Social Life: Haitian Style

Katie, Holden and I. I'm thankful each and everyday for
them being here to do life with me. 

Well, it's been a while since I posted, but in my defense we've had a LOT of things going on. The end of October and beginning of November have been filled with many things and our lives aren't looking to slow down anytime soon.

Post Hurricane Matthew, we got back into our daily routine, but we've had many social events come up. What does one's social calendar look like in Haiti? Let me fill you in our our most recent adventures.

October closed with a Halloween celebration. In Haiti, they celebrate the Day of the Dead rather than Halloween. However, the blancs (all the Americans here in town) wanted a reason to dress up. So, naturally we had a get together. This meant a three hour trip to the market in search of the most outrageous costume you could put together and a lot of yummy food. Katie, Holden and I searched the market high and low for the best costumes. I ended up as a tacky tourist and Katie was the early 2000s brunette version of Britney Spears, complete with a denim dress. We didn't find the perfect outfit for Holden, but we were creative. Since he's working with chick(en)s, it only made sense for him to be a "chick" magnet. He even carried around his little chick for a bit. We played silly games and had ourselves a party.

Desire - up on a mountain where we went
to visit baby Mika.

Fast forward a week and Katie, Holden and I went to our first Haitian party. Let me rewind and give you a little background. One of the Haitians that we work with, Torch, knows literally EVERYONE in Gonaives. He's lived here is whole life. This includes him knowing the owner of the local grocery store, Gonaibo. He hooked Holden up with the owner, so now Holden's chicken co-op is selling some if its eggs to the local grocery store. (We're getting fancy around here!) The grocery store recently celebrated five years of business, so the owner had a party and invited all of his vendors. Katie and I were lucky enough to tag along. We had no idea what to expect when going to a Haitian party. There were any number of things that could happen. So, we "dressed" up and out we went. Torch went with us too. The party was supposedly starting at 7. We showed up at 7:30 and in true Haitian fashion, the party didn't really kick off until 9:30. So, we spent two hours just hanging out at the local grocery store -- which is where the party was held. There was a band that came and played some cultural music (thankfully not the crazy, annoying campos music or loud rap Haitians tend to like) and it was LOUD. We lasted until about 11:00 and when they had an intermission, we were ready to go. We're normally in bed at like 9 so this was a late night for us!! When we got back to our house, we could still hear the music all the way from Gonaibo -- that's how loud it was!

Then, the flu hit.

Mom, Grandma and I at Royal DeCameron. 

The flu and strep throat have been passed all around Gonaives and we, unfortunately, were not spared. Katie went down first followed quickly by Holden and Julie. Chloe and Micah then fell in the mix and it was Luke, Jude and I trying to hold down the fort. I blame my two years in public education for helping keep it away from me. I went to work as Nurse Caitlin, making sure that everyone had their fill of liquids and anything else they needed. Thankfully, it was a quick spurt - or so we thought. While everyone began to feel better within a few days, the effects last much longer here in Haiti. So, eventually Jude caught it, then Luke caught it, and eventually it knocked me out for a day. Even still, not everyone is back to 100% and we all have moments where we feel a little out of it. It's been three weeks to this point and we're still trying to get rid of the germs. So, pray that they will go away and not come back!

Holden with baby Mika,
or should I say his baby.

Meanwhile, it was time for a little taste of home. My mom and grandma came to visit last week as well as Holden's mom and sister. They got the real taste of life in Haiti because our power decided that it was not going to cooperate well. We were able to show them a lot of really cool things that we get to do here and then we spent two days on the beach at a resort. They got a couple of typical Haitian meals, we visited the salt flats and baby Mika (She's a baby we met during one of our mobile medical clinics that we check in on from time to time. She's also known as Holden's baby and your heart will melt a little when you see them together.) They also got to see school, the chickens, and the medical clinic. We kept them busy! Then it was time to relax. (We'll gloss over the part where this is when I caught the flu. What an end to their vacation, but thankfully I was able to take a hot shower - or two or five!) It was nice to have a taste of home after being gone for three and a half months. In just a month, I'll be home stateside for a couple weeks to see even more people from home.

This week includes another blanc holiday celebration as we are all getting together for a Thanksgiving meal. We try to make the holidays here special since it's sometimes difficult to be away from home and your normal family traditions. I'm going to try and make my mom's homemade rolls -- we'll see how they turn out! Then, next week leave for a vacation in the Dominican Republic (where I'm very excited to speak some Spanish -- if I can get it all out of the dark reaches of my mind). We come back from the Dominican and a week later Katie, Holden and I come home for Christmas. We bring a team back with us when we come for the first week of January, then we have another team later in January. Our winter is busy, busy! Before I know it, I will have lived here for six months!

Sweet Moses

Pray for our team as we have many up and coming things going on. We are also in the midst of a big push to raise awareness of what we do and how we do it. (Read our blog and watch an awesome video here: http://hopecommunityproject.org/blog/ ) Pray for all of the traveling we will be doing in the coming weeks and that it would all go smoothly. Continue to pray for the adoption process of Moses. Luke and Julie recently got their guardianship papers and can begin the process of applying for a visa. Their lawyer has also shared that he thinks it shouldn't be too long for the adoption to be final.

Thank you for your continued support and prayers. They mean the world to me!

Normal for me, but not for you: 

Showing up to a Haitian party, and it not starting for two hours.
Watching ants as entertainment sometimes. It is not uncommon for us to kill a cockroach or a cricket and just leave it in the middle of the floor. Why? Because before too long there will be little ants coming to carry it away piece by piece. It's very fascinating, especially when they carry parts up the wall!

This also means that we have little ants crawling around. I just don't even kill them anymore, unless they're on me! They don't really bother anything, so we just let them be!

You can see the whale (or tiger shark)
way out in the water!

When we were on the beach we saw what
we're pretty sure was a whale, but the
locals were saying it was a tiger shark.
Either way, that's pretty cool!