I know its going to sound redundant but it was another great day!! We had to get up extra early today because we wanted to get the village done and with the amount of time it took to get up to the village we decided that we wanted to be out the door by 7:00am. Of course 7 turned into 7:20 before we were actually out and about. We actually tracked it today and we went 9 miles in 2 hours!!!! that gives you an idea of the road situations. Jim decided that going with us was not the best decision so he made sure the guesthouse bathroom was monitored throughout the day (we missed him and he is feeling MUCH better now). Mark, Theresa, John, and Jim put backs on the side of the truck with a great donation of brackets from Tucker Town Forge and Elenbass Steel in Lowell. Its still amazing to me how when people hear about us going to Haiti, they are more than willing to help any way that can.
The ride up was full with just as much laughter as we have every time this group is together. Sam (Tamaras husband) enlightened us with a few goofy jokes and many trivia facts. It was actually quite amusing - hes not much of a talker so when he does talk we all intently listened. At one point, Tamara even turned to him "when did you get so funny". John of course had another hilarious comment after getting hit with another sticky tree as he felt his eye sight going "I do have one last request from you ladies". Apparently Tamara didn't understand because it took a couple minutes for her to get it and when she did, she must have laughed for a good five minutes. Our cheeks definitely hurt from all the laughter. Speaking of cheeks, did I mention that our butt cheeks are killing us!!! Holy cow we have bruises on our coccyx (Miriam enlightened us of what area really hurt), bruises on our backs, bruises in spots that we didn't know could bruise.
On the way up we see lots of people along the way, one that caught our eye was a couple each carrying a baby. All the woman in our truck did in unison "awe, we need to stop". Big John stopped the truck and we piled out. Through the translator, we discovered she just had twins, a boy and a girl. They were absolutely beautiful!!!! We took tons of pictures of them. The trip continued until we came upon a school that we wanted to stop at and give soccer balls too. We walked into the back courtyard with Dada as he translated John asking them if we can drop them off. As Mark said, "As soon as they saw a blond walk through the courtyard, the kids went crazy" (meaning Kelsey). The kids were off the hook excited to see us. John pumped up a couple balls for them and headed into the classroom to cause a small ruckus. Kelsey and I headed into the classroom too. I think we could've stayed there all day to play but we needed to move on.
The plan for the Land Cruiser going on the massive hill was going to be that they were going to drop off the people at the top of the hill and have them walk the rest of the way and the Land Cruiser was to stay at the top of the hill. Apparently, someone fixed the 4wheel drive or the transmission or whatever was wrong with it because before we knew it the Land Cruiser was continuing on. We installed 8 before lunch which the goal was each group had to get to 10. We had the honor of installing one in the school. The village is only 52 and we completed it.
The installation went totally smooth!!! We split up into three groups this time. I was with Mark and Miriam, Kelsey and Samantha were with Sam, Theresa, John and Tamara were together. This village was so spread out that the village was about a mile long and only housed 52 houses. The last one that the Theresa, John and Tamara installed was WAYYYY out there....like to the point where the woman of the house fetched her water from the ocean. We waited for that group at another home. We ended up getting together with Kelsey and Samantha. While we were waiting for them, Kelsey noticed the door to the house that we were standing outside of was a sheet hanging there that had crochet flowers on it. Within one of the flowers, Kelsey noticed a spider.... a TARANTULA!!!! Really it was a tarantula!!!!! Really I'm not lying. We all freaked a little - obviously we didn't want to offend anyone by screaming like our hair was on fire but we really wanted to. Kelsey actually took a picture of it and Dada caught one in a can. BLAH!
The other group came up after the long trek and the final installation. They were pretty whipped coming up the hills.
We got back to the truck, said our goodbyes and began our way back to the guesthouse. Before we left, we had a cooler full of water and Freddy gave the rest of the water to the local kids to fill any bottle they could find. It was a flock of kids just wanting some good clean water.
The truck ride was full of bouncing, laughter and at the end of the 2 hour ride, the skies opened up and it poured!!!!! We came off the truck absolutely soaked. Three of us had white shirts and dark bra's on which of course ended the day in even more laughter!!!
Dinner was again wonderful, we had some great conversation in regards to why we do what we do and our individual reasons. We all have very different views on religion and whether this is a mission or service job, but we all respect each other and know that we are making a difference here. Pastor Benny came by with his entire family and wanted to personally thank us for the work that we did in his home village.
Love and thanks for reading...
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