Back at HATS for the 2nd Time!

Hey everyone, Jocelyn here! I’m glad to be back at HATS for the second time. Sandra, Dickie and I all arrived safe with all our luggage on Tuesday. The Internet has not been working well and we have been unable to get a blog out. We are hoping to get this out by sending it by itself and Karen sending photos individually from her camera to hopefully be posted with this blog.

Our first full day here was spent putting up Christmas lights around the compound, the kids are so excited! We have the tree up in the gallery and decorations are going up in the Children’s Homes.

I spent some time with TiFi doing therapy, hopefully more over the next week. She loves the bright red bouncy ball, her face lights up and she starts to giggle. Sandra brought her a soft baby doll with yarn hair that she loves also. She hugs it and loves it and then gives it back to me to do the same. She also enjoys playing with the magnetic dolls that you can attach clothes to, we always seem to have help with that activity 😉

As usual the food is delicious here… pancakes, spaghetti, tuna melts, pumpkin soup, oatmeal, chicken, beans & rice, and of course fresh mangoes!! We are always spoiled with amazing food every time we come!

On Thursday we went to the furniture store, market, grocery store and bank in St. Marc. We went to a furniture store and bought a water cooler as our other one had broke. We went to the grocery store next. Found most of our supplies we needed. The total ended up being over 7000 gouds, good thing it wasn’t in Canadian dollars ;). We drove through the busy crowded streets of St. Marc to get to one of the markets. This was my first time going through the market and Karen would not let go of my hand the whole time! It was a quiet day in the market but everyone was still hollering and squeezing through the small walkways, and it was hot! I don’t speak Creole but all you can hear as you’re walking through the markets is “blanc this and blanc that”, everywhere we go, they’re always talking about us. As we were walking through some school kids kept following us and when I would turn around they would giggle and touch me and run away, they were quite amazed with the blanc going through their market! There were many motos and even a huge truck trying to fit through the small paths of the market! We had to be very careful not to get our toes run over. We stopped at a few vendors and picked up some barrettes for the girls to wear in their hair for school and a dress for Leica, one of the older girls here at the orphanage. As you walk through the market, they have just about everything for sale. Anything you can think of they sell it…clothes, shoes, toiletries, furniture, electronics, food, etc. One of the things I noticed at one of the vendors were these strange looking small clay-like discs. Karen said they are cookies made of dirt mixed with a little sugar and vanilla to make them taste good.

We finished walking through the market and made it back to the truck safely, avoiding motos and honking trucks. We went on to the bank… That was the scariest trip to the bank I’ve ever taken! The bank looks like a big ware house on the inside with concrete walls going half way up. There are a few guards outside with machine guns and some inside also. We got in line at the bank and told the teller what we had come for. All the Haitians stared at us while we were waiting, some give you some nasty looks! Our bank trip took about forty minutes before we got back to truck. Just driving around in Haiti is an experience! The motos and bikes and trucks and tap taps all think they’re the only ones on the road and everyone is honking and hollering and squeezing through the tiniest of spaces between the trucks. Dickie got us safely back to the compound… That was enough excitement for one day!

We enjoyed a walk along the canal with the children before supper. The walks have always been one of my favourite times in Haiti. The sun is setting and it lights up the mountains, everything is so green and beautiful, it’s just perfect.

On Friday we got a chance to redo Ti Luc’s room, half is his bedroom and the other half is his schoolroom. As Karen was standing on the bed passing me bookbags, I see a cockroach on my hand! I screamed, Karen screamed, Sandra came running and Leica grabbed a shoe to kill it! Good thing someone is brave around here!

This afternoon we had fresh coconuts for a treat. One of the staff cut a bit off the top of the coconut with a machete and gave it to us to drink the yummy coconut milk. Everyone of us got a coconut. Once we drank all the juice, he broke it open again and we got to eat the inside. Mine was soft and juicy, not quite ripe yet. I got to try some of the other ones that were more ripe and hard. It was so good! The kids were digging it out with forks and spoons, they were covered in it. It took a lot of work to get that snack but it was worth it!

Dickie has all the Christmas lights up and working and the compound looks beautiful! The kids are so excited for Christmas!

~Jocelyn