February 28, 2018
Questions and Answers
We have been approached by two different publications lately wanting to do articles about our work. We find this very humbling because to us we are just being obedient to God. He called us and we went, often not really sure if we are heading in the right direction or not. The Tennessee Register (diocesan news paper) just printed n article about our work. It was well written and we are very honored.
One of the questions we were asked is what is the hardest part of your work? I have been thinking about this question. I would now say hands down being away from our family and friends. We have friends here but the friend ships are mostly biased on what we can do for this or that person. That is not true of all the people but many. We have to always be on guard as to not be taken advantage of. I think this is always true if you have more than the people around you. It is also a part of third world mentality to take advantage of whatever opportunity is presented to you. I often chant to myself we are their opportunity , when I have been scammed or there is an attempted scam. It is hard to not have your feelings hurt of to get angry. It can feel very lonely here.
The voodoo is another difficult belief system that is hard to understand. It seems to be mostly built on fear. Most people believe in it even if they don\’t practice it. Herbal medicine is probably the only good I have seen in it and even with that people don\’t seek help with serious problems until they are almost dead. Often there is little to nothing that can be done for the person at that point. We see sacrificed chickens in the road in these baskets along with other offerings, where people are starving the chicken could have been put to better use as far as I am concerned. I think with education the voodoo will lose some of its hold on the people, because a lot of the beliefs seem ridiculous to us.
The lack of education has amazing effects, some I would have never understood without experiencing a culture of mostly illiterate people. I thought illiteracy meant you couldn\’t read. It is so much bigger than that. The process to learn is not developed, problem solving skills, researching information you need for whatever you are trying to do. One of the ladies who works for us cannot write her name. I have spent a great deal of time trying to teach her, I can\’t get her to make the same mark twice. I don\’t believe this has anything to do with intelligence but everything to do with opportunity. I am so glad we have been able to help so many children get at least a basic education. People working here have asked what is the use of educating the children when there are no jobs? I feel like the Haitians will solve their own problems, as they get a more educated population they will develop as a culture and jobs will be created in that culture. I can already see this happening, there is already a service industry developing, banks, more people taking motos , and grocery stores. Development does not happen overnight.
Lack of resources is a challenge. We are blessed to have running water and our solar electric system, but no one else in our village or really for miles around has such luxuries. We have very little internet access, to improve this is very expensive and I am not sure it is available where we live. Our friends in town paid one-thousand dollars to have the system installed and then pay two hundred and fifty dollars a month for the service. We just can\’t justify this expense. But there are other things that are so easily accessible in the US, that can take you most of a day to find here. One time we needed a couple of muffler clamps, we visited all the auto parts stores in town (there are several). Finally we found four at a store and bought all of them. I could go on and on telling stories of things we could not find here in our area.
We were asked many questions and this is getting long again so I will leave other insights for another time. We are coming home in a couple of weeks to start packing goods for the shipping container. Bob will work with Pat again this year receiving the many donated items to be shipped. While we are still here we will give another workshop for the farmers. We are attending many meetings with the different people we work with making arrangements for things to continue in our absence. The pavilion is almost finished, it looks very nice. This time we will come back in May to pollinate the vanilla , this will be a short trip and then we will have time with our family and raise funds to continue the work next fall.