February tour report. March report coming soon.
N a Sonje
say in Ayiti) to everyone who has been encouraging us and continues to
up to today, Thursday March 9th. Here's just a little news about N a
Sonje Foundation's fund-raising trip for the building of the Memory
Village since February 1st:
Feb 1st, we left Ayiti and arrived Miami. Feb 2nd we were driven to
Gainesville.
February 4th, 2PM at the Santa Fe Community College we played for the
1st time in the US. Two different newspapers wrote stories about the
presentation. The Alligator at:
http://www.alligator.org/pt2/060206haiti.php and the Gainesville Sun.
The audience was pleased enough with the performance that they gave us
a standing ovation. Afterwards they asked questions about N a Sonje,
the Memory Village and about the play.
The person who organized and planned everything there for us to perform
was Trudy Harris and her team of friends like April and Diane. Trudy
visited Haiti not too long ago herself.
Sunday, February 5th, we went to the "Christ United Methodist Church"
where Trudy is a member. They asked us to take the time that would
have been for the sermon that day. It was an interesting but good
experience for us to be in the role of the pastor!
We were driven again back to Miami on the 6th, slept at our base at our
sister's, Ti Ko and Mari Ka's place and then flew to Denver on the 7th
(election day in Ayiti).
Sunday February 12th at 7PM was the second place we performed in
Denver, Colorado at the "Atonement Lutheran Church" with more than 50
people in the audience. That morning, we participated in Sunday school
where we spoke to 2 different groups. In the afternoon, before we
performed, we participated in a bible study in the same church where
the subject was "Demons and Healing" The wonderful friends responsible
for organizing there were Pastor Jim Gonia and Cheryl Stone. They had
come to Ayiti with the church's confirmation class and parents in 2004.
February 15th, we winged our way to California.
Sunday February 19th at 7PM at the "First United Methodist Church of
Canoga Park" was the 3rd place we presented "3 Innocents" in Los
Angeles, California to more than 70 people. A majority were members of
the church, but there was one who drove more than 6 hours just to see
the play and to meet the 3 of us. There were lots of questions from
the audience afterwards. Pastor Karen Murata organized all the details
and logistics for us so that we were able to present the play at her
church. Sunday morning before the play, the pastor of the church gave
us seats of honor as special guests of the church next to the pulpit.
They gave time during the service for us to say a few words to the
congregation. We naturally spoke about Ayiti and N a Sonje. Don't
want to forget that on Thursday (the day after we arrived) we spoke to
2 anthropology classes at the "Los Angeles Valley College".
Wednesday February 22nd at 4PM was the 4th place and was in Denver
again, this time at "Metropolitan State College of Denver" at the St.
Cajetan's auditorium, a former church that sits in the middle of the
universities' campus. Carla's daughter Leah is in her last year there
and did all the set up which means reserving the room, planning
everything, hosted us at her house and provided all our transportation.
There were approximately 38 people that attended the presentation. We
were very happy though and there was plenty of good discussion
afterwards. Among those who were there, a wonderful woman by the name
of Arlene McMillen who liked it so much what we are doing that she
decided to organize another performance for us so that other teachers
and students would have the opportunity to see the play. We also met
with a super person, Dr. Lucas Shamala, a professor at Metro State is
from Kenya but received his doctorate from US college. This guy comes
from where the sun rises. He brought us to speak to 3 of his classes
to present ourselves and to talk about N a Sonje, the history of Africa
and Haiti. It was a smash hit!
Sunday February 26th, we spoke on the radio program "Origins" with
"Scotty" on KUVO 89.3FM Denver where we spoke about N a Sonje and the
play.
The 5th place was once again at Metro State because Arlene had arranged
with the administration to reserve a hall with a stage on Monday
February 27th. A whole class came to the performance. There wasn't any
time for questions since they had to go to class immediately after the
performance. We're waiting for their responses since they said they
would dedicate a whole class time to everyone's reactions.
The Monday after our performance at Metro, we had dinner with friends
where we met with a dear friend that we just hadn't met before,
Malaika. She became interested in what we were saying and decided
right away to organize several presentations for us in Boulder, not far
from Denver.
March 1st, we bused our way to Boulder where Malaika picked us up and
took us to speak to a group of African Americans at "Fairview High
School". Then we went to the university "Naropa" where we spoke to a
multicultural student group about who we are and what we are doing, the
students were from very diverse backgrounds and one was even half
Haitian.
March 2nd we presented to a small class "Environmental Justice"
Before too long, we'll give you more stories of our progress as the
journey continues. We've been in Chicago - Illinois, Sioux City - Iowa,
South Bend - Indiana, and we are now about to play in Kalamazoo -
Michigan, and we will start the month of April in Germantown -
Pennsylvania (near Philadelphia).