Haiti Part I: The State of it All

It’s the first 24 hours since we’ve arrived home, and I’ve had a sad day. I’ve been surprised with how emotional I’ve been. I think it’s because 1) I’m coming down from a high from the team unity; 2) the trip we’ve anticipated for 3 months is now over; and 3) I feel like the people of Haiti have been abandoned and although I was able to leave, they had to stay. This trip has forever changed me (and Michael too), and because of its impact we wanted to share our trip in a few separate blogs. Here is the first of a few different posts.

When thinking of how I can describe our trip, I have many words and no words at the same time. How do I put into words what we saw, felt and experienced? As soon as we got out of the airport and into the streets, I just couldn’t believe what I was seeing…people living in some sort of chaos. Survival- not living. Tents are everywhere. For a city built for 300,000 and the size of Charleston, there are now 2.5 million people in Port-au-Prince, most of them living in tents. Even if their houses made it, they live in fear of a future earthquake and won’t sleep in their homes. Rape, kidnapping, robbing, sexual promiscuity, etc have become rampant. People from the country have moved into the city so they could have a tent and receive free food and aid from relief organizations. From what we’ve been told, the tent cities are communities within themselves- they have a leader and oftentimes it’s better than the way they were living. This astonishes me. I was so choked up driving around with the way people live, that it’s so hard for me to imagine that they like living this way. The city is filthy with rubble everywere. One building would be a crushed 4-story pancake, and the one right beside it wouldn’t have been touched. The smell in the city I will never forget- it’s the smell of human waste, trash, and sadly, even decaying bodies under buildings that haven’t been dealt with yet.

I think what bothers me most about the state of the city is the way the government has handled this crisis. Haitians that we were with has described it as the rich in Haiti getting richer, and the poor getting poorer. The government officials are making money off of this tragic earthquake and have done nothing to help their people. There’s no military, a non-effective police force, and because of the cycle of handouts, a lot of people aren’t working. We drove past the country’s government palace (similar to our White House) and it was severely destroyed (below). And it looks like the building hasn’t been touched. Just across of it is a tent city of 60,000. 60,000!! That blows my mind. Apparently the president didn’t speak to his people for a month after the quake!

Organizations like Samaritan’s Purse, World Vision, US AID, American Red Cross, Shelter Box, Water Missions International, and others are making a difference. And it’s group like ours that are going to be the rebuilding factor for this city/country, not the government, sadly.

I’m worried it might get worse before it gets better. But I’m hoping that what has happened will make this country stronger and better. What we saw was really hard to watch, and although you might say it would be difficult to see hope there, I could see it. I could see it in the boys who shared their faith with us and who were sincerely interested in what we were doing. I could see it in the smiles of the people we talked to. I could see it in the church where people still praised and worshiped amongst tragedy. I could see it in the innocence of the children at the schools. I could see it in the Haitians we worked with. And I could truly feel God’s presence there. The Haitians are His people, and Haiti is His country.
Port-au-Price is a tough, increasingly dangerous capital of a country; but it’s also a beautiful city filled with hope.

Many more photos and stories to come later. Thanks for following!



This is our group at the airport with some of the Haitians we were with...what an awesome team!!



This is called a tap-tap. It is their "transportation system". They fill these cars up to the rim and then when someone is ready to get off, they "tap" the side of the car. I've never seen cars filled so tightly that it nearly drags on the ground while driving!



I have a lot more pictures of the kids...this is just one of many! They were so fun and adorable.










These are pictures of the palace.