Comfortable? No... but happy!

It's so much fun living with and caring for twelve children.  They are all precious in their own ways, their individual personalities always shining.  My favorite time is first thing in the morning when I go downstairs and one by one the younger ones wrap their arms around my waist and hold on tight.  "Bonjou, Anita" or "Bonjou, Mama".  The older kids are more reserved, but do come to me for a less enthusiastic hug.  Now that school is out some of the kids sleep late.  This morning Ange slept till after 10:00.  Breakfast was over when she wandered sleepy eyed into the kitchen to begin her day with a hug and a kiss.  Chores begin right after breakfast: the older girls sweep and mop their bedroom.  The boys have various jobs: cleaning their room, picking up trash around the yard, taking trash in a wheelbarrow to the "dump", always making their beds and picking up their clothes.  This morning all the kids went to the mountain water source to wash clothes.  There isn't enough water in our water tank to allow for washing clothes.  They carry huge basins full of clothes on their heads, walk up the mountain trail to the water, and then after a couple of hours, return and hang their clothes on the line to dry.  This morning the younger boys were in charge of washing "stinky" sneakers.  Kids at Kay Timoun love between meal snacks.  Their favorites are watermelon and mangos.  No paper wrapped snacks here!  So, bringing up kids here is a lot different from bringing up kids in the states.  And in many ways, it's a lot easier.  With people on the Kay Timoun staff, I have very little actual "work" to do.  Carole does the cooking and is main caregiver to the children.  She makes sure they take a bath, brush teeth, and have clean clothes.  Naomi and Dedet clean the house and wash clothes.  There is a tremendous amount of laundry with kids changing clothes two or three times a day.  Carole does the big market shopping for food.  Wonel runs all the errands on the motorcycle.  There is no such thing as driving a kid to soccer practice or a music lesson or to a church activity.  Everything is right here.  The kids watch movies on a small laptop.  They have never been to a movie theater.  So, life is simple!

I write on Facebook and complain about not having electricity, (true...we have electricity for a couple of hours a day.)  I write and complain about not having running water, (true...I often take a "bucket bath" and the kids bathe outside, often with rain water.)  Going back a hundred years, we buy ice to keep food from spoiling.  Most of our food is cooked in an outdoor kitchen in a huge pot on a charcoal fire.  Today Carole is roasting peanuts for home made peanut butter.  It doesn't get any better than that!

Having lived for years in my comfortable air conditioned condo, driving in my air conditioned car to shop in an air conditioned store, or have dinner in an air conditioned restaurant, or worship in an air conditioned church, it's not easy for this city woman to live in what I view as primitive. But, truth be known, the joy of my kids far outweighs the discomforts of living in rural Haiti.  I pray that God continues to give me strength and endurance, and whatever else I need to carry on.

"Bebe"

“Bebe” is a deaf mute lady who has lived in Bondeau all of her life.  She survives by selling fruits and vegetables that she buys at the market and sells for a few cents profit.  It’s a hard life, carrying around huge baskets of fruit in hope of selling a few pieces.  Bebe has the added problem of not hearing and not speaking.  But local people know her sign language and can communicate. 

Bebe has come to Kay Timoun often to sell her produce and we always buy from her.  We can use the food and she needs the money.  So, when the children called to me, “Bebe is here," I expected that she would be selling something.  But,not so.  Bebe said that she didn’t have any money to go to market to buy fruit.  I just listened, or watched, I should say.  The kids translated her sign language.  I saw that she was considerably thinner than she had been.  I assumed that she was hungry, so I asked her to wait.  I went into the kitchen and made her a peanut butter sandwich on an oversize Haitian bread, scooped the oatmeal that was left in the pot into a small bowl, and cut a piece of watermelon.  Bebe sat at the picnic table and ate her meal.  I went out again to say good-bye but she was gone.