An Early Good Morning to All

My days are all hectically full and so I try to blog in the evening just before bed. On the last two blogs I made errors. I forgot to mention some children who had been to HATS on one and put in two photos almost exactly alike on the last one. Doing the blogs when I was very overtired may have had something to do with that ?? We will see. Now it is 4:00 a.m. Will this one be any better ???

The construction and repair work continues at HATS. Only one thing remains to be done on the Kid’s home – a sink for the kitchen. And painting, of course, which will be done later on. The windows are in the missionary house upstairs. We need to get the plumbing and electrical work finished up there, and doors in. Those who have been to HATS might have difficutly recognizing the house in this photo. Can this possibly be the same building??

Windows going in missionary house

Is this recognizable to anyone who has been here?

The loud banging and crashing of cement, and the sound of cement debris being dumped down behind my office window continues as the top level of the house continues to be broken down. It is anything but pleasant but it is necessary. So grit the teeth and take ibuprofen for the headache caused by it all, and let’t get it over with. The roof must come down. As it does the plies of rubble go up. A lot of cement dust caused from dumping the debris behind the house necessiated the closing of windows, and covering in sheets. Yesterday the pile became dangerous to the glass in the office windows so plywood had to cover the windows outside. And the repair work goes on.

Let’s get this roof down

The roof came down and the rubble piled up

Falling cement broke the newly installed water pipes so Luckner did a repair job which gave us water on the compound again. What remains to come down is the section next to my two satellite dishes. What to do??? Take a chance and leave them in place?? Or remove them and possibly have to wait weeks to get them up and positioned properly again. Must decide today.

Luckner repairing broken water pipe from falling cement

The repair work has been underway this week on the compound walls damaged in the quake. A lot of the support posts (far more than half) were damaged and are being replaced. Work is being done on one section at a time as, for safety reasons, the fence wall cannot remain open. Yesterday heavy rain came quickly and the work continued as the workers knew they could not quit without the fence being secure.

Work on repairing enclosure fence

School is out for the summer and there is no one happier about that than I am. A break from that is needed. The students and teachers return for a couple of hours this week for the students to be given their report cards. Reminder: Sponsors of our students – please forward your sponsoring fees for the school year, Sept 2010 to June 2011, to the Hands Across The Sea Association in Yarmouth. Thank you for continuing to help your student receive a very necessary education.

Antoinette, the house mother, decided to have everything in the Kid’s Home cleaned – all clothes, all cupboards, supply boxes, everything. The kids were helping with that job. I caught Leica helping and then my heart soared as I saw something else. Our precious Ti Fi who continues to blossom and improve these days was helping too. I saw her carring a small plastic tub, in which she had water and laundry detergent. (This is amazing for her.) She carefully set it down next to Mirlande and proceeded to help Mirlande wash their undies. Ti Fi’s face was beautiful as she showed me what she was doing. Mine had tears of joy as I watched it. Good things are happening here with the children now. I have someone who is working with me – not against me. Thank you, God.

Leica helping clean

Precious TiFi doing laundry with Mirlande

Ti Luc has not been well since Wednesday. Luckner and I went to PAP Wednesday to do some necessary shopping. We returned with a refrigerator and other needed items. When checking home with Martha that day I was told Ti Luc was not well. He had a fever and was vomiting. He has been ill since then, and yesterday, Friday, he was in my arms the whole day – 8:00 a.m. to 7:15 p.m after which time he spent the night hours lying next to me. Presently he is asleep here next to me and I am trying to get this blog done before he awakes. His fever was not bad yesterday – low grade – but he was having seizures (or that is what I am calling them.) Please God may he be somewhat better today.