Thursday, November 22, 2012

Thanksgiving away from home!
As we live day to day, we know we are to be thankful.  We are taught from little up to say ‘Thank you’ when we receive something.  The Apostle Paul instructs us to be thankful in all things.  But today is Thanksgiving Day at home, and it is more than a little strange to be celebrating when life is just going on around you.  We are enjoying an ‘American style’ thanksgiving with Vladimy and Ashly at the mission house in Fond Parisian and we are truly thankful for that.


  But there is so much more to be thankful for!!!!  First of all we are thankful for a loving God who is always Faithful and full of Grace.  We have also been blessed with an awesome family who we miss so much, and our friends and supporters  who are the world’s greatest.  You always come through with the prayers, finances, notes and packages just when we need them the most.  Yes, we are abundantly blessed with material things, but relationships are head and shoulders above anything else.  We thank God today and every day for all of you, for your steadfastness and grace, and pray also that God will continue to abundantly Bless you every day.
 ___________________________

Yes, as we live every day, it occurred to me that we talk about the house, the school, the gardens and the area like you all know what we are talking about.  We’ve been here, but few of you have!  Some have seen pictures, but I thought we’d just give a pictorial tour of the property and our house so when we talk about some of these things you’ll have a better understanding of what we are talking about.
Whenever you hear about Haiti, the poverty is what first comes to mind.  It does to us too, but then something will break through and remind us we are on a tropical island that at one time was close to paradise!   


This is the front of our house, and you probably didn’t even notice the green plants to the left of the step.  They came with the house and I’ve never seen them do anything but sit there and be green. No one seemed to know what they even were.
Well, we found out in a big way this week as these huge blooms just seemed to burst from the plant in just a couple days.  First there was only one, but they just keep coming with 3 coming out now.  We have a lot of surprises here, but few are as welcome as a beautiful flower bursting forth just for the Glory of it’s Creator!

Let's back up a little to show you most of the property.
It’s kind of pie shaped with the house at the pointy end and then goes uphill with the bathroom (kinda in the center of the picture) marking one corner and the administration building for the school (top left) marking the other. The school is between them and the slope below the school is what I fondly refer to as my garden. 

This is my workshop, the only flat, level spot on the
property.  Our solar collectors and water supply are
up here too.  Not much protection from the sun, but the
view is awesome!

Oh,here comes a water delivery now!

It comes just like that, 5 gal. at a time from a spring nearly
a 1/2 mile away.  About $5.00 US per barrel, that's 10 trips
to the spring and back!














Looking uphill from the workshop, up the path past
the tree, the little building to the right is the bathroom.













Looking the other way is the path leading to the laundry room.
Yes, it looks like it just drops off into nowhere.  That's
about what it does.  Down about 100', across a ravine,
up a small hill and on down the ravine to the spring.


























It's not very convenient, but it is absolutely beautiful!  
You're surrounded by the sound of rushing water and
lush greenery.  You have to watch so not to step in the
manure, but the surroundings take your mind off
the labor.  There's always someone around to give 'motherly'
advice.














It's all in the wrist action.  The locals don't think I'll ever get
it right!
And then a leisurely walk home!  














Inside the house there is one main room -
The kitchen is on the one end with the table in the center -













with the sitting area at the other.













The other half of the house is separated into three rooms

Our bedroom













Pat just put the shelves it the utility room.  Everything fits
and has it's place. Organization is good!
And this is your room when you come to visit.  We have a
queen size inflatable mattress. The rest of the furnishings
are in process but it's clean and dry and we do our best to
keep the spiders out!
















The shower is out front not far from the front path.  It can get a little chilly and dark
if you don't get it done before the sun goes down. Adjusting the water temp isn't difficult
either, if it's the day the barrel was filled, you get cold.  If it's been a couple days, it's a
little warmer.  The faucet by the door is the hand washing station.  All the waste water is
collected for irrigation.
My little personal garden is just in front of the house.

This is where it all starts.  The first things I've planted are
growing pretty well.  The trellis has vining spinach planted
at each leg with carrots growing underneath.  The black
bags are tree seedlings that are just about ready to go into
the big garden.
















This is my soil mixing station.  No sterile bagged potting
soil here.  The black stuff is collected topsoil, the pile in
the center is fresh horse manure the kids collected for
me and the pile to the right is compost I've made.  The green
stuff is leaves  off a Neem tree.  I cut them up and mix them in.  It's a
natural insecticide.  Everything gets mulched with
Neem leaves too.
 






















Well, that's the nickel tour.  Hope it helps make sense of some of what we have talked about before and future posts as well.  It's still a month or so from bean harvest so I'm running out of places to plant things.  We have eaten some of our own green beans and lettuce.  The carrots aren't too far off and there are little cucumbers on that just showed up yesterday.  We're finding out that the bugs like sweet corn more than we do.  That crop isn't going to amount to anything.  The language is coming, very slowly, but we are getting braver in venturing out and trying to engage people in conversation.  Our next goal is to become emersers, venturing out and making new friends.  The plan is to take a walk every day to discover new friends and learn more of their language and history.  Pray that God would remove the scales from our ears and loosen our tongues so we can really become a part of the lives of our neighbors and begin to understand their culture.  

'Si Bondye vle!' (If God wills!)   Our neighbor Memin, bread baker and mother of 7

Tuesday, November 13, 2012

Yeah we're still here!
Wow!  It seems like so long since we've talked to you all!  The last couple weeks have been really frustrating.  Not really ministry/life things so much, more things we had taken for granted at home that just really don't work the same here.  But before we go any further, there are some things we are really thankful for.  We were without internet service for about 10 days and were really feeling isolated.  Our budget doesn't allow a lot of time on the phone so text messages were our only contact.  Almost....Good ole' snail mail came through!!!! We just want to send thanks to some people that really came through for us and brought some huge smiles.  Joan, you are the best sister in the world!!!  You're note and the treats were a huge bright spot!  Josie Hicks and the kids at The Gathering Place really lightened our house with your pictures and knowing you remember us!  We have some really great supporters for Heart of Compassion, too.  We'd shared about the needs for some upgrades at the school and several have stepped up to really make it look like we can get the work done.  Thank you so much, you know who you are.

Ok, now to catch up a little. This will be pretty random, because that is what our life is like here.  The frustrations come when you expect things to turn out your way and work the way you want them to. God wants us to depend on Him and be content with the way He works things out.  It's a hard lesson to learn, right up there with learning a new language, but we're getting there slowly. 

My days have been filled more with projects than farming.  I'm kinda out of room to plant stuff till the black bean harvest and we're heading into the dry season, so I've been in my workshop on the roof.  

Building benches for the school.  The cordless drill is a
blessing until the batteries are gone.

Had to rip some boards to make
shutters for the front of the house.













Hanging shutters.

Did I tell you what a blessing a cordless drill is?  Yeah,
I'm drilling in concrete! 














Cheryl's days are probably more random than mine!  I just wear a floppy hat to protect my brain from the sun.  She's more talented than I, and can multi task way better than me, so she wears LOTS of hats!

She's now 'Godmother' to Samyell, the new son of our
friends Tinom and Klotid.  He's a cutie!
She counsels people that appear at the door.  Headaches,
body aches and heartaches.  She's a good listener!













She spends a lot of time at the school, especially helping
with the meals














She's gets her hands dirty occasionally.  This is her herb
garden that is slowly providing some culinary herbs.
Lots of weeds too!














There's lots to learn about cooking in the mountains!












The neighbor ladies like learning to cook on the gas
stove too!














And of course the 'Front Step Medical Clinic' seems to
always be open!

There has been considerable work done on the road since the hurricane, but it's still pretty iffy a lot of places.  There were 3 of the big 'top top' trucks that fell over this week but there were no injuries we heard of.  The people are scared to ride on them.  Can't see as I blame them. Instead, they have to walk, in some cases several hours through the riverbed to and from the markets with their wares on their heads or backs. 

The way they load these things, they are really top heavy with cargo and then they usually put a layer of passengers on top and hanging on the sides!  A truck like this one would usually carry 30 or more people on top of the load you see.  And that's the new road you see behind it.  There is still a lot of water running, and you can see how brown it still is in the main river to the right.  It is unbelievable how much soil was lost in this one storm.  It is heartbreaking, but there is hope.  We are terracing our ground and hoping it will catch on to our neighbors to keep some of this soil on the mountain, but that is a story for another day.

Sunday came and we hiked down the mountain with visions of good company and internet service.  Oops, better not get my expectations up too high! It did work out though.  There are a lot of stories that will come at another time as we continue to adjust to life on the mountain and learn to be more self sufficient in doing some of the things that cause inconveniences and frustrations.  Life is good.  We are slowly learning how to communicate. Maybe I should say that our neighbors are adjusting to our version of Kreole!  This trip down holds a special treat because we have been invited to an ag ministry conference with other missionaries in the area doing the same things we are.  A day with English speakers that are experiencing the same things we are.  We're really looking forward to that!
So, we caught a moto and headed to Fond Parisienne for a night with Vlad and Ashly before heading on into Coix des Boquets for the conference.  This had really been fun, working on a fast internet connection!  It's only 3G, but seems lightning fast compared to what we work with on the mountain.  Thanks to you all for your prayers and support.  God is doing some really neat things on the mountain we share with Him.  Stay tuned and we'll tell you more about the school, the church and everyday life in Soliette!  Love you ALL!
pnc

"God is my friend." Masouk, age 15
A friend living on his own since age 11!