Tuesday, June 19, 2012

Checking in from Haiti

Hello! We have been in Haiti since June 5th. We are staying in Carrefour with Don Mobley, who is a missionary with God's Missionary church. He has been a wonderful host by helping us with culture, customs and the language. He has 40 different boys that live off and on with him who attend the college here on the compound. We have gotten to know Escotte, Menal and a few others. They are all very good cooks and we have enjoyed the food we have been served. Lots of rice and beans and beans and rice! Thankfully, we like beans and rice :o)
  We flew in Tues. and stayed a few days before driving 11 hours one way to Grande Riviere du Nord. A very bumpy, hot, long, yet scenic drive! We had very primitive accomodations at GR such as little electricity, no comfy soft furniture, seldom had COLD water to drink and HUGE spiders, cockroaches, ants and mosquitos. Despite the less than ideal circumstances, God really helped us to connect with our future Haitian family! We taught each other English and Creole alike. They put us girl's hair in corn rows and taught us how to handwash our clothes. I shared my Southern Living magazines with them and they were thrilled! We sang a special in church on sunday with a few of our Haitian sisters and was able to read to a couple groups of children from a Creole book. God is good and gave us the grace, help and strength we needed to deal with the culture shock. We also experienced extreme temps in excess of 105 a couple of the days we were there. Pastor Dominique and his wife, Madamne Dominique are the caretakers of the orphanage and have 3 children of their own. We will be co-laborers with them when we move to GR. Looking forward to working with them!  Danny helped to build a house for Escotte. He will be moving back there once he finishes college in Carrefour. We stayed about a week in Grande Riviere before heading back to Carrefour. We stopped at La Croix and spent the night with another sweet mennonite missionary couple that we met. The Martins are wonderful hosts and their house with 24/7 electricity, fans and comfortable furniture plus COLD water with ICE was a refreshing haven to our weary souls! Mrs. Martin fixed us an American meal of Spaghetti, salad, garlic bread and cupcakes..what a treat! We thoroughly enjoyed our stay with them!
   We arrived back in Carrefour on Thur. and have been relaxing and resting for a few days. We have been helping with cleaning and handy man projects around the compound here. We have come and go electricity, you never know when you will have it. Amazingly, we have had it today all day long! Very rare! We have been able to get all of our laundry done using Don's old wringer washer and the 3 boys have gotten haircuts from Escotte. We are enjoying the fans and being on the pc most of the day :o) Thankful for this blessing! We have been having a hard time with culture shock and this day is a breathe of fresh air! God knows just what we need does'nt He!?
 Enjoy the pics and thank-you for your continued prayers!


                                               Our kiddos at the airport early in the morning.
                                           
                                              
                                                  Mommy's side of the plane

                                                    
                                                  Daddy's side of the plane.

                                            
                                          Our family with Pastor Dominique's family

 
                                            Our family standing where God has called us!
 
 I wanted to post a lot more pics but it takes FOREVER to upload here so feel free to visit our page on Fb to see all the pics I have posted. There are lots! Friend us at Dannynliz Hirschy Flowers.
 When we get back to the states I will try to upload more photos on here.