later I got an email from a girl named Andrea who I didn’t really know : “Hi Crystal, I was really inspired by your talk this past Sunday. I was speaking to my living room (small group) last night & I mentioned how the kids in Haiti were in need of a bus. I think that we should raise the money for it and I'd love to organize a fundraiser of sorts to do it!”  When Florence mentioned her dream of a school bus it became a wild dream in my imagination-how fun to bring them a bus and then paint it with the kids  all crazy and colourful with messages of love, like all the other buses in Haiti called “Tap Taps”. It was kind of a fantasy. But when someone else came forward about it back in Canada I realized that  Florence’s dream could actually become a reality.