Haiti - What I Learned While I Was There

I learned so much in Haiti that I'm sure my friends and family are tired of hearing all of my fun facts that I link to virtually every conversation we have.  Here's a brief glimpse of what I learned:

I learned  that women in every country love purses and that teenagers everywhere are glued to their cell phones.

I learned that almonds don't just fall of the trees the way they look in bags at the store.  You have to bang on them with a rock to get them to open up and eat them:

I learned that I'm still bad at soccer, even against young, barefoot kids

I got to learn that there are ways other than air condition to cool off

.

I learned that Spartans are everywhere!

I learned about the reality of Voodoo to the Haitian people.  I learned a little bit of what it's like to be a part of a Haitian family and see some work being done that is making a difference.  I got to learn about the plight of living with an incredibly corrupt government.  

I learned that kids everywhere love candy (I always kept my pocket filled with candy).

I earned to appreciate my iPhone.  (This kid only had one battery so he had a wire running out of his walkman that he had to hold to the battery to get music)

I learned to appreciate Haitian oatmeal, which Facilita does an amazing job making!

I learned that kids everywhere love action movies (This kids name was Jean Claude and he was convincing me he was tougher than the action movie star Jean Claude Van Damme)

I learned that people can carry a lot on their head, and that even a little kid can carry 40lbs of water.

I learned about different breeds of goats and that one lucky male goat keeps about 140 female goats pregnant throughout the year.

I learned that most Haitians aren't good at taking pictures with an SLR camera.  Especially Echo and Obenes.

I learned to appreciate water and electricity, especially when you have to haul a 400lb generator around to get a little power.

I learned about agribusiness and planting trees in a way that you could double production, prevent erosion and get water back into the springs.

I learned about poverty so deep that you would rather give up your children than see them starve.

I learned about joy through a household slave girl, Sophia who radiated a deep joy, that she explained by the fact that "she had jesus in her heart".  She had a joy that I want.

  I also saw a girl with a deep saddness in her that I wanted to fix somehow.  I didn't do much, but I experienced a lot and was changed deeply.  Make sense?  It didn't to me either.

Haiti - What I Did Down There

People ask me what I did in Haiti. It's tough to describe. I didn't go down there to build a school or work in an orphanage. I went down to Haiti to experience Tom's world and his mission. My goal was to take it all in and figure out where I can connect. I wanted to understand the culture, the people, the problems - not so I could fix it, but to hopefully so I could change something in me in terms of my compassion, my priorities and my connection to my stuff.

I spent most of my time hanging out with Tom and his family and friends and seeing what his world was all about and how it worked in Haiti. I asked Tom a million questions about what people were doing, why they were doing it, what they believed and how they lived.  Each of things I did really requires it's own blog post to describe what I did and show you some of the pictures behind those things, so those will follow.

I went into the mountains to see some of what Tom's done with nursery's and goats.  I went into the village market.  I went on a run for clean water.  I went to the crusade in town.  I went to church.  I went on a beer run.  I ate Hatian oatmeal. I bought cokes for Echo.  I rode on a motorcycle to pick up a generator.  I rode on the motorcycle to go get clean water.  I watched a voodoo parade.  I saw kids swimming butt neked and doing flips off of the edge of a damn.  I saw and experienced so much, but I didn't really do anything to make the place better.

The little I spoke Creole just wasn't enough to let me communicate the way I wanted to.  I had to speak through Obines and Tom who would translate for me as I spoke.  Thinking back, I don't think I ever really felt afraid while I was there.  Maybe because I didn't go into scary parts of down, maybe because I didn't understand what people were saying and they always seemed to be smiling, or at least I was smiling at them.

I spent some time over at the Methodist compound and the guy Steve, who ran it.  They'd essentially created a large walled compound where they would train Haitians in metal work, manufacturing and auto repair.  Groups would come in weekly and work there and outside of the compound on projects.  Steve had been in Haiti for years working here,  went off and did his own project in Haiti and then came back and had an interesting perspective on both options.

I spent time fixing computers and and helping get some of Tom's technology working.  Nothing fancy, but I felt like I was at least accomplishing something while I was there.  Bill & I spent half of a day with a local catholic priest, Father Alexis, learning about what he's up to.  I'll put some of the pictures up of his parish that are very cool.

I got to spend time listening to Tom dream about what he wants to do and why and bounce ideas back and forth.  I got to talk about different business models I'd seen and how they might work in what he's doing.


I got to sleep on the room of Tom's house and see the brightest stars of my life.  I got to meet people who in my world had nothing yet still seemed to have joy.  I got to see in Port Au Prince a city devastated.



Most of all, I got to have my world pulled out of it's self-centered orbit and be transformed for a period of time and begin to change it's dave-centric orbit somehow.  I had a glimpse of what it looks like to live without and still be filled with joy.  

Haiti - Soccer Game

I scored a goal and blocked a goal. Never mind that I was 150lbs bigger and wearing shoes. The kids were awesome even though we didn't speak the same language.

Haiti - The Mountains

On the day after we'd arrived, we headed into the mountains to deliver water filters. Tom had talked to a small group of leaders in the mountains whom he was going to distribute the filters to and they would take them back to their family groups and use them. Heading into the mountains was a wild experience. The town of Verette was full of cinder block houses. The mountains was a whole other world. It was like something out of National Geographic.

Interesting thing about the mountains; Tom explained to me that the caste system in that area was composed of two things: skin color (the lighter the better) and where you were from (the mountains versus the village).  The poverty in the mountains was amazing, or I guess what looked like poverty to me.  The houses were made of mud and rocks between sticks with roofs made of either tin or other natural material.  The wood used in the houses were the tree branches used as supports.

The roads in the mountains aren't so much roads as they are paths without trees.  The roads would be 12 inches higher in one place over another, be straight up or straight down and washed out at the bottom where you'd have to get out and find rocks to fill in the wash-out so that you could pass.  You'd ford a river just to get on the road to the mountains and then from there you'd wind your way around up miles and miles of roads.  On the way up the road you'd see random cows, bulls and horses tied up along the side of the road grazing.



You pass people who would yell out for a ride up or down. Tom would stop and let them in, either inside the truck or in the back.  When they wanted out they'd tap on the side of the truck to get out (hence the term "Tap Tap" for their cabs).  Everywhere we went, no matter how remote, we'd drive through and kids would hear the truck, see Tom and come out yelling "Tom! Tom!" and the adults would wave.  Tom seemed to be thought of very highly to everyone up in the mountains.

As we drove up the mountain I was in awe of what I saw.  Not just the view, but the houses, the people, the land, the differences.  Seeing women walking up the mountain carrying a giant laundry bin on their head or a 40 lb bucket of water on their head.  It was just so different and tough to take it all in.  We stopped multiple times to let people just in the cab until it was full.  We stopped for two little kids, maybe six years old and we let them sit in the back seats on our laps, so at this point we had probably 13 people in the truck.  They'd then tap on the side of the truck and we'd let them out.

We got to a guest house at the top of the mountains expecting to see 20-30 people and instead saw hundreds.  We pulled the truck in and were immediately surrounded on all sides of the truck by people who wanted water purifiers.  In America, you'd see a mob like this if someone was giving out $100 bills or iPads, but water?  One of Tom's guys tried to organize people, but it wasn't working.



Guys had machetes and it was going to get ugly.  Tom was able to back out and we jumped in the truck and took off.  We pulled off to a distance and tried to distribute them to smaller groups, but that didn't work either.  We ended up taking down names on a list and had them come to Tom's place one by one to get the water filters.

Here's a video I filmed of some of what was going on.  I think it seemed even scarier since everything was so new to me.

On the way back down, Tom took us up to show us this beautiful view and some property where he'd eventually love to build a guest house.  As we walked into the area we heard a drum beat and walked in on this amazing worship service going on.  One of the guys with us explained that we'd walked in on a desert retreat.  We watched from a distance as the women were in this small shelter, singing beautifully, dancing and worshipping.

The following day as we drove through the mountains we saw a group of women on a porch singing and we stopped to listen.  They danced and sang, celebrating international women's day.  Echo of course joined in an danced with them.

The same evening we saw a group of guys gathered on the side of the road shouting.  Tom explained that it was a cock fight, so we stopped.  Bill wanted nothing to do with it.  Because they knew Tom, they let us in to watch.

The cock fight was more like a boxing match than a gladiator match.  Tom explained that none of the people can afford to loose a roster, so they don't let them fight to the death.  After being woken up repeatedly by roosters at 4am, I had no problem with one of them experiencing a little pain.  The people were more fascinating to watch than the fight.

We stopped at Ficilta's parents house in the mountains and got a chance to look around a little.  This was the food shed where they store the food and cook.  The smoke from the cooking fire keeps the bugs away from the food.  You can see in the second picture below how the corn is stored in the shed.

On the left is a rain water catcher.  The only problem is that it's made of clay and it looks pretty appealing to play on.  Those two things don't go together.  On the right is a mortar, who they pound the corn into flour.  Seems like a lot of work. 

As we'd headed up into the mountains, we dropped Limene off at her boyfriend's house and we all got a chance to meet him.  We tried to make it as awkward as possible for both of them.  I think the equivalent of a dad cleaning his shotgun when the boyfriend comes over is the equivalent to the Haitians cleaning their machetes.  

One of my favorite moments was riding up into the mountains while  Echo and I were riding in the back of the truck.  We drove through town, and I'd hear people yell "Echo!" as we'd drive by and the kids would wave at me because I was the white guy.  The dust was amazing and we were both getting it everywhere - eyes, mouth and hair.  I gave Echo my sunglasses to wear and he thought he looked very cool in them.  People would jump in and out of the truck to ride with us up the mountain and we would speak the small amount that we understood of the other.

I'll go into detail about some of Tom's work that I saw in the mountains in another post.

Haiti - The Country

I'd never been to a third world country for anything but a vacation. Sure, I'd driven through the nasty parts of countries, like the Bahamas, on my way to the resort. I'd seen the touristy areas off of the cruise ship ports, but never really been in a third world country.

For those of you who don't know (and I didn't know much about the place), Haiti is an island connected to the Dominican Republic on the island of Hispaniola in the Caribbean, south of the Bahamas, near Turks and Caicos. Things are in bad shape there.

Basically, the place is dirt poor and the government incredibly corrupt. They speak Creole and the population is black (is that politically correct to say that people are black?). I was told that they break it down into 25 different shades of black as part of their unofficial caste system, the darker, the better and the higher up in the caste system you are. They broke away from the French a couple hundred year ago, but they still speak french and creole and almost no english, unfortunately.

This 4 minute video does a great job in describing why Haiti is the way it is, though it leaves out some of how Voodoo fits into their plight:


As you know, there was a huge earthquake last year in Haiti that killed over 300,000 people and displaced millions people from the capital city of Port Au Prince out to the surrounding areas. There was also a big outbreak of Cholera, a disease that kills you quickly through dehydration. On the political front, past president Duvalier (aka Baby Doc) returned to Haiti January after being thrown out in 1986. He was a bad man, and it's bad news that he's back.

All that being said, things are ugly there, but I figured that before reading about my experience in Haiti, you should at least know more than I did going into the country.

Haiti - The Arrival

View Faith In Action - Verrettes, Haiti in a larger map
When we arrived into the town of Verette, it was dark and to me, a little scary.  My brain was still adjusting to what I was seeing.  Tin roof cinder block houses instead of 2 story colonials.  People of a different color, culture and language and no one that I really knew, except Bill, whom I'd had 12 hours that day to get to know him.
Bill wanted to surprise Limene (Tom's semi adopted daughter.  More on her later) .  They dropped Bill off at a neighbor's house and I showed up on my own.  I met Tom's wife Ficilta Limene and a host of other people that were there visiting.  I could tell Limene was disappointed that it was just me.

Bill walked in a few minutes later and surprised Limene and everyone was thrilled to see him.  I was taking all this in, standing there listening to everyone speak Creole, sitting around as one of the only white people in the city, seeing barbed wire on top of the wall and about everything that could be different, was different. 


Even though I couldn't understand what was being said by anyone but Tom and Bill, everyone was very welcoming.  Half of the guys were wearing red shirts and explained to Tom that it was red shirt day and how could he not know.  Tom and Ryan put their shirts on to complete the red experience.

The only thing I had that was red was my hat.  I had the chance to meet Obenes (aka le profesor) who later became my Creole teacher.  More on him later.

We sat down to a great dinner that Ficilta (Tom's wife) made and I had a chance to get to know the whole group.  The whole day went by pretty quickly but I felt incredibly welcomed by everyone I met.  I knew that this was going to be a crazy week and I sensed that I wouldn't return the same.

Haiti - The Journey

Bill and I left early Thursday morning and flew to Haiti through Fort Lauderdale. The flight to Port Au Prince was full of two kinds of people: missionaries and Haitians. The missionaries were mostly white, the Hatians black. Pretty easy to figure out who was who. You had the missionaries striking up conversations with each other, using phrases like "If I don't see you again in this life, I'll see you in the next", wearing the same bright colored shirts and even singing in the airport. Bill and I didn't do much singing, but we got to know each other during the layover in Fort Lauderdale. While boarding the flight down to Port Au Prince, they pulled us aside in line, which I figured was for additional screening. Instead, they bumped us both into first class. Kind of an ironic way to arrive in a third world country.

As we started our descent, my first impression from the air of Haiti was beautiful mountains and trees. As we got closer and closer, my jaw dropped. I saw destruction and utter poverty. I saw tents everywhere, buildings crumbled. My eyes got moist at what I saw. What I saw was some of the worst, and in my trip I got a chance to see some of the best parts as well, thanks to Tom.

We arrived in Port Au Prince and were ushered into exactly what you'd expect when you think of customs and immigration to be in a third world country. It was a warehouse they'd created due to the recent influx of relief workers. Immigration was a cursory glance and a passport stamp and at customs, the guy didn't even ask for my slip of paper declaring what I was bringing in and just waved me through.


Bill and I found our luggage and stepped outside to a million porters all looking to get a tip. Bill found a one armed man named Jackson that he recognized named Jackson who led us to Tom and Jean Rooney (after asking for $5 for him and another $5 for his buddy who had glanced at our bags at one point), waiting for us with the pick-up truck. Bill, Jean-Rooney, Tom and I drove through Port Au Prince as I sat there, trying to take in what I was seeing.

I saw UN soldiers stationed with their tanks. I saw tent cities labeled with the name and flag of the countries that had donated the tent (who would of thought that the People's Republic of China does some good in the world?) pick-up trucks loaded with 15 or more people driving down the road. Tom explained that a few weeks prior the route we were taking had been marked as dangerous due to car jackers. He told me the story of driving along this road and having guys with guns trying to stop him to take his car and probably his life. With some hollywood style driving, he was able to escape.

The road from from Port Au Prince had crazy pot holes in it, but Tom explained that this was good compared to how it had been.  We stopped in one village to get some fruit and while we weren't looking, a guy helped himself to some food in a cooler in the back of the truck.  I saw a beautiful sunset along the way as we arrived into the town of Verette at night.  

Haiti - The Pull

I was sitting in church over a year ago listening to this guy named Tom talk about the work he was doing in Haiti and how he'd ended up there. I've heard missionaries talk over the years and they all seem to be doing great things, but at the end of hearing them talk, I end up feeling bad for the people they work with and guilty that I'm not doing enough and wondering if all we're doing is putting a band-aid on the problems things. With Tom, I connected with what he was saying at a lot of levels:

• As a businessman, it made sense in terms of the return on investment of what he was doing.
• As a consultant, it made sense that he was getting to the root cause of some of the issues and addressing them in ways that would be self-sustaining
• As a person, it made sense that he wasn't doing the normal missionary plea. He got up and told his story and didn't use a lot of christianize like "blessed", "evangelize" or "conversions".

All of those things connected me and flipped a switch inside of me that said, "I want to be a part of this". Fast forward to a year later and I'd done nothing as a result of that switch being flipped. I was at an event at church in January where people had tables setup different people were talking about the ministry they were a part of. I walked up to an older guy who reminded me of Cathie's grandpa that I'd never met before and asked him what he was a part of. His name was Bill, and he was talking about Haiti.  It turns out, he and his wife were the people who'd connected Tom (the Haiti guy) to our church originally . Bil told me there was a group going down in September, and then said: "I'm going down in March. Do you want to go with me?" Before I could even think about it, my immediate answer was, "Yep, I'm in" The switch had already been flipped a year ago and I reflexively answered.

We booked our flights and got our vaccinations for malaria, hepatitis, tents, etc. My wife and I had a "get to know you" lunch with Bill and his wife to learn a little more about the plan and figure out the logistics for the trip. Seems a little strange to some that I'd agree to spend a week with a guy I'd never met in a place I'd never been. In my gut, I sensed that Bill was a good guy and it turns out I was more than right. I guess I can't discount God's pull on me around this whole Haiti thing either.

Haiti - The Pictures

Ping Pong

In 2009, Cathie's parents got Nate a ping pong table for Christmas.  For the past year, Nate and I have played ping-pong just about every day that I'm home.   We'll play rounds of best 2 out of 3 and play those sets 3 or 4 times per day.  Working out of my house, I'll play him in a quick match as a mental break.

We've both improved a lot.  I guess playing that often is bound to do something for you.  I can still beat Nate pretty consistently, but he wins at least one game per day, sometimes two in a row.

We've got odd things we say at the different scores:

• 7 - 11 - Slurpee (a conveinence story called 7/11)
• 9 to 5 - Dolly Parton (from the movie)
• 9 - 10 - Radio Disney (a radio station)
• 9 -11 - Sad Day (Get it 9/11?)
• 17 -11 - Giant Slurpee
• etc

My sister Susan made Nate a "ping-pong safety kit" for Christmas.  It consisted in gloves dipped in this stick-um stuff and a set of goggles.  Safety first!

I'm hoping someday we both get as good as Bruce Lee is in this video:

Maddie's Smile

An ode to Dave

I couldn't go on the youth group's Winterblast Retreat this weekend.  In honor of my past announcements, Maddie and her friend Jordan were kind enough to recite a poem they wrote:

Oh I love my DaddyDear
And how I miss him when he's not here
Dave is sick and note feeling well
But his wish for us is not to dwell
His decision was swift and very fast,
But he really couldn't come so he had to pass
(Jordan)
Maddie's my best friend and he's like my father
and I hope to him, I'm not such a bother
He wanted us to do these announcements for him
And before I left, he told me to break a limb (in honor of him)
We hope he'll walk in on this glorious day,
But since he's not here, we might as well pray
I love you daddy!
Get well soon Dave!

My PizzaPopolis Complex Explained

Reason #1046 I'm proud of my Dad

My Dad's friend Bakar (the muslim Somalian refugee I'd blogged about eaerlier) stopped by and got a chance to meet the family. You'll notice in this shirt that my Dad is wearing a shirt that says, "I'm Awesome". Now normally in the Kurt family we would joke and mock anyone wearing this shirt. Heck, we'd mock the pope for wearing his silly hat. Before you mock, here's the story behind the shirt.

As I'd mentioned in the other post, my Dad has helped Bakar since he came to this country as a refugee with nothing. He's worked with him to get a job, his first car, cell phone, helped him get Cochlear implants (Bakar is deaf) and braces.

My Dad uses the same skills that made him great at his job to help Bakar make it in America. What would the middle east conflict look like today if Muslims saw Americans giving and helping sleflessly? My Dad is living out what Jesus calls us to by helping the poor and hurting.

Bakar got this shirt for my Dad because this is the best way to express the way he feels about my Dad. He simply thinks my Dad is awesome and thought that this shirt was the best way to express it. Can you blame him? My Dad wears this shirt proudly, and he should. We're all proud of him.