He looked into my eyes as if to say...

I am finding it difficult to find words to accurately describe my first trip to Haiti. It just isn't possible to put into words how emotional and moving a journey it's been. As I write this message and remember all the beautiful children and amazing people I have met over the last four days I am moved to tears.

Didn't I come to Haiti to help people and to make a difference not the other way around? I did go out on the water truck and fill empty buckets with clean water; played with the sweet children in Cite Soleil, the poorest slum in the Western Hemisphere and spend time with children in orphanages and schools; held and fed tiny, sick babies at Mother Teresa's hospital for the sick and dying babies. And I hope through these actions I was able to help in some small way and, if nothing else, provide some comfort. But something else happened...something so unexpected. As I reflect on the last few days, it appears that the purpose of this trip was to show me my Purpose, to give me a better perspective on the world and my place in it and maybe, most importantly, as Jeff would say, to break my heart wide open.

It's impossible to go to Haiti and not have your heart broken wide open. We all live unbelievably comfortable lives by comparison and while we shouldn’t feel guilty for this, I do hope that our good fortunes will motivate us to want to help others who have less than us. There are so many stories to tell from my trip but I know I can't share them all. I’ll let my photos tell some of the stories and I will share with you one experience that was particularly touching. I met a two year old named Nixon at Mother Teresa's Hospital for the sick and dying babies. As I was holding him in my arms and feeding him his lunch of rice and beans, he reached his little hand into his bowl and picked up a couple of grains of rice and brought it up to my mouth. He looked into my eyes as if to say here, you have some of my food. My heart nearly burst I was so moved. Here is this child who has experienced more hardship and rejection in his two short years on earth than most people do in a lifetime and he is sharing his food with me. What an amazing spirit!

I am not leaving Haiti a different person but rather a person with a different perspective on what is truly important and what really matters in life. The last four days in Haiti have been a true gift and words cannot describe how grateful I am to all of the wonderful people I met here. I have never felt so inspired to do whatever I possibly can to make a difference and to raise as much money as I possibly can to support the projects in Haiti.

I look at my role as a sales rep with Print for Change a little differently now. Yes, I want to produce great products, provide excellent customer service, meet customer expectations but I don't want that to be my primary focus. Ultimately, my job everyday is to help feed, educate and shelter children in Haiti. And now, I've met these adorable, innocent children and their families, looked into their eyes, held their hands and heard their pleas for help. So, I came to Haiti with the intentions to help people but as it turns out, the people in Haiti also helped me.

I urge every person who reads this to take the time to think about what they can do to help the children in Haiti; whether it's to participate in a mission, donate money, spread the word, get others involved. Every act and every donation helps no matter how big or small.

Joey Perry

New York, NY

[Joey Perry works as an "agent for change" at Print for Change, a print management company that donates 50% of all profits to support missions in Haiti, the poorest country in the western hemisphere. Visit www.printforchange.info for more information on how you can use your print purchases to make a difference in this world.]

God knew just what I needed to hear.

I am at home now sitting at my computer after spending 2 weeks in Haiti. Nine people joined us on our trip and as I reflect, I am amazed at God's work. Not only in what we do in Haiti, but in my own life. I left Haiti feeling overwhelmed by all the need and commitments we have made to help and not knowing how we will be able to do it all. I know that it is not us, but God that is doing His work through us, but I still try to plan and figure things out myself on how we are going to get everything done.

At church last night I was reminded by God to be faithful... and that through him all things are possible... and that God works for the good of those who love him and have been called according to His purpose. That God uses the low points and struggles in our in our lives to prepare us to do profound things. God knew just what I needed to hear.

So as ordinary people, just like all of you who read this, God has once again inspired Jeff and I to continue on His mission. To provide clean water, food, education, housing and a living faith to the poor and most vulnerable in Haiti.

Last week, our orphanage caretakers asked us if we would take 30 orphans from Cite Soleil to swim at the sea. These children have never been to the sea so we rented a tap tap bus, and went to a deserted resort that had the most perfect swimming area for the kids.

I wish you all could have felt the simple joy that came from all of these children as we played in the water. It was so much fun. We had peanut butter sandwiches, cheese puffs, cookies and juice for lunch and I have never seen 30 kids so well behaved and thankful for such simple things... things that most of us would take for granted.

After lunch, we headed back into the water and all the kids started singing songs to God. It was so touching. These children who have nothing physical in this world... still abound with joy, faith and hope in Jesus.

During our swimming and spa day, we noticed some health issues and skin sores with the children. For the poor in Haiti, there is not such as thing as going to the doctor. In emergencies, kids are taken to the hospital to be treated but we couldn’t bring 55 kids to the hospital. We took photos of some of our concerns with the hope of identifying what the illness was. Mike, one of our team members, emailed them to his brother-in-law who is a doctor. As he finished, a medical team that had been at the hotel earlier in the week came in for dinner. Mike took the photos over to them to see if they help identify the sores or could guide us in anyway. The group were nurses and told us that the doctors in the group had gone home earlier in the day... they could not identify what the sores were.

As Mike came back to our table, two women and a couple of men stopped by to ask us what our mission group was doing in Haiti. We told them about our mission and and then told them about the sores that many of the children had and showed them our photos. One of the men was a doctor... a Haitian doctor. He knew immediately what they were... Zona. He suspected that it was caused by dirty water. After more discussion, he agreed to go with us the next day to do a medical clinic for all 55 kids. God had placed this man in our path at the exact time that he was needed...it was amazing.

So the next day, after 55 checkups that took most of the day, we were saddened and overwhelmed to hear that only one child did not have any medical needs. We had 5 hernias and several swollen tonsils... most of the children needed antibiotics and hydrocortisone creme for the Zona and skin rashes from the unclean water. A few need to be taken to the hospital to be checked for typhoid and malaria. We had one case of pneumonia, several very bad teeth, several that were anemic and malnourished along with one ear infection and several high fevers. The doctor wrote up 54 prescriptions that Jean, our director of Grace Village is working hard to procure.

After viewing the well at the orphanage, we discovered that the water table is only 5 feet underground. This is not deep enough to cleanse the surface water that sinks into the ground and is most likely the cause of the Zona sores that many of the children have. We made plans to install two new water tanks at the orphanage and have our truck deliver clean water for the children. We also planned hospital visits for the fevers and pneumonia. Going forware, we are going to start collecting vitamins, tylenol cold medicine, antibacterial and itch cremes to have on hand at the orphanage and figure out a way to get more protein in their diets. We will by the antibiotics in Haiti until we can get a medical source here in the US that can provide it for us. Doctor Sem also said that the dirt the children walk in and play in is also part of the problem. When the new orphanage facility at Grace Village is completed this problem will be solved.

When working on the water truck in Cite Soleil, my heart was burdened by all the requests for food. It is so difficult to continually say "I only have water and love to give you. God Bless you". It just tears at my heart. At the end of August we have a container of 270,000 meals from Feed My Starving Children that we are shipping to Haiti. We are grateful for the donated food but most don’t realize is that we still have to pay $10,000+ for the shipping and customs.

The night before we left, we had a pizza dinner with the ten street boys that we sent to school this last year. Only 4 had final report cards. We asked why the other six did not stay in school and were told that they had to quit because they had to make money to pay rent for a small room that they shared. It is amazing that 8,10 and 12 year old children have to make a decision whether they stay in school or drop out to pay their rent.

After some discussion, we made a deal with them... we would pay their rent for the next 6 months and will continue to do so, as long as they stayed in school and receive a passing report card. They live in groups of 3, 3 and 4. We had one condition though. If one drops out of school, funding will stop for the others in their group too. We hope that this will encourage support from each other and lessen the financial burden of them living on their own. We discussed how they could still work on weekends to earn money if they need too. They all are street window washers.

After the negotiations we discovered a new room in the hotel that the management said we could use with the boys for a short time. They got to play pool, foos ball and sit on big couches in front of a wide screen TV. This group of tough boys turned into little kids. They explained to me how much they liked the big couches and wished they could sleep on those instead of a floor. Of course they wanted us to buy them a big screen tv too. Please pray that these boys will stay in school this year.

Visiting Grace Village and seeing the foundations for the girls dormitory, boys dormitory, feeding center and cistern being dug out was wonderful to see. They workers were having difficulty because the land is so rocky. We watched as they pounded under the hot sun with sledge hammers to break up the rock. It is difficult and demanding work. Eighteen workers from the community started the project but only 4 are left. The work is very hard and many have gotten bad blisters and sore backs.... please pray for strength and health for the workers at Grace Village.

One of our team members gave me a couple books on Mission Trips and Creating Strategic Partnerships. After reading them, I felt again that God was speaking to us on how to better run Healing Haiti, be more effective with our giving, encourage sustainability and to further the Kingdom in all we do. Some of our projects are just humanitarian and short-term relief oriented... but with this new knowledge, we are challenged to see how we can grow these into more in the future.

Something I did this trip before reading the books mentioned above, was to choose seven children that we've come to know over the past 3 years while making water deliveries to send to the school we support in Cite Soleil. One is the brother of one of our water truck workers who is 18 but will only be in the 4th grade. The others have all touched my heart over the years and I felt lead to do something. I met with the parents while we were delivering water and then met them again the following week at the school. The parents were so grateful and the kids so excited. It was a $70 per child per year investment that will hopefully impact their entire life... the cost of one latte per day for many of us.

Other great memories include my niece giving breast feeding directions to a new mother, visiting inside the little tin shacks in Cite Soleil with some of the people to discuss their needs, caring for Pierre at Mother Theresa‘s who looked like he was 5 years old, but was really 10 and had a kind spirit and a very inquisitive eye for watches and glasses, the man that Melissa cared for at the Sisters Wound Clinic who had a dead foot, the hugs and greeting from Marie Alice from the prayer house, FanFan, who opened up to everyone and had such a great time with lots of laughter and fellowship and getting a bunch of kids in Cite Soleil to do the "Alleluia" song along side the ocean.

With great faith and trust that God will show up, and driven by obedience, Jeff and I will continue to develop new relationships, work on additional funding and create more efficiency in what we do. If you are moved or nudged by the Spirit to help, please contact us.

Blessings...

Alyn

There is no beginning or end...

Jeff told me something early on my first day in Port-au-Prince that has stuck with me; when it comes to the need for help in Haiti, there is no beginning or end. You just jump in the middle and try to make a difference. I didn’t understand the implications of this statement until our first trip into Cité Soleil.

We boarded the water truck for the first of two runs that day, to bring the only free water into the projects on the backside of Bobby Duval’s soccer fields, where about a hundred kids were practicing and learning life skills (disguised as a soccer camp) by an attentive staff. These kids, I was soon to find out, are very fortunate to have this facility and the opportunity to escape their daily existence.

As we wound our way through the pot marked streets, and still war torn buildings into the main thorough fair my senses were overwhelmed by what I saw, smelled and heard. Nothing in life can prepare you for experiencing this for the first time. The corrugated tin houses built over a flimsy wooden skeleton with roofs held in place by broken cinder blocks sporadically placed over it. The air, thick with the combined stench of raw sewage, garbage, diesel fuel and burning charcoal. (It was 98 degrees that day, with a heat index of 114.) The never ending mounds of garbage that invade everything you see- the streets, the open sewage canals, the doorsteps to a shanty where the barefooted children play, eat and sleep. The eyes of these kids staring at me, some smiling at the “blanc” staring back at them, others shouting “Hey you!” and holding out a tiny, empty hand.

As we drove deeper into the shanties, I was weighed down with the reality of a people struggling just to live beyond today. The make-shift stands in front of their houses selling anything that may be of value, but with little results as no gourdes are to be found in Cité Soleil today or any other day.

As the truck navigated to the narrow cluttered intersection that was our first stop, the bucket line had already formed, easily fifty yards long with others running, buckets in hand to the back as it grew to well over a hundred yards within seconds.

Kids were coming from every direction now, surrounding us, wanting to hold a hand, play a game, sing a song, or to get in the way of the hose as it fills the buckets, getting a moment of relief from the ovens their tin houses become in the summer heat of Haiti.

As the water began to flow the controlled chaos began. People saw the line was too long, and unless they could get in front somehow there would be no water for them today. Most respected the fairness and intention of the line, others kept trying again, and again, and again to get their buckets spirited to the front. I have never known in my life the certainty of life or death residing in the position of a five gallon paint bucket that doubled as the only clean water available to me. My heart hurts for them, but I don’t know how that truly must feel.

As the water tank filled the last bucket, the line still a hundred people deep, we walked with the children through their neighborhood. We ambled through the narrow paths between the shanties, the temperature now 20 to 30 degrees hotter as the sun reflected off the tin, and any breeze was blocked by how tightly compacted the shanties had become. We slowly emerged into what seemed like the back side to Cité Soleil and a narrow path that wound along the side of a drainage canal filled at least ten feet deep with garbage that emptied into the bay a half mile in front of us.

This path led to a vast open expanse that ended at the ocean’s shore. It quickly became apparent why this space had not been built up.

As I looked down, dodging the ever present garbage piles, and navigating the two small children holding my hands through this maze, I saw their bare feet instinctively missing the intermittent human excrement piles we were walking through. We had indeed stumbled into and were walking through their bathroom. As the reality of this hit me, I looked up and immediately saw the children and few adults squatting not a few hundred feet from us.

These children walking with us, bare footed, some naked, all hungry and suffering multiple untreated sicknesses, live in this reality every day of their life, knowing nothing else.

As I fought back the tears, I knew there was no beginning, no end, I just had to jump in the middle and begin to make a difference...

Blessings...

Michael Cohen

My body left Haiti but my heart stayed behind.

It's Thurday night and I go home tomorrow.

How can I leave this place.

Did I do enough?

Did I understand the people?

What do I do now?

Will life ever be the same?

This was a mission trip for me but as I get ready to leave I think Haiti was on a mission trip for me. I learned more from the people of Haiti than they could ever learn from me.

I don't want to leave but what happens if I stay?

Will it be too much?

Will I always have in the back of my mind that I can leave this place?

What about them - longing to leave and knowing they cant.

Could I listen to the kids cry day after day at Mother Theresa's orphanage?

Could I handle seeing people in desperate need everyday for water, food, money, medical attention?

Could I watch the pain of parents who can't even send their kids to school?

Would I ever become de-sensitized to it all if I stayed?

I don't want to stay but what happens if I leave?

Will it be too much?

Will I get tired of seeing the waste in the U.S.?

Will I get tired of having everything I need?

My family is alive, healthy, happy, and functioning well. Do they really need me here?

How do I explain to people in the U.S. what I saw, felt, heard, smelled?'

Would people really listen to me and respond to the needs of the Haitian people?

Where would I do the most good for the people?

It's Friday

My body left Haiti but my heart stayed behind.

Saturday morning

I'm feeling a little numb and confused about being home so I went to church.

Before mass started I was asking God what it is that He wants from me and praying for help to open my mind to be able to listen.

Well he heard me and I heard Him loud and clear.

The homily reading for the day was Luke chapter 9 verses 57-62

The Cost of Following Jesus

⁵⁷As they were walking along the road, a man said to him, "I will follow you wherever you go."

⁵⁸Jesus replied, "Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head."

⁵⁹He said to another man, "Follow me."
But the man replied, "Lord, first let me go and bury my father."

⁶⁰Jesus said to him, "Let the dead bury their own dead, but you go and proclaim the kingdom of God."

⁶¹ Still another said, "I will follow you, Lord; but first let me go back and say good-by to my family."

⁶²Jesus replied, "No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for service in the kingdom of God."

So now I say to you Jeff & Alyn - The cherry bomb has just exploded!

God Bless Haiti

Shelley

Soiled

The word of the day was: soiled. My black shirt was completely discolored by the end of the three hour trip to Reiser Heights. I rode in the back of the truck the whole way – and my shirt was brown by the end of the night! The countryside was breathtaking. The sights, sounds, and smells completely different from the city of Port-au-Prince. Culture seems to shift once we are in the country. The mountains were amazing!

Everyone seemed relieved to step off of the toptop or truck and into the school of Reiser Heights. The kids were energetic and overjoyed to see us. We blowed bubbles, passed out bracelets, tootsie rolls – and made jokes with the kids. We also were able to feed them and watch the kids glow with laughter.

I visited Reiser Heights two and a half years ago and the change was enormous. The foundations were only there – and this time when we visited, the whole school was constructed and very much in use. Kids were packed inside – and it was the summer! I can only imagine the school year. We were given a tour and I can’t wait to see how kids’ lives are changed and molded by this school.

We stopped halfway on the way back at the Baptist Mission... with an American style restaurant– what a treat!! We ate food ranging from chicken fingers to hot dogs, and some of us enjoyed ice cream (besides David). At the end of the day we drove around Port-Au-Prince and were able to see the Palace and street markets.

All in all it was a wonderful day. It was a sad conclusion to an amazing trip. Tonight as we sit around the table we are going to say our goodbyes – but it is not the end of what God is doing. It is just the beginning. I know we all hate to leave Haiti but we cannot wait to see how God’s work will advance through this trip, not only in the work in Haiti but in our individual lives. We all feel the conviction, fire, and passion of the Lord. This light will be visible when we return to our homes. Our everyday life may go back to “normal”, but I know each one of us will never be the same.

Sarah

Missionaries of Charity

Today we went to visit Mother Teresa's Orphanage. What a moving, overwhelming experience. So many precious children with so many physical, emotional and spiritual needs. My word that I picked to describe the day was "unfair." Why have my children been so blessed? I guess they just happened to be born on the right side of the hemisphere...?

I pray I do not ever forget the sight, the smells and the desperation of the babies I held. I so want to make a difference -

I thank God for this incredible experience. I know with the experience, comes an incredible accountability. God, help me to be a faithful servant, one that will make you proud.

Linda

Our good friend FanFan holds the 2 boys that Carol Plamann from Minnesota is adopting from Mother Theresa's