The LAST POST from Haiti...

Sorry about not being able to post last night. We were having power issues here at the house and needed to power pretty much everything except for our well pump. Life in Haiti...

I'm now posting on Friday morning. I'm trying to recapture all the conversations from last night in order to give you the Thursday recap as well as what we're about to tackle this morning.

Here's the rundown from yesterday (Thursday):

1. Dustin, Amy and Suzanne finished up their time at the ND hospital/clinic. It sounds like it was a pretty uneventful day (by Haitian standards). We planned for them to leave around 3p in order to head to an orphanage that TG has just formed a relationship. They were able to perform simple evaluations of the children in order to ensure their general health. Around 5p these three were joined by Tyler, Matt, Jon and Greg and the eight of us had a rocking time just playing with the children, holding them, loving them and in my case actually trying to jump rope with them.

2. Matt, Greg and Jon were back for a final day with the Baptist team, where we did a little more of what we've been doing all week...digging holes and mixing/pouring cement. Dirty, but frankly, kind of fun. We've appreciated the interactions we've had with these three men and one woman and the unique things that they are doing here in Haiti. One of these three men reminded us a great deal of what Joe Drew might be like in 30 yrs. Ask for a story about Herb...you'll see.

3a. Tyler stayed out of the sun again today. When we had some overcast skies he was able to jump in on the roofing project with Joe and John. He also tackled some additional organizing here in the house.

3b. Ken spent a good part of the day prepping supplies for the latrine project here at the house. Mid afternoon, he and his new partner-in-crime, Terry headed up the hill to knock out a few things. They have just a couple of small parts to finish up on today (Friday).

4. John and Joe were back up on the roof. Since metal arrived, they made great headway on getting us nearly completed. In the afternoon, while stopping for a break, John had the chance to interact with a few of the local kids in the street out front. He then had an idea, ran inside his bunkhouse and returned with two ball gloves and a ball. He then spent the remainder of the afternoon teaching some local kids to catch and throw. It was awesome to hear this story and realize again that this whole "thing" is about the people and not the project!

And then for today. Our flight out of PaP isn't until 5p, but b/c of possible traffic issues, reliability of vehicles and general Haitian life, we're leaving the house at 12n (keep in mind that the airport is maybe 15 miles away). So we've sent Ken and Terry up the hill to finish what they can on the latrine project. I'm sure the two of them will have a hard time leaving the place where they've invested so much time and energies (into both the project and the people). On the homefront, we've thrown four people up on the roof (I'm supposed to be one of those four, but I snuck away to type this...shhh!) Others are doing a major re-organization of supplies as well as a few other small things that need to get done here.

Despite wanting to get to our families and homes, I know it's going to be a tough day to leave. We've had a fantastic time...God has met us in various ways...new relationships have been born, existing relationships have been cemented. We can't wait to see you all...

Today's photos:

1. Dustin and one of the children from the orphanage

2. A shot of the trenches and the concrete work at the Baptist mission site where Jon, Greg and Matt have been.

(a general apology about not having any photos of Ken and Tyler's latrine site. Ken's camera's memory card is incompatible with the laptop. Therefore we'll have to hit up Ken for his photos when we get back home!)