Safe in God's Will

There is no safe place.

Many would say Haiti is one of the least safe places in the world.

There are myriad risks here, from traffic to unclean water to manifestations: protests when citizens create roadblocks and throw rocks, to be discouraged by police forces with tear gas and rifles.

One Tuesday last month the National Road in front of our school hosted such a manifestation.

By noon students were leaving in droves, anxious parents and caregivers leading their charges away to avoid the risks of rocks and gas.

Ti Goave has been troubled by riots like this in the past month. Students from the lycee, the public high school, are protesting for the lack of teachers. The teachers are striking for they have not been paid for a questionably long time. Town’s folk demand electricity after a week of no power. Thus far the manifestations have not succeeded in reopening the lycee or paying salaries, but they have disrupted school for everyone, and turn on some switches.

On this particular Tuesday our second-grade class went down to Recreation as scheduled at 11:30, but was called into the kitchen after just ten minutes so students could eat something before departure. (Usually they are dismissed at 2:00.) Once in the kitchen excitement matured into minor frenzy which would increase to chaos with the afternoon.

In the five minutes preceding, I had been attempting to direct exercise when we were interrupted by our sixteen year old custodian Jonas.

 “We have gas there! Get away from the windows!”

He swung his arm toward the far wall where rows of open-window blocks let in feeble light and air. On that side of the school building there is nothing but an empty lot riddled with banana trees and various stubby growth. The street is perhaps a couple hundred feet away, for the Recreation room, kitchen, office, and bathrooms are set at the back of the building, after all of the classrooms.

I looked out the windows and neither saw nor smelled any foreboding vapors, and shook my head.

“Thank you, for inciting a panic,” I said to myself, and called the students to order, arranging them on the other side of the room and continuing to lead exercises. Our security guard and substitute Recreation teacher Michelet had disappeared to the almost immediately after our entry, so I had stepped in.

“Make two lines,” I said, spacing out students so they could move without hitting one another. We were just getting into twists to practice counting by three, when the group began to flow away from me, pushing each other out of the doorway.

“Go to eat!” someone said, I think it was Madame Rose, sticking her head round the door.

I sighed but followed the surge and called again for order.

There was an attempt to storm the kitchen and be served, but I called for return to the hallway to wash hands. We always wash our hands before we eat.

A passable line was formed and the class began to wash, but those waiting kept turning to look down the hall and out the front doors. This caused backups as the line wouldn’t move forward.

“Turn around, be calm,” I kept repeating. (I would speak less and less Creole as the afternoon progressed.)

The words were not as important as the tone of voice, as the hands that turned around writhing bodies and directed them forward, one by one, to wash their hands and enter the kitchen as usual. “Let’s keep routine,” I told myself, paying little attention to what kerfuffle was occurring at the end of the hallway.

With some compliance the children washed their hands, filed into the kitchen, received their food, and then marched up the stairs.

In the classroom everyone ate at their place, most wearing their backpacks, knowing they might be called to go at any moment. I knew that, too, but didn’t acknowledge it.

“Don’t eat too fast,” I said from my station at the front. “Pa mange two rapide. Mange normal.”

As students finished I collected their plates at the front. Then we gathered our bags and headed downstairs, the children combining in Madame Patricia’s five-year old classroom.

The low point of the day was when I was left in charge of thirty-odd children crammed into the office.

I had been surveying Madame Samanne’s classroom, wishing to engage the wild and leaderless students but not knowing how to go about it. So I continued to stand, half inside the classroom and half out, watching the hallway.

Suddenly there were several loud pops, and staff began to sprint down the hall. Madame Samanne lunged inside, Madame Valerie bolted from the doorway she’d been guarding, Madame Rose and Jonas burst inside from their outside post. There were cries of “Gas! Gas!”

A flood commenced from classrooms and courtyard to office.

I recognized that I was still standing, that no noxious fumes had knocked me over or assaulted my eyes. There were no masked police or sign-carrying protesters surging through the doors from the street.

Thus I left my own post and began my almost leisurely way down the hall after the crowd. The teachers had shunted students into the office, deeming it the most secure place in the school, although even there the windows are open blocks that permit constant outdoor air and sunshine to enter. If there were truly gas spoiling the area, the office would be as hazardous as any other room. There was no safe place.

As I walked, I pulled up the collar of my teacher’s polo to cover my nose.

“Cover your mouth, cover your nose,” I began to repeat, approaching the office. “Kouvri bouch, kouvri nè.”

Madame Patricia saw me from her stance in the doorway. Her troubled face smoothed a bit at this practical action. She began to repeat my direction, pulling up her own collar.

The word spread inside and soon all the teachers were instructing the mingled students to cover their faces, tugging orange tee shirts from waistbands and lifting them up over noses and mouths.

Our office is perhaps 8 by 12 feet, comfortable enough for the bookshelves, cabinetry, desk and benches, and various boxes and articles, along with a few staff and odd students. It was not designed as a shelter for 30 persons.

And there we were.

The teachers at first huddled near the door, which remained open, continuing to usher in the odd student, Samanne and Valerie herding the three-year olds into the adjoining bathroom.

The students were mixed, ages four to seven crowded together on benches, the desk chair, standing or leaning on the walls. Only half of them had their backpacks.

The three-year olds were then sitting on the edge of the tiled shower stall, or jumping around on the tiled floor, as vivacious or silent as they always were.

After a few minutes, teachers began trickling away. We’d been united in our flight from potential harm, but as the time passed without those noxious fumes, the teachers became bold enough to leave. All of them have families. All our teachers save Valerie have children of their own. And most take moto taxis home. I understood their desire to leave—the advisability of their leaving.

That didn’t leave me happy about their departure.

For there I stood, the sole adult in a room packed with young children, some of them only three years old, attending for sounds of sirens, horns, gas canisters popping, or Michelet calling someone’s name to signal a guardian’s arrival.

As the minutes passed the noise inside increased. Most children were talking, chatting, laughing, pushing, whining, searching for amusement in that stuffy room.

I called for silence. It was predictably ineffectual.

I picked up the Bible, what I’d done earlier in Madame Patricia’s classroom where second grade mingled with her kindergarten class. I’d commenced the story of Noah, projecting my already tired voice to stumble through the Creole as I half-regarded the book and half-regarded the students.

In the classroom the story had been mostly well-received, and the noise level and frenzied frolicking had decreased.

There, in the office, my attempt at entertainment was unsuccessful. I thought of The Book Thief, and wished I could comfort a roomful by the sound of my voice telling a tale.

The three-year olds kept jumping. Kids kept pushing and talking and elbowing one another.

After perhaps 15 minutes, a first grader spoke up.

“M’ap chante, Madame Rachelle,” she whispered to my ear. “I’m going to sing.”

“Ok, go ahead,” I nodded, putting the Bible back down on the desk.

I had refrained from singing earlier because I’d guessed the noise level in response would be even higher than before, as children who love to sing and dance would commence singing at the top of their lungs. Or shouting the lyrics.

The first grader began to sing one of the most popular songs at school: He’s got the whole world in his hands. Il tient le monde entier dans ses mains.

Her voice was immediately joined by several others, and a rousing chorus began. We pounded through one verse before word came in that the greatest risk had passed and we ought to relocate across the hall in the Recreation room to give the kids some more space.

Thirty minutes later we’d be back in the office, although this time only myself and a handful of students remained. All other students had been collected by guardians who took firm hold of the children’s hands and rapidly retreated back through the gate.

There had been another call of close proximity gas, and the air was indeed a bit foul. My eyes were pricking, so I lowered sunglasses onto my face and pulled up the little ones’ tee shirts to mask their mouths and noses again.

Outside the office windows is a beaten path alley where there are perpetually parked and broken cars rusting in the sun. Sometimes it seems a mechanic is there, and there’s light foot traffic, but the route is small and unimportant. Crowds and gas had no place down that way.

I looked around the small office space, noting the heavy iron doors that could slam into the concrete walls and lock us in here or the bathroom. In the U.S. that bathroom would probably be the allotted lockdown space, or the tornado shelter: the most enclosed space in the building where we could hunker down and bar the door. But even there the open window blocks break up the thick wall and ventilated between the bathroom’s interior and the hallway. There is no safe place.

That Tuesday school day finally finished as the last child was collected and we drove home, weary with tension and dust. The car we use is a new model, barely two years old with smooth gears, electric tinted windows and locking doors. Inside we are sealed from dust, scents, and exposure. It’s almost a safe place.

But car accidents are fast. Motos zip up and down the streets on whichever side they please. Pedestrians, dogs and goats crisscross the way. Potholes and speed bumps disrupt the pavement and huge loaded trucks and speeding Papadap vans roar along National Road on their way to Port au Prince. Venders’ stalls stretch from the road side. Driving involves intense concentration: one palm ready on the horn, eyes darting from side mirror to rearview to far side and back again, squinting through the sun and swerving around whatever dog, goat, van, wheelbarrow or trash pile is blocking the road.

No, the car is not a safe place. Beverly and I prefer walking when we can rather than deal with the swerving, honking, avoiding, dust-rousing and street parking that driving entails. On our own two feet there are narrow paths to walk, sunshine and trees to enjoy, and community members to greet. We choose the pace and worry only for ourselves, not an expensive machin or another’s livelihood—or life.

No one would say that the roads are safe.

Petit Goave is a safe town. It’s well maintained and quite impressively clean. There are the blessed drainage ditches that aided so much during the hurricane. There are waste baskets posted on some corners and certain fields unofficially designated as dump zones. Lush green and brilliant flowers border and adorn us here.

Many people in the community know us, from church, school, or frequent sightings. We walk paths, sidewalks, and main roads. We buy local and always greet with a smile. To many we are no longer an anomaly but an amusing pair of friendly local faces.

Most times we are quite comfortable in our excursions, our purposeful forays to our ocean-side retreat, the copy shop, or home from school.

While Beverly was gone, at home with her ailing husband from mid December until early February, I walked little. Most of my housemates don’t care much for walking, and it’s inadvisable for me to go alone. In our pair there is security; on my own there is invitation.

So two afternoons in a row I asked Jonas to accompany me on the walk to the copy shop. This little back-alley shop is directly across from our church, perhaps a half-mile from the house, easily accessible by main roads.

“You want to go this way? You want to see house Ann?” Jonas asked as we turned up the perpendicular street that should lead us straight to the copy-shop street. It is paved and interrupted on both sides by little stalls, driveways, and unexplained holes.

He gestured to a narrow beaten path veering down from the road on the right side, traversing through a bank of trash and winding out of sight among the trees.

I’d seen people using it but never thought to take that route.

“Yes, okay, but I don’t know the way,” I said.

So I tailed after Jonas down this footpath, stepping over the litter of bottles, cans, water saches and wires. We twisted down to walk beneath sunbeams and tree-limbs, the path widening, passing half-finished walls and many contented pigs. Then the path forked, the right side diverging to a cluster of houses and possibly abandoned structures. On the left it hugged a wall, turning a corner out of sight. But in the open space I could see a distant high wall and the mountainous horizon. As we turned that corner the view opened and it was lovely: sunlight and shade and green foliage.

I liked taking this new way with Jonas, merging from footpath to dirt road, passing beneath tree limbs, immersed in the thick of local terrain.

Jonas showed me his school and introduced me to the director seated at the office door. I shook my head at the expected cries of “Blan! Blan!” from children. At the end of the road we emerged onto the copy-shop street, stepping back onto cobbles, and went about our business.

The next day we walked that way again, but diverged to stop at Ann’s house.

At a corner before the house a cluster of young boys lounged, and were particular amused to spot a blan. Jonas summoned me inside the house after him as their calls continued.

I was glad to duck through the hanging clothes, pass the ladies and children sitting there, and turn out of sight in the next room where Jonas met Ann’s tailor husband.

But as I stood there, shadowed, one of the young ones approached the house and tried to enter.

The ladies shooed him off. I wondered whether his manman had ever taught him manners. I wondered if he had a manman.

When we emerged from the house the clump called louder and louder.

In response, Jonas swung his legs in his usual swagger and cranked up the volume on the speaker he was carrying. The degrading voices were drowned under Alicia Keys passionate “This Girl is on Fire.”

Jonas and I laughed and continued, the prickling discomfort in my palms and heart lessening every step we took away from that corner. I thanked God for Jonas, thanked Jonas for being security for me, and wondered if I’d ever be able to go out on my own. Just when it seems the community is acceptant and affable—there’s another someone, usually group of someones, who crush the budding sense of comfort.

The streets are not safe.

So we are usually grateful to get off the streets, returning to Pastor’s house, our house. This large concrete house firmly enclosed by high wall topped with wire, gated, and patrolled by dogs. Inside the windows are barred and screened and lights brighten the darkness.

The house has always felt a safe place.

But even here, even from my favorite rooftop post, threats are possible.

I first had this inkling during the hurricane, when Matthew knocked on every door and window, huffed and puffed in rage when we wouldn’t admit him. The bars on the windows prevented broken branches entering, and the lack of glass sheltered us from broken glass. However leaves and water blew through those screened and barred windows. In my bedroom the bed sets between two windows, and usually I fight to feel the entering breeze. While Matthew blew outside, I wrapped myself in two sheets topped with a towel and curled my feet away from trespassing rain.

There was no total refuge from wind, water, or darkness inside the house.

Last week I sat on the roof with three visitors and Madame Beverly just before dusk. The family was all at Tuesday night church service, leaving us five at the house. The gate was closed save for a few inches where it was sticking: we had given up trying to seal it and just shrugged for the best.

A knock came at the gate. Beverly and I called out.

“Bonswa—ki es? Who’s there?”

Beverly heard an answering male name and thought he was delivering bread. She set off to collect the bread while the rest of us remained on the roof.

I perched on my usual concrete slab and waited for her to appear in the courtyard below. In the crack of the gate I could see a figure.

Beverly began crossing the cement yard when suddenly Blackie, the long-legged dog named for his color came bounding out and cut off her step.

“Oh, Blackie!” she called. “Wait! There’s a dog out—chyen!”

The figure hastily backed out through the gate, echoing her warning of chyen dog.

I watched from above as Beverly turned her step, calling after Blackie to get back.

A few minutes later she returned to the roof, shaking her head.

“I don’t know who that is,” she said, looking down at the almost-shut gate. “I didn’t like that he started to let himself in.”

Down in the courtyard, now dusky and rife with shadows, Blackie was trotting about and sniffing contentedly.

“That man, he started to come in before I got to the gate. And then Blackie came out right in front of me!”

We all stopped to listen to the man on the other side of the gate. There was an exchange. He entreated entry to leave something for Pastor. We told him he had to wait, that Pastor was coming.

He offered to leave the something with us and be on his way. I stood up to go down to collect it. Beverly said no.

“I don’t know who he is. I don’t let people in that I don’t know.”

I called down again to this figure at the gate, who was now afraid to enter and face a possibly hostile dog.

“Ou bezwen tale pou Paste! You have to wait for Pastor ! »

He was not pleased but Beverly stood her ground.

“I bolted all the doors downstairs,” she said. “He’s not getting in.” After a few minutes the figure turned away and walked up the street with what sounded to be words of discontent.

By then the courtyard was all but black, and the roof deeply shadowed.

“I believe God brought out Blackie at just the right time,” Beverly said from her seat on the concrete.

Blackie had been tied up behind the house with the other two dogs. They are only released at night when the house is shut up or when everyone is gone. That night he slipped out of his collar and loped happily free. His loping cut off Beverly’s stride to the gate, the uncloseable gate through which a stranger was entering.

We continued talking on the roof of other things, watching stars appear in their twinkling glory. But from my regular perch I continued to survey the gate and courtyard below, and noted the sinister obscurity of the night shadows in which I normally reveled. The soft, restful darkness could be hiding anyone.

We took comfort in our high walls topped with wire. In our watchdog-patrolled courtyard. In our barred iron doors. In our placement on the top of the house. In our position of respect in the community.

Mostly we took comfort from Jesus. From the All Mighty. From His angels who we knew stood on those razor wired walls. Who patrolled the courtyard and the street and the skies. Who crossed swords over doorways and sat beside us under the stars.

When the family came back from church we told them about the gate not closing and our mysterious visitor. We shared his name, and Pastor appeared to recognize it. He considered it possible such a person, an acquaintance from the mountain, did indeed come looking for him. He also understood Beverly’s decision to refuse entry to a stranger.

With their arrival the gate was closed firmly, with guidance on how it could be fitted (stubbornly) in place and padlocked; the generator was cranked and lights blazed forth from the windows. The house was full of voices, laughter, and light once again.

I went to bed without fear of the shadows.

Today there were manifestations again. Beverly marks this as her first manifestation experience at school. It was certainly up close and personal: directly in front of our building there were roadblocks, rocks and angry protestors.

There was police retaliation. There were gas and firearms.

Parents began to arrive with the restless crowds around 11:30 and pulled students hurriedly through the gate.

Like the last time, I was not afraid. I was frustrated this was happening again, but more determined than ever to not let this time be wasted. With Beverly there, surveying and organizing, responding as a long-time emergency-trained United States teacher would, with reason and calm and clear directions, the entire school was less frenzied.

(And perhaps the experience of having been through all this before…)

After Recreation ended for our class at noon, students lined up to wash hands, collected their food, and returned to class. I entered the room to quiet eating, everyone seated in place, some already wearing their backpacks for the inevitable dismissal.

But I didn’t accept the wide-eyed fear on some faces.

I set down my own plate of food and addressed those nineteen second graders, and my co-teacher.

“Class, don’t be afraid. We don’t have to be afraid. God is with us. He is for us.”

I picked up one of our new Bibles, a Creole New Testament that each child will be responsible for and practice reading.  I turned to Matthew 6:25 and started reading, stumbling over the first few verses.

“Look at the birds of the air; gade zwazo k’ap vole nan syel la they do no sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Eske nou pa vo pi plis pase zwazo yo?”

My co-teacher, Madame Alice, sat on the back desk and clucked along with the reading. At verse 34 I closed the Bible.

“Do not worry about tomorrow, pa chaje tèt nou pou denmen…”

“Class, God does not want us to be afraid. Satan wants us to be afraid. He wants us to be discouraged, to stop learning. Do we want to make Satan happy? Nou vle bay Satan plezi?”

“No,” everyone agreed.

“Okay, so we will not be scared. We will continue. We will keep learning.”

There were then a few loud pops from outside. I recognized the sound of gas being thrown—again.

Beverly called up and then appeared in the doorway.

“Get your stuff and go downstairs. And pray,” she said in the perfect Director voice: authoritative and rational.

Students gathered their bags and plates and filed down the stairs to the Recreation room. Madame Alice and I took a few extra minutes to gather up our own things and the materials intended for the afternoon lesson.

When I arrived down in the Recreation room students were milling. Some were sitting, some standing, some wandering slowly, some kneeling. I was giving directions to sit down in silence when one told me, “Shh. We’re praying.”

Beverly had gone from class to class instructing teachers and students to pray. Everyone had heeded, and in that open space with balls piled in a corner, our seven-year old students were talking to God on their knees, asking safety for our school.

Every morning we pray protection for our school, for the building and all the members. We pray for blessing on the food preparation and consumption, for clean water, for guard against malady and contagion, for encouragement and overflowing love and joy.

Every evening in family service we pray protection for the house, for the courtyard and all the members. We pray for angels on the walls, peaceful rest, and God’s guidance. We pray safe travels on these unsafe roads. We pray encouragement for easily overwhelming circumstances.

And everywhere we go we know we face uncertainty. We know there is no assurance of preservation. There is no safe place. Nowhere the evil or harm of the world cannot touch us.

But we know with all certainty, with all assurance, with all faith, that we are preserved in God’s love.

Last week we were blessed to attend seminars featuring American guests: three godly men who work to provide Christian literature to Haitian people in their native language.

One of the speakers, gifted with great wisdom, knowledge of history and tradition and clearly explained theology, shared this thought.

“I believe the only safe place to be in the world is in the middle of God’s will.”

There is no safe place in this world. From the quiet tree-lined streets of small-town New Hampshire where we don’t lock our doors, to Daejeon, Korea, where at any time of day or night I walked alone without fear, to Ti Goave, Haiti, where we are continuously more respected in the small community—in all of these places there are risks. There are reckless drivers, foul minds, freak accidents, and illnesses.

There is no safe place.

But we have this blessed assurance that Jesus is ours, that God goes before us and sets His angels around us, from the time we rise in the morning to the time we lay down our heads at night. He watches out for us and has a Master Plan.

We are safe in God’s will, knowing that while we are doing His work He will preserve us, on unpredictable streets and through all rock-throwing manifestations.

Maybe there is no safe place. But we need not fear. Nou pa bezwen pè. Nou p’ap janm bezwen pè. He is with us.

Psaume 23 : Cantique de David.

L’Eternel est mon berger: je ne manquerai de rien.
² Il me fait reposer dans de verts pâturages,
Il me dirige près des eaux paisibles.
³ Il restaure mon âme,
Il me conduit dans les sentiers de la justice,
A cause de son nom.
⁴ Quand je marche dans la vallée de l’ombre de la mort,
Je ne crains aucun mal, car tu es avec moi:
Ta houlette et ton bâton me rassurent.
⁵ Tu dresses devant moi une table,
En face de mes adversaires;
Tu oins d’huile ma tête,
Et ma coupe déborde.
⁶ Oui, le bonheur et la grâce m’accompagneront
Tous les jours de ma vie,
Et j’habiterai dans la maison de l’Eternel
Jusqu’à la fin de mes jours.

~La Bible : Nouvelle Edition de Genève

Psalm 23: A Psalm of David.

23 The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.
²     He makes me lie down in green pastures.
He leads me beside still waters.

³     He restores my soul.
He leads me in paths of righteousness
    for his name's sake.

⁴ Even though I walk through the valley

of the shadow of death,
    I will fear no evil,
for you are with me;
    your rod and your staff,
    they comfort me.

⁵ You prepare a table before me
    in the presence of my enemies;
you anoint my head with oil;
    my cup overflows.
⁶ Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me
    all the days of my life,
and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord
    forever.

~The Bible: English Standard Version

"Whom Shall I Fear?" Chris Tomlin, Burning Lights, 2013.

Not Tragic Sophonie

Sophonie

The name reminds me of Persephone, the almost tragic figure of Greek mythology.

Beautiful, beloved daughter of Zeus and Demeter, Persephone is one day seized by Hades and spirited away to the Underworld, away from the sun and flowers in which she once frolicked.

She’s only a young girl when Hades abducts her, and her mother is furious. Demeter curses the earth in protest, freezing the fields and ceasing growth. Zeus intercedes but Hades has tricked Persephone. She’s bound to him for one third of the year, having eaten devious pomegranate seeds Hades presented her.

Persephone’s redemption is in the Spring. Hades compromises with her return to the surface for eight months of the year.  

So after four months of barren freeze, she’s released for the season of birth, of growth, and of hope.

Like the ill-fated Pandora, Persephone retains Hope.

The Sophonie I recently met is young. She’s 19 years old and the fourth child of eight siblings.

Papa is a carpenter and Mama stays at home with the younger children.

There’s not much money in the household. There are many mouths to feed. Many school uniforms and books to purchase.

If the family fares as many do in this country, they live in very close quarters and food is not a guarantee.

Sophonie is in her ultimate year of school. She hopes to attend university.

She’s the oldest child living at home and, naturally, helps provide.

She learned to crochet.

With the help of her friend Myrline, who learned crocheting from her American sponsor mother, and her thrifty mother, Sophonie undertook the art and can now create with yarn.

She makes bags.

Before I left Ti Goave in December, Myrline (Mee-lynn), an eighteen year old housemate, presented me a plastic shopping bag folded with crocheted bags in varying sizes and hues. I was impressed with the difference in design and shape, and the strength of the flexible yarn.

Myrline dictated prices based upon size, and I nodded, saying I would do my best to sell them, and hating the thought.

I’ve never been a salesperson. Never been a bargainer, a haggler, or an ads rep.

Browsing in a store without purchasing something fills me with guilt. Negotiating prices, even those which are meant to be talked down, makes me highly uncomfortable.

The few times I’ve had to stand behind a table presenting wares, at yard sales or craft fairs or raffles, I’ve squirmed in my skin and held no expectation of purchases.

(This obviously makes it more challenging to fundraise, to seek support for the school and myself as a full-time missionary.)

However, Myrline asked me to take the bags, and said there was no problem if they didn’t sell immediately, but that I could leave them with my mother when I returned to Haiti.

The bags made only one appearance in the two weeks I was Stateside. I remembered to pick them up January 1 before we left for church where I was sharing about the ministry.

A kind church member helped me spread some of them over the table in front of the poster overlapped with photos of Haiti. She then overpaid for one, bold crimson and white, saying it was fit for a young lady.

As folks asked about the bags I pointed to Myrline in the group family photo, appearing as a tentatively smiling slim figure in a black dress. I said Myrline had made them and was selling them to help herself out.

This I thought to be true.

Upon returning to Haiti I learned otherwise.

Yes, Myrline can crochet.

But she didn’t make these bags, and the money was not for her.

“Not for me,” was the first I heard of it, as I gave her the envelope of advanced money. “For my friend.”

“Oh?” I asked, adding a check to the mental list of incorrect preconceptions. Then I told Myrline I’d like her to tell me about this friend.

The other night I met Sophonie in person.

We attend the same church.

Sophonie is not tall, not grand, not loud or gregarious.

Possibly she is more bold when not around a blan, but I saw in her a gentle person.

The most notable aspect of her unassuming presence is her smile. It is bold, it is grand, it is sincere. It is wide and free under her sparkling black eyes.

“She has joy,” Myrline told me before. “She is happy.”

Life is hard for Sophonie. I don’t need Myrline to tell me that.

Life is hard in Haiti. Even the well-off face difficult scholastic standards, competition, lack of medical care and an extremely uncertain future.

Survival is dependent upon Jesus.

As is Joy.

Sophonie has eight brothers and sisters. She is the oldest one living at home. Her mother depends on her to help the household.

She’s obligated to study long hours to prepare for her Philo, 13^th grade, national exam. She surely has to clean and cook and tote water. She must wash her laundry and that of her younger siblings. She gets up in the dark and awaits electricity that often doesn’t come. She has no guarantee of….anything.

Sophonie is hopeful. Sophonie is joyful. She has a content heart.

She also has talented fingers and an eye for design.

Maybe you don’t need a crocheted purse. That’s okay.

But at least consider Sophonie’s perspective.

She’s 19 years old and is yoked to a life of hardship and uncertainty, already shouldering responsibilities unfaced by many of today’s older millennials.

Remember the not-tragic Sophonie—a young lady with hope who lives like it’s always spring.

Rejoice in the LORD always. I will say it again: Rejoice!

~Philippians 4:4

Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men, since you know you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. ~Colossians 3:23-24

Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the LORD your God is giving you. ~Exodus 20:12

Pre-Transition Sadness

Let me explain something to you.

Being a missionary is hard.

Brilliant, I know. Groundbreaking, too.

But seriously. This missionary life is not easy.

Of course, I love my life. I love what we do. I love the way we see God moving, providing, healing, and redeeming every day. I love my family, students,  and continuous new friends. I love our beautiful residence and location. I love teaching and reaching God’s children.

But it’s hard.

We do give up a lot to do what we do. We have given up a lot.

I never wanted to be a teacher boxed inside a classroom.

I wanted a farm. I wanted to raise dogs and horses and illustrate children’s books from an upstairs, sun-filled studio in a rambling refurbished farm house.

I wanted to live by the mountains but not unreasonably far from my parents.

I wanted a comfortable life. Don’t we all?

It’s not important, many of the things we’ve given up.

Our preferred clothes and styles. Our favorite foods. Sleeping in and snuggling up on the sofa before the TV. Not a big deal.

The independence is tougher to surrender. Ability to walk out the door unconcerned. To hop in the car and cruise down well-maintained and well-monitored streets. To window shop, grocery shop, get a haircut or visit the bank without hassle or security checks.

English church is harder still to miss. There’s nothing like worship in your native tongue. The ease in following a sermon in your first language. The power of prayer and song and WORD understood without translation.

But people are the biggest sacrifice.

Jesus promised that whoever gave up mother or brother or friend for Him would gain so many more (Mark 10:28-29). Surely He told the truth. Surely we have gained many beloved family and friends in our travels and ministry.

But we still miss our family and friends from before.

Tonight I visited my brothers and underwent the difficult pre-transition phase. A contemplative, serious, solemn, and tear-jerking phase. It’s not a time of regret or hesitation. There’s no doubt in my mind I am where I need to be and God has set a place for me in Ti Goave. However, there is definite sadness in the separation.

There is wistfulness, reminiscences of childhood, fond memories of our times together in younger years, awe at how far we have come and how different our life paths.

Through all the joy and love of my life, I still hurt to be so far from my family.

They are my first family: my parents and brothers. They are the first ones I knew and still the ones with whom I’ve spent the most time.

They are the ones with whom I have the most inside jokes, the most movie references that leave others baffled, the ones with whom I can interpret looks, gestures, and read thoughts.

I still shed tears leaving them. Even if they don’t see.

You needn’t be surprised when I say definitively that I’m returning to Haiti. You needn’t be bewildered when I say comfortably that Beverly and I have no plans to leave. We see a future there and will remain as long as God provides the means.

Haiti is home. We are blessed beyond measure.

However, don’t be surprised at our sadness. Don’t be bewildered at our tears when we leave those we love behind. We still harbor great love for the places from which we come and the people with whom we have long history.

New Hampshire and Texas are home. Korea, South Carolina, and Missouri are home. In all these places is love beyond measure.

Rejoice with us as we return to loved ones in Haiti. Myself this week and Beverly in the near future.

But weep with us too as we consider the great distance between us.

Together let us look forward to our True Home where there will be no more tears, no more distance, no more separation, and no more departures. Where no one will be left behind.

Until then, we carry on, each of us following God wherever He calls us. We praise God for the good times and pray for the strength to endure absence. And we do our best to keep in contact so that none of you forget how much we love you, near and far.

²⁸ Peter began to say to him, “See, we have left everything and followed you.” ²⁹ Jesus said, “Truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands, for my sake and for the gospel, ³⁰ who will not receive a hundredfold now in this time, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions, and in the age to come eternal life. ~Mark 10:28-29 NIV

²⁸ And Peter said, “See, we have left our homes and followed you.”²⁹ And he said to them, “Truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or wife or brothers^[b] or parents or children, for the sake of the kingdom of God, ³⁰ who will not receive many times more in this time, and in the age to come eternal life.” ~Luke 18:28-29

Dishes are Therapy: Thank God for Food

Madame Missoule told me she could wash the dishes.

The students were all gone; she’d finished serving and could resume her dish-washing duties. I could return to class. I was a teacher, after all.

But if I returned to class the tears would come.

Washing dishes was therapy. It kept the tears at bay and gave me some extra minutes to pray, to thank God for what He’d given us and disregard the lack.

Lentz started it.

The first time I remember was in Recreation.

Michelet sent him out because he was crying. He didn’t want to play because his stomach hurt.

 “What’s the matter? Poukisa ou kriye? Sa ou gen, bebe?” I asked.

« Vent fè mal, » he confirmed. « My stomach hurts . »

As we don’t treat stomachaches I told him automatically to drink water. “Bwe dlo.”

But as this is a school of children unable to afford school, full of children who walk from shack wood and tin homes, who sleep with their families in one cramped room, who have never used a toilet before attending—as this is Haiti, the land of preventable tragedy—I also asked the necessary question.

“Did you eat today? Ou te mange nan kay ou? Ou te mange maten-an ? »

Lentz said no.

« Eske ou grangou ? Are you hungry ?”

He nodded his head, gazing at me with those large eyes fringed by beautiful thick lashes, then dripping with tears.

“Ou vle mange? Do you want to eat?”

He nodded again.

So I bade him sit down on one of the benches around the kitchen and fetched him a plate of rice. Our class eats after Recreation so he wouldn’t have had long to wait, but I couldn’t ignore hunger that caused a stomachache that overcame the desire to play.

Lentz ate quietly on the bench then returned to Recreation in the next room.

When I next checked in he was laughing and playing with all the rest.

After Recreation was finished the class lined up to wash hands, sweating and panting and inevitably pushing. Lentz washed and received his allotted food and ate his plate of rice and beans in class.

From then on I kept an eye on Lentz. If he began to cry in class, putting his head down on the desk, my first assumption was discomfort from hunger.

I took to sending he and Shemaly to the office in the morning for extra crackers.

Beverly told me Maman Lentz doesn’t have food at home. Actually, they don’t really have a home. They stay where they can when they can.

Manman is young.

Every morning she is at the gate, lingering on the neighboring store’s porch, chatting with Michelet and Manman Shemaly. I wonder how she spends her days.

Shemaly is one of the brightest students in the class. She can read well in all three languages and is dependable. She works more slowly than the two leading girls, but she is good-natured and sweet and tries her best. She is good about self-correcting.

Her manman doesn’t have food at home, either.

For a few weeks I called Lentz and Shemaly out after the morning cracker with peanut butter. I sent them down to the office to ask for more, after confirming that they’d had no food at home that morning.

They’d return after a few minutes and settle back down at their desks.

Madame Alice noticed and one day commented.

“Ou renmen Lentz!” she said as I handed one of the precious extra peanut-butter dolloped crackers to Lentz before waving the empty plate before the class (it’s finished!)

I smiled and answered her in a low voice with a shrug.

“Li pa gen manje nan kay li. Li e Shemaly toujou grangou.”

She nodded and gave her customary “Dako, okay” response.

She didn’t comment on favoritism again.

Usually we have a few extra crackers on the plate.

From my experience of “making” the crackers—dolloping peanut butter—I know keeping track of the numbers is difficult.

I would have to restart my count several times and still be unsure of the number of crackers layering the tin plate. The largest class is 28 students, and ours is smallest with only 19. But we have the oldest students: students who should require more food.

Giving out those extra crackers is one of the worst parts of the job.

I hate to choose who will be blessed and who goes without.

Some of the children bring snacks from home. Some come with juice or milk boxes. Some come with plastic containers of macaroni, meat, paté, or fried banana. Many come with snack crackers “bonbon” which they pour directly into their mouths as the crackers have crumbled.

Some of them, like Lentz and Shemaly, do not bring anything from home. There is nothing to bring.

Last week we couldn’t teach. Many students couldn’t focus. They were too hungry.

Thanks to Madame Beverly’s daily question of “Are you hungry?” and required response of “Yes, I am hungry,” or “No, I am not hungry,” before they exit the kitchen with their allotted plate, the students can tell us in English their bellies are empty.

This day, several did.

Sometimes they look sad, mouths turned down and faces hidden on crossed arms, like Lentz and Ludgie. Sometimes they’re vacant, staring idly or unable to read the work before them, like Saloubens and John Theodore. Sometimes they’re angry or cranky, saying “Don’t touch me,” like Tchialensky and Gilberto.

That morning I kept repeating the mandate of “Drink water, bwe dlo” attempting to explain, in Creole, that water helps an empty stomach. Water can help to appease that demanding stomach. But even the ones who heeded me, believing those ludicrous words, couldn’t overcome the hunger to work well.

Students who normally work just fine through the morning, who don’t complain of hunger pangs, even those were pleading.

“I’m very, very hungry,” Ludgie said.

“I want a cracker, please,” Gilberto said, then amended to “I want some rice, please.”

The time crept toward 11:00 and I was at a loss. I was spending an inordinate amount of time repeating the command to drink water, encouraging with backrubs, and not enough time teaching.

At 10:50 I went downstairs with the empty cracker plate, entered the office and took the cracker container off the shelf. Then I stood in the middle of the floor, lost.

What should I do? Spread peanut butter on fifteen crackers and bring them upstairs?

I turned for the hallway and met Beverly coming out of the Recreation room.

“I don’t know what to do,” I confessed, lifting my helpless hands in the air. “There are so many of them who are hungry and just can’t work today. So many. Many more than usual.”

Beverly nodded. “You know what that means? They’re about to go through a growth-spurt.”

“What do we do?” I asked.

Beverly turned and called Madame Rose, who was supervising the feeding of the five-year old class who’d just left Recreation. Beverly explained that the children in second grade were hungry because they were growing, grandi.

“Do we give them more crackers? Or do we give them piti diri a little rice?”

Rose was decisive. “Rice. And later, more.”

Beverly nodded. “Yes, and we explain that this is a snack. They’ll eat more after Recreation.”

Madame Rose then made an about-face into the kitchen and commenced scooping a ladle of rice on eleven plates. Adrianna and I balanced the stacks and toted them upstairs.

Outside the classroom I peered around the doorframe. We had 11 plates and 19 students. Not all of them needed this offering.

I summoned Madame Alice from her surveilling.

“Ki moun bezwen manje kounya?” I asked. “Who needs food now?”

We looked into the classroom.

“Shemaly. Theodore. Lentz. Lovenita….” She shrugged. “Tout moun bezwen. Everyone needs it.”

“Okay,” I said, and we entered with the plates.

It was the first time since before the cholera scare we didn’t wash hands before eating. We just set plates down before children and let them scoop up rice as rapidly as possible.

We had to return for perhaps two more plates but a few students rejected the plate. A few opted to eat snacks from their bags, under instruction they should not eat much now.

“Manje piti paske nou ale recreacion. Pa bon pou manje two e fè exercise! It’s not good to eat too much before exercise!” I instructed, helping Shawn choose a few morsels from his lunch container and then stow it back in his bag.

It was rapid fire—that pre-Recreation “snack.”

We stacked the scraped plates and the students resumed their Creole grammar work.

By this time it was 11:15 and they had fifteen minutes to digest that bit before jumping and running and dancing with that unlimited youthful verve.

For most of them the food interfered not at all with their ability to leap and frolic—because it was the first food of the day and was immediately devoured by needy metabolisms.

Dancing commenced in Recreation a short while later to cheery students. They love dancing.

Before they began, Madame Beverly called upon those who had been hungry to stand in a line.

“Gade, Madame Rose,” she said. “Look and see who it is who’s hungry.”

The majority of the class formed a line, wondering why they were on display.

“You see?” Beverly nudged Rose. “See who it is?”

Madame Rose nodded. “Yes, I know.”

Many of the students standing on that line were ones whose homes Madame Beverly and Madame Rose knew well: the kind of homes that make Madame Rose shake her head and Madame Beverly turn to God in anger. The kind of homes that might have been acceptable in the 19^th century. The kind of homes like forts children build of scraps, before returning to their solid, insulated, secure homes of loving comfort.

The Madames nodded their understanding, nods of regrettable acceptance. Then the students broke up into mingled lines and the music began to play. With the usual buoyancy and contagious laughter they danced, showing off their progress in the Chicken Dance and Macarena.

I laughed and smiled and danced too, knowing that this physical therapy was a daily necessity, as is the dawn devotion on the rooftop, watching the sun rise while reading the Bible and praying—but as I frolicked, watching Ludgie swing her hips and sway with brilliant diamond smile alighting her ebony dark face, watching Saloubens kick his pointy-shoed feet with vigor, I couldn’t help but think of what they were missing.

“Thank you, God, for their ignorance. Thank you that this is all they know,” I said in my crumbling heart. “Thank you for their joy.”

After one dance I exited Recreation and stepped into the kitchen to wash the dishes my class had made. Madame Missoule, the cook, was occupied scooping portions onto first graders’ plates, and I began washing.

Dishes are therapy.

In days past I would retreat to the woods to walk off emotions—to appease stress, release anger, to sob out sadness under comforting, sheltering branches. I would pour out my heart among the roots and stay out until I’d exhausted body and eased the heartache.

Even in Korea I could walk or run out those emotions, barreling down a sidewalk with headphones in or following the river, or trekking into the woods, losing myself on a dirt path passing azalea bushes and memorials.

Here in Haiti life is more confined. Often I have no option to venture out, walking or running in solitude. I can retreat to my room or the roof, and I can work.

Dishes are constant here, with so many folks in the house. Dishes are simple. They’re predictable, mindless and sometimes tiring. Do enough dishes, certainly scrub enough pots, and you’ll be worn out.

That morning I washed all the plates for my class, all the spoons, too. Then I started washing the first graders’ dishes as they returned to the kitchen, smiling wanly at my students as they entered, sweaty and glowing from Recreation.

They got their second serving and marched out eager to eat again. I kept washing.

When the crowd had gone, the line diminished and all students back to their classrooms, Missoule sat herself down on a bench by the door and called to me.

Jonas helped her communicate with my faulty Creole.

“You can stop now. All the students are gone and she can wash,” Jonas said.

“I want to wash,” I answered, dunking plates into the bleach water. “If I wash I won’t cry.”

You’re probably able to figure out why I was repressing tears. You’re probably sitting there in your comfortable home, well-fed and enjoying certain holiday gluttonies like gingerbread men, pecan pie, whoopee pies, eggnog, a Starbucks peppermint latte, Grandma’s fudge…we all have our food vices.

The children in our school don’t have those. Sure, they enjoy candy and cookies. They’ll ask for lollipops when they see Madame Beverly has given them as rewards for English class or Recreation competition. They’ll try to share a friend’s bonbon. Most of them probably love pate.

But they don’t know homemade cookies. Some of them know nothing homemade, save rice and beans on a good day.

They know hunger. They know fatigue from empty bellies. They know eating that first serving quickly so they can return to the kitchen first and secure the second helping before the food runs out.

Second grade is the last class served, and by the time they’ve eaten once, the pot is nearly empty. There’s usually a race to return and offer the plate again—and then an exercise in scraping the bottom of the pot for the remnants of rice and beans.

Gilberto is quite small. He’s petite all around, including his baby teeth that smile so charmingly. Beneche is bigger with a round, dark head and secretive smile. Both of them always request large servings, and both usually return for seconds.

That midday meal may be the only one for the day.

Watching these seven-year olds undertake heaping plates of rice, you wonder where they can fit so much food. But then you remember how much food other seven-year olds you know eat through the day. They eat before school, they eat snacks in the morning, they eat lunch, they eat another snack in the afternoon, they eat dinner, and they probably eat a snack before bedtime. They drink water, juice and milk all day. They may not like to but they have fruit and vegetables to eat. They have meat and cheese and yogurt. They get protein, calcium, vitamins, and minerals.

They have regular doctors’ appointments, school nurses, guidance counselors, and worrisome grandparents who fuss after their health, who insist they eat more. Their families celebrate holidays featuring traditional food. They attend parties stocked with treats.

Our students do not.

I don’t want you to feel sorry for them. Do not harbor pity in your hearts. Do not consider them the world’s lowly unfortunates.

God has blessed these children with joy abundant.

Of one, Madame Beverly says, “God has given him the gift of not recognizing his reality.”

I agree. Blissful ignorance is personified in many of our students.

But you should be angry. You should be outraged that in a fertile world where crops of all kinds are cultivated, where fruits of immeasurable value and exquisite taste flourish, where restaurants and school cafeterias and overfed children toss away uneaten food en masse—you should be outraged that there are children going hungry.

That there are children who come to school with naught in their stomachs, who cry at their desk from stomach pain, who nod off during lesson, who race for second helpings to tide them over until tomorrow.

You should cry for the children who dread school vacation because it removes them from the only safe environment they have ever known, keeps them from toilets, clean water, hugs, affection, praise, and food.

I do.

Yes, I know hunger is a world epidemic. I know that near your own neighborhood are folks struggling and deciding between electricity and groceries. I thank God for Feed My Starving Children which enables us to have food. While washing dishes and blinking back tears I praised God again that we had food to give these hungry children.

Let us be continuously grateful every time we sit down to eat. Whether the food is your favorite, that special homemade tradition, or whether the food is merely for survival, lacking taste or appeal. Let us be grateful, and let us never feel entitled.

Sure, everyone should be guaranteed food. Everyone should be guaranteed nourishment and nurturing, a safe place to sleep and a hygienic bathroom.

But not everyone is.

Maybe you need to take a break now. Go for a walk. Put on your headphones. Take a drive. Wash some dishes. As you do, pray. Pray for wisdom to help feed the starving children. And say thank you for what you’ve eaten today.

And it’s okay, you can let the tears come. 

December Newsletter from Petit Goave

Dear Friends,

Joyeaux Noël! Merry Christmas!

We are blessed more than ever here at Christian Light School Petit Goâve.

Ti Goâve is a beautiful place year round, but come November the weather takes a most pleasant turn. Even inside the school building the air is better.

In Recreation we have been learning a new dance every week, commencing with an instant favorite: The Chicken Dance. From the three year olds to the second graders, every class has enjoyed wiggling down and turning around. Even the staff took an instant liking to this silly dance.

As the year draws to a close we are also focusing upon Christmas: the celebration of Jesus’ Birth. Every week we introduce and study a story from The Jesus Storybook Bible: the three weeks in December permit three stories of Christmas, from Jesus’ arrival to the shepherds’ attendance to the wise men’s journey. The children are perfecting the French lyrics of “Away in a Manger.” Each class prepares to perform 2 songs at the annual Birthday Party for Jesus on December 20^th.

Madame Beverly and Madame Rachelle continue to teach concentrated English in the afternoon, while teaching English and new methods of teaching for benefit of teachers and students alike throughout the day.

With the first grade class Beverly motivates with stickers and lollipops: the children compete to recall sight-words. They’ve been focusing on essential objects, colors, months and days.

With second grade, Rachelle is focusing on classroom phrases and introductory conversation. Students are now forming sentences to identify and describe objects, and can answer and ask questions about name, age, birthday, and family.

In Recreation, everyone practices English counting and alphabet, the weekly Bible verse and song, and action verbs. Students love shouting out “I can run!” as they run along the spray-painted black line and clap.

In this Fall Semester we have been overjoyed to witness progress in all classes and students, and in our teachers’ lives. Madame Eunide, the three-year-olds’ teacher, gave birth to twin baby girls in August. Every few weeks we visit her home to deliver formula and hold the babies: Olarm Ifanuella and Olarm Ellael. The girls are growing rapidly and display increasing individualistic features.

Eunide is a woman of great faith and powerful prayers. Three years ago she was a married woman with no children and no job. She began praying earnestly for both of those things, despite her husband’s advice against so doing. He warned her that with children she would not be able to work. Nevertheless, Eunide prayed. She was soon pregnant with Raphaella.

Then Madame Beverly followed God’s call to Ti Goave, began the school, and Eunide was recruited as a teacher. She was soon pregnant again, but this time the doctor revealed dangerous news: Eunide’s cervix was open. There was no way she could keep the baby without surgery, and even then delivery was unlikely. However, Eunide refused surgery. She insisted that God had given her this baby and He would deliver her.

Beverly implored all to pray, month by month, that Eunide would keep her baby for those four more weeks. She did.

And in mid-August Eunide delivered two beautiful, full-term little girls.

The incredulous doctor said that he would never forget Eunide and her faith. She answered that she serves a big, big, big, big God. After the twins’ birth, a Sunday School class in Kentucky that had been praying for a safe delivery began sending money every month to purchase formula.

Last month Eunide woke to a man robbing their home. The house is two rooms—she and the babies were sleeping on the bed and her husband on the floor in their bedroom, and the intruder came in around midnight. He fled when she woke, taking phones and a computer but touching no one.

For weeks afterward Eunide had trouble sleeping, but her husband insisted she should have no fear. He told her her faith encourages him, and she ought not give up now.

More recently, Eunide came to school in pain. Beverly looked at her teeth and saw severe cavities. The dental work would cost 300 USD. Teachers earn a monthly salary of 9000 HGD (Haitian Gourdes), about 140 USD (U.S. Dollars). [The Haitian Gourde is continuing to decrease: in September there were 63 HGD to 1 USD, now there are 65 HGD/1 USD.] Beverly sent out messages presenting Eunide’s need and inquiring if anyone was interested in helping Eunide. Within two days 300 USD had been pledged.

Eunide teaches her class of – three year olds and her toddler daughter Raphaella with Bible stories and songs. A sure way to get Raphaella to smile through her fear of strangers is to dance a doll before her chanting “Mesi, Jezi! Thank you, Jesus!” and lift your hands saying, “Le sang de Jesus! The blood of Jesus!”

Although she cannot speak much English, Eunide understands and communicates well. She speaks purposefully and slowly, pausing for translation. She laughs often.

We see Madame Eunide and shake our heads, thanking God for this woman of faith. And when we want prayers answered, we ask her to pray. God listens to all prayers, but He is particularly responsive to Eunide. We are so blessed to have her at the school and in our lives.

Please pray for God’s continued blessing on His servant and amazing witness Eunide. Pray that she receives more help as the babies grow and her husband will have ample work to support their family.

Second quarter exams will be from December 12 to 16. December 19 will be the final day of class, and December 20 will be the Birthday Party for Jesus with parents and visitors. The children will perform and receive gifts and their report cards. The next day the Americans will depart for the United States and everyone commence Christmas vacation.

On January 9 school should recommence. Madame Rachelle should be present, scheduled to return to Haiti January 6, but Madame Beverly should remain in Texas with her husband. He is in poor health.

While she is absent Madame Rose, Haitian director, and Madame Rachelle will continue English classes with the first grade and Michelet will manage Recreation.

Please pray that much can be accomplished in the remaining weeks: that momentum will build and carry over into the New Year. Pray for continued unity and increased relationships for teachers and students and parents. Pray for wisdom for all of us as to how to teach and love better.

Pray for safe travels for Beverly, Rachelle, and Adrianna as depart for the United States this month and campaign for God’s work in Ti Goave. Pray rapid healing for Beverly’s husband Wally and smooth operation of the school in her absence.

And thank God with us for every child in the school who every day can enjoy a safe, loving environment, receive medicine, attention, food, and education of academics and Jesus’ love.

Thank God for His constant amazing provision and protection of us and the family.

Most of all, join us in rejoicing this Christmas Season, when we pay particular attention to the miracle of God becoming human and condescending to the lowliest of birthplaces, to prepare for the lowliest and most excruciating of deaths on the Cross.

God bless you and thank you for your prayers and support in all ways.

From Ti Goave, Haiti, we wish you Joyeaux Noel and Peace.

Love and God’s blessings,

Beverly Burton “Madame Beverly”

Rachel Collins “Madame Rachelle”

A Day in the Life

Wake up call is between 5 and 6.

During the week I don’t set an alarm but usually God awakens us before the sunrise.

I head to the roof for the essential Quiet Time. Electricity shuts off between 5 and 6, usually, as well, and before too much is stirring the air is actually cool and quiet. You can hear the ocean.

From the roof I watch the sun come up as I read the Bible, pray and sing, usually preceded by a brief yoga routine to loosen muscles and circulate the blood. These days it’s so cool that exercise gets me comfortably warm.

The sun rises at about 6:40—cresting over the trees so the roof is lit and probably uncomfortably warm.

At 6:45 I should return to my room to prepare for the day : dressing in our purple and black, pulling back my hair, taking a vitamin and then heading downstairs.

I make coffee with an old style percolator—the kind which accepts no filter and boils on the gas stove (no electricity required!)

Breakfast is between 7 and 7:15 – many days it’s spaghetti, cooked with oil and diced hotdogs, often onions. We eat it with ketchup.

Sometimes Pastor returns from his daily Sport (exercise group) with a welcome bag of bananas, avocados, and fried paté (a treat of fried dough encasing shredded meat and egg)

We depart the house between 7:30 and 7:45, trying to arrive at school before 8.

Beverly is the common chauffer, driving one of Pastor’s vehicles, a 2014 Suzuki she was here to help purchase.

But if the vehicle is needed by one of many family or church members, or Pastor himself, Pastor will drop us off.

We stop at the shanty house beside Pastor’s to pick up Sandrina, one of the four year old class. Mama or Papa hoists her up to sit on a lap, as we’re always crowded in the backseat.

If Beverly drives, Adrianna and Saintilus (one of our 2^nd grade students who lives at the house), and I are in the backseat and Madame Rose is always riding shotgun.

Sometimes we drop the youngest son off at his school.

Always we crowd the hatchback with our “luggage” for the day

When we arrive the students are assembled—not usually in their proper lines but clumped, buzzing about the small courtyard. By this point with 122 of them the space is really too small.

They form an orange swarm.

Teachers gather at their arrival to sing and pray together in the first classroom. The children wait outside for however long it takes.

We sing in Creole or French and English, and then pray together. Everyone prays at the same time and then usually Madame Rose closes us in the “nom de Jezi.”

We then greet one another with the customary kisses on the cheek and the custom of our school: “Jezi renmen ou. Jesus loves you” and “Bondye beni ou. God bless you.” That’s ten women of faith praying together. There’s mighty power in that room.

After greeting we go to the children.

Together we sing the song of the week, are led in prayer by one of the teachers, sing the Haitian National Anthem to the flag, and finish with the Pledge to the Christian flag in English and French.

Students are dismissed to their classrooms, beginning with the oldest second grade and down to the tiny three year olds.

I accompany my class upstairs, usually diverging into the first floor office for whatever the day’s needs are.

Madame Alice usually begins the day with a warm-up assignment of math or grammar. By the end, when the slowest of students are almost finished, we usually have our morning crackers.

Each child receives a cracker with a dollop of peanut butter.

Some of them eat before school. Some do not. Some are sent down to the office to get a second cracker because there’s no food at home.

Before eating we must wash hands.

After crackers I take over for Bible time. Sometimes we focus on the weekly story, reviewing vocabulary and lessons, then coloring a page that includes the vocabulary and appropriate sentence, always in the three languages.

Coloring is one of the very few creative outlets the children have. Madame Alice, too. She enjoys taking a rest and sharing colored pencils with the students.

Sometimes this time is spent practicing the verse and then copying it into notebooks.

Sometimes we play the arrangement game, when each student is given one word on a strip of paper and they must arrange themselves in the proper order to complete the verse.

After Bible there should be a movement break.

Despite its rigidity and majority of rote and lecture, Haitian curriculum is full of songs. Haitians have amazing ability to remember not just words but melodies.

Madame Alice may start a song, or I may, and this includes parading around the room. A favorite is “Father Abraham,” where we march around the room and do the motions of right hand, left hand, right foot, left foot, et cetera.

Sometimes we do “Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes,” or “Mickey Mouse,” where the motions are simple but can be vigorous.

By this time it should be after 10 AM, and there’s only an hour and half left of our morning. Madame Alice usually teaches math, grammar, reading, and experimental or health sciences at this time. I generally circulate and aid those students who need coaching: we have several.

When they’re finished students ask for a board or a book from the shelf. We don’t have many books: some French/English picture dictionaries, a set of “Dlo Sal” books that instruct against contaminated water, and the few books I’ve contributed, which are in English.

At 11:30 we go to Recreation, where Madame Beverly fills 30 minutes with as much amusing movement as possible. Recreation is also the first English lessons the children receive, from the baby three year olds up to the second graders. They practice counting and reciting the alphabet in French and English, doing simple movements to accompany the recitations. They also sing the weekly song and recite the memory verse. Then they pray before they commence the new exercise of that day or week.

The past weeks have introduced dance routines. The children now know and love the “Chicken Dance” and the “Macarena.”

After Recreation everyone lines up to wash hands and then collects their food. Even the students who bring food from home are required to eat “piti, piti,” a very little bit, to ensure they’re sharing in the vitamins packed into the manna-pack rice we receive from Feed My Starving Children.

If they’re dancing, I stay in Recreation. If they’re not, I probably stay for the introduction, reciting the verse, counting and alphabet and prayer, and then depart.

I collect my own food, the teachers eat what the students eat, sometimes purchasing a Malta for additional energy and nutrients, and usually browse news on my phone for a few minutes.

Haiti is a turbulent place, so there is often news to be seen. But lately, America has been turbulent as well.

After eating I usually talk with Madame Beverly or prepare for the upcoming English lesson.

We both do intensive English from 1 to 2, she with first grade and me with my class.

The class eats from 12 to 12:30 officially, but is usually finished before then. We copy homework into agenda books, Carnet de Leçon, and Madame Alice has each student recite for her what they ought to have studied the day before.

By 1 I have started teaching English.

Sometimes we do math, currently we’re working on addition and subtraction.

We review the alphabet with the Wilson Language alphabet chart that helps the students practice phonics sounds.

By now we have several sight words and sometimes practice spelling with the individual chalk boards. The children love this—to write and then proudly display their boards in the air for Madame Alice and I to see and approve. The competitive edge motivates them. Who can finish first? !

So far they have three books. One is already assembled—an alphabet book that features three words for each letter and corresponding images. I created and put these together, and we’ve been going through them, focusing on three pages at time. The children can color the pictures and we review the vocabulary, how to sound out the words, and their Creole translation.

We practice the word “have” and common vocabulary, including bottle, board, colors, floor, desk, shirt, skirt, pencil and notebook.

The other two books are growing. One is an “All About Me” book that lets the children fill in the spaces with their individual answers. I am --- years old. I live with --- and --. I have – brothers and sisters, et cetera. This helps them practice essential introductory conversation.

The third book is “In Class” and is phrases useful for the classroom. The phrases are typed in English and we have been going through writing the Creole translations.

Our class is quick to pick up and eager to perform.

We try to do something more low-key between 1:30 and 2, such as coloring or a movement break. At 2 we descend, the kids filing down to sit in a classroom awaiting dismissal.

Parents should pick-up at 2. Consistently there are students until 2:30. Sometimes there are students until 3. But if this happens more than once the parents are supposed to pay a fine.

After school we go home. If we have the car Beverly drives. If we don’t, we may walk.

Once I’ve taken a moto taxi home, behind two children and the driver. Madame Rose took another taxi holding onto the large cooking pot that we use to serve the meal.

School is very close to our house. We take the safest, best-maintained route, no more than five minutes on a normal day. Usually the biggest risk upon leaving is backing out from the space in front of the school gate.

Once home we unload. Saintilus carries the pot to the kitchen. The three year old who accompanies us from school toddles off to join her mama in the kitchen or yard where she cooks, washes dishes or clothes, and we ladies head inside.

We call out greetings to the vicinity. I often head upstairs immediately afterwards to deposit bags and change clothes.

Sometimes we have errands to do and purposely retain the uniform.

Food is usually on the table shortly after 2, so we can eat upon returning.

This is the large meal of the day: rice and beans or rice or corn—the meal centers around a carbohydrate which is accompanied by sauce. There’s black bean sauce, sos pwa; legim, a thick almost paste like sauce with shredded vegetables, bits of meat and usually crab; there’s red, soupy Creole sauce with onions and bits of beef or fish, et cetera.

We drink water.

“Lunch” is usually eaten quickly because there’s so much to do—and the table has a miraculous ability to collect the hot air from the house and retain it, and an understandable tendency to collect biting flies.

After eating we wash dishes. We wash with soap and water and rinse with bleach, klorox, and water.

Now we may leave for errands, take advantage of temporary electricity to communicate or research, take a rest, organize or plan.

Errands include walking to the copy shop to pick up or drop off. We go at least once a week to make Bible activity pages or our English classes.

We may go to the bookstore to purchase books for students who don’t have them. We may head to the pharmacy to buy inhalers for students with asthma or formula for Madame Eunide, our lovely three-year olds’ teacher with baby twins.

On any of these errands it’s probable we stop for a drink. If we are driving we almost certainly go to Black Star market, which is the surprisingly well-stocked convenience store in town. They carry Coke Zeros, Gatorade, Bongu “milk” shakes, the usual sodas in plastic bottles, Malta and juice in refrigerators! The store is good for a cold, refreshing beverage, and the manager speaks good English, and finds us highly amusing.

Beverly relishes Coke Zero for its caffeine. I appreciate Bongu for its milkiness. We both appreciate Malta for the energy.

If we’ve purchased formula we then deliver it to Madame Eunide’s house and hopefully spend some delightful time holding her twin little girls who were born at the end of July.

At least once a week we try to walk to our quiet place: a compound owned by the John Weslyan church just two blocks down from our road. Here we can sit under the mango, almond and coconut trees beside the ocean, enjoying the view and sounds of nature, and attempting to ignore the inevitable haranguing of passing locals who can’t resist calling up to foreign blan.

Sometimes our visits there are spent conversing with other visitors, usually high school students who come to study and enjoy engaging in English.

Sometimes these visitors will sing with us.

Sometimes we are left in peace, and can enjoy time in silence, interspersed with Bible reading, singing, praying and reflecting.

Our preferred visit time is between 4 and 5, so we can watch the sunset over the mountain before walking home.

Sometimes I meet with a church member, a pastor’s daughter who’s preparing to go to Florida for study. We talk and go over her English homework I’ve assigned and she departs before dark.

Sunset these days is about 5:15. We avoid being out after dark.

Usually electricity at the house turns on at 6 PM.

Shortly before sunset and until electricity is available, the roof is the best place to be. Air is moving up there.

I spend as much time as possible on the roof.

There I can work, study, read, or simply gaze at the stars in peace. Usually.

In the evening we do school work.

Between 6 and 7 I give Lhens, the eight year old son, English lesson. These are generally about 30 minutes, which may be productive or continuously distracted.

Around 7 there should be “supper.” This is usually labouie, which is creamy, sweetened oatmeal with cloves and ginger. It’s served with bread and peanut butter.

There are then more dishes to wash—always there are dishes.

At 8 the household gathers for “service.”

This is a roughly thirty-minute devotional time which everyone enjoys, even if they drift off. Everyone is tired from rising early and working hard, not sleeping enough and having very little time to relax, but everyone attends and everyone sings.

There is singing, praying, and usually Pastor speaks about a scripture.

We close with greetings of “God bless you,” and “good night.”

After this the house begins to wind down.

Most members do not go to sleep, although Lhens and Saintilus are sent to bed, because the students must study and the house be secured for the night.

I often retreat to the roof for a little more time under the stars in the cool night air, sometimes talking on the phone.

Possibly I meet with another household member who wants to practice English.

Sometimes Beverly and I meet to plan or discuss or share some work.

Usually around 10 I close my door for good—take my shower and wash the day’s clothes. Then there may be unwinding time browsing news on the internet and sending messages.

I may take the quiet time to finish off and post a blog or photos.

I may be utterly spent and drift off while reading my Kindle.

Bedtime is usually about 11 PM.

Sleep is always welcome to my fatigued body, and often mind, but most days also taken with a mite of wistfulness: another day is passed, and how very blessed it was.