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Thank you GLOW Ministries for all your help while we were in Haiti! Because of your ministry we were able to put shoes on so many of the needy children there. Our trip up the mountain to Evwa School was unforgettable. Our drive up on the goat trail with no guard rails, etc., was both frightening & beautiful beyond words. Some of the kids there had flip flops on where the back half of the flip flop was gone. Others came with their feet in shoes that were too small, curling their toes. We would gently push down their toes so we could get the correct size on them. What a blessing to see the kids walk away proudly with a brand new pair of shoes that fit properly! We kept fitting shoes until we ran out of sizes. Because of the generosity of those that gave us money to buy food for the poor, we were able to go to a small "brush arbor" school near Kalico Hotel where the children desperately needed food. We gave each child a bag of rice to take home to their family. That little "brush arbor" school touched all of our hearts. We also gave bread, water and rice to Village 87 where everyone lives in such poverty. Thank you to Bettie and Phil for the transportation, great meals, your home, and the hospitality that GLOW Ministries showed to our team. Without your help "Shoes for Haiti’s Kids" would not be able to do what God has called us to do. Phil, "Shoes for Haiti’s Kids" will get you those 600 pairs of BRAND NEW SNEAKERS for Fonde Baptiste School, with Gods help! God Bless you for the lives that are changed in Haiti because of your ministry! Ria Voss Shoes for Haiti’s Kids
The Shoe Gang enjoying lunch in Evwa
Raquens Turenne was chosen by his peers to serve in Haiti as the secretary of GLOW Ministries, he is also the Sponsorship Director. It was imperative for him and the sponsorship team to walk up to Fond-Baptiste for these reasons:
When a Boss has never tried something hard, he will not fully understand the people who are doing it.
God has called Raquens to see and understand the needs of the people and to intercede for them.
People in Fond-Baptiste do not have a vehicle. They walk or ride horses. You can have a better fellowship with them if you “look” like them. God will soon bless Raquens with a vehicle; he should understand how to protect the vehicles.
On Sunday February 17, 2008 Raquens has let pastor Morvan know about his trip to Fonde Baptiste. Elitesse Morvan is the pastor of that area; he should be the first person to welcome Raquens and his team. But pastor Morvan was not available that week because he had a special convention in Montrouis with his many churches. He sent words to people there to let them know about an inspector will be visiting on Tuesday morning.
Raquens and his team can’t walk all the way up to Fond-Baptiste, climbing mountains for about 6 hours. They plan to stop and do some works in Evwa’s school which is half way to Fonde Baptiste. The team was supposed to leave early on Monday and spend the day in Evwa. They should reach Fond-baptiste the next day (Tuesday). One member of the sponsorship team had an emergency on Monday, so they leave Mont-Rouis Tuesday morning instead.
Can you imagine the people they met on their way, people carrying their children to Montrouis’s clinic? It is not an easy task to take a medical team up there to minister to the people. Let’s pray for God to provide a better way for them.
Can you also understand how many people are walking many miles without shoes? They carry their shoes! When they arrive in Montrouis they put their shoes on: they are trying to protect their only shoes or sandals. It is exactly what people did in Gardere, Savanne au Roches, etc. Do you know how much a pair of shoes here cost? My congratulations to you who contribute to bless Haiti with shoes. Let’s pray that the people in the mountain get blessed also.
We arrived in Evwa at 8:00 am (Tuesday) where pastor Oristyl welcomed us. It was a good time to minister to the children there. We filled in the paper forms and took pictures of each school child. Pastor Oristyl fed us a wonderful lunch. In the afternoon we decided to go on to Fonde Baptiste. We have never been there before but we follow the road. We finally got there by 6:45 pm.
People up there knew that the inspectors should come in the morning; they had cleaned the property, done their best to welcome the inspectors but after 4pm, everyone returned back home because an inspector never arrives after 4 pm. Their greatest surprise, they were waiting to see a vehicle because “inspectors” do not walk; he rides a motorcycle or drive a vehicle.
When we arrived, there was no one to welcome us. Some neighbors were watching us but they did not ask us any questions. We started singing, praising God and praying to let them know that Christian Missionaries were visiting them, but no one came to us. We visited the school in the darkness, helped by our flash lights, and we found that there was one classroom door that was not closed.
We praised God for providing us one room to spend the night. We did not have any bed but we used some benches for beds. We did not expect these conditions so we did not bring any sweater to resist the cold weather. We had different enemies: we are visitors, our room is not protected and the weather. When we woke up in the
morning, we were freezing but God had protected us. The people were astonished and ashamed as they saw us in the morning. In a few minutes, someone is preparing coffee, others are bringing water and other things that we might have need of. Later, we had to choose where to stay because 4 families wanted to have us in their house. May God bless them all.
In Fond-Baptiste, it is not easy to have school in the afternoon because children walk many miles to school. I really appreciate the children’s behavior and also the school principal, Maximilien who put good principles in the school: teachers and students are regular and on time. They have respect for others…
The students were happy when I explained to them about the Sponsorship program and what the sponsors represent to the community and to them in particular. All the sponsored students write with joy to their sponsors. Majority of students have one problem: after the 6th Grade, if some parents have the possibility, they move their children to Montrouis, Arcahaie or Port au Prince to continue their studies while the rest, hopeless, go to garden because there is no way to continue their studies. We would like to have 7th grade next September. The director told me that they have teachers available to teach the secondary classes.
If we can help Fond-Baptiste school to have the other grades (one grade each year) and then later have a professional school where we can help educate people on the mountain, giving them the possibility to catch fish instead of giving them a fish every day, we will really have a new and nice Haiti. People will say: this mission really does GLOW in Haiti.
Thank you for your time reading this newsletter. God bless.
Raquens Turenne
Beautiful Mountains near Fonde Baptiste
Raquens
I stepped out when the shoe fitting started, they have done this a number of times and I didn’t want to be in the way. I took advantage of this time out and strolled around the village.
There is a piece of land down a little way that the community donated to the church. I stopped and visited the land, took some pictures and basically prayed for wisdom on what to do. Anyway, as I returned to the church I met with the director of the school. We talked about the land and he confirmed that the owners had given the land to the “community council” which is a must for any type of development to progress. This insures that any buildings or other improvements do not eventually fall back to the owners but in case of a ‘default’ situation the property will always be controlled by the community council for the purpose of education and development. I felt led to suggest that the community now begin to collect rock and sand on site. I committed that once they give us a copy of the land deed in the name of the community council and amass enough rock and sand on site, GLOW will provide the cement, steel and expertise to build the foundation of the school. I think this will be a good start and an encouragement to the whole community.
Later, as I was sitting under the shade of the mango tree, chatting with some locals, I made the mistake of asking how far they had to walk for water. One thing led to another and before I knew it I was being led to the spring. It wasn’t a bad walk, by Haitian standards at least, only about 20 minutes. I was able to see it first hand and take some pictures. This particular spring usually has water but does dry up now and then depending on amounts of rain. The water was filthy brown and not much good for anything but washing. They told me they have to walk much further for good drinking water. I walked down with a few people, in our party was a 13 year old girl named Manushka. I enjoyed talking with her once she started trusting me and opened up. She walks to this spring to fetch water at least 3 times a day. She has 4 sisters and 5 brothers. She attends the Catholic school in the area (the only other school there).
The fellow who was leading us, Jean, was an enjoyable fellow. I asked him how much water he usually drinks in a day. He answered that on a good day when he eats well he might drink 3 small glasses of water. Other days, maybe only one. I am going to try and get 2 bio sand filters to that spring site and see if the community will trust them enough to drink the water from the spring once it is filtered. This will have a big impact on the community to be able to drink on site and carry home filtered water.
By the time we trudged back to the school area the shoe gang was finishing up. There were kids everywhere prancing about showing off their new shoes. We gathered at the home of the director and were hosted to a divine banquet of goat, beans and rice, beet salad and fried banan. We also had brought the drinks ourselves, plenty of pop and juice for everyone. The children lined up with their bowls all the way out to the street and came through patiently receiving a huge bowl of food and cold pop or juice to drink. It was a very, very fun time and everyone was happy and smiling. The food was excellent and there was plenty to go around, no one went home hungry that day.
Site for a school in Evwa
Mamushka
The spring in Evwa
S.O.S.
Have you heard, these are tough times in Haiti. If you’ve been reading my newsletter faithfully you will recall that I’ve been waving a warning ever since fall. The rainfall this past summer and fall was unprecedented in Haiti. I would speculate that 70% of Haiti’s gardens were flooded and lost (mostly in the Artibonite Valley). I saw this coming and now it’s here. The cost of food in Haiti has nearly doubled in the past six months. One factor causing the rise in prices is the shortfall of foods grown in Haiti, that “bartering” power is gone. Other factors include the rising fuel costs worldwide and the general sense of depression in the financial markets. For the first time ever the cost of operating our feeding programs has exceeded $10,000 a month. And though the cost of food is rising, we cannot compromise our feeding programs. At a time when hunger is ravaging Haiti, we must be that much more diligent to see that the children are being fed, every school day! By feeding the children in school we are helping relieve the food insecurity at home. This has a major impact on the communities where we are serving. AND: IT’S BEING DONE THROUGH THE HAITIAN CHURCH! We are helping to sustain healthy communities through these most desperate of times and doing it in a way that brings glory to the church!
WE NEED YOUR HELP NOW! PLEASE CONSIDER AN EXTRA DONATION TO HELP US UNDERWRITE THE RISING COST OF FOOD SO THAT OUR FEEDING PROGRAMS IN HAITI WILL NOT BE INTERRUPTED. Simply because: “I was hungry and you fed me!”
Phil
Kids in Fonde Baptiste
The following article was written by Raquens Turene our Sponsorship Secretary in Haiti. Although the English is not perfect I choose to run it with minimal edits in order to preserve the true flavor of the Creole thought.