I spent this weekend in Kenscoff, which was an amazing little retreat from everything going on here in Tabarre. This week was so hard physically, lifting and moving the contents of an entire warehouse, and mentally, hosting volunteers, that it was amazing to snuggle up, drink coffee, read a book and peak out at amazing view or the pouring rain, both of which I was happy to see. St. Helene, the orphanage in Kenscoff, is tucked way up in the mountains. Kenscoff, the city, is very small and very high up, but from the ‘downtown’ area you take about another 10 minutes driving up the mountain to get to St. Helene. If you continue up the mountain, about another mile you get to the top, so it is really up there. When you pull in the gates, the buildings are interspersed among the largely wooded grounds. Some of the buildings are painted in the traditionally “loud” Haitian fashion with bright colors and characters, but it feels out of place with all the green plants and gray skies. Kenscoff is like Seattle with a tropical twist. It was cold, maybe 60 degrees, with crisp air. It rained every day and the sun only came out for about an hour or two each day.

Retreat House at Kenscoff

One of the children's homes at St. Helene

The drive up the mountain was at first amusing and then breathtaking. I absolutely love driving around in this country, it’s like extreme people watching. If you drive around in the U.S. you might run into a person or two on the street doing something other than walking, but it’s pretty unlikely. The people here spend their days in the street, which provides endlessly amusing scenes to watch as a passerby. There were so many little scenes I wish I could freeze in my brain. Three little girls, all in fancy dresses, gleefully running full speed ahead over gravel, rocks and dirt in their barefeet. An old woman, with two bags of laundry on her head climbing up the mountain, puffing on a long, old school pipe. Endless cows, horses, pigs and dogs. A man in a formal business suit, hanging out the back of a tap-tap which has “I DON’T CARE” painted in English across the top. People going about their daily business, barely noticing one more car passing by. I found the infamous “Christmas tree men” that Sister Judy told me about… men who carry “Christmas trees” of pharmaceuticals and people pay to have their ailment treated by these salesmen. It is sketchy beyond belief, but it was amusing to see them. I’ll take it as further motivation to require justifications for medicine requests and responsible disposal of expired meds.

I’m excited to see what we can get accomplished this week. It will be so nice to have our focus off of sorting the warehouse and more on acquiring donations and making contacts with other NGO’s in the country. I’m also at the point where I’m sick of being the new girl, but in order to move forward I MUST to be able to speak Creole. I am determined to be able to completely understand it within the next two weeks and speak it fluently within the next month. It will help that I can spend more of my time this next week at the hospital and not with American volunteers at the warehouse.

These three weeks have flown by. And now that I know about the little retreat up in Kenscoff, I feel like I will be even happier during my year here.

Oh man these last couple days have been so busy! We have a herd of volunteers here this week and I have been hosting/leading, so it’s really nice to have a quiet evening (probably wishful thinking that I have the whole evening). But I’m making the most of it, curled up in comfy clothes on my bed, listening to Matt Nathanson and enjoying a surprisingly delicious glass of white wine. I didn’t have high hopes for it, considering it was one of the cheapest at the supermarket, but with a little bit of ice to cool it down, it definitely hits the spot.

Volunteers in the kitchen for lunch

I can’t even remember the last time I wrote on my blog, and of course since I’m by myself in my room I don’t have internet to check. But I spent most of the weekend sleeping and watching movies on my computer because I wasn’t feeling good. I know what you’re thinking, but it was just a cold that has been going around with the volunteers! People actually do get colds here, not just malaria and cholera!

On Sunday I went over to Francisville for a bit to drop off some supplies that one of the volunteers brought and on the way back we ran into Father Rick who was taking some of the little boys who hang out outside the hospitals and the UN to get ice cream. I think it’s really an incredible gesture. Father Rick is heading three hospitals, a series of industrial warehouses, building a fourth hospital, providing all religious services to hundreds of people, starting internet cafes and street clinics and schools in the slums, not to mention all the fundraising events all over the world and he finds the time on Sundays to take a group of street kids to get ice cream every week. To me there is something so fundamentally right about that. We (not just NPFS, but every other NGO and the UN) are supposed to be here to improve people’s lives, and yes healthcare is a huge portion of that, but it’s so pure, so innocent and perfect, to give kids who spend all day begging behind a fence something to look forward to on Sundays. And it’s not just Father Rick, but our other long term volunteers who know the people that sell and beg on our streets. They are involved in the children’s lives and trying to help when they can. It’s incredibly selfless and I admire them so much because they never burn out, they keep going and living and don’t lose sight. Sometimes with my American perspective, it’s hard not to be critical of some things, but I have no doubts about the motivation of each long term volunteer here. They are truly incredible people, beyond just being nice and tons of fun to hang out with.

Okay, so on Sunday evening I went to mass. Sunday is the only day that Father Rick does an evening mass because he goes to Kenscoff on Sunday mornings to do mass at St. Helene’s, the NPFS orphanage. Mass was at 7pm, so it was already dark, but there were candles lit in the chapel as well as two on the desk (giving away my lack of religious education with that one… wherever they set the bible and chalice) and one on the floor in front of the body. The mass/ funerals in the morning are very nice and it hasn’t bothered me that it’s a funeral as well, but Sunday night it was very creepy at first before the service started. Although we were on time, the service started late so there was a lot of sitting in silence in the candlelight. It’s funny how the time of day can give you a completely different outlook. The chapel felt dark and depressing, mournful of the patients and for all the suffering in this country. The feeling continued when Father Rick arrived with two of the volunteers who are doctors. They were late because they got a patient who had been in a motorcycle accident and had her arm torn off. The songs were beautiful, as usual, and more in English so it was easier to understand. When people start sitting down after having their wine and bread (ok I really should know that one…) someone usually sings while everyone else finishes. This time Wynn sang, and I had never heard him before, but he is an amazing singer! I was impressed because of course there is no music, just his voice and he was really, really good. After mass, we were planning on going to Mama Raphael’s and the rain almost stopped us, but we decided to go anyways and I’m really glad we did. We were laughing the entire time playing games with the German volunteers who are here. Sergio offered to make us dinner the following night and sangria which I was VERY excited about.

On Monday I had five volunteers, plus Yvenson, helping out at Francisville so we got a TON done! We came back for lunch and even more volunteers had arrived, so we are overflowing with volunteers this week. The volunteers who came on Monday (a DO and PA, think that’s a sign I should ask them for career advice??) brought new dishes and cups for us! Very glad they did, because I don’t think there would have been enough without the new stuff. I’ve noticed that that happens a lot here, things just happen to come right at the exact moment you find yourself needing them. Later, I was very pleased to find out that Sergio came through on his promise, not only for food, but for sangria! He is a great cook and it was a lot of fun to have everyone together eating, drinking and joking around. I’ve been telling everyone that I don’t miss any food from the US yet, but last night I realized I do miss something… garlic. Sergio’s food had lots of garlic and oh man it was good.

This morning I found out that we had two containers coming, so we had a mad dash at the warehouse to clear out a big space to get the new stuff in. It ended up that we didn’t empty the containers until after lunch, but since we worked our butts off early, we were able to totally plan and sort our patient care section. Opening up and clearing out the containers was fun, especially because all of our medical supplies were in pre-sorted and labeled boxes which made our job a million times easier. We worked until after 5pm, so after almost an entire 8 hours of manual labor, we were exhausted. It’s definitely one of those days where I couldn’t imagine anything better than ending it with a cold shower.

All of our pre-sorted medical supplies... so nice!

Unloading the pallets- thanks for your help girls!

Father Rick rearranging containers, a favorite past-time

Oh my gosh I have been so busy I haven’t had time to write on the computer at all!

After my fabulous breakfast of witnessing such great generosity by the Italians, Wynn introduced me to Yvenson who is now the person helping me out with the pharmacy tasks. He speaks English with barely any accent at all and he also knows French and Italian… pretty impressive. He wants to work in diplomacy, so I think the languages will definitely help him out. The other great thing is that he’s been working at St. Philomene hospital already, so he already has a relationship with most of the staff there. All week he’s been working hard and been such a great help.

Monday night, Kenson and I worked on English for a long time, but it was really fun because there was a long article and then questions on reading comprehension. Kenson wants to study psychology at a university in the US and the article we read was about different psychological views of aggression. It was fun and interesting to hear his perspectives on cognitive versus sociobiological theory and how he could relate to the theories with his experiences directing the FWAL program. It was also hilarious for me to try to explain to him Freud’s “steam engine” analogy of aggression. Especially since I started out my explanation of a steam engine as a train… Kenson was like,” uhh it could be any kind of engine that uses steam, right?”

'Cabri' aka goat, a Francisville resident

Tuesday and Wednesday, Yvenson, Jim (a US volunteer here for a week) and I got SO much done at the warehouse. We completely sorted all the syringes and orthopedic supplies. Okay, so that doesn’t sound like much, but when you consider that’s a total of probably 500 boxes, it’s a LOT. Especially because there were a ton of boxes where we just had to dump the whole thing on the ground and sort through all of it. Wednesday was an especially great work day because first of all, we got a computer! So now we can manage our inventory in excel and I don’t have to come back here and do that after spending all day working at the warehouse. We have to go drag this long extension cord across the “road” from another warehouse and it has two big electrical outlets (like you would plug into a wall) on the end, so it looks totally ridiculous. Although, today some Francisville employeers put up a power line right outside our warehouse, so maybe we’ll get hooked up soon! The second reason it was a great day was that Father Rick and Raphael dropped off cold waters, sodas and chips for us! I did not realize how much I was craving salt until I had those Kettle cheddar chips… mmm my mouth is watering just thinking about how delicious they were. The second reason it was great was that we got to bring a bunch of supplies to St. Philoemene that they have needed for a while, including an amazing find by Yvenson of a huge cooler full of zinc supplements. Later, Sergio, our year-long volunteer from Spain who is working at a wound clinic at St. Philomene, got to come into the warehouse and pick out all the supplies he needs for his clinic. It was so much fun because he’s fairly quiet and his English isn’t super great, but he’s looking around and finding so many things that he needs and he’s goes, “this is like CHRISTMAS!” I’m so happy that the supplies are finally getting to the people who need to use them and it’s very fun that I get to be the one to give them to them. And the FOURTH reason why it was such a good day was that Olson and his wife and daughter came and visited me in the warehouse! I was so sweaty and dirty and of course Esther was wearing an adorable dress and looking amazing, but I was really happy to see them.

Cholera tests, here from the US dripping in reagents and being sorted on our spectacularly clean 'lab bench'

Bryn dancing with the girls at FWAL

Ok now for the fun stuff! Any of you who think I’m so noble for living in a third world country, that it must be so tough, and that I’m truly roughing it… you can just skip over this next part! Haha. Tuesday evening we had a surprise goodbye party for Bryn, a long term volunteer who has been here since the earthquake. It started at FWAL, all the kids were sitting on their little benches waiting for Bryn to get there. The dance group of girls had lots planned, but it was hilarious because they were playing music as everyone was waiting, and these two little boys get up and are putting on their little show for everyone. They’re dancing around, doing like techno foot and arm-work. Oh my god it was hilarious! Then, a few more brave souls get up and it turns into this all-boys dance party! I was taking video and trying so hard not to shake the camera, but I was laughing so hard! I’ll post the two videos I took on Facebook if you want to see. So, when Bryn walked in and all the kids started singing for him and clapping. Bryn was so funny, he was shaking all the little one’s hands and thanking them for making this little party for him. Some of the kids recited little stories and a group of girls sang some nice songs for him. I don’t know how Bryn held it together, I wanted to cry it was so cute that the kids love him so much and are sad to see him go. The directors got up and said some really nice stuff about Bryn. Kenson’s speech was especially great because he was telling the children things like, if they had apples or blackberries for breakfast, that was something they should thank Bryn for. It was nice that he put it into tangible terms for them. Then, in true Haitian fashion of ceremonies going on entirely to long (just in my opinion, of course) the little dance group at FWAL did a whole bunch of dances for Bryn and sang some more. They gave him some little presents and they ended it by allowing Bryn to pass out lollipops, as a special treat for the kids.

Everybody loves an i-phone

Then, we went to Mama Raphael’s for the grown up fun, haha. There was a live band that played such good Haitian music and it was so fun to see everyone together, just having a great time. Father Rick and Augustnel were there, so there was much more toasting, lots of dancing (including another all-boys dance party… what is it with the boys here??) and some ridiculous speeches. I was crying I was laughing so hard at some of the craziness. In Haiti, there are a few words that people overuse all the time, one of them being “dezod” which basically means unruly and ridiculous, but Tuesday night it truly fit the occasion.

On Wednesday evening, we had a little party in Father Rick’s office for Sister Judy because it was her 66^th birthday! We had some drinks and chips and Father Rick entertained everyone with funny stories. Then, Joanne, Sister Judy and I went to Petionville for dinner. We went to a very nice seafood restaurant where they grill the fish right in front of you. A couple who have been friends with Sister Judy for a long time and all their children joined us as well. The restaurant is very close to where the Father Wasson Center used to be, so we drove past on the way. There’s nothing there, just a wall of planks (whatever that stuff is called where they make a sheet of wood out of scraps). Wow not having internet as a crutch creates a big problem when trying to sound semi-intelligent. Also being in a foreign country messes with your language-brain, I’m gonna blame it on that. Anyways, Sister Judy used to come to this restaurant all the time before the earthquake and our waiter remembered her! He brought over some complimentary appetizers for us which was sweet of him. I got my fish which was pretty good, but I was not expecting it to be an entire fish just sitting on my plate. Head, guts, eyes, tail, everything grilled right up! Honestly, it just makes me realize how packaged and processed everything is in the US to make us think that we’re not eating an animal. Okay I won’t get into that, but really, you should watch Food Inc if you haven’t.

And finally, I’m caught up to today! This morning Wynn introduced me to two volunteers from the US who are here for a little over a week and want to help out. So I brought them to the warehouse with me and we sorted all the needles by their gauge which was another HUGE project and I am so thankful for their help. It’s great because the guy, Shane, was a med tech in an ER so he knows a lot more about the supplies and is able to tell me what things are when I don’t know. Also, they are both good organizers and Sabine has worked in a warehouse before, so they had a lot of great ideas for me about how to arrange the warehouse. After lunch we went over to FWAL, so they could meet the kids and I was very happy to take a break from work to go play. I met some new little sweethearts and talked to one of the kids who is in the English class that I went to once, so I straightened out the days and times with him, so hopefully I’ll make my way back there. Shane, Sabine and I taught a big group of the boys how to play freeze tag and red-light, green-light which was so much fun. Hopefully, it was successful enough that the kids will start playing those games with each other. After such a busy last couple of days, I’m so happy that I just get to write, listen to music and relax tonight. And of course I’m going to call Kayla because it’s her BIRTHDAY today! HAPPY BIRTHDAY KAYLA!!!

Oh my gosh, it has been such a fun morning. The two Italian photographers, Andre and Steffan, had a Haitian family come visit them that they know from their many visits to Haiti. They had taken the little boy’s picture for an exposition on their very first visit. Then, when they came back last time to film ‘Mr. Brown for Haiti’ they went out and found the boy again to star as little Mr. Brown in the film. Mr. Brown is a popular character in Italy who teaches little children English and it is hilarious. So they filmed Mr. Brown for Haiti with the kids in our program and took the kids from our orphanage in Kenscoff into the studio to sing the chorus that plays in the background throughout the film. This is the link to the video… you should definitely watch it! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mSWOquhr_lA

The family was all dressed up to come visit Andre and Steffan and they were so sweet. While they were talking, Steffan asked the parents if their son was still in school and they said no because school became too expensive for them. They had a big discussion about how much it costs and Steffan gave them money for a school uniform and the first month of school. It was so nice and the family was so thankful. When the family buys the uniform and takes him to school, they are going to get a picture and send it to Steffan in Italy and he will send more money for the next month. It’s sad that the family has to prove that they are really going to send the child to school, but unfortunately people are so poor that it’s common for the family to take the money and use it for something else.

Andre and Steffan are leaving today, so they gave a suitcase of their clothes to the family, our kitchen staff and some of the guys who work at the hospital that they’re close to. It was such a great moment and all the men were excited and digging through the suitcase to find the dress clothes that would fit them. I don’t think they’re bringing much back to Italy because one of the suitcases they brought down was filled with toys that one of their daughters had donated to the FWAL kids. I’m sad that they’re leaving; I hope that they will come back again before my year is up.

Like I mentioned, yesterday I went to brunch in Petionville with the girls. It was a beautiful drive up there and I love getting to see more of Haiti. We drove through the downtown area of Delmas as well as some main streets of Petionville. Delmas was very nice and because it was Saturday there were even more people on the street than there usually is. Usually there are a lot of people, so yesterday the city was packed. The streets were clean though and there were even some street signs that one of the cellphone companies had installed. When we got up into Petionville, the roads were a little bigger, much less crowded and the views were amazing. Petionville is so green and tropical, it was beautiful. There was also a lot of nicer, more unique artwork. We got to the hotel where we were eating and Sister Judy told us a lot about what everything was like before the earthquake. I guess the hotel was near to where the Father Wasson Center used to be. The Father Wasson Center building was used as St. Damien Hospital and then it became an administrative building and housed the volunteers. During the earthquake, the Father Wasson Center collapsed as well as the majority of Villa Creole, the hotel we were at. Sister Judy said that before the earthquake, on the weekends she used to come down to the hotel and swim in the pool and study Creole. Sounds like an amazing Sunday afternoon to me! Luckily, some of Villa Creole remained intact, including the outdoor café area and the pool. Breakfast was delicious. It was a buffet with lots of fresh fruit, eggs, coffee and pancakes. We sat at a nice table right next to the pool and a view of the half-crumbled building.

Back at home, I was going to go sit and do some work, but Wynn was setting up a little nerf basketball hoop and playing catch with two of the boys from FWAL and I decided that playing sports would be way more fun than doing work. The boys were about ten years old and totally stoked to play with the sports equipment. When they were batting, I taught them a proper stance, although once they got the hang of it, we lost the ball a couple times. They taught me some very necessary Creole words for playing with kids like, ‘throw’ and ‘bat’. Ivy lent them some books from the “library”… we’ll see if the books make their way back.

After sports, we took the boys back to FWAL and brought cake and soda for one of the high school girl’s birthday. She turned 13! The girls are super loud and totally move as a pack, just like any other group of high schoolers, but they’re really sweet and it was fun talking with them. Of course they wanted to take a million pictures on my camera so I’ll post some of them. The girls are in the Don Bosco program which is temporarily at FWAL, but they all grew up at the St. Helene orphanage in Kenscoff.

The birthday girl with some friends and some cake

Hanging out with Alianne and Claudia

Wynn, Alianne, Alain and the 2 boys from FWAL

Ivy getting her hair greased and braided Haitian-style

I made a lot of progress today inputting inventory into the computer system, but other than that it's been a pretty lazy day. I was able to talk to a bunch of people on Skype/FB today which was nice. I'm probably just going to read my book for the rest of the night, who knows what will come my way tomorrow!

I took pictures today! This morning Sister Judy, Ivy, Claudia and I went to breakfast at a hotel in Petionville and I took pictures from the car along the way. I'll write more about my day later, but here are the photos...

Haiti's flamboyant public transportation, a tap-tap 

a nice street, notice there's a sidewalk and no trash

Prestige truck! Haitian beer that is delicious!

View of the countryside from the road

Today Junior and I finished inventory of the medications in the warehouse! We spent probably 12 hours each comparing the old medication list with what was actually there. I still have to update it in the computer system, but we know we don't have to work in the boiling hot warehouse anymore! There still is no electricity hooked up to that warehouse in Francisville and I think the roof just sucks up all the heat from the sun and makes an oven out of the warehouse. All of the medications and supplies only take up about 1/3 of the room, but there is no partition that separates it, so I'm nervous that even when it gets power, it'll waste too much energy to keep the whole thing cool. Yesterday I was able to talk with a previous short-term volunteer who had been here with the Mayo Clinic and set this whole system up. He is a pharmacist, so it's great to have him as a contact if I have questions. I'm hoping to have a meeting with the medical director of the hospital, as well as Wynn and Raphael, to show them a current list of what we have, as well as what is about to expire. I'm excited to start ordering medications (there are many organizations that will donate them to us for free) to stock the hospitals.
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Junior in our Francisville warehouse

Half of the medication shelves

Last night we had dinner at Mama Raphael's with Ivy's friend Claudia who is visiting for a couple days. After dinner, we climbed the water tower so that we could sit and talk for a while. It's a big climb... I'm actually sore today... and literally within one minute of getting to the top, it started to rain. Not Seattle rain, Haiti rain which means huge droplets that just pour down on you and get you soaked within seconds. So we climbed down the wet ladder and were completely drenched by the time we got down.

our pediatric hospital, St. Damien's, from the water tower

view of MINUSTAH grounds from the water tower

I'm very upset about missing the Harry Potter premiere last night. I'm trying to get my hands on a bootleg copy asap. Speaking of not being in the US, I realized today that it's been an entire week without wine, TV or chocolate. Surprisingly, I don't miss it but I guess it's only been one week...

Woohoo for internet connection! I'm actually writing this online instead of making a word document and posting it later.


Yesterday I finally got to get started on organizing the pharmacy! We went over to Francisville around 2pm and Junior and I spent about two hours organizing the medications, so that today we can do an inventory check. There is no air conditioning in Francisville and it was HOT yesterday. It's a miracle I could even hold on to the medication bottles I was so sweaty. Junior was a huge help, he's worked in the pharmacy before so he knows what he's doing and he's going to medical school in Haiti starting in September. Pretty cool. Also, he likes Rihanna so we're going to be best friends. He played it on his ipod yesterday while we were working.


Unfortunately, there are some medications that are expired on the shelves. We haven't thrown them out yet because we need to double check with Father Rick how to get rid of them, but it's a bummer. Hopefully we won't have to do that anymore! After organizing the stock in Francisville, we went over to St. Luc Hospital to see the medications that they try and keep in stock there. Once we know for sure our inventory, hopefully we'll be able to do rounds at St. Luc's and keep their cabinets stocked so they don't run out of any medications.


Last night I helped Kenson with his English. We worked out of his TOEFL book which is the English test for foreign exchange students to get into college in the U.S. I was surprised because some of the questions were really hard! Some were obvious because I'm a native English speaker, but trying to explain to him the random rules of English sucked. I feel bad for anyone who has to learn English. For example, how do you explain to someone that you don't say 'furnitures' or 'mails'? While we were working in the little trailer there was an enormous thunderstorm. Rain was pelting the metal roof of the trailer and the thunder was shaking it. It was actually great to fall asleep to.


This morning I did exercises in my Creole books, then went over to FWAL to practice Creole with the kids. I bounced around for a little bit, then ended up in the English class. The teacher had me teach the kids the alphabet and then I had them sing it with me. It's hard to direct the class because some of them are just starting to learn English, but one of the kids I talked to had been taking English for four years. I was impressed with how patient all the students were, I know that American kids would have been going nuts with all the waiting and listening to each person recite their ABC's. After I helped with the ABC's the teacher went over colors with them and then finished the class with a discussion of the quote "be the change you wish to see in the world." I thought Palo, their teacher, did an amazing job with the lesson and the kids are really lucky to have him. He said I can come back every day if I want, and I think I'll take him up on that offer because it really helps me to practice Creole with the kids.


Alright, I'm heading off to Francisville now to work on the inventory. Might need a beer tonight after 5 hours of correcting inventory...

I had another great day today. I feel like every day I get to experience so much it’s hard to take it all in sometimes.

I started the day at mass in the chapel on the grounds with Father Rick. They lay the bodies of the children and adults who died the previous night in the chapel and Father Rick does a Catholic funeral for them, there were three there this morning. The bodies are wrapped and they each have unique cloths over them that are decorated with crosses and flowers. The one for the little girl was a light pink and had white lace over it, it was very pretty. There was a lot of singing in Creole which sounded beautiful and a Haitian girl, Esther, who works here and is known for her singing was there, so it was a really nice funeral. I had a hard time at one point because the door to the chapel is open and when you look out you can see all of the mothers with their babies waiting to be triaged to come into the hospital. Many of the babies and children are crying because they don’t feel well and have to wait such a long time to be seen. I felt so bad for those mothers because we had someone’s little girl in here, watching her funeral. I was thinking this over very solemnly when I glance outside again, and Sister Judy who is doing the triage, is so frustrated with one of the mothers interrupting her while she’s talking to a patient that she takes matters into her own hands. She is standing facing the chairs that the mothers are sitting in and she reaches between the two, sets her elbow down on the back of the chair, and turns her body to face the one she actually wants to talk to, elbowing out the rude mother. Hilarious.

I had some plans for the mid-morning to afternoon but they changed. I feel like I could start almost every story here with that… “well, I was going to do something, but I ended up doing this.” Anyways Dievrek (pronounced Jevek) drove Ivy and I to Project HOPE to have a meeting in hopes of getting some donated medications and supplies. The meeting went really well, it sounds like they have a lot to give away and we need a lot of medications. Ivy was especially excited because the representative we were talking to said that they had the capability to send us insulin and chemotherapy drugs. I really hope that I can do my pharmacy project well because it could end up saving the hospital a ton of money, money that can be used for so many other things, because there is so much need. The drive to and from the organization, which is in Delmas, was equally as exciting for me because it’s only the second time I’ve been outside of our compound. I saw so many interesting things: a 10 year old boy wearing a “Junior Girls” t-shirt, a man washing a tire in the street runoff so that it would look new to sell, little garbage fires all over the roads, a man selling pills from his random assortment stuffed into a black garbage bag (scary), plus tons of beautiful art. We also passed the Canadian Embassy and the U.S. Embassy, both of which were gorgeous buildings made out a light, shiny stone (how scientific of me) with tall, wrought iron gates surrounding them.  We also took a road home that was up on a hill where we could see all the way over the flatlands and Port-au-Prince to the ocean. It’s surprising how many trees there seems to be, although you can’t appreciate how nice it is because of all the smog.

Before the sunset I went up on the roof of St. Damien’s and took some pictures of the views. You can see the dark clouds in the distance, which produced tons of lightening when it got a little later. I sat in the other room and watched it for a while because it was really pretty. Later, I had my first Creole lesson with Kenson, the director of FWAL. Tomorrow, I’m going to help him study for the SAT’s. He might have wanted me to take an SAT first before he agreed to this deal… hopefully I don’t embarrass myself too bad.

Volunteer area and water tower

View of Francisville, from the roof of St. Damien

I had a great rest of the day after the FWAL graduation ceremony. I took quite a bit of time for myself because the conference room had internet! I sent some emails and chatted with people who were online, so I’m really, really hoping that I can get internet in there tomorrow as well. I even took a shower, because I didn’t take one last night and then I baked in the sun all day, and I’m sure the glare coming off my sweaty skin was blinding over Skype. Thank god Skype doesn’t share smells because it was no good.

A little later Ivy and I went back to the conference room so that she could show me the computer system that they’re using to manage their pharmaceutical inventory. We brought some of the new French books we had donated and brought some kids from oncology into the conference room with us so that they could read the books while we were working. I’m sure the kids have bad days when the medicine really gets to them, but I have yet to see it. They are big troublemakers and have huge personalities just like any other kids. When you’re interacting with them, you never think about the fact that they have cancer because you’re focused on making sure they behave and enjoying their ramblings. So anyways, about work, the great thing about the computer system is that it’s really simple to use, but the not so great thing is that there is still quite a few glitches and a lot of things you can’t do on the system. But, I was extremely impressed that the entire thing had both English and Creole for any button you click on. I took my aforementioned shower, then had some dinner with Wynn and the other volunteers and we chatted and he was able to tell me a little bit more about the long term vision of the pharmacy and St. Luc and St. Philomene. I really liked hearing about the future plans because it gives me a great idea about what to prioritize and the goals that we’re working towards. I’m excited for my first official day of work tomorrow!



my room on day 2



my bathroom


Yesterday after Ivy and I toured St. Damien’s Pediatric Hospital, Wynn took me through St. Luc’s ER and ICU, St. Philomena’s cholera center and some of the outpatient clinics. We stopped in the small pharmacy that supplies each one, as well as the storage warehouse in Francisville where they keep large quantities of medicines and supplies. It made me realize that this is a huge job and one that is going to take a lot of time to put together. I really need to get my Creole fluent so that I can talk with all of the doctors and nurses about what works best. I think the best plan in this first month or so is to work on Creole for half the day and learning about the pharmacy for the other half.

After the tour, Ivy took me on an eating marathon. First we stopped at 18 Santos, which is a new home setup by Partner’s in Health, Paul Farmer’s organization. They took in many of the orphaned and disabled kids after the earthquake. They have an extremely nice facility with a huge kitchen, a therapy pool and only two children per room. We were given a tour by two Haitian-American kids who were there volunteering for the summer with their mother. Ivy’s friend in the kitchen served us some delicious boullion, rice and avocado. It was stuffed and I barely ate half of it. We said goodbye at 18 Santos and headed for a staff members house. They just moved in and have a very nice house. The staff member’s wife was so generous and fed us again, but I just some fruit because I was so full. They were all speaking Creole, so I read some French books to their two year old girl until she fell asleep. I was very impressed that the family had at least two hundred books for their daughter, but only about ten or so toys. Haitians really place a ton of importance on education. Their daughter is only two, but they are already teaching her French.

Back at the compound, we went to visit Sister Judy and see how her dinner at the US Embassy the previous night was. She said that there were a lot of Americans who live in Haiti running the big NGO’s as well as some Haitian politicians. We talked about my job while I’m here and I’m happy that I’ll have Sister Judy to ask advice because she was the Operations Director of St. Damien’s for many years. I’m hoping that I’ll be able to shadow the pharmacists at St. Damien’s because they are much more established. It’s difficult because St. Luc’s just moved into “more permanent” housing, which means they are out of tents and into prefabricated houses. They have a foundation and a cement wall that comes up about a foot and a half, but then it’s just wood plank up to the tin roof. There are no doors, just sheets that are actually really nice because they let the breeze through the different areas of the room.



Philippe at the FWAL ceremony with my sunglasses

Last night we went back to Mama Raphael’s for dinner and had a drink and plantains with picklies. We came home fairly early though because this morning was the FWAL graduation ceremony. I left with Joanne, an advisor for FWAL, to go to mass at 9am with the children. They were all dolled up in their dress pants and white dress shirts and a bunch even had bow-ties on. They were adorable and loved playing games with me. I was so impressed that they made it through the ceremony without any crying or tantrums, because I was about to have a meltdown in the heat. So many of the kids loved singing and many were drumming against the pews to the more spirited songs. Little Jackson who was next to me got so tired and kept falling asleep in my lap. I let him sleep because he was so little (maybe 3 or 4 years old) and just woke him up for the parts where the kids were supposed to stand. After two hours of mass, there was a half hour break and they started the graduation ceremony. I made it through about a half hour of the ceremony before I had to come back because I was so hot. It was nice because many of the kids had extended family there, all dressed up to watch them graduate. In Haiti they celebrate every grade the kids graduate from, because it isn’t like the US where everyone just moves up, you have to pass the tests, so many kids don’t get to graduate each year.

Not sure what I’ll be doing for the rest of the day, but I need to get my hands on a broom and some bleach to clean up my house!

I’m in Haiti! I’m writing from the outdoor kitchen where volunteers hang out, eat and socialize. It’s only 9:30am and already 90 degrees, but it’s windy so the breeze helps cool you off.

I arrived yesterday and my plane was actually half an hour early. There was a space shuttle launch in Miami and I think the captain was very eager to see it, so we sped through the first half of the flight. It ended up working out nicely; the captain got to see the space shuttle and we arrived second out of the six flights that all got in at the same time in the tiny Port-au-Prince airport. Even being second, it took about an hour to get to customs. It was so hot and stuffy, but people are very friendly with each other so I was listening in trying to understand some Creole. I pretty much couldn’t decipher anything. Luckily, coming back to St. Damien’s most of the volunteers speak English and I am even able to understand their Creole a little better. I even understood a joke yesterday! They didn’t ask me any questions coming though immigration and at customs they took my paper and I walked through. A little different than TSA who searched my bag as I was leaving the country.

I was able to find Ivy, the volunteer who was picking me up, and Smith and they drove me back to St.Damien’s Hospital where I will be staying. Along the road there are colorful canvas paintings for sale and other really pretty artwork. My favorite pieces were wooden statues about a foot tall that looked like caricatures of UN troops. I’ll take a picture or bring one home because they are hilarious and a written description won’t do them justice. The streets are filled with various NGO cars, tap-taps and so many UN vehicles. Ivy bought me a corn icecream popsicle which was actually really good. Some kids came up to tap on the window asking for money and our icecream, but I knew that that would be a part of living in Haiti. What I was not expecting, however, were enormous cows that wander through the roads! Yesterday we went on a walk and there was a huge bull just staring us down as we walked by. Maybe if I grew up on a farm I wouldn’t be as scared of them, but they don’t like people so they just stare at you at eye-level with their huge horns as you walk by.

Ivy took me on a tour of all the grounds yesterday and I couldn’t believe how many projects are going on. The craziest part is that they are almost exclusively run out of shipping containers. They are building more permanent housing, warehouses and offices but of course obtaining land and building permits takes much longer than plopping down a container. My favorite thing we did yesterday was visiting the Father Wasson Angels of Light program (or FWAL, they all just say the acronym). You walk into their gated area and it’s a large grassy courtyard with toys for the children and it’s surrounded on all sides by shipping containers that the children live in. Many of the kids were friendly and knew Ivy, so they came up to say hi. The high school girls group was hilarious; teenagers are teenagers no matter where you go. They move as a pack and luckily they love Ivy, so they were joking around and even showed us their dance routine that they were working on.

Today is Saturday so people are working but it’s very relaxed. This morning Ivy walked me through St. Damien’s Hospital. They have most of the major departments of a pediatric hospital in the US- ER, PICU, “neonatology”, lab, radiology and pediatric oncology (that’s not an exclusive list). We stopped by the abandoned babies room, which is the same room Molly used to visit to go play with the babies and give them some attention. Ivy usually visits the kids in pediatric oncology, but we stopped by Sister Judy’s house today and she was saying that the abandoned babies really need it the most, so I think I might go over there from time to time to play with them for a bit. Anyways, Ivy and I brought a book with us to oncology which some of the kids were interested in, and others were much more interested in stealing the i-pod out of her pocket. They also have a very new flatscreen TV which is nice for the mother’s who spend all their time in that tiny room with their children who are receiving treatment. All in all it was a great morning and I’m excited to learn some more about what I will be doing and go into Tabarre with Ivy.