While we were on site in Bonneau getting the ground level for the foundation of the church there were children everywhere.  They came to play with us and longed to work side by side with us and the Haitian men.  We had a huge dirt pile that they loved climbing up and rolling down.  The men, who I assume, were supposed to be watching the kids would periodically come over and yell at them and they would get off the dirt.  The other times they would play games at the bottom and sing songs.  This really kept us working in the hot sun.  Some would sneak up and want to carry buckets.  At one point the kids were all singing a song with the same words over and over again.

“boule dyab boule,boule dyab boule,boule dyab boule,boule dyab boule”

I asked our translator what the were singing.  He started laughing and said it was a song they taught in Bible School, “Burn Devil Burn”.  We would take breaks to get water and the kids would run up and grab the tools from the ground.

I promise we didn’t go over there and make all the kids do the work!  It made me think of kids back in the US, it made me think of my kids.  How willing would they be to go out in 100 degree weather and work to build our future church?

Water in Kreole is Dlo.  This is one of the only words that I learned while there.  We take clean water for granted.  When I turn the faucet on water is going to come out, not doubt in my mind.  Not only that, the water will be clean and I will be able to drink it.  The reason this word stands out to me the most from our trip is because the kids begged for it.  When we would go out to the work site we would take our own water.  I had a 2 liter camel pack and a water bottle full of water.  We also had these little bags of water in a cooler.

After a few hours the water we brought would be hot and everyone wanted the little bags that were in the cooler.  The kids would all come up and say dlo dlo dlo.  How do you turn down a hot sweaty kid begging for water?  Needless to say we ran out of water a few days on the job.  We returned back to the mission praying that the ice machine was working.  The mission had a huge water tank and all the water was filtered and safe to drink.  Safe to drink and good tasting water do not go hand-in-hand.  The first day they brought ice out we were all fighting over it.  You can only drink warm water for so long.  We were covered in dirt and sweat from head to toe and made a beeline for the ice machine.  “Any ice?”  and the reply was “No Water!”

No water?  I guess that means no ice…..  Wait, that also means no shower. No shower? Luckily they had filled a large barrel with water before they ran out.  You could dip the bucket in the barrel and take a bucket shower.  We were already on strict rules to take a military shower.  You know, turn water on to get wet, turn water off, soap up, turn water back on to rinse off.  And of course if its yellow let it mellow…..

The water came back on for a little while and you had to get in line to take a shower.  I went back in to brush my teeth and heard yelling from one of the younger members on our trip.  “My eyes, my eyes, they are burning.  I’ve got soap in my eyes.  The water is out”  I’m sorry, but my first instinct was to start laughing.  I yelled and told him that there was some water in the bucket that was right outside the shower curtain.  His response was that he had no clothes on.  I looked for a bucket but I think all of them were being used.  I finally found a small dixie cup for him to use.

The water was pretty intermittent during our whole trip.  Most of the town that we were in had no running water in their homes either.  There were stations around the city that had water inside that you could get and take it back home.  I have no clue who ran these or if they were free.  I also saw places selling water.  I saw a lady walking down the road with a full water jug on her head.  I estimated it to be around 40lbs.  One of the most disheartening things I saw was someone carrying water in a large tank that was labeled sulfuric acid.  I’m sure it was clean, but just the thought of drinking water from it.

My point is we take for granted that when we turn the handle clean water is going to come out, but so many other places this is not so.  We don’t have to dig holes in the mud to try and get water, no matter how dirty it is.

I’m not a superstitious person at all and don’t plan on starting any time soon.  I do like to make fun of superstitions.  Is that bad?  I wanted to share one time on our trip where things got a little heated.  That will be the closest to a Friday the 13th story you will get.

We were headed back from our work site in Bono for the day on Saturday.  One of the guys was asking our security if we could stop in the market and get some bananas for the trip back.  That started the whole conversation of what a banana was.  In Haiti they call bananas figs and they call plantains bananas.  We finally made it through that confusion and our security guy told him no, not on Saturday.  We had to drive through the market and across a river to get to the work site.  The market had been big, but not overwhelming every other day.  However, Saturday this place was packed.  We had a driver that we had not had before and he seemed a little unsure of himself.  Back to the journey to the mission.

Our driver stopped and let someone out of the front and off he went into the jungle.  He turned to us and said “bano” which from my limited Kreole means bathroom.  The guy is in the jungle and our driver puts it in reverse and goes about 50 yards in reverse down the road.  Then we turn into a side road.  The guy comes out of the jungle and can’t find us.  Our driver pulls out picks him up and puts it back into reverse.  Apparently he had missed a turn.  I’m not sure how they find anything in Haiti.  There are no street signs or house numbers.

We are back on track and getting ready to go over the river into the market.  People had set up along the path we normally take so we are going to have to drive the length of the river to get back on the road.  Or so we thought.  Our driver stops in front of one persons selling some produce and rice and lays on the horn.  I guess he is expecting her to pick up and move everything.  Meanwhile, some older lady starts dancing around the back of the tap-tap and grabbing at people.  She gets to one of our translators and he smacks her in the head with his shirt and yells something at her.  Then we start moving forward.

I look out around the front of the truck and see an 80lb bag of rice in our path. BOOM!  The truck hits the bag of rice with the front passenger side tire and can’t get over it.  The driver continues to try to get over the bag while we are all yelling at him.  He rips the bag open and then puts it in reverse.  The lady is yelling at the top of her lungs at the driver and she runs to get the bag of rice.  Rice is pouring out as she moves the bag, yelling the whole time.

The driver ignores her and continues on to the road.  We have to drive around the other vendors to make it to the road.  We finally double back and make it to the main road.  The lady has made her way through the market and is waiting on us in the middle of the road.  I’m not sure how much an 80lb bag of rice is, but our driver should have paid for it.  She gets out of the way and we continue to drive the whole time the driver and the lady arguing.  Up ahead their is a tap-tap loading people in and a truck to the right with a flat tire.  Our driver is still arguing with the lady and tries to squeeze through the small opening between the two trucks.  I’m pretty sure he grazes the guy changing the tire.

Now, let me set the stage.  I’m sitting in the back looking at the lady who is yelling at our driver.  By this time most of the market is watching this scene.  Then the guy on the right who is changing his tire with a machete jumps up after being bumped.  He has a machete in his right hand and has his left hand in the cab yelling something in Kreole.  After getting nowhere he comes to the back of the truck where all of us are sitting.  I don’t care what language you are speaking, when someone is yelling at you with a machete in their hand you start to get concerned.  I look at our security guy and he is off in lala land looking down at the truck bed.  The Haitian man with the knife is still yelling at us and is slipping in some English words.  These are not words that I use, let’s just leave it at that.  After his tirade our security guy yells something at him and the guy hands his machete to another guy to finish changing the tire.  I’m not sure what our security guard said to him, but we were all in agreement that he should have said it 5 minutes earlier.  The angry Haitian man wave as we left and all was well.

Needless to say it was nice to get back to the mission on Saturday and glad that Sunday was a day of rest.