EIGHT PEOPLE ONE SINGLE PERSON COT

This week several of us went to visit some families that live in a community several miles away.  This community, prior to the January 12, 2010 earthquake, did not exist.  The land is desert like with trees having long ago been cut down to make charcoal, which the Haitians use as cooking fuel.  After the earthquake many who had lost their homes came to this land that the Haitian government made available for people to resettle.  Although I don’t know the number of houses in this vast community comprised of a number of zones, I would simply say that there are thousands of houses.  Some are made of cement, others of wood, others of tin, and some are still made of tarps.  The building is ongoing with houses in various stages of completion.

We, while there, visited with a family of eight that live in a one-room house.  Although I have seen this family dozens of times, I hadn’t until yesterday actually been inside the house.  Looking inside I noticed right away that there were eight people but one single person cot.  When I asked where the other seven people slept, I was told that they slept on the cement floor.

We only stayed several more minutes, but I couldn’t get the one cot and seven people on the floor out of my mind.  Upon arriving back at Heartline, we did a search of our supplies and came up with seven cots for this family and four for another family in the same area.

Several of our men brought the cots today and showed them how to put them together.  The family was ecstatic.  While it may not seem like a big deal, I know that I will sleep better knowing that there are seven people no longer sleeping on a cement floor.

Thank you for your ongoing help that enables Heartline to make a difference here in Haiti.

John McHoul

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GUEST BLOGGER: READ ABOUT TJ’S FIRST DAY (ADVENTURE) AT HEARTLINE

I woke up on the floor of the Fort Lauderdale airport around 5:30 AM and proceeded through security.  Around 6:00 we boarded and after a brief hour and a half flight, I stepped off the plane and onto foreign soil in Port au Prince, Haiti where I will spend the next three months as a volunteer driver for Heartline Ministries.  It seemed that the airport had undergone significant renovation since I first visited the country in 2011.  Upon exiting the plane I was greeted by a lively Creole band playing lovely traditional folk music to the freshly arrived visitors and residents, a warm welcome indeed.  In the past we passed the same musicians, but had to board a shuttle van that taxied us to the baggage claim. Today I simply walked down a flight of stairs, handed in my immigration form and received a stamp, then proceeded to the baggage claim area.  Here I encountered many persistent greeters, offering to locate and carry my baggage for me in exchange for a small tip.  There are many in red matching jackets, and others in regular clothing.  Since I brought only one small backpack and one large backpacking backpack, I waited for the checked backpacking backpack to circle by, grabbed it, and headed towards customs.  Before I could get to the customs desk, a row of people in official looking polos stopped me and asked to see my luggage ticket provided by American Airlines, which I’d accidentally discarded.  Instead I showed my passport, which matched the name, printed on my luggage tag and was allowed to pass through.  After clearing customs I walked outside to the street and parking lot area.  I immediately found Nick, the current Heartline Driver I’m replacing, and my new friend Jack who had just arrived from New York State for six weeks.

Nick had been instructed to take us to the Guest House where we’d drop off our belongings and head to the office, Heartline’s operations base.  From the moment we got in the car, Nick began providing valuable instructions on how to communicate with the parking lot attendants and provide a ticket showing you’d paid to enter the lot on the way out.  The ride from the airport took around 15 minutes, and Nick pointed out street names, landmarks and turns that I would need to immediately internalize for my future responsibilities and routes.  We arrived at the Guest House and Nick gave me a quick tour and had graciously prepared a room for me that we’d be sharing until his departure the following week.  I was happy to learn that I’d have a private room and bathroom just next door.  We then met John at the office, and Jack and I were put to work with some other Heartline employees, tasked with building a wooden sign for the new bakery.  Although it took our group of 4 grown men with a working knowledge of carpentry almost half the day to construct a basic 4×3′ sign, we ended up with what is probably the most beautiful sign the country will ever gaze its eyes upon. We left the bakery and were headed back to the Guest House assuming I’d have to wait until tomorrow for my hands-on driving lessons to begin, when John’s phone rang.

A lady at the Maternity Center had gone into labor and was experiencing high blood pressure.  We later learned that this is more common with younger women of African descent during pregnancy, and is highly dangerous to the unborn child as it could cause the mother to seizure and lead to damage or death.  When I was emailing back and forth with John and praying over whether or not I should accept the position and come to Haiti, one of the bullet points on the job description casually stated “occasionally driving women to the hospital in the ambulance”.  I almost thought it was a joke that he included this.  Maybe in some horrible situation where all of the Heartline staff were at the beach or sick or out of the country at the same time would I have to drive the ambulance   I was wrong though.  We changed our plans (something I’m increasingly noticing will happen often) which included stopping by the store on the way home and eating dinner together, and went straight to the maternity center.  The ambulance is kept several houses down at the Haitian Creations center on account of the Maternity Center’s rats’ fine appetite for wiring, so I drove it a couple of yards next door and backed into the Maternity Center where a lovely, distressed looking young woman in labor was gently loaded into the back seat area where nurse Winnie, Dr. Jen and Jack accompanied her.  John showed me a couple of buttons that made very loud classic ambulance sounds and turned on some gospel jazz, and we hit the road.  Since her blood pressure was so high it was important that we took to a hospital.

The hospital was a decent distance away, and John coached me from the passenger seat as we winded and twisted around enormous potholes, dodging hand-dug canals for runoff water and oncoming traffic that pays no attention to traffic lights nor common driving practices such as signaling, stopping at stop signs, heeding road markings (there aren’t really any, but double yellow lines are okay to pass on here, as are sidewalks and driveways it turns out), The vehicle itself ran very smoothly and handles the rugged urban streets and highways nicely.  Roads in Haiti are often unpaved and littered with potholes, and litter.  Often cars will be broken down or left like statues in the middle of the road that the rest of the driving world is forced to maneuver around. People honk, yell, and throw out random hand gestures frequently, and as an American driver, it was left to my imagination to decipher what any of it meant.  John warned me however that the most important thing to do is consistently check each mirror for upcoming motorcyclists.  The motorcycle drivers weave in and out of traffic at their will, and one quick turn without foreseeing one coming up from behind could easily turn ugly.  So I found myself driving a off-road, four wheel drive vehicle filled with Kreyol-speakers and a crying woman teetering on the edge of giving birth a foot behind my head, pushing up and downhill through what at first glance is a noisy jumbling chaos moving at a stop-go pace of about 10-30mph.

It was interesting to reflect on the week before when I sat behind a computer screen for 8 or so hours a day making phone and video calls under florescent light bulbs in my private, air-conditioned office, and now suddenly I was off-roading and on a mission to assist with ensuring a new child brought into the world safely.  To add to the symphony of physical obstacles I was traversing, what seemed like a mild rain shower turned the entire city into a river.  The next day I learned that huge amounts of water flowed downward from the surrounding mountains and into our area.  The road completely disappeared and we were completed surrounded by flowing brownish water.  It came about half way up our tires and at one point, on a dip between two hills, a small creek had transformed into a gushing river and cars and trucks were lined up for miles taking their chances one by one at crossing it.  It seemed that the brown water gushed rapidly in all directions, and as we got closer in line to our turn to cross my adrenaline began pumping.  John and I noticed a silly pig to our left that didn’t seem to be taking the flood or its life very seriously   We were almost certain it would be swept away within seconds, but somehow avoided its watery ending by staying put where it was.  If I ever were to buy a pig here I wouldn’t settle for any one but that one.  But I would probably forget to pen it up or something and it would end up getting swept away in the next flood, which I guess happens more often then I’m used to in drought-plagued Texas.  I tried my best to remain calm and focused on what I was doing as not to alarm the others or bring any more stress to the situation, and prayed silently as we pressed through, and had to rely completely on the Lord to keep us from having any issues. At one point I actually rear ended someone in front of us (it was really just a light tap that caused no damage), but the driver started to get out of his car and I felt like a complete failure and was going to get out and meet him.  John re-assured me that it would be better to let it pass since there was no damage, and eventually we finally arrived at the hospital where by the Grace of God our lady in labor was admitted.  The rain stopped but the water continued to flow all around us, splashing up on inconspicuous pedestrians and intruding into peoples’ homes.  We drove past the United Nations base on the way home and saw a huge wall of water forcing through the gates.

By the end of the day we made it back to the Maternity Center and Dr. Jen dropped Jack and I off back at the Guest House.  We scarfed down what was left of a delicious chicken and noodle casserole and I was wiped out so I went to bed not too long after.  It was a blessing to have been able to serve a woman about to give birth on my very first day on the job.  I would not have expected God to put things in motion so quickly, but of course we don’t always think alike.  He was so gracious to deliver this woman to a place where should could safely given birth given the challenges he set before us along the way, and having come to Haiti desiring to overcome the sin of fear and anxiety in my life that often afflict me, this proved to be an answered prayer right out of the gates.  When you are driving someone who is depending on you to ensure their safe and prompt arrival somewhere that they direly need to be, there is a wonderful sense of duty that you experience both to that person and to God who is entrusting you with another human’s wellbeing.  No matter how bad the roads are or how crazy its inhabitants seem to be at the moment, He is able to deliver you as he delivered his people out of Egypt and lead them to a land of His choosing.  I cannot take credit for the fact that I remained calm during this first wild adventure that I so craved and had been looking for, since I have enough of a problem remaining calm on our neatly organized highways during rush hour back home.  For me personally, it was a wild and exciting adventure that I was quite literally thrown in the driver’s seat of, and when the rush and adrenaline came down which it always does, I was left with an overwhelming feeling of gratitude towards Him for our safety and his good Providence.  I wish everyone could have such a warm and gnarly welcome to Haiti!

T. J. Cheavens

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Thoughts After Receiving My First Senior Discount

I was recently in the States for one of my rare visits.  I came primarily to see our newest grandson, born to our daughter and her husband.  We now have four amazing grandchildren.  During my visit I was in the same room with our son, his three children, and with our daughter with her first-born.  Sometimes I feel as if I am just an outsider looking on from a distance.  Where did these people come from? How did they get here? Where are they going?  Where have I been?  It seems that I have missed a lot.

I simply can’t grasp, that once upon a time, I was like them; raising a family, trying to figure it out. Sometimes I’m afraid to think back that far as I don’t always like what I see and feel.  Now, years later I can see the wisdom in this well known quote by Robert Brault.

Enjoy the little things in life, for one day you’ll look back and realize they were big things.

Perhaps I am feeling a bit melancholy because while in the States we visited an aquarium and now that I am sixty I got my first senior discount.  Sixty, when and how and where did that happen?  Where was I when this was happening?

I feel that life can often be like a plane ride.  You get on; take off, fall asleep and then you wake up sometime and somewhere before you land.   Sometimes even though we may have achieved success, so to speak, in that we are financially secure, we have a house and family and all the things that should make us content; we discover that we have been asleep.  And as it is with being asleep, you don’t know you’ve been sleeping  until you have woken up.

I’m thinking that there should be some type of health warning that comes with your first senior discount.  Just as a hospital will ask if you are on medications or are allergic to medications, there should be a special line for first timers with someone asking, “Have you ever had a senior discount before?  Is this your first time?  Are you sure? Why don’t you just sit here and think about it? Take your time”

The blessing of being able to see your children and grandchildren loving and being loved is invaluable. The riches of the world pale in comparison.  No discount wanted there.

I’m thinking that I could get used to this senior discount thing, but next time I hope it is more than just two dollars.

Ecclesiastes 12:13

All has been heard; the end of the matter is: Fear God [revere and worship Him, knowing that He is] and keep His commandments, for this is the whole of man [the full, original purpose of his creation, the object of God’s providence, the root of character, the foundation of all happiness, the adjustment to all inharmonious circumstances and conditions under the sun] and the whole [duty] for every man.

The significance of what you do before God is not measured by how many get to see what you are doing, but by the obedience to God in the doing.  John Meadth

Click  here to check out our recent e-letter. Read about a few days in the life of Beth.

John McHoul

Home Alone

I should have known.  John scheduled a two-day trip to the States to meet our new grandson Zachary and to hang out with the other growing by the minute grandchildren.  I’m sort of famous for things going wrong when John is gone so he doesn’t leave often.  Troy and Tara were fully committed to make sure I, the vehicles, the house and the dogs were all alive and functional when John got back.  Troy is an awesome stand in leader.

 

Then Isaac Livesay got bit by a bat.  Vaccine could not be found in Haiti so Tara had to fly Isaac out to Florida to have him vaccinated.  We talked before she left and I said “Not to worry, no ladies are due right now, I’ll be fine”.  

 

I drove John to the airport Monday morning, returned home, jumped on the treadmill and not three steps later my cell phone rang.  A new lady in our program was at the maternity center bleeding.  I jumped off the treadmill and into the car.  Sure enough this sweet and very poor lady was miscarrying.  Her husband was with her, they were newly married and really wanted a baby.  Sad stuff the day after Mother’s Day.

 

Just as I was finishing up with her another of our ladies came in walking bent over with premature contractions.  Doubled over she seemed near ready to deliver.  I quickly called our nurse Wini to come help me.  After all our checks we realized she was not really in labor at all but was definitely having contractions due to dehydration.  We put her on some fluids and had her rest a few hours in our birth bed that wouldn’t be used for birth today.  She wasn’t eating or drinking.  Why not?  She lost the water bottle that we gave her and a clean water source is neither free nor convenient.  Eating – well, she hasn’t felt much like eating.  Her body rebelled and put her into premature labor demanding food and water.    Marie France has a hard life and things like enough food and water just aren’t guaranteed.  We offer both those things daily but getting to us is a chore.  She used to have a job to feed herself and her children but her employer raped her and here she is pregnant with her former employer’s child and no job and no money.  Drinking water is the least of her problems.

 

Tuesday morning and I leave for the maternity center.  The road is blocked so I go the back way.  A giant pile of rocks meets me half way so I twist and turn through our neighborhood and somehow come out a mile or two away.  I finally find a road I know and eventually make it to program.   I walk in expecting a normal program day.  One of our soon to be graduates is telling Agathe a story and she has tears dripping down her sweet face.  Come to find out her house and neighbors were robbed and her husband was shot in the chest and in the back as he tried to run.  He is now at Doctors Without Borders Hospital.  This husband and dad who worked each day to care for his little family is now fighting for his life.  His wife has good reason to cry.  Our shoulders slump and we cry with her.

 

As the child development program starts one of our pregnant moms arrives with a worried look.  She hasn’t felt her baby move since yesterday and she is concerned.  I grab the Doppler and quickly pray I will hear a reassuring baby heartbeat.  I do.  Loud and strong!  Crisis averted – we smile, I complete her prenatal and send her on her way.   As program ends she is back, this time her skirt is soaking wet.  Her bag of waters has broken.  This is not good news for a mom who is only 31 weeks along and measuring really small.  Not good news at all.

 

This is beyond our skill level and we start to look for back up.  The first hospital states if she doesn’t have high blood pressure along with the broken waters they won’t take her.  For the first time in my midwifery career I am hoping for a high bp.  Nope, perfect.   We crank up our ambulance and prepare for hospital number two.  While waiting for family to arrive and all the wheels to be set in motion dear little Guernise lays on our birth bed weeping.  For the second time today our bed is used but not for its intended purpose.  At one point I enter the room and there is Cherline, our loving housekeeper (and so much more) holding Guernise in her arms praying and crying.   Women with women.  Praying for one another in those grief filled and frightening times of life.

 

The second hospital takes her and we are relieved.  

 

I saw a lot of sadness packed into the last two days.  I also saw women who know how to pray for each other, women who know how to comfort each other and women who love each other.  Our maternity center sees a lot of joy, we have a lot of fun and witness the miracle of birth over and over.  Sometimes it is required of us to dip our cups into a well of sorrow and grieve with people in loss.  And this we willingly do because the word midwife means to be “with women” and Christian means to be “like Christ”.

 

Tara gets home tomorrow and for this I am very glad.  She carries all this along side me.  John gets home Thursday and he carries us all.

 

Beth McHoul

 

 

Haiti Mothers

I listened to a speaker recently who spoke on the dangers of a single story. I am referring to the unfairness of knowing one thing about a culture, a country, a situation, a person and then making assumptions.  For many people the only thing they know about Haiti is poverty.  That’s it.  Poverty compounded by a catastrophic earthquake.  Poverty compounded by political troubles, poverty compounded by cholera and so on.

The heartbeat of our maternity center is our relationship with our women.  That is why it works.  Over the year and a half women spend in our program we get to know them.  They begin to trust us, accept what we teach and then see the fruit of it.   A healthy pregnancy, a safe birth, a healthy, good sized baby, a breast fed fast growing, chubby baby are things they can expect when they are part of our program.  We have exceptions but they are few.

Haitian women love their babies and have dreams for their children just like moms everywhere.  They value education.  They want to make right choices and do so when new ideas are presented in an atmosphere of trust and relationship.   Haitian moms love and care for their babies while dealing with hardships most of us can’t imagine.  We have a mom who is nursing her second set of twin girls.  She is tired, she is weak and yet she keeps going.  She shows up every Tuesday for class with both girls.  She delivered them via cesarean section and I noticed she didn’t seem to be rebounding.  She hedged questions on how much she was eating, she made excuses, she didn’t want me to figure out that she wasn’t eating much.  Too many other mouths to feed.  Yet, she is breastfeeding her girls because we taught her to do so.  Because of time spent together, because our staff has relationship we were able to get to the bottom of this and help with food.  She is a woman of dignity who cares for her family at a cost to herself.

Our moms come to love each other and they form community while going through our program.  They visit each other in our postpartum wing after they give birth.  We hear them laughing and joking while they visit.

Haitian culture is rich in so many aspects.  We notice when we drive our moms home after they deliver that the neighbors come running and cheer the mom and the newborn.  These are folks that live in tiny cement houses without plumbing or often electricity.  Yet they have community, they have friendship, they have joy.

Haiti is not the single story of poverty.  It is so much more.  Yes, people are often poor.  They often struggle.  They survive in terrible circumstances.  But as we care for mothers through their pregnancy, birth, postpartum and well baby months we grow to know mothers.  Mothers with dreams, struggles, hopes, grief and joy.  Mothers like mothers everywhere.  Mothers who want the best for their children, mothers who sacrifice for their children.

On this Mother’s Day I want to honor the mothers who trust us with their prenatal care and birth.  I want to honor the women who attend our program week after week and practice what they learn.  I want to honor the women who teach what they learn to their neighbors and other mothers.  I want to honor the women, who against all odds, will be agents of change in this country.  In so very many ways they are rich indeed!

Beth McHoul

I Didn’t Even Know His Name

The man, probably in his fifties, sold ice creams that he would have in an ice cooler that he carried on his head.  He would walk the streets hitting the side of the cooler with a stick while calling out, “Crème Mayi.” Everyone, hearing the noise of the stick hitting the side of the cooler and the voice of the man calling out, knew that one of the hundreds of ice cream sellers throughout Haiti is passing on by.

I, a few times a week, would buy an ice cream which costs about twenty cents each, from such a seller and eventually had this man once a week come by the Heartline programs.  I would have him go to the Women’s Center, Haitian Creations and the Maternity Center and give an ice cream to each of the ladies.   Typically he would sell to us about 100 ice creams each week. I got to know this man as you would expect over the two years or so that he sold ice creams to us.

One day it occurred to me that I hadn’t seen him for a couple of weeks and so I asked one of our workers if he had seen him.  The man responded, “Oh yeah, he got hit by a truck a couple of weeks ago and was killed.”

I felt stunned and sickened as his words penetrated my mind and heart. I, for two years, had established a relationship with this man and had purchased thousands of ice creams from him.  And now he was dead, just like that.

And then it occurred to me, that although I had known him for two years, I had not known his name, as I would simply call him ‘Mr. Crème Mayi.’ I didn’t know if he was married, if he had children or where he lived.  I didn’t know if he went to church or if he was a Christian. I felt ashamed!

Haiti is a country that has largely been evangelized. While the gospel must still be proclaimed, there are churches seemingly on every street corner and churches can be found in the remotest places in the country as well.   So while the work of evangelism and the church goes on, much of the work of Christian missions here as well as secular organizations are in the areas of education, health care, vocational training, orphanages, feeding programs, adoptions, home building, micro loans, and helping people establish small businesses.

Therefore it is possible for there to be not much of a difference in the way that a secular organization works in Haiti and how a mission works in Haiti.  I know that this is a strong statement, but I believe that the greatest danger facing missions here in Haiti is that we can become Christ less missions.  This is amazingly easy when working in a country such as Haiti where people’s life needs are so often lacking, and where you work to help alleviate their suffering and to raise their standard of living.

When looking at a brochure of a mission in Haiti you will most likely find a list of their areas of involvement and often even a list of how many students they send to school or how many meals they provide or how many people they employ or how many houses they have built and so on.  Please, understand that I am not saying that this is bad, I am just saying that for the believer it is easy for us to stop there.  I know that from experience.

People will often ask me what our biggest challenge in Haiti is and my immediate response is that, “It is working to stay focused on Christ, and not on just meeting life needs.”  Can we do both, of course, and many do.  But it’s easy to lose focus and to concentrate on the temporal needs and let it stop there.  It is easier than you can imagine and often simpler and can it ever look good on paper.

For the believer: Heath care, building homes, providing jobs, education, orphan care, adoptions, well drilling, feeding programs, and whatever else MUST BE IN THE MESSAGE AND NOT THE MESSAGE.

I, for over two years, bought thousands of ice creams from the ice cream man.  I treated him with respect and helped him, but I never knew his name, or if he was married and if he  had children and I never, not once, took time to share the message of The GOOD NEWS OF GREAT JOY

 For this is the way God loved the world: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.  John 3:16

Perhaps, there are people in your life that you see on occasion, perhaps often, some even daily.  It could be your auto mechanic, or your hairdresser; it could be the person who takes your coffee order at the coffee shop, maybe a fellow employee or a neighbor.  It could be a number of people.  You treat them well, perhaps help them when needed, but you have never, not once shared with them the GOOD NEWS OF GREAT JOY.

Christians should be involved in health care, and in education, and in feeding programs and in working to abolish trafficking, and should be known for and by their good deeds.  But in all this,  let not these things be the message; but rather, be in the message

The believer has  a message to be shared in word and shown in deed.  Share it, show it, be it.
John

One Plus One Equals Three

“John,” said the man sitting across from me, “In the States one plus one equals two, but in Haiti one plus one equals three.”

We had been in Haiti for several weeks and had hired the man sitting across from me to care for the yard and to help out at our house.  He, although in his thirties, was not able to read or write and asked if I would pay for him to go to literacy school.  I, of course, was glad to do so and that is how I found myself sitting across from him on that day.

He asked if I would help him with his math, and thinking how hard could it be, I agreed.  Well, so little did I and do I know.  We started with one plus one which I said is two.  He disagreed and told me that one plus one equals three. So, I got two rocks and then two beans and showed him how one plus one equals two.  We went back and forth as he insisted that one plus one equals three. And then he told me that in the States one plus one may equal two, but in Haiti one plus one equals three.  That was the first and last tutoring session we had as he no longer had confidence in me.

He, of course, was incorrect, sort of, and after many years of living in Haiti I now know for sure that one plus one may equal two today and perhaps three tomorrow or even fifty.  After living here a while, all as I can say is, that what used to add up, often no longer does,  and what would have made no sense at all, does.

We Will Cut You Off

While I can think of a number of examples of what should have made no sense, but somehow did, here is the first one that comes to mind.

We for four years lived in a house that we were told had city water.  Port au Prince has an antiquated water system that is suppose to, a couple times a week, bring water to an under ground cistern that most houses have.

Three years went by with me paying the water bill monthly but we never, not once, received water.  So I went to the water company and told them that I was not going to pay anymore since I had paid for three years and had not received water.  The person I talked to simply said that if I stopped paying they would cut me off.  I responded that they couldn’t cut me off since  the water has never been on.  He then told me if the water did start coming I wouldn’t get any because I would be cut off.  For some reason what he said made sense,  even though I for three years had paid and not once received water.  So I paid for the remaining  year that we lived there, but never received water.  But I am happy to say that I was never cut off.

So you see, sometimes one plus one does equal three,  or least it did then; today it could be 12.

FYI: That house completely collapsed during the January 12, 2010 earthquake. We had moved from it several years earlier.

I highly recommend the book African Friends and Money Matters if you plan on living in an African country which is very much what Haiti is.

John (the mathematician) McHoul