News from CONASPEH
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Denise Karuth
Jan 14, 2010, 11:07:33 PM1/14/10
to First Churches Listserv
Dear Friends,
Below, please find news from
about CONASPEH from Global Ministries and Kim and Patrick Bentrott, missionaries
associated with CONASPEH in Haiti. Patrick and
Francoise Villier are safe. Their house seems to have held. They lost one of
their foster care children in CONASPEH.
The rest of the news is harder to hear. The
CONASPEH building was flattened. Many nursing students were inside and some were
killed. More details are below.
Information form the following websites is
included below. Please click on these links for additional updates or if the
infomtion below does not come through to you.
I know that we are all praying for all the
people in Haiti and for everyone who is trying to assist them.
Fred Pelka and I send our love to you
all,
Denise Karuth,
Cambridge, MA
Earthquake in Haiti update
Here is the news I received from our Disciples Ministry partners:
Your Global Ministries Update: January 14, 2010
Disciples and UCC… together in God’s global mission - Visit us at: http://www.globalministries.org//
Haiti Earthquake Update:
Global Ministries received news this morning that Patrick and Francoise Villier are safe. Patrick is the president of CONASPEH, a grassroots movement of 6,000 congregations and our largest Disciples and UCC partner in Haiti for almost three decades. Patrick is also a member of the Common Global Ministries Board. We also learned that Polycarpe Joseph, the House of Hope Director, is safe. The leaders of our two denominational partners in Haiti are alive. We are grateful to God for this, but deeply saddened by the loss of so many.
To see the latest updates as we receive them at Global Ministries, please follow this link and return to it regularly:
http://globalministries.org/news/lac/haiti-earthquake-what-we.html
The blog posting from Kim Bentrott, GM missionary in Haiti with her husband Patrick and son Solomon provides the latest details:
Dear Friends and Family,
I will write more later, but just want to let you all know that Patrick, Solomon and I are safe. We had just gotten home when the earthquake hit, our apartment building went from 3 stories to 2 in one sickening crunch, but our space stayed miraculously in tact and the people on the first floor got out in the nick of time.
We had a group working with CONASPEH here with us from Tennessee. All members of the group were safe. Had they been on time for dinner, this note would have a different tone. Not all people in the guest house got out alive. We took the group to the embassy yesterday and they should be able to leave the country via the Dominican Republic in the next few days.
CONASPEH building has been flattened. All my nursing students were inside. Yesterday we helped pull bodies out of the wreckage and heard some voices within the rubble. Efforts continued frantically all day to reach them.
Patrick and Francoise Villier are safe. Their house seems to have held. They lost one of their foster care children in CONASPEH.
Communications are horrible. The phone network is either jammed or down completely. The manager of the guest house and our DEAR FRIEND has taken us under his wing and brought us up the mountain. He has a family with a 3 year old girl and a new born to consider as well. We are trying to figure out our next move at this point.
I will write more soon. Please pray for Haiti. In a minute's time, buildings crumbled and life was lost. So much life. And even with that said, I think the hardest times are still coming as people try to figure out how to put their lives together again.
Much love. Thank you for your thoughts and prayers.
Kim, Patrick and Solomon
You can follow updates from the Bentrotts on their blog: http://www.kimandpatrick.blogspot.com/
At this time the most urgent need is for funds for emergency relief. Global Ministries has wired funds from the Disciples Week of Compassion (WoC) and the UCC One Great Hour of Sharing (OGHS) to CONASPEH and House of Hope, our denominational partners in Haiti.
As we walk in solidarity with CONASPEH and the House of Hope during this difficult time, let us re-affirm our commitment to pray for them and their leaders, Patrick Villier and Polycarpe Joseph. Let us do all that we can to help “meet God’s people and creation at the point of deepest need” with our gifts and service. Let us also remember that as Disciples and UCC, our Critical Presence with our partners in Haiti will be required over the long haul as we help re-build the infra-structure that is so essential to the life-giving ministries of our partners. For those that have visited the CONASPEH headquarters and the House of Hope center, you will know how important these places are to the ministries of our partners… May God give us all grace for the journey ahead! '
Jeannette
Adventures in Life
The life and times of two Americans in Haiti: the celebrated, the inspired, the frustrated, and all that lies in between.
Thursday, January 14, 2010
Processing
*leaving home.I write from the safety of a small, quaint hotel in the mountain town of Kenskoff. The air is cool and smells of pine. Solomon is drinking a bottle of milk and watching Curious George. Patrick is out getting word from people in the community, trying to locate supplies and find a more permanent/transitional place for us to stay. We lent our car to a friend (Veniel, guest house manager) to go retrieve other people stuck in the city without a place to stay.
I feel the need to put the events of the last 2 days in writing, brief and unemotional, to help process as we find time to momentarily rest.
Tuesday started like any other. Coffee in the morning, a clinic with what has become the normal list of complaints among my patients. Our group from Tennessee was taken by Patrick to visit some schools in City Solei and eat at one of our favorite haitian restaurants. They were kind enough to bring me back a take-out box. It was huge. I shared it with the janitor who lives behind the school and never has enough to eat. It would be my last meal in 36 hours. It was to be his last.
I had my first class after the holiday break with my second year nursing students. We talked about labor and delivery. It was a great class. I had brought in my computer and internet modem, so was able to show them some great visuals of the birthing process. We covered a lot of information. The students were stimulated and asking a million appropriate questions. It was a great day. Patrick at the same time was teaching the first year students English and they were laughing out loud at his antics. We left CONASPEH at 4pm with a couple of the staff who have class near our home. We joked and teased each other all the way to Delmas. I remember laughing so hard.
Solomon had just gotten up from a nap. Silvia had done laundry and it was hanging on the line. Patrick had just changed to go to the gym. I was standing on the balcony with Sylvia, Solomon and Patrick talking when we heard a groaning. Then the building started to tremble. My equilibrium told me that we were weaving. My first thought was that our landlord's truck was rumbling or exploding under the balcony, then that our building was collapsing. "Earthquake" never crossed my mind. We all clung to each other and huddled under a door jamn as our apartment pitched, shook and moaned. We watched the neighbors balcony seemingly rise up towards us. Anticipating. Waiting. Watching. Holding. Not breathing. Silvia immediately started praying out loud fervently. When the shaking stopped, all fell quiet in the house, but screams were heard on the street. I looked out to see our landlord, Amos, stumbling into the road, his face white with dust. We called out to him. I still didn't know if people were screaming over OUR house collapsing of if it was something bigger. We opened the door and called out. The stairway was blocked in rubble, but the neighbors on the second floor called back to us and said they were ok. Their apartment had held too. We escaped down one flight of stairs to their apartment. Everything in their apartment lay broken on the floor. The woman was crying in fear, but no one was hurt. We exited from their back balcony that used to be a story up, but now was inches off the ground. We all crawled over crumbling concrete through a hole, helping each other down through hand-holding. Sylvia was frantic, praying out loud that the world was ending. All I wanted was to get away from what looked like an immanent complete collapse. Careful, purposeful movement. Focus.
*from 3 stories to 2We made it safely to the street and suddenly it was apparent that we were one of many. People streamed out of buildings, bloodied, crying out for their children, their friends, their neighbors. It wasn't just our house. It was everywhere. People I have only waved to or shared cordial pleasantries with were hugging me, grateful for a face. When Moulout--the boy that helps us in our house--showed up after running from his school, huge relief. The first floor of our building had entirely collapsed and no one was pinned or killed underneath. Miraculous. Even waa-waa the dog survived.
Our friends from CONASPEH came soon after. Their school had held sturdy, but on their dash out, they had seen such devastation. "Haiti has never had an earthquake." said my friend. Earthquake. We hugged grateful to see more faces ok and reeling from what we had just experienced, but their eyes were full of tears over worry about their family and friends across town. For all of us, it was the first time we'd felt the earth tremble under our feet. Disconcerting. Disorientating. Disturbing. I quickly went about looking at our injured neighbors, HATING that I had just unloaded all the medical supplies donated by our visiting group into CONASPEH the day before. I didn't have as much as a bandaid. No tylenol. Nothing. I examined people, tried to reassure. Several needed stitches, others needed x-rays and casting. I wanted people to stop calling me Doctor. I had no tools, no medicines, no tricks up my sleeve. Our car was undamaged amazingly since we had fortuitously parked it beside a wall instead of inside our house's gate. I loaded up the injured from our neighborhood with plans to take them to the hospital. Patrick took Solomon to Walls International guest house to check on our visitors that were staying there.
*stopped trafficThere is no way to accurately describe the streets of Port-au-Prince as I made my way to the hospital. People were streaming from homes, down sidewalks, flooding streets. The religious were praying out loud, giving thanks to God. Others were evangelizing, predicting this the beginning of the end of the world. Many were wailing, crying, desperately searching for loved ones. Others were quiet, stunned. I scanned the streets for injured, stopped when people looked horrible and their family loaded them into our truck with words of thanks. Soon the truck was packed with bleeding and battered women, men and children. No one cried. Silvia was still praying at the top of her lungs. The old woman beside me was telling me her body was going cold, stiff, that she was dying. With my one-handed exam, I could gently reassure her that her heart was beating strong, her skin warm... that fear was responsible for the cold. She seemed to acknowledge my reassurance and would quiet momentarily only to need reassurance in the next 5 minutes.
When we finally got to the hospital through inching traffic and streets flooded with people, the scene was heart breaking. Tap-taps full of injured were parked outside of locked gates, ambulances were lined up and blaring. A woman came to our window and said that the hospital had collapsed and they were trying to get some of the injured doctors out, that they couldn't see any patients, there was no need to stop. "People are only coming here to die." Inside the car, the anxiety increased. Everyone started shouting out names of hospitals all over the city. I chose the closest one, but only found more of the same. It was decision time. I was almost out of gas and desperately needing to see Patrick and Solomon again. I told them all that for tonight I was going to take them back to their families since there was nothing to do right now. Slowly but surely I got people back. I found Patrick at the house and he helped me find homes for the rest of the riders. A little boy with a broken arm and his mother got out where there family was congregating outside their demolished home. I had nothing to do for him but to kiss his head and tell him to hold strong. Everywhere we went, people were crying, sobbing, searching for family. When we brought a family member to them, they'd scream with relief and then scream with anguish at the state they were in. Wailing. I found myself yelling out first-aid instructions to people hovering over people with broken extremities. We inched through traffic. The last rider in the car was a man with a broken leg, horribly broken and crushed arm who endured the bumpy ride without so much as a moan. We left him outside the television station with his family after searching for material to make a basic sling.
*rescue attemptsDriving to the guest house, Patrick told me about his walk there, preparing me for what we were soon to witness together. Parking our car back at home, we walked with Moulout the 10 blocks to the guest house, past street vendors who had been crushed to death by the walls they were sitting by, past houses reduced to rock piles, past mobs and mobs of people, past a traffic jam 5 blocks long outside of the Doctors Without Borders hospital that was still reeling after it had partially collapsed and its staff was all trying to get in from their own pockets of rubble. People were congregating on sidewalks and streets, finding chairs and blocking off pieces of road to make a safe place to gather. Hymns were rising up all around us by groups of people singing praises in the streets, calming themselves with their faith, relying on spiritual strength to hold them up. It did not cover up the wailing. The sirens. I passed children with towels wrapped around heads, arms, legs without so much as a bandaid. I felt worthless. Helpless. Overwhelmed.
*The main building at Walls International Guest HouseWe made it to the guest house to find the main central building had collapsed and now stood like a layer of pancakes less than a story tall. Our group had gotten back late and therefore hadn't sat down for dinner, their tardiness saving their lives. Six people had been caught in the guest house... 4 visitors, 2 staff. The two cooks had crawled out of the rubble with mild head injuries. One of the groups staying at the guest house had just arrived that morning, a medical group who had packed enough supplies for a week-long mobile clinic in the country, but most of their bags were in the collapsed building. They had seen the cooks, bandaged them and given them tylenol. By this time it was dark and not safe to go back out in the streets. The guest house had pulled mattresses into the parking lot and everyone huddled on them, nervously talking amongst each other, recounting what each had seen, experienced. One woman had lost her husband in the collapse. Another group lost their friend. How helpless they must have felt to be so close to their bodies and not be able to touch them, to see them, to help in anyway. Haunting. Patrick had found a little lost girl in the streets who couldn't find her family. He brought her to the guest house where our group wrapped their arms around her, tucked her in, and reassured her to sleep that her family would be waiting when the sun rose.
We stayed there for the remainder of the night, trying to send out text messages, trying to make calls to no avail. All systems were down. The aftershocks were so disconcerting... happening every 5 minutes or so, some stronger than others... Sleeping on the ground, you felt every shake, and looked up to see if anything was going to fall. Solomon entertained the huddled people with his youthful oblivion to what was going on. He was a blessing, others told me, keeping their minds on something happy and hopeful. He allowed people to laugh.
There was no sleeping that night. Patrick was planning with Veniel--the guest house manager--how and where to take the visiting groups when sun broke. Veniel was planning several trips up the mountain to take his family to safety and to buy food and water for the people in the guest house. He and Patrick worked all night on plans for the next day. Finally at 2am Veniel left with his family. Patrick, Solomon and I laid down only after Solomon fell into sleep with a pee-soaked diaper and an empty tummy. But he never fussed.
The sky was full of stars that night. We could see Orion, Andromeda, Scorpio, the dippers, Mars. I've never seen a sky like that in Port-au-Prince. Hymns rose up all around us from groups gathered: How Great Thou Art. When the music subsided, the wailing resumed, then the music rose up again, as if to add comfort for those enduring such pain, such loss. Everyone in the guest house camp was taking care of each other, sharing water, divvying up snacks, taking turns sleeping or sitting on mattresses, offering a back rub or support. The night guard kept watch all night with rifle by his side, not leaving his job despite not being able to get in touch with his family, not knowing. He kept us company as Patrick and I paced most of the evening with a restless, uncomfortable baby boy.
I can't describe feelings because they were muted. Numbed. I've never ever been so present in a moment, purposeful, moving and doing what needed to be done, avoiding thoughts of what the daylight would reveal, what would come next.
At 5:45am the sun rose. On phones that hadn't worked all night, we were briefly able to get through the Patrick's mom. Then my mom and dad to let them know we were ok. I've never heard their voices sound like they way they sounded... frantic, flooding, tearful relief, anxt, panic. For a moment I broke down. They'd been up all night with me from their perch miles away, worrying, fielding calls, searching for news, fearing the worse, completely helpless. We cried together over the phone. I wanted to pass some of the calm that had stayed with me through the day and through the night to them. I wanted to reassure them. I have had to trust God for that.
Patrick returned the little girl to her family who cried and hugged her first, then Patrick. A beautiful reunion to start the day.
Veniel started packing groups into his vans and trucks, transporting them to the embassy. We lent him our car to help in the efforts. Patrick and I walked back home to survey the damage and attempt to get diapers and formula for Solomon.
*Walking through our neighborhoodDaylight revealed the destruction from the day before. Camps of people filled the streets, blocking off some small streets completely. The injured lay next to their friends and families. The dead lay under sheets. Groups of men covered piles of rubble, shouting out for any survivors, digging through to find bodies, yelling out for a flashlight or a hammer. The hospital had cleared some of the backed up traffic, we watched people being brought in on stretchers, the dead lined up outside on the sidewalk covered in sheets. We came home to see the apartment as we left it. It had held through the aftershocks. We risked it. We scaled the rubble, entered the apartment and moved quickly gathering the most important, the most necessary. It was only then that I saw what the earthquake had done. Books off shelves, mirrors fallen and broken, closets emptied, furniture moved. We tidied up a bit, locked doors, packed other non-essential essentials in case we could come back, and left within 15 minutes time, not risking any more time than necessary in an unstable building. I grabbed a first aid kit.
*leaving the apartment after our retrieval runWe encountered Francois in the street outside our house. She had walked across the city to our house to make sure we were ok, to check on the group. She looked exhausted, overwhelmed, and numb. She reported most of her family was ok, but that CONASPEH had collapsed completely with the nursing students and some of the staff within. She gave names of some of the people she knew to be dead. Friends. Students. Coworkers. The janitor in which I had shared a meal. Her foster son had been caught in the collapse, but had survived. They could hear his voice, they'd been working all day and all night to free him. He was still alive, but she was loosing hope. She headed back on foot to her family after hugs and words of encouragement.
*A once 4 story building now pancaked into one small
pileOn the way back to the guest house, we passed out ibuprofen and tylenol to those who looked like they needed it. Our car was back at the guest house and one last group remained, small enough for us to ferry them in our car. We packed them in and headed out for the day. They had lost a member of their team in the collapse, and told us about her with eyes brimming with tears and love in their words. They were able to find her body pinned in the rubble and pray for her beautiful spirit. They retrieved her backpack to return to her family. We left them at the Canadian embassy with tears and hugs. People we had never before met had bonded with us under a shared traumatic time. Patrick and I then drove to CONASPEH, surveying the enormity of the damage around us. Schools, businesses, homes leaning, caved in, pancaked down, reduced to rock.
*partial collapsePulling up the drive to CONASPEH, we met familiar faces along the way, warning us of what we'd see, praying for our strength. When we arrived, three bodies awaited us under sheets, stiff and lifeless. Many others had already been claimed and removed by family. The 6 story building that had been our office, our school, our clinic, our headquarters was nothing more than one story of rock and rubble. The basketball hoop lay cockeyed on the ground. A crane was working to create an opening. A crowd of 100 or more were gathered round. Reunions. Hugs. Brief tears in the arms of another. Volunteer rescuers--men with big hearts and a hard work ethic--were tirelessly digging through rock and sand, bringing water into the man they'd been working hours to free. His legs were pinned. They could touch him, but were scared to free him. Oh good, a doctor was here. He needs anesthesia. I had none. He needs pain meds. I had none. Everything I had that could help in some miniscule way was buried under six stories worth of concrete. Helplessness. Patrick and Solomon left with a student at the school to find a saw that could cut through rock. I stayed with the mob of people to survey, to remove rock, to give instructions on first aid, but mostly to witness. Other volunteers had found voices on top of the rubble... 2 of my students had survived and their cries had finally been heard. A new effort began to break through layers of concrete to find them. Men with hammers commenced to break and carry away the chunks of concrete. No one had eaten. No one had water. But all worked relentlessly.
While I stood and waited, people came up to me hoping for word of their daughters, their sisters, their friends. They showed me pictures of faces I knew well, faces I had just taught antepartum care to, faces who had worked with me in clinics, helped me the day before unload supplies onto shelves that would later be buried. I could only honestly tell them that I didn't know, that yes, I had seen them yesterday in class but I hadn't seen who had been taken to the hospital yesterday. I didn't know. Families left pictures of their loved one on the mountains of rock as prayers for their departed souls. It was then that I cried, seeing the faces of my students, the picture of my top student, the one who had aced all my tests, volunteered the most in my clinics, brought half of her community in for evaluation looking up at me from a still shot on that pile.
Men around me started to break down crying, "I have no force, its too much, I can't find my sister." Mother's bravely stood, cradling their daughter's ID hoping despite the hopeless pile of evidence before them. We hugged, we held hands, we held each other up.
A few bodies were found while I stood there... still dressed in their school uniforms. I barely recognized faces in death. Life makes us who we are in so many ways.
G was finally able to be freed. We hailed a tap-tap and paid the driver to carry him to the nearest hospital as fast as possible. When all was ready, the team drug G free, both of his legs crushed and mangled to the bone, his face in shock but aware. He responded to my voice, the mob surrounded him, gently carried him to the tap-tap. I made a tournaquet above the bleeding, knowing there wasn't much time. I sent two men with him, men who seemed to know a little about first aid and trauma. They would only return an hour later to tell me he had died in route. They left his body at the hospital for the family to retrieve. Hours spent pulling him out. I only hope his in final minutes he breathed fresh air and felt cared for. We tried to call Patrick and Francois, but phones were still down. Patrick and I drove to the Villier's house to deliver the news only to find they weren't home. Surely they were checking up on other family and friends, trying to do what they could somewhere.
We then went to the embassy to leave word that we were ok. The group from Tennessee was still there, and a stream of American citizens were coming in, some battered, some in good shape, all shell-shocked. We found a missionary friend there who had been trapped for 7 hours in her home, but freed suffering only scratches. She was able to report that our other missionary friends were safe and accounted for. The embassy was working to get people out of Haiti via the Dominican since all commercial airlines had stopped flying into Haiti. From the DR, people could continue home. We trust that over the next two days, our group will be back on US soil.
After leaving our names at the embassy, we returned to the guest house to get Veniel. On route we found Frenaud who needed a ride to the hospital to find his brother who was gravely injured when their house collapsed. He reported his dad and sister had been at CONASEH when the earthquake hit. They had had no word from them and suspected the worse. F looked frantic. His usually cheerful disposition turned somber.
By the time we returned to the guesthouse, it was nightfall. The staff who had worked all day to free bodies from the rubble filled all the vehicles up with gas. We stopped by our apartment again to pack our car with the items we'd removed from the apartment: canned food, a few changes of clothes, diapers, our computers and a hand-held solar charged inverter that could grant us electricity if needed, chargers, a few toiletries. We then caravanned back up the mountain to deposit a body at the embassy, pick up a few hitchhikers along the way, making our way to a safe place to sleep for the night. The streets were brimming with people, huddled together, too scared to get back into their homes or go under any roof. The huge supermarkets had tumbled to the ground with everyone in them, Tanks of UN troops were roaming the streets with guns poised daring people to make trouble. Despite the mobs of people in the streets, it felt empty somehow. No one was selling anything. The street markets were empty. Some folks were handing out or selling sodas and water, but the familiar hustle and bustle of street commerce was eerily and tragically quiet. No water vendors selling their sachets of water, no used clothing for sale or fresh produce. A few fritay vendors had their pots bubbling to help feed the hordes of people camping in the streets. We passed parks teeming with people, tent cities erected on soccer fields and parks. We wonder about people we know, people we haven't yet seen. We wonder about Silvia and her family, wonder if her family is ok, if they are able to sleep in their home or if they are, too, taking to the streets.
Last night we took refuge in a hotel in the mountain town of Kenskoff. We ate our first meal after 36 hours, drank fresh water, showered and slept. The basics never felt so luxurious. We are safe, we are together, and that is more than we can say for millions all around the country.
We still feel numb. There are too many emotions to process.
Today we established internet access and our world opened up to all of you who have been waiting, worrying, praying, listening, watching for any news. I cannot tell you how much it has meant to us to swim through inboxes full of messages of love and prayers, pour over facebook postings of hope and relief. We know how horrible NOT knowing is, we understand your own pacing, your suffering, your helplessness as you watch coverage and hear piece reports of friends, partners and family that you have been worrying about. It wasn't until reading such outpouring of love and support that the tears started to fall, letting go of a little of all that we experienced in the last 36 hours, tears of the overwhelming love that surrounds us.
We are the lucky ones. And tonight we are safe. We have met a pastor and his family who have offered to take us in for a while. Veniel will meet up with us tonight to return our car, and we plan to head to the city tomorrow to find the Villier's and plan our next moves from there.
So many have asked "what can we do?" To this I say, keep praying. Write your congressman, your senators advocating for emergency visas and refugee status for Haitians fleeing this crisis. Give money to relief organization or to Global Ministries for the crisis has only begun. The sea-ports were badly damaged and thus all the supplies shipped are having a hard time docking, the airport is struggling to receive planes because the island has no fuel. Food stores are quickly diminishing, clean water is getting harder to find, hospitals and medical services are overwhelmed with their own tumbled walls and overwhelmed staff. We already have word of mobs tearing through the remains of tumbled markets in search of food. We hear of help and emergency on the way, but as of yet, we have not seen it.
For those who want to come, I say wait. We have so much to do right now, simple things like finding a more permanent place to stay for a while, finding the Villier's, figuring out what step is next. We'll keep you informed as it all unfolds and as we are able the goings on and how you can help.
Thank you, thank you, thank you for your love and prayers. We love you and feel enormously, undeservedly blessed to have health, our families and such an incredible network of people willing to fund raise, write, call and e-mail their congressmen, pray and send help. It is this that gives us hope. People helping people, loving people. It is this that will deliver Haiti from ruins. It is this that gives us the calm, the strength, the will to keep going.
*we're okayWe love you.
Safe
Dear Friends and Family,
I will write more later, but just want to let you all know that Patrick, Solomon and I are safe. We had just gotten home when the earthquake hit, our apartment building went from 3 stories to 2 in once sickening crunch, but our space stayed miraculously in tact and the people on the first floor got out in the nick of time.
We had a group working with CONASPEH here with us from Tennessee. All members of the group were safe. Had they been on time for dinner, this note would have a different tone. Not all people in the guest house got out alive. We took the group to the embassy yesterday and they should be able to leave the country via the Dominican Republic in the next few days.
CONASPEH has been flattened. All my nursing students were inside. Yesterday we helped pull bodies out of the wreckage and heard some voices within the rubble. Efforts continued frantically all day to reach them.
Patrick and Francois Villier are safe. Their house seems to have held. They lost one of their foster care children in CONASPEH.
Communications are horrible. The phone network is either jammed or down completely. The manager of the guest house and our DEAR FRIEND has taken us under his wing and brought us up the mountain. He has a family with a 3 year old girl and a new born to consider as well. We are trying to figure out our next move at this point.
I will write more soon.
Please pray for haiti. In a minute's time, buildings crumbled and life was lost. So much life. And even with that said, I think the hardest times are still coming as people try to figure out how to put their lives together again.
Much love. Thank you for your thoughts and prayers.
Kim, Patrick and Solomon
I will write more later, but just want to let you all know that Patrick, Solomon and I are safe. We had just gotten home when the earthquake hit, our apartment building went from 3 stories to 2 in once sickening crunch, but our space stayed miraculously in tact and the people on the first floor got out in the nick of time.
We had a group working with CONASPEH here with us from Tennessee. All members of the group were safe. Had they been on time for dinner, this note would have a different tone. Not all people in the guest house got out alive. We took the group to the embassy yesterday and they should be able to leave the country via the Dominican Republic in the next few days.
CONASPEH has been flattened. All my nursing students were inside. Yesterday we helped pull bodies out of the wreckage and heard some voices within the rubble. Efforts continued frantically all day to reach them.
Patrick and Francois Villier are safe. Their house seems to have held. They lost one of their foster care children in CONASPEH.
Communications are horrible. The phone network is either jammed or down completely. The manager of the guest house and our DEAR FRIEND has taken us under his wing and brought us up the mountain. He has a family with a 3 year old girl and a new born to consider as well. We are trying to figure out our next move at this point.
I will write more soon.
Please pray for haiti. In a minute's time, buildings crumbled and life was lost. So much life. And even with that said, I think the hardest times are still coming as people try to figure out how to put their lives together again.
Much love. Thank you for your thoughts and prayers.
Kim, Patrick and Solomon
Sunday, January 10, 2010
Home In Unlikely Places
I suppose it has happened. Haiti has slowly become home to me in some important ways.
Home is where the heart is, and my heart over the last year has often yearned for golden wheat fields of Kansas, the snow-sprinkled peaks of the Rocky Mountains, or for the company of friends and family I miss.
But stepping out into the warm, sunshine-drenched air of Port-au-Prince after my plane landed Thursday was like a long awaited hug for my cold bones and numb toes.
I loved every minute of my wintery holiday in Kansas with the warm company of family and quality visits with amazing friends, yet all the while, I felt like a piece of myself was missing. On the morning we opened Christmas presents, one little elf was missing from my nephew's package-unwrapping carnage. When toasting around the room in celebration of a New Year, there was one special face I missed kissing. So when I stepped into the outstretched arms of my husband and let my son wrap his chubby arms around my neck, I reunited with those missing pieces of me.
Haiti has offered a gentle welcome with the kind of gorgeous days that remind me of the beginning of a midwestern summer: hot sun coupled with the lingering cool breezes of spring. The air fragrant with smoke and vegetation welcomes me back after leaving the sterile, scentless airport air. I’m happy to hear the gobble of the neighbor’s turkey who miraculously survived two major holidays. I smile at the sound of music that rides the wind day and night: kompa merging with hip-hop fading into church hymns and accented with the tinkling of the water trucks' endless tune (still either Celine’s Heart Going on or a Christmas medley that jingles all year long). After 10 days of broad white landscapes, the popping colors of Haiti look like an oil paint canvas of color: palm tree green, dusty street brown, the rainbow collage of market colors—tomato red, lime, leafy and chili pepper green, bean white, red, and black, and carrot orange all under a sky Caribbean blue.
With homecoming came unpacking and resettling into the routine of life with a 14-month-old. I was spring-boarded back into work activities with the arrival of our first group of the new year—an enthusiastic bunch from Tennessee who are mostly first-timers to Haiti, full of curiosity and open to adventure, learning and reflection.
Today we attended church in a familiar spot, a place we tend to gravitate back to now and again. The simple structure sits in a green field outside of City Solei. Patrick and I have been there enough times that our introductions are now, “glad to see you again” and the faces in the congregation greet us with smiles of recognition instead of curious stares. Thanks to a largely sleepless night with Mr. Teething, I snagged a seat in the back with the other mothers-with-small-children anticipating a restlessly tired boy. In all honesty, its my favorite seat in the house, and in that church especially, I feel welcome. From such a vantage point, I watched mothers nursing quiet their infants, little sisters holding the hand of their even littler brothers, kids wiggling and dancing to the music, balloons and silk flowers hanging from the beams of the ceiling above, hands clapping in song or waving in prayer, and from the front of the church our new friends taking it all in. On one particular lively hymn, when the entire congregation seemed caught up in the energy of the music and Solomon was clapping in my arms to the beat of the drum, I grinned in complete and simple happiness.
Haiti can certainly leave us tired and spent. Yet they say you have to leave for a while to appreciate where you come from. I suppose that also means where you find yourself living. So for me I had to go home to appreciate coming back to my home-of-the-moment. Lucky for me I have two great places to hang my heart.
Saturday, January 9, 2010
Home for the Holidays
FIRST SNOW
by Mary Oliver
The snow
began here
this morning and all day
continued, its white
rhetoric everywhere
calling us back to why, how,
whence such beauty and what
the meaning; such
an oracular fever! flowing
past windows, an energy it seemed
would never ebb, never settle
less than lovely! and only now,
deep into night,
it has finally ended.
The silence
is immense,
and the heavens still hold
a million candles; nowhere
the familiar things:
stars, the moon,
the darkness we expect
and nightly turn from. Trees
glitter like castles
of ribbons, the broad fields
smolder with light, a passing
creekbed lies
heaped with shining hills;
and though the questions
that have assailed us all day
remain-not a single
answer has been found-
walking out now
into the silence and the light
under the trees,
and through the fields,
feels like one.
My plane blew in under a cloud cover with snowflakes tumbling out of its folds, shaking a new layer of frosty icing to the already white blanked world in Kansas.
With a hot cup of coffee, mittens, hat, winter coat and a hug that could trump them all with warmth, my vacation started in the hands of a friend with such history, such all-knowing heart connections that even at baggage claim at the Kansas City airport, I was instantly home. 11 days later another of my soul sisters made the white-knuckle journey across rural Kansas in yet another blizzard to put me back on my way to my tropical home.
The in-between was a chaotic swirl of my very favorite of faces, brightly-lit trees, glowing candle light, loud and lively charades, laughter rising up over conversation, well-bundled walks over snow-blown roads, heaps of food, sledding the mini-manmade-mountains of scooped road and driveway, conversations into the dark of night, snow angel crafting, hot coffee that merged into hot tea and then into hot totties, games of go-fish and old maid, hugs, a light-splashed home winking at me from the road a mile away, movies, careening toboggans behind the Papa-Steve-driven-four-wheeler letting loose the little kid inside us screaming with joy, cookie-decorating, kitty patting and dog wrestling, all to the background of an endless white horizon.
I treasured stepping into the homes of people I've sorely missed, catching up on the miraculous growth of my nephews and my best friends' children, toasting to how far we've come and here and now we find ourselves in. I wrung in the new year with a house packed full of family all giggling with party fever. I hugged my grandmother and pulled some quiet moments away from the crowd to enjoy some of her witty wisdom about marriage and child rearing. Incredible friends from Denver made the arduous trip across the drifted highways to cozy down in the warm oasis of the farm thus initiating themselves into my ever-growing farm family. With each visit, each hand held, each conversation had my heart filled to bursting.
On the last evening I was home, I took a walk along the road heading west. Usually the road yealds soft, velvety dirt underfoot, but this visit I instead crunched in the snowpack for a few miles with the trusty farm dogs following behind ready to defend me from rogue pheasant or roving coyote.
After a gluttonous feast of friends and family, I walked in search of the other thing I most long for during Port-au-Prince living.... peace. quiet. open spaces. empty places.
Fields for miles were blanked under several feet of snow, insulating the world. When standing still, the only sound to break the deafening silence was the winter wind whistling past my ears stuffed in my stocking cap. The air I breathed smelled of cold and ice. All the details of the landscape I have loved my life through were hidden under drift. My breath vapored around my face condensing on my eyelashes like teardrops. For most of the walk the sun stayed hidden behind a bank of flat grey clouds. But like a rare surprise, it would occasionally find a crack in the wall and send golden light sparking fields full of diamonds to emerge, glittering in surreal beauty. For miles over of miles, I was alone save for a heard of deer huddled together on a far away hill. In that kind of space, my soul expands. It breathes. It is at once inexplicably quiet and bursting with joy.
After eye-filling, ear-rattling, nose-overwhelming days in Haiti, my winter walk was like coffee beans during a perfume testing... a moment to clear the senses, a blank canvas to stare into, a clean void where all goes quiet. Even the rambling of my thoughts muted themselves in honor of the pristine, hushed world all around me. Collapsing into a snow bank under a grove of trees, staring up into the blue grey sky, the wind blocked by the shelter of pine letting pure deep silence settle around me like the flakes of snow that created this masterpiece, I let all go quiet.
Now, back in the hustle bustle of this concrete stacked, people-packed city the images of my time home seem almost dreamlike, put together of the very ingredients I need for rest and revival... people long and deeply loved, the playful passing of time together, and nature in whatever mood she feels like sharing. Among the most cherished of my Christmas gifts were new golden memories made, soulful conversations shared, and an incredible peace settled deep within. What a way to start a new year.
Thanks to all who created a wonder-world of homecoming. You've done my heart good.
Friday, December 25, 2009
Christmas in Haiti
*forgive
the late posting... just getting caught up after the holidays*
Merry Christmas!
The sun once again shines and the streets have rebounded after the rain with mobs of people, vendors and traffic.
Life doesn't look a whole lot different here despite the date on the calendar. The big bank near by has a 2-story blue tinsel Christmas tree and gaudy balls decorating their fence. If driving at night, a few restaurants and dance clubs show off a string of lights or two. In the piles of used clothes, shoes and plastic housewares sold on the streets, you can now find tinsely decorations for sale. A man on the corner is selling Reindeer made out of pinecones. Silvia called them large rabbits when I asked her their name.
In preparation for a new year, December is a time when people put a little extra time and care into their homes. If a little money has been saved, walls will be painted, construction continued, improvements made. Now that we know to pay attention, freshly painted store fronts and stuccoed walls covering previously exposed concrete blocks are evidence as we pass by familiar spots. Silvia tells us everyone spends extra time in the week before Christmas thoroughly cleaning their homes and preparing for a fresh start to the year. Maybe she was just indirectly hinting at us to clean our closets or scrub the couch liners.
Last night we spent the evening with friends, sharing a pot-luck style meal that was full of savory flavors, roasted vegetables, homemade cornbread, pumpkin soup, and lots of christmas sweets. We sang carols around candle light, and slipped into easy conversation. One of the couples there has two children, their oldest a 3 year old girl. She and Solomon became fast friends and walked hand in hand all over the house and yard while the grownups did their boring grown up things. Although we haven't known this group of people long, their company has become familiar over the month and the atmosphere warm. It was a perfect way to spend Christmas Eve.
On the drive home, the streets were a buzz with activity. Usually, if driving home after 10 in Port-au-Prince the streets are wide open as the city sleeps. But no one sleeps on Christmas Eve. Like New Years, Christmas eve is a night when young and old stay up through the night and welcome the holiday at the stroke of midnight. Many of our friends, including Silvia and her family, went to church in the evening and spent the entire night there, dancing, singing and celebrating with friends and family.
As we drove down Rue Delmas, we passed masses of people dancing in parking lots and along the side walks, rum and Klerin being sold by the cup full to people walking down the street, vendors hovering over their baskets full of food despite the late hour, fritay vendors selling their hot fried food. The street kids were still out and about, a few sporting Santa hats, wishing us a Jwaye Noel and seemingly caught up in the energy of the night. The music and party-making lasted 'til the break of dawn and was accented with bursts of fireworks and carols sung over megaphones into the wee hours of morning.
Silvia reported she went to bed at 2:30am after coming home from church, was up at 4 to pray, but couldn't go back to bed because the neighbor was slaughtering a hog and the "streets were hot" with activity at the early hour.
We, however did not see the 4am hour arrive. Just removed enough from the street, the Bentrott family enjoyed the rare treasure of sleeping in. I immagine there won't be many Christmas's that we have the option of sleeping in with kids, so we enjoyed this our first, and maybe our last.
Tonton Noel found Solomon. We opened a few presents and mostly watched Solomon bang on his drum with Santa hat on and smiles abound. I'd worry about what the what the neighbors will think, but their little angels got a karaoke machine and have been rocking on it since 7am. Maybe we'll all start a band.
About the time we were getting ready to sit down for breakfast, Silvia surprised us at the door to declare that she wanted to make us our Christmas gift--homemade Pumpkin soup. She chopped and simmered, stewed and stirred our surprise Christmas feast. She has quickly learned a quick way to our heart is through our stomachs!!! She couldn't have wrapped anything more delicious!
Pumpkin soup is a special soup for the Haitian people, symbolizing freedom and hope. It is packed full with vegetables and meats as if to celebrate all the produce Haiti is capable of making. It is fragrant and delicious. She told us stories of her all-nighter at church with family and friends while patting around the kitchen and drinking cocoa with us. She is planning another late night tonight at a different church, but would take a nap before starting round 2 of Christmas celebrations.
Nothing on the agenda for us tonight aside from maybe a movie and some quality time before I pack and catch the early flight out of Port-au-Prince tomorrow morning. Our tummies are full, the lights are glowing illuminating the dark room in primary colors, my little elf is reading a book with his dad and we all are cuddled up on the couch. A perfect Christmas day. The traditions are new, the scenery a little unusual, but the day full of the most important ingredient of the season--time with those I love.
Merry Christmas!
The sun once again shines and the streets have rebounded after the rain with mobs of people, vendors and traffic.
Life doesn't look a whole lot different here despite the date on the calendar. The big bank near by has a 2-story blue tinsel Christmas tree and gaudy balls decorating their fence. If driving at night, a few restaurants and dance clubs show off a string of lights or two. In the piles of used clothes, shoes and plastic housewares sold on the streets, you can now find tinsely decorations for sale. A man on the corner is selling Reindeer made out of pinecones. Silvia called them large rabbits when I asked her their name.
In preparation for a new year, December is a time when people put a little extra time and care into their homes. If a little money has been saved, walls will be painted, construction continued, improvements made. Now that we know to pay attention, freshly painted store fronts and stuccoed walls covering previously exposed concrete blocks are evidence as we pass by familiar spots. Silvia tells us everyone spends extra time in the week before Christmas thoroughly cleaning their homes and preparing for a fresh start to the year. Maybe she was just indirectly hinting at us to clean our closets or scrub the couch liners.
Last night we spent the evening with friends, sharing a pot-luck style meal that was full of savory flavors, roasted vegetables, homemade cornbread, pumpkin soup, and lots of christmas sweets. We sang carols around candle light, and slipped into easy conversation. One of the couples there has two children, their oldest a 3 year old girl. She and Solomon became fast friends and walked hand in hand all over the house and yard while the grownups did their boring grown up things. Although we haven't known this group of people long, their company has become familiar over the month and the atmosphere warm. It was a perfect way to spend Christmas Eve.
On the drive home, the streets were a buzz with activity. Usually, if driving home after 10 in Port-au-Prince the streets are wide open as the city sleeps. But no one sleeps on Christmas Eve. Like New Years, Christmas eve is a night when young and old stay up through the night and welcome the holiday at the stroke of midnight. Many of our friends, including Silvia and her family, went to church in the evening and spent the entire night there, dancing, singing and celebrating with friends and family.
As we drove down Rue Delmas, we passed masses of people dancing in parking lots and along the side walks, rum and Klerin being sold by the cup full to people walking down the street, vendors hovering over their baskets full of food despite the late hour, fritay vendors selling their hot fried food. The street kids were still out and about, a few sporting Santa hats, wishing us a Jwaye Noel and seemingly caught up in the energy of the night. The music and party-making lasted 'til the break of dawn and was accented with bursts of fireworks and carols sung over megaphones into the wee hours of morning.
Silvia reported she went to bed at 2:30am after coming home from church, was up at 4 to pray, but couldn't go back to bed because the neighbor was slaughtering a hog and the "streets were hot" with activity at the early hour.
We, however did not see the 4am hour arrive. Just removed enough from the street, the Bentrott family enjoyed the rare treasure of sleeping in. I immagine there won't be many Christmas's that we have the option of sleeping in with kids, so we enjoyed this our first, and maybe our last.
Tonton Noel found Solomon. We opened a few presents and mostly watched Solomon bang on his drum with Santa hat on and smiles abound. I'd worry about what the what the neighbors will think, but their little angels got a karaoke machine and have been rocking on it since 7am. Maybe we'll all start a band.
About the time we were getting ready to sit down for breakfast, Silvia surprised us at the door to declare that she wanted to make us our Christmas gift--homemade Pumpkin soup. She chopped and simmered, stewed and stirred our surprise Christmas feast. She has quickly learned a quick way to our heart is through our stomachs!!! She couldn't have wrapped anything more delicious!
Pumpkin soup is a special soup for the Haitian people, symbolizing freedom and hope. It is packed full with vegetables and meats as if to celebrate all the produce Haiti is capable of making. It is fragrant and delicious. She told us stories of her all-nighter at church with family and friends while patting around the kitchen and drinking cocoa with us. She is planning another late night tonight at a different church, but would take a nap before starting round 2 of Christmas celebrations.
Nothing on the agenda for us tonight aside from maybe a movie and some quality time before I pack and catch the early flight out of Port-au-Prince tomorrow morning. Our tummies are full, the lights are glowing illuminating the dark room in primary colors, my little elf is reading a book with his dad and we all are cuddled up on the couch. A perfect Christmas day. The traditions are new, the scenery a little unusual, but the day full of the most important ingredient of the season--time with those I love.
Wednesday, December 23, 2009
Chill in the Air
Its beginning to feel a lot like Christmas...
This Haitian winter, we've had nearly 4 weeks of no precipitation. The end of the hurricane season left the skies clear and the days hot and dry. Humidity returned 2 days ago, but last night the rain finally started to fall. Fall and fall. And the wind blew. At about 3 am, Patrick and I actually crawled UNDER the comforter because... get this... we were cold! What has long been decorative finally had function as we pulled the blanket under our chin and snuggled down for a few more zzz's. I woke this morning partly wanting to stay in bed all day, but too giddy to have a cup of coffee and need its WARMTH as much as I needed its dark aroma and flavor (caffeine). So out from under the covers I crawled to savor a steamy cup of Joe, curling up in a sweatshirt I dug out of deep storage and gazing out the rain-spotted window. Palm trees danced and waved in the wind, silvery puddles crawled over rooftops shimmering in the morning light, raindrops pitter-patted on tin and concrete, in puddles, on palm leaf as the world wriggled awake under the wet overcast morning.
Joy.
The sensation of "cold" here is about as luxurious to this Midwesterner as Ben and Jerry's icecream or hot showers.
Solomon slept soundly and late this morning, cuddled under two blankets. Patrick, though, was soon up to join me, just as giddy about the chill in the air as I. We were like two kids on a snow day. Too excited to sleep in perfect sleeping weather. ;)
And the rain kept falling for hours, chilling the air and blocking the sun with wet grey clouds. Rain storms here are usually fast, hot and furious flooding streets and raging to the sea. Today was an unusual "ground soaker" as Papa Steve would call it, slow and steady, spanning a full night and most of the following day. Life in the streets yielded to the steady shower.
With windshield wipers wiping, I drove to work this morning traversing a bizarro Haiti. Cold and rain to Haitians is like snow and ice to Americans. People stay in unless they absolutely HAVE to go out. So my commute had no traffic jams, no police stops, no herds of humanity crossing through traffic, no kids with rags polishing the windshield at the stoplights. Sidewalks were empty their usual masses of vendors. Faces peered out of windows and doorways. Even the tap-tap traffic seemed light. Instead I slowed only for giant puddles to splash though with Monty.
During my commute, a radio program read Christmas letters to Tonton Noel (Uncle or Old Man Christmas) from children all over Haiti. Jean wanted a toy car; Katiyana dreamed of a doll. Several children asked that Tonton Noel remember the kids in the street this Christmas, and one little child asked for a home and a mom. That one had my eyes as misty as the weather outside.
No one braved the wet roads to show up to clinic this morning in Carrefour, so I kicked back with the nurse and the lab technician and visited in our rare empty clinic, sharing about our plans for Christmas as the rain tumbled over the roof. We watched the neighbor catch roof-run-off in a buckets and bottles, seemingly storing up for a long dry spell. Since most Haitians have to walk to the public pump every morning for water, a heavy rain can offer a rare surplus of water to store leaving a few mornings to follow with a lighter work load. I left after an hour, all too happy to make the 35-minute miraculous no-traffic drive home, officially kicking off my Christmas vacation. WAAAHOOOOO and Ho Ho Ho.
I picked up my boys and we went up the mountain to run errands. I don't remember the last time Patrick and I were in such a good mood in the car. On the way home, we decided to try out a Chinese restaurant some friends had recommended. Rainy cold day? Chinese take-out sounded all-too perfect.
While Solomon and I waited in the car for Patrick to get our orders-to-go, a gaggle of street kids surrounded our car. Despite being absolutely soaked to the bone and shivering, they were in remarkably high spirits. In my best motherly tone, I scolded them for standing out in the open and not ducking a single raindrop. Laughing through chattering teeth, they told me that even the trees were dripping on them. Instead of running for cover under the closest overhang, they demonstrated some scenes from a Jet Li movie for me complete with "hieeee-yah" sound effects, drew pictures in the mist on the car window, quizzed me about Solomon--inviting him to join their little gang of boys--, and asked for my phone number. I had to give the kids credit for their sunny disposition while sporting cold wet hands shriveling in the constant moisture. Despite my joy in an overcast, rainy day, I am glad that such days are rare here in a place that lacks enough sturdy roofs to keep many-a-head warm and dry.
In our luxurious lives this afternoon, Solomon drifted to sleep to the lullaby of raindrops on pavement. Patrick and I enjoyed delicious hot Chinese food and steaming tea that tasted AMAZING (any variation from Creole food or our bland home menu is quite exciting). With bellies warm and full we snuggled together to watch a movie in disbelief at the still-falling rain. This afternoon we made cookies and Skyped my Mom and Dad who are socked in at home in Kansas with an ice storm. Apparently weather is reeking havoc in many parts of the world today. Dad wasn't as happy about limbs crashing into his lawn under the weight of layers of ice as I was in our rainy-day in.
Santa couldn't have packed anything better in his sack of toys for Kim in Haiti than a chill in the air. A cold day in Haiti... a cool, wet, rainy, overcast GORGEOUS day appreciated by this Midwesterner who misses the changing of seasons... or any simple variation from relentless summer.
Its beginning to feel a lot like Christmas...
Monday, December 21, 2009
Advent: Joy
Joy.
This is what I'm supposed to be focusing on this week for Advent.
Quiet honestly, over the last few days I've instead felt annoyed by traffic, uninspired by work, heartbroken for kids in the street, frustrated with fatigue, worried over news of family falling ill and overly anticipatory about leaving Haiti for home--letting the light-splashed American landscape and the jingle-jangle-jing of holiday tune piped over Musak in airports and shopping malls overtake what my spirit should have been doing all along.
"Annoyed to the World" doesn't have the same pick-me-up that the original song gives, now does it.
Joy.
It sounds like such a BIG emotion to feel. One reserved for the occasions of party hats and silver bells.
Happiness is one thing; happiness can describe a general state of being that umbrellas all the moment-to-moment scuttle you have in its midst. But joy--joy feels to be a whole other animal. Joy, to me, is a little euphoria that takes over everything, holding you completely present. Its easy to be happy while feeling a lot of other things. But Joy demands you to pay attention to moment where eyelash to toe-tips feel abuzz in smiles. Joy means happiness all-consuming. Even if it lasts for a second, an exchange, a moment. Joy means the soul is involved.
In my Advent meditations, I get how you can make yourself HOPE in the worst of situations. I understand how you should find PEACE even amidst the chaos. But JOY? Can I really be joyful while driving through Port-au-Prince break-and-weave traffic, can I find joy in hopeless diagnoses dolled out, in the stink of sewers filled with trash, in the claustrophobia of a walled concrete world, in the frustration of cross-culture communications? Maybe it isn't to be a constant state of being, but choosing to find the joyful in a day, finding reasons to celebrate even the smallest of beautiful things.
When I think of the moments in my life when I've felt true joy, they are usually the GREAT moments of my life: Dancing at my wedding where everyone around me seemed intoxicated by the party and me feeling intoxicated by the love and future I felt with Patrick. Finishing medical school despite the odds and knowing that I earned the diploma I had in my hands more than I had earned anything else I'd ever before worked for. Helping my first baby to be born--CATCHING that baby and with tears in my eyes celebrating with all the family in the room the miracle we witnessed together. Seeing my brother be a Dad for the first time and watching the best in him rise out of himself in all its protection, humor and love. Becoming a parent myself and feeling overcome the first time Solomon stopped crying when he cuddled next to my heart.
I have experienced Joy... in the grand as well as in the moments you don't always remember to write home about.
Joy:
Falling in a snow bank with friends while snow shoeing, laughing hysterically over a joke I don't remember, but the laughter still lingers.
Joy:
Running (in a previous life) with my dog at sunrise, watching her sniff curb sides, delighting in the chase of an illusive prey. Feeling the endorphin high of exercise mingled with watching the pink and orange break of morning painting the cityscape before me.
Joy:
Reveling in Solomon's laugh, and no matter what we did to inspire it, doing it over and over and over again just to hear that hysterical, little boy belly laugh one more time.
Joy:
Sledding over frozen farm fields, bumping, wiping sleet from my eyes, tumbling off, Duke barking at our heals, falling into the kind of child-like giggles with my brother, my dad, my nephews, my sister in law, my mom that make us breathless and uncertain over bladder control.
Joy:
Sharing a celebratory moment with a patient when both of our fears were dissolved thanks to healing taking over despite our most realistic fears.
Joy:
Finding myself awake in the quiet of morning, before Solomon or Patrick have stirred, sipping the first cup of hot-brewed coffee and finding an inbox full of e-mails to open like presents.
Joy:
Looking over mountain peaks today as we traversed Haiti's western ridges, seeing mountains giving way to mountains and the life that rises up from its valleys. Recognizing incredible beauty in the world around me that so often only shows me its suffering side. A sense of knowing that despite all the doubts and fears, I'm where I need to be and its beautiful to be on the adventure.
Joy:
Sharing an inside joke with Patrick, in the middle of a group of people, trying to keep a straight face while delighting in the instant connection I feel with him.
Joy:
The anticipation of seeing the faces of friends, of family that I've missed so hard and for so long. Looking forward to hearing their voices tell me about their days instead of having to read it in print. Snuggling in to a moment, a warm, cozy, twinkly-light moment.
Joy:
Unexpected laughter. Surprise.
Joy:
Unexpected kindness.
Joy:
Unexpected resilience you find in yourself.
I'm not sure I'm advanced enough to know how to experience joy as a permanent condition, but I've learned to recognize it in moments. Those are the moments that I polish like jewels in my life's collectables
The truth is it is easy to let the realities of life diminish joy, from headlines to headaches, trivial frustrations to the kind of heart aching situations that seem too big to solve. It is all too easy to look at all that is wrong with people, the world, our governments... the endless cycle of mistakes made over again, violence and corruption.
Yet despite it all, life can be inexplicably beautiful. I'm always surprised when the beauty catches me in the midst of the messiest of places. Life springs up from dust, trash and rock.
Advent asks us to recognize Joy in our belief in all that is bigger and better in the world.
So I turn to what I have faith in.
I believe in a God that bubbles up in the laughter of a child, breathes through the beauty of a landscape, flutters on a dragonfly's wing, lives in the sweat and breath of a moment LIVED, delights in loving the person or people you are with.
I believe in a God, in life, that pulses with the beating of our hearts, blooms in the earth beneath our feet, blows through the air we breath, lights the sun and stars above. I believe in a God that is bigger than war, bigger than fear, hunger, suffering, pain. I believe in a God of hands held, who lives in us even as we die. I believe in a God of Justice, who empowers us through our very core to stand up to the wounds of this world and let His healing power work through our fingers. When it comes down to it, I believe in a God of Hope, of Peace, of Joy and of Love.
So maybe that is what Advent asks us to do... take stock in what we believe in and rejoice in what we hope, what we know, what we feel to be true. So tonight I'm pledging to take a better look of joy all around me—in the faces of children, the twitter of birds in the morning, the lights lit after dusk in the markets, the music beating from drums, in moments when I forget to take myself too seriously, in the gathering together of family and friends.
Merry Christmas.
This is what I'm supposed to be focusing on this week for Advent.
Quiet honestly, over the last few days I've instead felt annoyed by traffic, uninspired by work, heartbroken for kids in the street, frustrated with fatigue, worried over news of family falling ill and overly anticipatory about leaving Haiti for home--letting the light-splashed American landscape and the jingle-jangle-jing of holiday tune piped over Musak in airports and shopping malls overtake what my spirit should have been doing all along.
"Annoyed to the World" doesn't have the same pick-me-up that the original song gives, now does it.
Joy.It sounds like such a BIG emotion to feel. One reserved for the occasions of party hats and silver bells.
Happiness is one thing; happiness can describe a general state of being that umbrellas all the moment-to-moment scuttle you have in its midst. But joy--joy feels to be a whole other animal. Joy, to me, is a little euphoria that takes over everything, holding you completely present. Its easy to be happy while feeling a lot of other things. But Joy demands you to pay attention to moment where eyelash to toe-tips feel abuzz in smiles. Joy means happiness all-consuming. Even if it lasts for a second, an exchange, a moment. Joy means the soul is involved.
In my Advent meditations, I get how you can make yourself HOPE in the worst of situations. I understand how you should find PEACE even amidst the chaos. But JOY? Can I really be joyful while driving through Port-au-Prince break-and-weave traffic, can I find joy in hopeless diagnoses dolled out, in the stink of sewers filled with trash, in the claustrophobia of a walled concrete world, in the frustration of cross-culture communications? Maybe it isn't to be a constant state of being, but choosing to find the joyful in a day, finding reasons to celebrate even the smallest of beautiful things.
When I think of the moments in my life when I've felt true joy, they are usually the GREAT moments of my life: Dancing at my wedding where everyone around me seemed intoxicated by the party and me feeling intoxicated by the love and future I felt with Patrick. Finishing medical school despite the odds and knowing that I earned the diploma I had in my hands more than I had earned anything else I'd ever before worked for. Helping my first baby to be born--CATCHING that baby and with tears in my eyes celebrating with all the family in the room the miracle we witnessed together. Seeing my brother be a Dad for the first time and watching the best in him rise out of himself in all its protection, humor and love. Becoming a parent myself and feeling overcome the first time Solomon stopped crying when he cuddled next to my heart.
I have experienced Joy... in the grand as well as in the moments you don't always remember to write home about.
Joy:
Falling in a snow bank with friends while snow shoeing, laughing hysterically over a joke I don't remember, but the laughter still lingers.
Joy:
Running (in a previous life) with my dog at sunrise, watching her sniff curb sides, delighting in the chase of an illusive prey. Feeling the endorphin high of exercise mingled with watching the pink and orange break of morning painting the cityscape before me.
Joy:
Reveling in Solomon's laugh, and no matter what we did to inspire it, doing it over and over and over again just to hear that hysterical, little boy belly laugh one more time.
Joy:
Sledding over frozen farm fields, bumping, wiping sleet from my eyes, tumbling off, Duke barking at our heals, falling into the kind of child-like giggles with my brother, my dad, my nephews, my sister in law, my mom that make us breathless and uncertain over bladder control.
Joy:
Sharing a celebratory moment with a patient when both of our fears were dissolved thanks to healing taking over despite our most realistic fears.
Joy:
Finding myself awake in the quiet of morning, before Solomon or Patrick have stirred, sipping the first cup of hot-brewed coffee and finding an inbox full of e-mails to open like presents.
Joy:
Looking over mountain peaks today as we traversed Haiti's western ridges, seeing mountains giving way to mountains and the life that rises up from its valleys. Recognizing incredible beauty in the world around me that so often only shows me its suffering side. A sense of knowing that despite all the doubts and fears, I'm where I need to be and its beautiful to be on the adventure.
Joy:
Sharing an inside joke with Patrick, in the middle of a group of people, trying to keep a straight face while delighting in the instant connection I feel with him.
Joy:
The anticipation of seeing the faces of friends, of family that I've missed so hard and for so long. Looking forward to hearing their voices tell me about their days instead of having to read it in print. Snuggling in to a moment, a warm, cozy, twinkly-light moment.
Joy:
Unexpected laughter. Surprise.
Joy:
Unexpected kindness.
Joy:
Unexpected resilience you find in yourself.
I'm not sure I'm advanced enough to know how to experience joy as a permanent condition, but I've learned to recognize it in moments. Those are the moments that I polish like jewels in my life's collectables
The truth is it is easy to let the realities of life diminish joy, from headlines to headaches, trivial frustrations to the kind of heart aching situations that seem too big to solve. It is all too easy to look at all that is wrong with people, the world, our governments... the endless cycle of mistakes made over again, violence and corruption.
Yet despite it all, life can be inexplicably beautiful. I'm always surprised when the beauty catches me in the midst of the messiest of places. Life springs up from dust, trash and rock.
Advent asks us to recognize Joy in our belief in all that is bigger and better in the world.
So I turn to what I have faith in.
I believe in a God that bubbles up in the laughter of a child, breathes through the beauty of a landscape, flutters on a dragonfly's wing, lives in the sweat and breath of a moment LIVED, delights in loving the person or people you are with.
I believe in a God, in life, that pulses with the beating of our hearts, blooms in the earth beneath our feet, blows through the air we breath, lights the sun and stars above. I believe in a God that is bigger than war, bigger than fear, hunger, suffering, pain. I believe in a God of hands held, who lives in us even as we die. I believe in a God of Justice, who empowers us through our very core to stand up to the wounds of this world and let His healing power work through our fingers. When it comes down to it, I believe in a God of Hope, of Peace, of Joy and of Love.
So maybe that is what Advent asks us to do... take stock in what we believe in and rejoice in what we hope, what we know, what we feel to be true. So tonight I'm pledging to take a better look of joy all around me—in the faces of children, the twitter of birds in the morning, the lights lit after dusk in the markets, the music beating from drums, in moments when I forget to take myself too seriously, in the gathering together of family and friends.
Merry Christmas.
Wednesday, December 16, 2009
Mobile Lab
*At the "lab" in Carrefour
I admit, I was hesitant to celebrate. We've been through a couple of lab technicians over the last 6 months who came, looked confused and left before the microscope could get warmed up. So when someone seemingly perfect showed up for the job, I sat back and watched for a bit. She asked for all the right reagents, trained quickly in materials she wasn't used to, and didn't so much blink at lack of electricity or running water. We've compared findings over slides and shaken hands in agreement.
I think (pray) Everose is here to stay. She's reported for duty faithfully for 7 weeks now, showing up two days a week at CONASPEH and one day a week at Carrefour. She has even offered to travel with us on mobile clinic rides if deemed helpful. When our lab doesn't have what a patient needs, she refers easily and helps follow up with patients.
*mobile lab powered by a small solar panel
She's a kind, easy-going woman who takes initiative, has taken ownership of the lab and works cleanly, efficiently and for very little money. She makes due with the roughest of circumstances and still manages to make a well-stained slide and follow hygienic precautions. Miss Fanor and I find her an excellent addition to our team, and our clinic has suddenly broadened dramatically in outreach and capabilities. My own therapeutic strategies have thankfully become less shoot-from-the-hip and now have a touch more diagnostic back up which I am thrilled about.
The community is catching wind of her presence and already her lab is filling with people not only referred by me, but who come in with orders from other doctors in clinics nearby. After only a few weeks, she is now fielding a constant stream of patients of all ages waiting with veins exposed, urine and stool samples ready.
*At work in the CONASPEH lab spaceSo in this season of celebration, I give thanks for two more hands taking part in the effort. Our clinic has dramatically broadened in outreach with her presence. In the true spirit of Haiti, once again what once seemed impossible is well underway.
Tuesday, December 15, 2009
Advent: Peace
"Peace does not mean to be in a place where there is no noise, trouble or hard work, it means to be in the midst of those things and still be calm in your heart."
When life gets too busy, too complicated, too frustrating, too uninspired and I find myself in a slump, my habit always has been to retreat into nature, to places where peace flutters on every branch, flows through water, blooms up from the ground, stretches across the vast sky, rustles in the landscapes. In med school, my friend and I would evade piles of text to memorize for the solace of the ample public parks in Kansas City, laying in the grass and listening to the breeze whistling through the trees. In residency, I found myself escaping up the mountain at every free chance I got to hike, camp along a mountain stream, breath in the fresh scent of pine and let the quietness of the wilderness sink in. In Haiti, Patrick and I retreat to the beach to let the surf wash over us, and the cool blue horizon absorb all the tension we've carried on our shoulders through the week.
For rest supreme, I can always find it home, on my parent's farm
where the nearest neighbor is a retired dairy farmer and his dog living 2 miles
away. There I walk long stretches of road and never happen across another
vehicle or person, can talk out loud to God when I need to work some things out,
can listen to meadowlarks whistling on a prairie fence, to cows calling to their
babies across rolling fields, or to the squabble of wild turkeys I've disturbed
along my walk. On the farm, no lights from a city pollute the darkness, and with
the setting of the sun in wild splashes of color, the night gives way to a
velvety landscape of stars, the milky way spreads out like a silvery ribbon
across the sky, Mars glows red and Venus bright. Only the moon can dim the
skypscape of stars, and when it does, we rarely complain. The moon itself has a
majestic presence on the prairie, sometimes shedding enough silvery light to
illuminate the shadowy corners of nightfall.In these places I can always find peace, breathing in fresh air, reveling in the tranquility away from masses of humanity, on open roads or curvy paths, great stretches of the world that allow the soul to expand and breath. Usually my worries, concerns and preoccupations are exposed as trivial and the greater questions of my life grow quiet as I stand in a state of simply being.
Yet I always struggle with how to take the tranquility I find in such places into my existence every day, allowing it to soak into the hustle and bustle of life, seasoning the moments of stress and struggle, coloring the routine and maintaining balance.
Because peace should be experienced no matter how many millions of people fill a city, how loud the cars honk and trucks rattle. Peace can exist in a morning with room full of patients waiting with their aches and pains and needs. Peace should take over when I have to figure out how to say no once again to an outstretched hand looking for a handout that I cannot give. Peace can exist in the pollution, in the confusion, in the suffering and celebration. Peace can exist in laughter, in tears, in the living, breathing and dying of every day.
This Sunday, we celebrated the second Sunday of Advent, and lit a candle for peace.
In our time of community gathering, we meditated on that which blocks peace from entering into our hearts. Anger, ambition, control, mourning, struggle, impatience, redefining self, frustration, disappointment, loneliness. We allow such intrusions into our presence in the moment; they disturb our homeostasis and irritate our happiness.
The world itself hurts for peace, in all its definitions. The heart of the world is tainted with struggles for power and money, misunderstandings and unbalance. As a result wars are waged, environments are stripped, poverty and starvation pollute populations, disparities perpetuate, illness overtakes, racism, nationalism, religion-ism get in the way of a peaceful global operations. Yet how can we expect the world to fall into Utopian peace if we, as individuals, still struggle with maintaining simple peace in our own hearts?
So in this year’s advent, I recognize the real challenge of peace. It starts with me. It begins with the individual. Advent reminds us God brings peace, faith and belief in that which connects, makes whole, unifies and heals. If we trust in that, then we start the process of pulling down the walls of unrest, agitation, fear and injustice.
I have a long way to go, to harbor that peace that passes all understanding. But I’m thankful for the moments in life that I’m able to grasp it with both hands, breath it in deeply, catch its scent on a breeze, hear its whisper in the wind. This advent I focus on the barriers to peace so I may hurdle them, may discard them, may put them in their place and let the peace of God in.
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About Us
- Kim and Patrick Bentrott
- Port-Au-Prince, Haiti
- Hailing from midwest America and harboring a deep love for Colorado, we are currently living and working in Haiti. Employed through Global Ministries and partnered with a Haitian organization called CONASPEH, this is a blog that outlines our thoughts, experiences and days in this amazing journey of life. We are in the process of adopting our son, Solomon, and the adventure of parenthood makes life all the more sweet. MAILING ADDRESS: c/o Lynx Air P.O. Box 407139 Ft. Lauderdale, Fl 33340
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