http://highwaytohaiti.com Mon, 15 Sep 2008 16:47:59 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en Of all athletes in American sports today, two of the three highest paid professionals are Dominican-Americans. Alex Rodriguez and Manny Ramirez, who both lived in the Dominican Republic, are under contract to earn a combined $435 million. We kept up with the Olympics and it was intriguing that Caribbean sprinters dominated ... http://highwaytohaiti.com/2008/08/27/winning-and-losing-the-globalization-game/ The following letter was mailed last week: August 12th, 2008 Dear Family and Friends, Three generations ago it was common for missionaries to pack their belongings in caskets and leave for the field quite aware of the challenges ahead. Times have changed, and one of the challenges today, ironically, may be a lack ... http://highwaytohaiti.com/2008/08/19/occasional-letter-4/ This week we spent a day with our dear friends: Mark, Ruth & Elianna Brucato. The Brucatos are preparing to be missionaries in Italy with TEAM sent from College Church in Wheaton. Click here to visit their website (insideitaly.org), their writings in the Current Reflections link are exceptional. Silas has always ... http://highwaytohaiti.com/2008/08/07/vacation/ Recently Pam made a comment that Silas has taken playing to a new level. On most days if he’s not reading or drumming on empty milk-powder cans, he’s trying to keep up with his three-to-ten year old peer group. Most of the boys have chipped teeth, so when they tell ... http://highwaytohaiti.com/2008/07/31/a-new-level/ Thomas Malthus theorized that as the world’s population increases, the amount of resources available for each person decreases. Charles Darwin expanded Malthusian theory and proposed that natural selection (survival of the fittest) occurs when the weak in body or mind are eliminated due to defect or to an inability to ... http://highwaytohaiti.com/2008/06/02/do-ideas-have-consequences/ On April 18th, less than two weeks before Pam’s due date, we found out that our overseeing physician had to leave Haiti to attend urgent family business in the States—meaning we would not be able to count on him to back-up our midwife in the case of a medical emergency. This ... http://highwaytohaiti.com/2008/05/08/luke/ Despite government efforts to address the problems plaguing Haiti’s import economy, this article describes the severe failures in the supply chain. Since Cap-Haitien is where we purchase our supplies, we have experienced the shortages and high prices firsthand. From our observation, corruption still flows very freely through the bureaucracy. Pam ... http://highwaytohaiti.com/2008/03/17/rotting-in-the-ports/ We have been particularly impressed by the teaching of Ray Vander Laan and the Faith Lessons DVD series produced by Focus on the Family. Dr. James Dobson says, “Nothing has opened and illuminated the Scriptures for me quite like the Faith Lessons series.” One particular lesson puts an interesting twist ... http://highwaytohaiti.com/2008/03/13/the-gates-of-hell/ Yesterday we joined the exclusive company of those who can actually say that a tank—yes a tank—has showed up at their front door. We were doing some work in the yard, when a UN amphibious Armored Personnel Carrier (APC) with a large mounted semi-automatic weapon pulled up our driveway. The ... http://highwaytohaiti.com/2008/03/11/united-nations-stabilization-mission-in-haiti/ When people in abject poverty face difficult decisions, good options seldom exist—the choices are simply bad or worse. When a mother has more children than she can feed, where does she find help? In Haiti, there is a culturally acceptable and clandestine child-trafficking arrangement resulting from these difficult decisions and ... http://highwaytohaiti.com/2008/02/14/haitis-invisible-children/