Why Haiti?

Hi everyone, Ted here. I am sitting in a nearly empty guest house this morning, as Emma and the team from San Diego have travelled to the nearby town of Jacmel for the day. It turns out to be a good day to stay behind because we have another team here that was supposed to leave for the Dominican Republic by bus this morning but can't due to a national strike there. So I am here trying to monitor the situation and help them in any way I can.

I chose the title of this blog post because I want to try to explain the "why" of Haiti over the next several entries. It seems that during each new trip here, God reveals a little more about the work He has for us and why He has called us to Haiti. I hope to share some of those things with you so keep checking back here over the next week or so.

Before I finish though, I wanted to share something that happened just this morning. The team left around 6am to try and beat the traffic to Jacmel, and I was opening the gate for their van to drive out. There was a short delay as they were inside the van saying a prayer for safety. I was standing by the gate and noticed a few of the neighborhood kids standing nearby and watching me. One was a little boy about 4 years old and he was pulling a homemade toy car constructed from a plastic bottle and 4 round water bottle caps for the tires. He was followed by his little sister who looked to be about 5. As I stood on the sidewalk by the open gate waiting for the van to pull out, I looked around and saw two balloons on the ground that had drifted up by the gate. I picked them up and handed them to the 2 little kids. From their wide eyes and expressions of pure joy, you would think I had just handed them the best toy they had ever seen. I saw them scamper off and then turned my attention back to the van. As the van pulled out onto the street, I looked around and saw 3 other kids that just appeared out of nowhere. They wanted to know if I had any more "balons" to give them too. Unfortunately I didn't have any more, and I'm not exactly sure where the first 2 came from! 

So the first answer as to "why Haiti" is this: I want to be in a place where the simple act of handing a child a balloon can make their whole day!

It's Way Past Time for an Update!

Wow! I find it hard to believe that it's been 3 months since our last blog update. So many things have happened over that time, so many changes to our family on this journey to Haiti. As we clear the dust off this blog we will commit to doing a better job of keeping you all updated on what is going on with us. 

Since early April, we have:

• Closed on the sale of our home in Poetry, TX
• Sold our remaining furniture, household items, and everything else that we can't store or use in Haiti
• Traveled to California, where we had a refreshing time reconnecting with family & friends
• Moved to Ft. Lauderdale, FL 
• Started a travel nursing position at Plantation General Hospital in FL (Rebecca)
• Traveled back and forth to Haiti 4 times to work at the guest house and help with visiting teams (Ted)
• Emma got a job and is working at Subway in Plantation; Olivia is hard at work with homeschooling & Tynan is enjoying making good friends at church
• Ana came back from a year in Germany, promptly got married, and is now back in Germany for a while 

Whew! I hope you can appreciate how our heads have been spinning a little bit with all these changes. But God has been gracious and has helped us navigate this unpredictable and slightly crazy journey that we are on. 

I am here in Haiti again (4th trip in 8 weeks) and this time Emma was able to come with me. It's her very first trip to Haiti, and she will be blogging this week about what she thinks about it all. Check it out on their "Em & Liv" page. 

Thanks again for taking the time to catch up with all our "goings on", and we'd really appreciate it if you could remember to pray for our whole family as we are now on the "homestretch" to our goal of serving full-time in Haiti. God bless you!

 

I always feel happy when I see Haiti out the window!

liq·ui·date (verb):

1.	a. to settle or pay off...
2.	a. to terminate the operations of...
*3.	( tr ) to convert (assets) into cash
*4.	( tr ) to eliminate or kill

(Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 10th Edition. HarperCollins Publishers. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/liquidate(accessed: April 04, 2011).

So, the latter two being what we are in the midst of right now, I (Rebecca) am beginning to wonder if I'm not the one being converted...into liquid form! If tears count?? I was doing really great up until today. No trouble with letting things go really, like you would expect, but just the enormity of trying to get it all sold and resettled into other homes as we near moving day!

I, personally, found this definition more appropriate:

liquidate -

c.1575, "to reduce to order, to set out clearly" 

(of accounts), fromL.L. liquidatus , pp. of liquidare  

"to melt, make liquid or clear,clarify," from L. liquidus  

(see liquid). 

(Online Etymology Dictionary. Douglas Harper, Historian. 04 Apr. 2011. )

Despite the fact that I'm melting down a little lately, things ARE getting clearer as we follow God's lead...with just a little more patience we will find ourselves in further awe of His provision, perfect plans, timing, and YES places for everything to go!!!!

My personal blog is titled Ripples & Reflections, because that is what each of our lives become...so perhaps I'm being be reduced to a purified "puddle" that may reflect a bit of God's image in the end.

Haiti's Housing Bubble...and our plans?

An interesting article was posted yesterday, that Ted can confirm first-hand from his recent trip. Housing is an issue! Everyone knew there was less available, that was one reason for opening a guesthouse for short-term ministry teams. However, when Ted looked into a rental a couple of blocks away for our family, he found the rent for one was more than double what is being paid for the guesthouse currently and the other was triple. There was nothing currently in our price range...but we know if God wants us onsite He will provide as he did with the guesthouse.

Our first thought was gratitude for our landlord who is a christian man and has only raised next years rent in a reasonable manner. Let's pray God keeps him convicted on that for the forseable future! After all he could be raking it in too!!

Our second is how does this affect our move?? Well, we will have to wait and see...with our target date in mid-June there is time for God to provide the right location within our budget, but as some of you may know he laid a temporary "back-up" plan on our hearts too, a couple of months ago. It would mean setting up house in or around Fort Lauderdale, where flights are both under 2 hours and usually less than $300. It would allow us to commute down and oversee teams as they arrive and tend to guesthouse needs that are even now in demand.

It would also allow for a period of transition for the girls as they finish school and give us a little more time to prepare them for young-adulthood (driving, first jobs...) which they will be delayed on with "life at 18" in Haiti. Lately they have been torn between ministry & experiencing the stages of "growing up" needed. This option might allow for both?

SO, again PLEASE keep us in your prayers as God unfolds His direction for us. Being in Haiti full-time will still be the most effective for our ministry there, and less stressful (believe it or not!), so that will continue to be the goal. Also, PRAY for the Haitians and various Ministries, that risk losing their housing now due to landlord greed.

Here is the full article for further reading:

Haiti's housing bubble, more pressing to some than election or Aristide

Rental prices in Port-au-Prince are estimated at 5 to 10 times higher than before the Haiti earthquake, pricing out local civic organizations in favor of wealthier international NGOs.

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Supporters of former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide celebrate as news of his arrival spreads throughout Port-au-Prince, March 17. Haitians will vote for president on Sunday.

Shannon Stapleton/Reuters

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By Bill Sasser, Correspondent / March 18, 2011

Port-au-Prince, Haiti

Despite jitters over the expected return today of exiled former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide less than 48 hours before a presidential election here, many Haitians face a more basic problem: a housing bubble that is pricing many locals out of their homes.

Skip to next paragraph

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  Gallery: Haiti: Life in a tent

Real estate prices, particularly rents, have skyrocketed in Port-au-Prince since last year’s earthquake that killed more than 200,000 people and displaced 1.5 million people.

“The quake destroyed thousands of housing and office units in the city and brought an influx of non-governmental organizations from around the world,” says Beverly Bell, founder of Other Worlds, a US-based non-profit that supports over 30 grassroots community organizations in Haiti.

IN PICTURES: Haiti: Life in a tent

The foreign organizations and their workers often have more funds at their disposal than the average Haitian organization or worker.

“There’s a dual economy here since the earthquake – the international NGO economy, and then what everyone else can pay. Rental prices in Port-au-Prince are now 5 to 10 times higher than before the quake. There’s a sense now among many Haitian property owners that now is the time you can get rich,” she says.

NGOs can afford to pay double

That's leading many Haitian civic organizations and non-profits, including a large number of churches and schools, to work from improvised spaces, some setting up in the backyards of other organizations or operating out of tents in refugee camps.

By the end of this year, Marie-Jose Poux has to find a new home for her orphanage and free school, Foyer Espoir Pour Les Enfants, which serves 76 children in the Delmas section of Port-au-Prince.

Founded after last year’s earthquake, 34 orphans ranging in age from 6 months to 12 years old live in the home. But earlier this year the property’s owner began demanding more rent and recently informed Ms. Poux that he will not renew her lease.

“He knows that he can rent to an NGO for twice what I’m paying him,” says Poux, a resident of New Orleans and native of Port-au-Prince who has worked with orphans in Haiti’s capital for more than a decade. “I’ve been looking for something else but there is nothing we can afford. Everything suitable has been taken by NGOs – they have the big money.”

'Disaster economy'

Harley Etienne, a native of Haiti and assistant professor of city and regional planning at Georgia Tech University, agrees that a so-called “disaster economy” has hugely inflated the Haitian capital’s real estate market. Even before the quake, Haiti was known as "the Republic of NGOs." That was only exacerbated after Jan. 12, 2010.

“The prices are way out of scale, to the point that I don’t know how you can justify some of it,” says Mr. Etienne, who is part of a US-based research team assessing earthquake damage in Haiti and its impact on local communities. “Part of it is tied to how devalued the Haitian currency is, but Haitian property owners are certainly trying to get some money while the getting is good.”

While NGOs are inflating the costs of office space, foreign professionals working for NGOs are also driving up the cost of private housing.

“I know that Oxfam has its own compound that provides residential housing, but a lot of NGOs don’t,” he says. “Property owners know this and are holding out for top dollar from foreign doctors and engineers.”

Marie-Jose Poux, who runs the orphanage in Delmas, has taken her landlord to court to fight paying an extra $6,000 he is demanding on her current lease. Meanwhile, she has found a vacant lot in the area for sale for $80,000, but estimates she would need at least another $100,000 to start building a permanent home for the orphanage. Her current location, which employs six teachers using three indoor and three outdoor classrooms, is already cramped.

“We have a waiting list of 25 more children who want to enroll, but there is no space for them,” she says. “I know we are doing God’s work here, and He will provide us something, but this is a very frustrating situation.”

Funny that it’s Lent.

Though we don’t typically use liturgy in our faith, the past several years we have been appreciating and honoring a season of Lent leading up to the celebration of Christ’s resurrection. Lent crept up on us this year. When we turned our hearts to it a couple of days ago, and to what we could either give up or take on as a reminder, this year, a joyful irony appeared!  

We realized that the couple of month’s delay in getting to Haiti, along with an extended time in selling our home, has brought us to the stage of giving up all that He has asked us to, over the next 30-40 days, during the season of Lent!  How beautifully ironic is that?? It might seem coincidental to some, but for us it is a special affirmation and gives deeper symbolism to the coming experience.

So, this year we won’t give up soda, coffee, chocolate, or even our favorite TV shows. It will be our privilege to sign papers closing on the house, watch every stick of furniture walk out the door and see each knick or knack disappear, in His name. As we empty closets and cupboards it will be to His glory. For some reason, it seems a little easier to tackle now!

God’s humor and timing give such power to His plans. We could have been going through this part of the transition at any time of year, but for the time to be now just seems, well…perfect.