home at last...

well, my Haitian adventure is over for the time-being, and i'm currently sitting in my sister's kitchen while i type... it's so good to be home... funny how, to steal a line from dorothy, "there's no place like it"!

i currently am without "residence"... slightly displaced for the next couple months... staying first with my sister & bro-in-law for a couple weeks and then with my friend kristy who graciously offered! even in the 'displacement' period, God is providing!

i was journaling & praying this morning and was just marveling at God's faithfulness to me over the last couple years. so, i'm going to be transparent right now and share something that is humbling to me, but is a testimony to His faithfulness... over the last couple years i've really struggled with hopeless & subsequently, depression... i'm not sure of the exact moment it happened, but it seemed as though my hope slowly just ebbed away. now, looking back, i can see that prior to the 'ebbing away of my hope', i had taken my eyes off of Christ and stopped putting my trust in Him... over the last few months though, God has restored me and renewed me and once again filled me with hope in Him!!!!!!!!!!!!! i'm reminded of Psalm 40, in which David testifies..."I waited patiently for the Lord to help me, and [in His time] He turned to me and heard my cry. He lifted me out of the pit of despair, out of the mud and the mire [that had dragged me down and held me there]. He set my feet on solid ground and steadied me as I waked along. He has given me a new song to sing, a hymn of praise to our God! Many will see what He has done and be amazed. They will put their trust in the Lord!" I thank God for that testimony of His faithfulness and I pray that the result would be the same, that "many will see what He has done" in my life, how He has been gracious & faithful to me [His emotionally weak & needy daughter] and they will "put their trust in Him" to rescue them from the 'pit of despair' as well...
anyway, i was just dwelling on that hope and joy this morning, and had to share! it's so amazing to once again be "filled with both of them"! it's been a while!

so, for a final update on my trip! the last couple weeks i was there was without internet connection, so i wasn't able to update... and so many things happened! so i think in my last update, i had mentioned that people from my hometown had come to dessalines to work at a clinic in a nearby town... that was such an "it's a small world afterall" moment! one of the women on the team works for the same hospital as I do and she & one of the other guys on the team attend the same church that my sis & bro-in-law attend! so bizarre to have a "piece of home" there in haiti when i felt so far removed! it was such a blessing to be able to talk with them about home when i was missing it! after they left, i got the opportunity to go for another road-trip into the nearby city of Gonaives. if any of you remember, last year haiti was hit by a pretty intense hurricane season and the result was extremely heavy flooding. the primary city hurt by the flooding, with many resulting deaths, was Gonaives. aside from the deaths, there were many stories of people fleeing to their rooves to escape the flooding and being stranded there for many days without food or clean water. the city is still under repair this year and still struggling with much flooding. the main road into the city was still under water from last year... it was an unbelieveable sight. it was on this day trip that i experienced the worst roads of my entire 3 months in haiti! there were moments that i was trying not to laugh as we bounced along, almost banging our heads on the ceiling of the vehicle...which also frequently broke down and then had a flat tire on the way home! it was also on this trip that i received my first marriage proposal from a random, man on the street! he said that he 'felt something when he saw me' and 'knew that he wanted to marry me'... the thought crossed my mind that perhaps what he 'felt' was a free-ride to the states via my american citizenship! am i being cynical?! anyway, my friend, Frans, put a stop to the enticing offer and said it was time for us to go!

then in my last week there, i spent a memorable and feverish week with Malaria... yep... if there's anything worse than the Malaria itself though, it's got to be the treatment with Chloroquine... nausea, dizziness, ugh. my friend rachelle came over to the guesthouse though and kept me company (and watched me sleep) for the days i was the worst. she made me fresh-squeezed juice and soup and made sure that i didn't get dehydrated! when she wasn't at the house with me, she was calling me on the phone, "jill, ou mange counya?" ['jill, are you eating now?"], or "jill, ou bwell anpil?" ['jill, are you drinking a lot?"]. what a blessing she was in that last week when i felt horrible and was anxious to get home! just when i started to get better, however, she developed a fever and ended up with malaria herself... we must've been in the same pack of infested mosquitos...

oh, and i miss abraham already! i thought of him on the plane coming home, wishing i could've had him there with me... i saw pictures of him smiling at me on my camera yesterday, so precious... but i know that God was preparing me & the situation before i even got to E.G.O. by having rachelle be the other person taking care of Abraham along with me. i still miss him, but it didn't rip my heart out to leave him, because i know she's taking such good care of him and loving him! God knew what i needed & took care of the situation before i even knew it existed!

before i left, everyone kept asking me when i was going to return... all i could say was, "i want to and will, 'si Bondye vle'", which literally means, "if God wants". at this point in time, i have no idea where He will lead me... but i'm content right now, sitting in my sister's kitchen, my stuff still in suitcases and the remainder in a storage unit... i'm at a peaceful and exciting new place in life, walking day by day with God, trusting that He will lead me and use me as He wills, when He wills!

Thank you all so much for following my journey and especially for your continued prayers and encouragement along the way! It was a trip filled with ups and downs, but through it all, God blessed me with the knowledge that He was with me... we are never alone!! There's another passage in Psalms that I will end the blog with...

Psalms 143:8-11, "Let me hear of Your unfailing love every morning, for I am trusting you. Show me where to walk, for I give myself to You...Teach me to do Your will, for You are my God. May Your gracious Spirit lead me forward on a firm footing..."

love, jill

2 weeks left...

so, i've only got 2 weeks left here at EGO... i leave for port-au-prince 2 weeks from monday... nothing really new to write about so i thought i'd upload some photos...



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i love this picture of little carla! she was so excited to get her rice... she kept following the worker around clapping her chubby little hands in glee until she set finally set the bowl on the table!


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this is me & anne carvel taken after church today... she has a twin brother named kevens who also lives here!

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i absolutely LOVE this picture of dahanna & marco looking up at me! so precious!

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this is Rikelson, the kid from the tractor accident, sitting in the clinic after i'd changed his bandages the other morning... he wouldn't smile for the picture and then his mom said something to him and he started laughing! i love it! he's a great kid!

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this is a pic of me and ketla from a few weeks ago... when the team was here she helped out with cooking the dinner meal and cleaning up afterward, so she spent most evenings in the guesthouse.

chillin' in the sun...longing for ice cream!

Hi all! Things have been going okay here at E.G.O. This past Sunday as children were celebrated world-wide, we celebrated our own here! “Bonne Fete, TiMoun!” A bunch of tables were moved under a big tree and some of the women spent all morning preparing a delicious meal for everyone! It included some special treats from a donor organization that the children especially enjoyed; Pringles potato crisps and Oreo cookies!

Yesterday, I was really struggling with physical and emotional exhaustion… Sometimes I don’t know how Don and Doris continue to do it! Anyway, I decided to just take the afternoon and spend by myself reading and praying and just being quiet! I sometimes feel ‘guilty’ taking time away because I don’t want to waste my time here, but I guess Jesus gave us the example of isolated time alone to pray, so I shouldn’t feel guilty for doing the same! Anyway, in the evening, feeling much better, I came back over to Don and Doris’s to make dinner. The kids must've seen me coming, b/c a huge group of them came up wanting medicine for one ailment or another! Their antics made me smile though, especially when a little toddler, Carla, came wandering up holding her hand out for medicine like the big kids!

We all really miss Doris! She’s still in the states for therapy on her leg and it sounds like she is making some good strides in walking on her own again. She has been busy there with therapy as well as coordinating everything for the little girl with the tumor to come to the U.S. for surgery. She and her mom and E.G.O.’s director, Ruben, are in Port-au-Prince currently trying to get emergency medical VISA’s, etc. It can be a long and frustrating process to get everything coordinated here in Haiti.

Rikelson, the 9 year old from town, still comes to the clinic every other day for me to clean and bandage his feet. I actually look forward to his coming! His mom brings him in, carrying him on her back, and they are both so jovial! His mom told me that he ‘loves me’! That made me feel good considering what i do causes him pain everytime he sees me!

Don took me on a tour of Dessalines the other day… even took me by the Nazarene Church in town (since my dad is a Nazarene minister) so I could see it. We drove past the prison, the hotel and stopped in for a “tour” of the town’s bakery! “Tour” is kind of a humorous word to use considering it’s a small room (probably smaller than most of your kitchens!) with a huge wood stove in the middle. The owner was kneading huge amounts of dough preparing for the next morning. One of the other workers there kept asking Don for food, saying he was hungry, all the while chowing on a juicy, ripe mango! That seems to be somewhat typical in some areas! Kind of makes me laugh!

Anyway, nothing else out of the E.G.O. norm is really going on for me to write about, so I’ll end here! Hope you are all doing well! I still love being here, but have to admit, I’m getting excited to see everyone at home again too! That, and enjoying a big bowl of ice cream!!

more photos...

i think this is one of my favorite shots so far, it will always remind me of haiti... we went for a walk a couple sundays ago and these kids passed us on the road...

this is a picture of Rikelson, the little boy in the tractor accident, getting x-rays at the albert schweitzer hospital. he spent about a week there. they performed a skin graft on his right foot. he's now home and comes to the E.G.O. clinic every morning for me to clean the wounds and change his dressings... the risk of infection makes me so nervous here...

this is my friend & abraham's other "mom", Rachelle! i've written some things about her previously and my mom thought from some comments that i'd made that she was only 12 years old. so, just in case anyone else is under the same assumption, allow me to clear the record! she's actually 34! she's wonderful, kids & adults alike all love her! :)

this is my girl, dahanna! she's such a sweetie, but got a lot of spunk as well! here she's all dressed up for church with ribbons in her hair!

my bilingual little guy, Abraham! rachelle and i laugh that he's going to be able to speak both english & creole fluently since his american & haitian moms are speaking to him in different languages! he's smiling a lot and starting to "talk" to me, he's gotten so much more interactive these days! it's going to make it harder to leave him in a few weeks...


here's a pic of wadson & john sony getting the rat out of the bathroom window for me with a rag & a broom handle... interesting tactics, but it worked!

this is jack & jeanne (from FOHO in port-au-prince) at Chez Woo, the chinese restaurant they took me to for my birthday! it was beautiful & clean & the food was delicious!

a picture of jon & steve riding in the back of the pick-up on the way to the airport! i thought it was kind of a fun pic and pretty typical travel, Haitian-style!

this is a picture at the haiti baptist mission! wish my camera could've done it justice... it was kind of a hazy day, but absolutely beautiful!

BONJOUR! It’s been a while since I’ve written… to catch everyone up to speed, I was inadvertently stuck in Port-au-Prince for 6 & ½ days! (I got home to E.G.O. last night around 6pm). Last Thursday we brought the American team down from E.G.O. to Port-au-Prince. In the afternoon we headed up the mountain to the Haiti Baptist Mission for a little excursion. Well, about half way up the mountain the transmission went out on the van (again, not an auto-savy girl… “went out” is the best description I can come up with!). Anyway, they ended up having the van towed up to the mission to work on it. So, 7 days later and the van is still in Port waiting to be fixed… after 6 days there I was ready to come back to E.G.O., but it really was a nice “vacation” staying at the FOHO mission in Port. The missionaries there, Jack & Pastor Jeanne, are wonderful and I enjoyed getting to spend some time with them! They took me to a Chinese restaurant for my birthday, which was actually an amazing place! I thought a Chinese restaurant in Haiti might be a little on the ‘sketchy’ side, but it was beautiful and clean and the food was great! With the calming atmosphere, I almost forgot I was in Haiti for while! I also went to a church in Port with them on Sunday and Pastor Jeanne preached the message via a translator. That was the first sermon I’ve heard in English since I’ve been here and it was great being able to understand! Pastor Jeanne was speaking in Creole at the beginning of the message and she introduced her husband and me. She had me stand up and told them that I was a nurse, etc. Well, apparently, the word “nurse” in French/Creole sounds similar to the word for “smoking a cigarette” and she got a little confused! She quickly realized what she’d said and explained, and everyone got a laugh out of it!

It was good to get back “home” to E.G.O. last night though! It was so good seeing the kids again, even after just a week away… I know it’s going to be hard leaving them at the end of the month. I don’t know if I’ve talked about my new friend, Rachelle, or not. She & her brother (Ruben) & sister (Ruth) [they’re triplets] were some of the first orphans with Don & Doris. Anyway, she speaks enough English that we’ve been able to get to know each other a bit. She’s great! She always has a smile on her face and is laughing about something! I think the term “jovial” describes her well! Anyway, she gave me a birthday gift when I got home last night. She’d copied a book on learning Creole for me and also gave me a tablecloth & set of napkins that another of the girls had made! it’s beautiful!! I’ll try to post a picture of that later too (aunt gwen-- miraleine made it, so I’m sure you’ll want to see it!).

Interestingly enough, the spiders, bugs & small woodland creatures seemed to be somewhat rare findings in the guesthouse while the team was there, but apparently they are back… woo-hoo! This morning I wandered into the bathroom and on the floor was a big cockroach (they call them ‘palmetto bugs’ in florida…practically sounds sweet, doesn’t it? Ugh.), then I looked up above the door only to discover 2 beady-little eyes staring back at me… There are rat traps set everywhere in there, but apparently the Haitian rats are more intelligent than the American variety b/c the peanut butter is eaten off of all the traps without any other evidence of their visit… well, either that or the ants got it first! J anyway, 2 of the older boys came over, caught and ‘disposed’ of the rat for me! Of course I had to get a picture with them & the rat, I’m sure they think I’m insane… but, what’s new?!

So, we got some amazing news while I was in Port!! Dr. Enrique, the doctor who came to visit and work in the clinic a month-ish ago, was able to find a surgeon to perform surgery on Chrislee, the little 2 year old girl from Dessalines with the tumor on her face. So, now the race is on to get passports, VISA’s, plane tickets, etc. for her and her mom! I’m so excited! Wish I could hug Dr. Enrique! J

Alrighty, I’m sure that there’s more I could write, but I’ll try to post again soon! Thanks everyone for everything!! Love, jill

tractor accidents and machete fights...

okay...so this is going to be a long blog, i can tell you that right now! Hmm…how do I even begin to start… yesterday was quite the eventful day around here to say the least and I ended up getting to experience the renown Albert Schwietzer Hospital. I guess I’ll start by explaining some of the culture here. I don’t want to be presumptuous since I’ve only been here for a month & a half, but to preface the story, I’ll just say that anything going on draws a crowd. There are many people who just seem to stand around on the streets all day, so i guess it gives them some entertainment. Well, in the process of mixing the cement for the new school, much water is needed. So, the boys have been driving the tractor through town to the local spring (where people bathe, do laundry, swim, you name it…) and gather water in large barrels and then drive it back to the school ground. Everytime they leave, a crowd of people from town follow them and watch. So yesterday at La Suse (the name of the spring, and I have no idea how it’s really spelled) the boys did what they always do. They shut the tractor off, got off and started filling the barrels by hand. Well, yesterday while they were filling the buckets, apparently a person from town reached into the tractor and messed with the switch that operates raising and lowering the bucket and the bucket fell onto a little 9 year old boy’s feet. This was the story I got when they brought him to the clinic anyway. Of course, I only got bits and pieces that I could actually understand in Creole. So, they called me over to the clinic and I unwrapped the shirt that was around his feet and instantly knew we had to get him to the hospital. Working in the NICU I’m not really used to seeing traumatic injuries, etc. I won’t go into the gory details, but suffice it to say that I could actually see his bones in his feet. So I wrapped them tightly with gauze to provide pressure for the bleeding and we got him to the hospital here in Dessalines where they said that we needed to drive him to the Albert Schwietzer hospital in Des Chappel. So two hours later we arrived there. They debrieded his feet last night and are determining today if they need to do a skin graft or what they will do. They are planning to keep him there for at least 3 days. Oh yeah, and we got home around 9pm... and let me tell you that riding down haitian roads in a rickety old van, after dark, and in the pouring rain is an interesting experience in and of itself!!

That’s the basic story, but so many interesting details happened along the way. First of all, I described the crowd that gathers around anything out of the ordinary. It drove me crazy yesterday while we had him in the clinic b/c everybody “and their brother” from town were hovering around to watch. Then this one lady comes in and starts screaming, of course, I assume it’s his mom. She’s yelling and trying to grab the kid, he’s bawling, a couple of the people that work at EGO were trying to calm her down, while i was trying to calm him. Finally the van comes and she picks him up and climbs into the van. Well, apparently she wasn’t even his mom or any relation b/c his mom shows up then and the two women are fighting over who is going to take him to the hospital. Meanwhile, the poor little guy is getting pulled in every direction, crying b/c of his feet, etc. So, I reached around from the front seat and carried him/pulled him up onto my lap while the 2 ladies went at it. Finally the women stopped fighting and the mom came with and the other got out. So, we get to the hospital and I went in with him (i'm not sure where his mom went) and while they were giving him shots for pain and antibiotics he was crying. I leaned down close to his face to talk quietly to him, telling him that it was going to be alright and he was a good boy, and he reached up and wrapped his free arm around my neck and just started hugging me. It just about broke my heart. I can still hear his ‘little boy voice’ crying and asking me something that I couldn’t understand… I just kept saying in Creole, "Ou Cone, Jezi renme ou anpil, anpil, anpil?" Which is, "Do you know that Jesus loves you so, so, much?"

When we got to the A.S. Hospital, we stood around for a while waiting amongst many sick people(although they did give us an empty bed for Rickelson, so no one had to stand holding him). We saw a ‘white girl’ walk through and the two people from the orphanage told me to talk to her and see if we could get help. Her name was Marianne and she was a nurse educator from Switzerland. She was very sweet and gave me her phone number in case I needed her to translate anything for me. Anyway, apparently she went and found a doctor for us and that got the ball rolling. Don said today that usually Americans get waited on right away. It doesn’t seem right, and I'm sure it’s probably “money related”, but ultimately & selfishly, I was glad for Rickelson’s sake and ours that we didn't have to wait around any longer for him to be seen.

Another funny story from yesterday… actually not humerous at all, but to give you a little glimpse of the difference here… apparently, 2 men from town had been working on the school. One loaned the other one of his gloves, and when he asked for it back they started to fight, which of course drew a large crowd. Fights probably aren’t that different here, but the weapons these guys used were! One had a machete and the other had 2 large rocks! Crazy! Anyway, apparently the issue was solved without anyone drawing blood! Thank you, God! I can't begin to imagine the wounds they would've inflicted with those weapons!

Anyway, tomorrow, I'm heading to P.A.P. with the team. We are going to try to get up to the Haiti Baptist Mission, which is apparently absolutely beautiful. I'm excited to get to go along! Then the team flies out friday morning. It'll be pretty quiet (and probably a little lonely!) at the guesthouse without them! It's been fun to have them here!