Weather

Everything in America looks different to me because I spent time in Haiti.  The other day, when someone commented that the roads near her house were not well maintained, my mind wandered to the dirt roads in the neighborhood of Kay Ste. Ann and bouncing in the seat or in the back of the truck on the way home from school with the children.  While I could easily acknowledge the imperfections in the road probably due to warm summers and cold winters, the roads looked quite good to me, since these things are relative.  When someone talked about how bad the mosquitoes were in Philadelphia last summer, I acknowledge how annoying that must have been, but my thought was yes, but, at least, here it is highly unusual for them to carry malaria or other serious illnesses.  I did here from a volunteer in Haiti yesterday that a couple of children at St. Louie have Malaria, and also that there have been some recent difficulties with the safety of the drinking water for the children.  How strange it seems to me now, that here, I take a warm shower in water that is actually perfectly safe to drink.   

I took this right after the snow started yesterday; we actually had a couple of inches on the ground this morning.  It is very beautiful! 

If the conveniences and other cultural aspects related to reentry and reverse culture shock were not apparent enough, I only had to look out my window yesterday to be once again reminded that I am clearly not in Haiti anymore.  Snow in October, while there are still leaves on the tress, highly unusual for Philadelphia.  Today when I look out the window it looks like autumn and winter at the same time, as there is still snow on the ground and many of the trees are dazzling with their fall colors shining in the sun.  I am enjoying it as there was no winter or fall in Haiti, and New Orleans does not get the significant seasonal changes either.  Actually it will be nice to be in a place that is considerably cooler than Haiti, and considerably warmer than Philadelphia.  I enjoy all kinds of weather, though, so I go where my heart leads.

Here is the website for the Marianites of Holy Cross, the congregation I will be transferring to:
http://www.marianites.org/


 

Orevwa Ayiti, Cheri!

Tuesday evening there was a at party at Kay Ste. Anne to say, "mesi, orevwa," (thank you and good bye) to me.  The children sang and they danced.  It was so touching.  They presented me with a booklet of drawings that children had made with notes on the back of the pages from many of the workers.  At the party, I laughed with the children and cried as I said my farewells.  I miss them a great deal. 

 Using money that people had given me for Haiti, I was able to put new mats down for the children to play on and bought a tent like play house and some new puzzles and other toys for the playroom I had set up many months ago.  Thank you to all who gave me money for the children of Haiti.  Thank you too for all of you who were encouraging and supported me with your prayers and compassion.

  There was a volunteer from the states who painted a mural in the chapel during the last week or so that I was there.  There had been some earthquake damage in the chapel by the hospital where the volunteers and others gather for liturgy each morning.  The mural speaks to me of hope and transformation which continues to take place in Haiti.  Sometimes it is hard to get a good sense of what it changing in Haiti on the larger scale, but in the lives of individual children, and in the Father Wasson Angels of Light program as a whole I must say I have seen much hope and positive changes during the fourteen months that I was there.  If nothing else, I know that the time I spent in Haiti, the contact I had with the people of Haiti, the experiences I had have certainly transformed me and I am grateful   

    
When I told people in Haiti, I was leaving they typically asked me when I was coming back.  I told them I would not be returning, and then said, maybe someday, "si Dye vle."  This seemed to satisfy most, as if God wants is a common comment among the people of Haiti who have so much trust in the will of God.

On Thursday afternoon, I flew Portauprince to Miami, and then my flight to Philadelphia was delayed.  I arrived in Philly very early Friday morning. 

I heard from an American women who is volunteering as a nurse with the FWAL program.  Even though the children had a good-bye party for me and knew for quite some time that I was leaving, and even though I explained to some of them that I was going so far away that I would take two airplanes to get there, when they saw the nurse and one of the driver's for the program, the children asked the driver if he would go and get me and bring me back to St. Anne.  Just thinking about that, causes me to want to laugh and cry at the same time.  

Please continue to keep the people of Haiti in your prayers.  Please pray for me too, as I reenter into the so called "first world," and also begin a major transition of transferring from my current religious congregation, the Sisters of the Holy Redeemer to the Marianites of Holy Cross.  After a long discernment process, I truly have a sense of peace that this is what God is inviting me to at this point in my life, but farewells and transitions are rarely easy.  

 Thank you again, to everyone who was supportive to me in any way during my time in Haiti.  I am grateful to for all of the people in Haiti, who taught me so very much. I am not sure how regularly I will update this, if at all since I am no longer in Haiti.  Thank you for reading it. May you experience God's presence on your life's journey wherever it leads you.  Many Blessings!  Take care. 
Love and Prayers,
Kathleen

Reflections as I prepare for my final days in Haiti

There are somethings about Haiti I will surely miss.  There are other things I will not miss, and there are many things I will probably miss with a sense of ambivalence.Needless to say I will miss the children at St. Anne and St. Louie.  I will miss their smiles, their laughter.  I will miss the ways the young children stand behind me while I pretend to look for them and they call out while giggling "Se Kathleen pa we m" (Sister Kathleen doesn't see me.)  I will miss seeing children for play therapy, but I won't miss the challenge of finding a place to conduct therapy with an acceptable amount of privacy. I will miss the workers at St. Anne.  I will miss the morning liturgies in the chapel at St. Damien, but it will be very nice to attend daily liturgy where I know there is nearly a zero percent chance (as apposed to a nearly 95% chance) that morning mass will be a funeral for dead babies and or cholera victims.  I will miss the volunteers here a great deal, but I won't miss people who did not go to mass asking me how many bodies there were at mass.  I will miss speaking Creole and learning new words but I won't miss the frustration I feel when I really don't understand what someone is telling me even though they have repeated themselves several times.  I will miss the sound of the rain on the metal roof, but not miss the rain falling through the roof onto the floor of these little houses. The list could go on, but I don't really want to bore you.  Mostly I will miss the people.  

 There were a lot of visitors here this weekend because a Dominican sister from the United States who worked for NPH many years ago, now in her 90s returned for a visit since the Cholera hospital is being named for her.  There was a very lovely liturgy held on the grounds of St. Luke and St. Philomen hospitals nearby.  Teenagers and young adults she had cared for when they were babies came to the mass; it was very touching.  As I looked around at the land where the liturgy was held I thought about how,so much has changed since I arrived 14 months ago.  When I first came, the FWAL children had their summer camp program on those grounds, and very soon after my arrival moved to where St. Louie and the FWAL school currently stand.  A couple of months later, tents were placed on that property to treat people suffering from Cholera.  Now, there are more permanent structures there.  When I look at how much some of the children have grown and changed in the past fourteen months, it is amazing.  It is a privilege to have witnessed such growth.  Although I can't quite name all of the ways yet, I feel that my time here has changed me as well.

Please continue to pray for the people of Haiti.  Please pray for me as well, as I say my goodbyes here in the coming days.  I hope that you are well.  Thank you for all those who have been supportive to me in so many ways during my time here; be assured of my continued gratitude and prayers.

Hand-Me Downs and ti bebe (little baby)

Hand-Me-Downs
 Since, school started, it was more difficult than usual to find a private place to conduct individual therapy sessions with the children I have been seeing for play therapy.  The tent I used during the previous school year is no longer standing.  There was an empty shipping container at St. Louie which seemed like a reasonable spot, although it was impossible to close the door the all of the way from the inside.  While I was working with one boy who is about seven years of age, a girl who used to live at St. Anne came to the container door and slid papers with hearts drawn on them through the crack between the container door and called out the name of the boy I was working with. Later I realized that the tee-shirt the little girl was wearing had a picture of two dogs sharing a drink and and had the words, "Puppy love" written on it in English.  While I thought her shirt was perfectly appropriate she hadn't a clue what the words on it meant.  Many people in Haiti don't know what their tee-shirts say, because often they are hand me downs from the United States.  My guess is that somehow when thrift shops get too much, the excess finds its way to the Haitian people.  When we have passed people selling clothing on the side of the roads volunteers have joked that one of us might see something that once was ours.  People wear shirts with the names of events they could not possibly have attended, races they have never run, schools that are very different from their own, and cities no one in their family has ever visited.  Sometimes people are oblivious to the reality that their shirt has a rude message on it.  On one occasion I explained to a very kind and agreeable woman who among other tasks, mops the floors (an endless job) at Kay St. Anne, what her shirt meant, on the front it read, "why be difficult" and the back said, "when you can be impossible."  Another day, I saw a young dark skinned Haitian man wearing a tee-shirt with the words, "Irish grandmother" printed across the chest.  It is not just clothes, many cars, trucks, including tap-taps,were probably once in the states.  Sometimes they still have fading signs of companies that I just know are not doing business in Haiti, or signs which make untrue claims, that they are shuttling people from the New Ark airport to a New Jersey hotel.  Every now and then you see a vehicle adorned with two license plates, one Haitian and the other American; Florida is the most common but I have seen several other states represented.

Ti Bebe
Yesterday I accompanied a sister who is a nurse to volunteer at a clinic at a parish church near one of the poorest areas of the city.  The image of one tiny baby stays with me. This fifteen day old, was being cared for by her young aunt, who said that the mother of the baby had died.  They tiny baby was quite malnourished, probably because the aunt was not able to purchase formula.  The baby was given medicine because she had a fever and infection and referred to a malnutrition program.  As I looked at that tiny child, I could not help but think of how we have no control over the circumstances in which we are born.
   

Next weekend will be my final weekend here. This blog may be ending in a couple of weeks as my time here ends.  If I know that people would continue to read it, perhaps I will at least for a couple of months, do some updates as I reflect on my time in Haiti when I am no longer here.  Please, let me know if this would be of interest to you.  

Please keep the people of Haiti in your prayers, especially that little baby and other very sick people who are living in extreme poverty like those whom I met yesterday.  Thank you!  

    

Anpil Bagay (Many things)

There are so many things I want to write about this week.  As it was a full weekend, is already getting late, so I'll give brief perhaps seemingly random summaries and thoughts:

One day my heart ached for a mother who arrived at the chapel during morning liturgy looking sad and distraught because her child was one of the several dead we were praying for that morning, lying there covered in a cloth on the chapel floor. This mother still had a hospital bracelet around her own wrist which made me wonder if the child had died at or soon after birth, or if they both had been in the Cholera hospital at the same time.  

Yesterday was the monthly visitor's day for the children of St. Louie and St. Anne.  As always it is such a difficult day for some of the children who do not have any relative that comes to see them.  Yet, it is difficult for some of the children who do have visitors when their visitors' leave.  Yesterday one father decided to take his children home with him.  In this particular case I think this was a good thing for him and for the children.

It seemed rather ironic to me the other night, when I decided to wait until the heavy rains stopped before leaving my house to get water, especially as water (although not safely drinkable) was dripping from the ceiling onto my bedroom floor.

Today I went on a day trip to Kenskoft to visit the children who used to live at St. Anne that moved to the big orphanage in the mountains several weeks ago. The children mostly seem to be doing well there, thank God.  I am a bit concerned about one of the youngest little girls who was sent up there, because she looked so sad on both occasions that I have visited since they moved.  As I am not planning to return to Kenskoft in the next (less than) three weeks, it was the beginning of goodbyes for me.  

School will start for the children at the Father Wasson Angel of Light School tomorrow.  School is started later this year than originally scheduled so that more children can go to school for free.  It is hard for me to get a good sense of exactly what took place in the past month that will enable more children to attend school than would have if it had started in September.  This has been one effort of the president and I did notice billboard type signs on the road to Kenskoft with pictures taken of President Martelly with smiling school children wearing new uniforms and Haitian Creole words about children going to school.  In general though it seems that many people here in Haiti are frustrated with how little is happening to improve their lives.  

Have a good week!