|
Leogane, Haiti
August 2011
Participants: Alan English, Kevin Adkison, David Powell and Harry Whitt
Written by Harry Whitt
Haiti Mission Journal
Thursday, 25 August 2011
David Powell and I met at 1:00 AM to drive to Atlanta for our early morning flight from Atlanta to Miami and then from Miami to Port au Prince, Haiti. We had our carry-on luggage and one checked bag as a contingency bag. When our flights were canceled on Tuesday due to Hurricane Irene our checked bags were sent on to Haiti. I spent about an hour or so haggling with American Airlines of our need for a third contingency bag for our construction tools and some needed food. They were trying to charge us $150 each for a third bag. I had little confidence that our bags would be waiting for us in Port au Prince. Finally, I talked with the right person and we were given our third bag for free.
We arrived in good time in Atlanta, checked in with no hassles, ate a Burger King breakfast and we were on our way. Our concern today was our flights out of Miami being hampered by the incoming hurricane in the Bahamas. We linked up with our two guys from Florida, Kevin Adkison and Alan English who had stayed in Orlando when the Haiti flights were cancelled on Tuesday.
Our flight into Port au Prince was about one hour late due to our late start out of Miami. Once through immigration we began our chaotic scramble for our bags. David and I had marked our bags with bright flagging tape for an easy recognition. As David, Kevin, and Alan were getting our checked bags, I went to retrieve our bags in holding from baggage services. The lady told me to just go in this room and look for my bags. I immediately retrieved my bags but the generator was missing from the big duffle. Man, I was upset. I just knew someone had stolen it. Here we were in Haiti with plans to do construction work and now no generator. He told me TSA took it which sounded like a fabricated lie to me. It was a new generator still in the box. I had read American Airlines policy on shipping gasoline powered equipment and it simply stated that if it was new and unused there was not a problem. (There will be more on that later.)
David’s carryon had been grabbed at the Miami gate by an American Airline person and put with the checked bags because they said it was too big. Now we have found all the bags except for David’s so called carryon. It was wild with so many people and stacked bags in such a small area. Finally, David found his in a pile over on the side.
Outside the airport is another circus altogether. Now you have all these guys wanting to help you with an expectation for a tip. We try to fly into Port au Prince with enough baggage we can handle on our own. With all the tools and equipment we were bringing in it made us venerable to the mob of “helpers”. We ended up having to pay for too many baggage handlers.
It is amazing how God orchestrates things for us. So here we were with no generator to do a week of construction work. Kevin said he had shipped a small 1000 watt generator to Pastor Osnel (another Haitian pastor in the Leogane area) but it was not working. Kevin spoke up and said he thought he could repair it. So we went by Pastor Osnel’s home on the way and picked up the generator. Alan had the generator running in about thirty minutes after he started working on it. So God knew I needed a generator and He knew I needed a mechanic to work on the generator—it just blows my mind.
We arrived at Pastor Baptiste’s home (informally Pastor Fanfan). He lives just behind the church in a house we built for him after the earthquake. We immediately began preparation for our week’s stay by inflating our air mattresses and installing our four mosquito nets. I had brought in a small gravity fed water purification system so we could process good drinking water. We set it up and soon had some water to drink. Some of the ladies from the church had prepared a wonderful supper of rice and beans, fried plantain, salad, and chicken legs.
After supper, we looked over the school building and made some plans about the next day construction. We all took our turns taking a bath before bedtime with a five gallon bucket and a butter dish as a dipper/splash-er. Pastor Fanfan has an inside bathroom with a flushing toilet and a yet completed shower facility. He had just made a concrete shower wall and the concrete was still curing so we took a bath in the backyard standing on two concrete blocks. His house has sugar cane fields on three sides so we had adequate privacy. It was interesting none-the-less.
Soon it was time to sleep. As Americans, we are spoiled to sealed houses from the outside environment. We layed down and immediately the room was sparkled with lightning bugs (fire flies). Early in the morning around 3 AM, we heard a continual choir of roosters trying to out-do each other with their crowing. Then the village dogs began to bark—I didn’t know Buteau and Bossier villages had that many dogs. So after laying there listening to the chorus of dogs and roosters and spending some time in prayer; one gets the idea—I might just as well get up.
Friday, 26 August 2011
We arose early on Friday with less sleep than we wanted but rested just the same. Immediately, we began breakfast preparation. I had brought a small electric skillet and electric kettle so we could operate with an electric generator. We had scrambled eggs cooked with canned ham and instant coffee.
One of the first things we needed to do was to wreck-off the concrete forms on the top where they had made a concrete traverse around the top of the building above the blocks. This is a concrete belt of about seven inches tying all the walls together. Our guys started on the first one and they were quite stubborn coming off but once they broke loose they came falling eight feet in a hurry. The first came off and hit me in the forehead. These boards were a full inch thick and twelve inches wide and about twelve feet long covered with dry concrete. It happened so fast, I hardly knew what hit me. I was not dizzy or light headed so I knew I was okay from that standpoint but when I put my hand on my head I was bleeding pretty good. It put a one inch gash in my forehead. I put some pressure on it with a sweat rag. Kevin applied some triple antibiotic and a large band-aid. I went back to work but the wound was still bleeding and the band-aid came off.
Pastor Fanfan called for a young lady in the village who surely had some training as a first responder. She put on latex gloves, cleaned my wound with Betadine, covered it with a double gauze pad, and tapped it with some heavy duty bandage tape. Pastor Fanfan insisted I sit down for a while and allow the bleeding to stop before I resumed work. I was good to go after that and worked the rest of the time with no difficulties. It could have been much worse. I told the guys I hoped I had a small scar so I could show folks what a bad shot the devil is.
Our first task was to install the 2” X 6” wood plates on top of the walls with tap-con screws and then install the metal trusses. We had some construction issues which we quickly resolved and we had two trusses set with the purlins nailed in. A near neighbor whose house was just next to the school complained the water from the roof would flood his property. Water is a big problem in Buteau and Bossier as it is low lying land near the coast and black soil that clings to you like glue. Pastor Fanfan was afraid he would have a long-running problem with this neighbor so we changed the trusses around to allow the water to flow onto our property.
Now we had another problem, the trusses were not made for this side. We stopped and prayed for God to give us revelation and understanding as to solve this big problem. We broke for lunch and discussed how to remedy the problem. Bro. David Powell, a contractor came up with a plan. We could cut a portion of the truss and allow it to fit over the wall giving us a good plan. After lunch we set to work and installed most of the trusses before dark.
|
The Pathway School of Ministry is currently registering for the Fall Term 2011. The purpose of this school is to equip men and women for Christian ministry. The school will strive to balance the Word with the Holy Spirit and theology with practical ministry. The school is a ministry of Pathway Outreach Ministries, Inc. and will meet in the facilities of New Life Christian Center in Boaz, Alabama.
Haiti was hit by a devastating earthquake on Tuesday, January 12, 2010. We began assisting the relief effort just a soon as we were able to wire money to Pastor Baptiste. We purchased rice and cooking oil for distribution in our church community in Haiti.