The Highway to Haiti

This post will go online sometime in the early hours EST of February 14th—Valentine’s Day; also Pam’s due date. No baby yet! In Haiti, our midwife said 2/19 and the ultrasound showed 2/14. So, any time now. While in Miami we are assessing the long-term opportunities that have emerged from our role in the relief & recovery effort. Although Haiti has been on everyone’s heart for the past month, the devastation and onslaught of aid is only the tip of the iceberg. We are encouraged by how many people have expressed a commitment not only to the relief, but to the recovery and rebuilding as well.

Earlier this week we debriefed with the Miami crew along with the guys from New Orleans, and started reading through e-mail conversations between our team and the ministries we have been serving. From all accounts, the rapid-response “operation” was highly successful. As we compared notes, it’s tough trying to explain precisely who we are and what we did—yet that’s the beauty of it. Our non-traditional approach (no organization, no stated mission) enabled us to be quick and nimble, networked and relevant. Through this effort alone, dozens of people put their lives on hold to volunteer; thousands committed funds and prayed. In other words: those who love God are serving those who God loves. It’s bread-and-butter Gospel (Philippians 2). Since there is no organization to describe who we are, and no mission statement to detail what we did, let me defer to stories and pictures to illustrate how God is using us for such a time as this.

Within days of the earthquake we scraped up $10K and sent 2000 gallons of diesel fuel to a PAP hospital. Due to security concerns (hijacking), we lined the floors of city buses with fuel in 30-liter containers (pictured above) and made runs to PAP during the night. From the outside looking in, you would never guess this bus was carrying 800 gallons of fuel. At the peak, we were sending a convoy of three buses every other night. We worked in cooperation with the director of public transportation in Fort-Liberte. Each bus had two drivers, two mechanics, and two police officers on board. Only Haitians were allowed to ride so we wouldn’t blow our cover. On the return trip, the buses evacuated hundreds of refugees.

These folks oversee the hospital at the Baptist Haiti Mission—where we sent a lot of the fuel. Chris Lieb (pictured left) wrote us, “I just wanted to thank you for your hard work in getting us out of a fuel crisis here at Baptist Haiti Mission. You literally saved lives at our hospital and it allowed us to be able to distribute much needed relief. May God continue to bless your efforts. It is great to see the body of Christ working together.” Chris, Kyrk, and Rob told us that when they got the first shipment of fuel they split it among several other ministries including orphanages and MAF.

In 2001, Jeff Fogle and I played collegiate soccer together. Jeff was key to us winning a national championship—the man can flat out play. Now, Jeff is the chaplain for the 82nd Airborne, 173rd Cavalry. Jeff’s squadron was the first to arrive in PAP. Although the phones had been down, he found a way to get a call through. I remember it well, “We’re staying at some sort of country club. We have helicopters—a lot people are critically injured. Do you know of any hospitals?” At the time we didn’t know which hospitals had been destroyed, so we gave him a few names. It turned out that he met Chris, Kyrk and Rob (previous picture) and the army began airlifting patients there.

It didn’t take long for our supply line to earn credibility. Although ground transport was the most risky means of moving supplies into PAP, it was effective early on. We avoided bottlenecks and delivered supplies to PAP ministries quickly. Pictured are: Cameron, Francisco, Jay and Kyle.

Our Miami central command office began fielding hundreds of e-mails and calls. Requests came in for everything imaginable. One hospital asked for vinyl mattresses to handle the patient surge. Within hours, our guys in Santiago found a mattress factory (above) that could make anything we wanted overnight! From Miami, our team hunted down and delivered things like bone saws and cauterization equipment for PAP clinics.

To streamline the movement of supplies, we used a transshipment point just north of PAP. Since it was a remote location, drop-off and pick-up was safe and easy. Dennis and Jarod are loading sacks of rice and beans for a school and orphanage. This location also happened to be where Samaritan’s Purse set up their base.

News from the frontline was encouraging. I spoke with people from Christianville Mission as we loaded food into their truck—they were feeding 5000-6000 each day. Julie Scott from Haiti Child Sponsorship wrote, “Please extend our gratitude to all who helped Jenn-Vi (Young Life) and the Good Shepherd School receive supplies! Your ministry was really the only open door for us as we struggled to get supplies to them. Thanks for all you do and will continue to do in Haiti! May God continue to bless your efforts!” What wasn’t mentioned is that Good Shepherd School is in Cite Soleil. Google it.

Samaritan’s Purse hand delivered 1.5 million pesos (36 to the dollar) to the hotel where we were staying in Santiago. They needed helicopter fuel urgently—plus a semi-truck full of rice. No problem. Santiago immediately dispatched a truck with ten 55-gallon drums of fuel. However, the border closed at 5:00 PM and we snapped this picture…oh, 90-minutes later. Adam and Mike (pictured) and I asked officials on both sides if we could pay everyone overtime to keep the border open. The picture above was taken on the bridge over the River Massacre, the divide between Haiti and the Dominican Republic. Gerald, Jacques and James are rolling the drums from a Dominican truck to a Haitian truck. The truck drove through the night to deliver the fuel by morning.

For many of the “big” loads, MINUSTAH, the peacekeeping arm of the UN, offered our trucks armed escort. The Uruguayan battalion was great, from the commanders to the soldiers! It was a pleasure serving with them.

Besides transporting supplies to PAP, we worked directly with the mayor’s office in the city where we live. At last count, Fort-Liberte took in almost 2500 refugees. Here, Luis is pumping 1500 gallons of fuel into the city’s tanks to help keep utilities and public services (like the police) operational.

For more pictures, click here.

All of us still struggle to comprehend the earthquake. I remember staring at the headlines of the DrudgeReport on January 13th: “Hell Came Up”. If that’s what happened, then this is God at work.

Soli Deo Gloria

Silas starfishing at Fort Saint-Joseph

Lukey—out

Sometimes when you think you’re having French style green beans for dinner…you get corn

Hurricane Luke wipes out bridges on the “Island of Sodor”…again

The Tiki Room at Cofresi

Playa Grande

Christ the Redeemer (Rio replica) atop Pico Isabel de Torres in Puerto Plata

The original bucket bath

Dauphin Plantation ruins in Phaeton. Once upon a time this was a swimming pool

“Pirate ships” at Cormier Plage

Dad keeping watch over Cap-Haitien from the Citadelle–the largest fortress in the western hemisphere. Pictures don’t do justice to this monstrosity. You gotta see it yourself! Hopefully one day they’ll finish the restoration. It’s really cool

Marie-Louise in front of her husband’s “no worries” palace in Milot. When things heated up domestically for the king, she bolted for Italy. Completed in 1813, the palace was shattered by an earthquake in 1842

Books in bed; always a hit!

Matt, almost up on the kiteboard (next time it won’t be “almost”)

Sprinkles! Cheese

An 8-day “kwazad” (crusade) near our house. When you can’t hear each other talking inside your own house–it was rockin’

Pam’s rooftop vegetable garden

MPSL

Nothing quite says, Welcome to the neighborhood, like having your bikes stolen out of your backyard. Such was the feeling of violation in our new home last month. Incidentally, this is not the first time we’ve lived in a downtown urban area, nor the first time we’ve had our bikes stolen! When we lived on State St & Madison Ave in Chicago—same thing. Initiation? Rite of passage? Rookie mistake?

Years ago when I lived in Central America we used to joke about how easily things would “grow legs and walk away.” In Haiti, the easiest way to combat this is to live behind enough cinder blocks and bars, broken bottles and razor wire to rival a Supermax. Besides being ugly, living within utilitarian confines sends the wrong message and doesn’t quite jibe with the proverb in the previous post (which happens to be the November 18, 2008 post; we apologize for the long, yet intentional, hiatus). So, now we’re out a few hundred bucks in bikes—which had been great for getting around and meeting people.

About the same time the bikes were stolen, we had been planning a garage sale. We decided that we had enough stuff to merit a Thursday-thru-Saturday sale. On Thursday morning at 7am I set up a couple tables under the porch of a nearby vacant building and laid out the contents of a dozen boxes. Pam and I were going to work in shifts and we discussed in advance how much we wanted to try to get for the big-ticket items. Within minutes curious passersby turned into a crowd digging through all the stuff on the porch. By 9am, two hours passed, and so had the mob along with 90% of everything we had set out. When we counted the absurd wad of dirty cash and coin jammed into my cargo shorts—we made US$362!

Back to burglary: My wife could tell you that I’m a calculated individual. I study, research, and consider the risks at work or at play. When I gamble (don’t get the wrong idea, there’s a lot of theology here), the risk/reward ratio is the determining factor. The same could be said of the guys who stole our generator only two weeks after our bikes! We had an excellent little 2000-watt Honda generator that we secured to a concrete column outside. The heavy-duty steel cable was apparently no match for bolt-cutters, and the 45-lb. Honda that carries like a suitcase was easily handed over the fence in the darkness. It seems there are guys in this town who study and plan much like myself and share similar interests: in generators at least. I’m quite sure we could be friends.

This, however, caused us to step back and really think through home security and theft prevention. The idea is to create an environment where the risk/reward ratio, as it pertains to burglary, is so unfavorable that it isn’t even worth the hassle. Our neighbors say Dobermans work well. Ultimately, in the economics of our theology, the risk/reward ratio related to the choices we make in life only becomes favorable, or meaningful, when we live in obedience to Christ—even without guarantee of wellbeing or reward this side of Heaven. Sometimes it’s just the price we must pay to live in the hood.

Two weeks ago we were at the hospital getting health certificates—documents required for our residence permit. One of the requirements for the health certificate is sitting in on an HIV/AIDS counseling session and taking a “confidential” HIV/AIDS blood test. Another part of the process included getting a card indicating our blood types. So that day we dragged Silas and Luke around the hospital: to the exam room, to the counseling office, and to the lab for tests. After we finished, the doctor told me to come back the next morning to get the results—and the health certificates.

As instructed, I returned for the papers. On my way out a nurse stopped me and told me someone was looking for me. “Who?” I asked. She led me toward the radiology room and pointed me to the x-ray tech, a guy I didn’t know. He introduced himself and began by saying, “Eske ou ka ede-m?” On any given day, I find myself in at least three or four conversations beginning with these same five words (translated: Can you help me?), typically followed by a request for anywhere from $5 to $50—no joke. This happens so much, it becomes desensitizing, and it’s difficult not to tune-out and politely say, “no” and, “I’m sorry”. Since we were at the hospital, I presumed he needed help paying a hospital bill. But his request was different. (more…)