Busy About the Ministry

Family and Friends,

The following comes from Cory's journal about a week ago.  It gives a picture of some of the work we are doing here...

Today Patchouko and I did the big hike. If you have attended a Mission Haiti trip and hiked to any of the schools, you will appreciate how far we traveled. We went to ALL of the mountain schools today! First of all we walked down the road to the market near St. John, confidently allowing the tap-taps to drive past us. Next we hiked up the steep mountain to the Jabouim school. I paused for a moment to take a picture of our sponsor child Katia, but soon we were on our way.

Our mission today was mostly to deliver a bunch of gifts from sponsors to their sponsor children, so Patchouko and I both had plenty to carry. After Jabouim we headed up the big scorched hill to Tousainte and stopped at the school. We dropped off some gifts and continued on our merry way. After that we travelled along the beautiful, scenic ridge toward the trail of death. I had forgotten how breath-taking it is up there, probably because most of the time you go up there you are literally out of breath, and the only thing you can concentrate on is how you are going to get down without dying.

We took a little break at a beautiful spot where you can see the ocean on both horizons. Pretty cool. Next came the trail of death. I won't say it is easier to go up the trail than down, but it is no picnic going down either. We finally reached the Baptist School, dropped off some gifts, and then continued on to the Mountain school. We arrived right around noon, so it was getting hot.

Yesterday a couple of women came down from the mountain and told us the director of the mountain school had kicked out all of the kids and told them not to come back unless they had more money to pay. We told the ladies we would go and talk to the director the next day, which worked out good because we were planning to deliver sponsor gifts anyway.

We began to talk to the mountain school director about the situation. Also present was Madame Saver, his famous mother, whom I mentioned in an earlier newsletter and/or blog entry. She is a prophetess of sorts whom many people respect and venerate in the area. She sees visions, and people believe they will come true. Anyway, they tried to explain the whole school situation to us, and I left there more confused than when I arrived.

Patchouko tried to explain the whole thing to me, but it still didn't add up. I have to admit I have plenty to learn about this culture. Patchouko reassured me that it is a complex culture to understand. I agreed. All I know is that the schools don't seem to be educating the kids all that well, and I wish we could do something to help. Pam has been trying for years to help, but it is a real struggle. Something to pray about.

On the way back we made two house visits. One was to a young family where the woman is a christian but the man is not. We want to help them talk about that and ideally lead the man to Christ. The husband was not there, so we made an appointment to return next week Tuesday. The other visit was to Aldoni, the young man who stole from Mission Haiti ealier this year and ended up spending three months in jail. He was the one I visited with Kiki and Patchouko and blogged about the experience (see "An Adventurous Adventure" written in October).

Aldoni had a hard time in prison, but God protected him. For one thing cholera hit hard there, and over forty men died. It probably didn't help that sometimes the guards don't give people water to drink for days at a time. Aldoni said there was one morning when he woke up and both of the men on either side of him had died in the night. Also, one time the prison flooded, I think during the hurricane, and everyone had to be relocated to the penitentiary in Port-au-Prince. The rumor is that when they transfer you there sometimes they forget about you entirely and your records can't be found. Then add to that the reality that many people in there are some of the hardest criminals on earth. Scary. Fortunately, Aldoni was protected again and was able to return to Les Cayes and be released on schedule on Dec. 14th. He and his family were so happy to see us and thankful for our earlier visit. We prayed together.

Patchouko and I finally arrived home at about 1:30. We had hiked around 6 ½ hours. Woo hoo! It was a good day. Tonight we will reward ourselves with pancakes and some little sausages (little smokies canned in the Netherlands) I found at the market. I hope they have real meat in them, but if it is even close to meat I'm sure it will taste good.

We hope YOUR adventure is going well!
-The Grimms