This is Kendall and Laura. To start off the second day in
Haiti we all woke up nice and early to pouring rain. Some girls got up and
helped the cooks make breakfast. Then the rest of us woke up and ate the
breakfast. We got ready to go and loaded up in the Tap-tap (our transportation
bus). We dropped off ten people at The Home for Sick and Dying Babies.
Hey everyone! This is Laura and I am going to talk about my
personal experience in The Home for Sick and Dying Babies. When we arrived we had the option to either
go into a room full of mal-nourished kids or a room where more healthy kids
were. I decided to go to the
mal-nourished room first. When I got in
there I was overwhelmed by how small the babies were. I picked up a tiny girl who weighed around 6
pounds. Her ribs were protruding from
lack of food. Within minutes she was
asleep in my arms. I was seriously
considering taking her home with me! I
held her for a bit and then soon set her down so she could sleep in her crib,
she didn’t exactly like that idea, so I held her for the rest of the time,
sleeping in my arms. The rest of the
babies were adorable! One of them was obsessed with giving me knuckles! Besides all the smiles from the little ones,
some were getting sick and it was sad to see how weak they were from
sickness. The second part of this trip I
went to the room where the babies were healthier. It was sad to feel the weight difference of
the babies from each room. One of the girls I held was all smiles! She was in
love with pulling and playing with my curls! It was so cute to hear her laugh
and tickle her and see her beautiful smile!
Another kid I held was a boy around 3 years old…he was so skinny. When he saw the nurses preparing the food he
cried for a straight half an hour pointing at the food trying to tell me he was
hungry. I felt so helpless holding him
and trying to comfort him and not being able to feed him. Finally the nurse gave me some food to feed
the little boy. It was heartbreaking to
see the kids wait for their food because they were so hungry…it just made me
realize how much I take for granted being able to walk into my pantry at home,
when these kids don’t know when they will be receiving their next meal. Soon we had to leave and it was so hard to
say goodbye to the little babies...Hey mom, dad, Emily and duke! I’m doing
great! I love it here…I don’t know if I will be able to leave! So far all the
food has worked out with my food allergies! Love you all!
Hi this is Kendall. Frist hi mom and family I love and miss
you but I am having such a good time. After we dropped off the ten at the home
of sick and dying babies we drove in the Tap-tap the rest of the way to
Gertrude’s home for mentally handicapped and disabled kids. We were in rush
hour so the traffic was crazy. It was a rainy morning so the traffic police
were not out. The intersections were full of cars, which was such a different
experience then back home. Once we got there we walked in the house and there
were five plus kids smiling and greeting us. After we learned about the house
we were free to play with any kid we wanted to. The kid’s ages ranged from a
baby to around ten years old. They had 47 kids, 30 of them had a mental disability
or were handicapped, and the other 17 were kids who needed somewhere to live. Every kid in the house was smiling and the
littlest things made them happy. I met a little girl named Annie. She hung on
to me the whole time we were there. Even though it was hard to communicate I
still felt connected to her. Seeing all the kids smiling just because you held
their hands was a heart warming experience. When we had to leave it was hard to
put them down. I am excited because we get to go back for Easter and hang out
with the kids again.
Here is what we did for the rest of the day! We got back to
the guesthouse and had some snacks for lunch.
After that we headed to the Apparent Project store and got a tour of how
they make all of their decorations and jewelry out of trash and clay. Here is a video of how they make their
jewelry:
We spent an hour
shopping and getting fruit smoothies and then headed to another orphanage. We walked in and all of the kids greeted us,
some attaching to us right away. The kid’s
ages ranged from 4-17. We got a tour and
time to hang out with the kids. One of
Kendall’s personal experiences was she got to play tag with a little boy. When
he would catch her he would want to have a tickle fight. One of Laura’s personal experiences: a girl
attached to me right away; she also loved pulling my curls! The whole time she
wanted a piggyback ride or just being held...she was adorable! It was hard to leave because the kids didn’t
want us to. When we got back to the
house, a taco dinner was ready for us.
After dinner a one of Mr. Dols’ friend who grew up in Haiti and went to
college in Minnesota talked about her life story. The organization she runs provides sponsors
for kids to be able to go to school.
Here is a link to her website: http://teachaiti.org.
After that we had
reflection time about our day, then took showers and played games before
bed.
We are loving Haiti!
