We had gone to a hotel for the night. Once we arrived at the hotel, the teenage girls went out for about an hour looking for food, since we were all hungry. We arrived back to the hotel and in bed around 11:30pm. I woke up around 4:45am. Some of the others woke up before me and some after me. We headed downstairs for a quick breakfast and then headed out to the airport. We got all our bags weighed, our passports checked, and eventually our luggage on the plane. Then we were off to go. We had a four hour flight with a fuel stop in the Bahamas.
We arrived in Haiti at about 11:30am. Landing there, it was absolutely beautiful. The mountains, the trees, the water, the scenery was just stunning. Once we made it through customs and headed out to the village, though, it was a culture shock. Culture shock all the way. I don't even know what I was expecting, but it wasn't this. There were people, animals, and cars everywhere. Going in every direction. Just chaos. There was trash everywhere too. In heaps on the side of the road, in piles on the road, scattered through fields, just everywhere you looked. On top of that there were children everywhere. They were all so beautiful. Some were dressed decent, but others didn't have any clothes at all.
As we drove through the land of Haiti, we waved at the people and they waved back. Some children started hollering as we drove by and waved and jumped up and down excitedly. I smiled at all the people, but deep inside my soul I was heartbroken that it had to be this way. People lived in houses the size of my room, that some children were hungry and had no clothes. They were just living in poor conditions while Americans have everything. We have clean, fresh water, bathrooms with toilets, abundant food, we are always clothed, we can easily access any necessities, we have places that our garbage goes, we have AC when the summer comes. We have it all. While these people here are suffering, we just sit in our homes complaining about silly things.
When we arrived to the compound, we unloaded our stuff and then headed out to play with the children who came in. There were about three little boys to start out with when we set out to play. There was just one little girl. She was very quiet and the boys were kind of picking on her. I went and sat down next to her and she grabbed my hand. I took her hand and squeezed it and she smiled. We talked a little bit, mostly using hand motions. She knew about as much English as I did Creole, so we weren't able to have a full out conversation, which was fine. It worked out just fine. I told her that I loved her and so did Jesus. She smiled so big that that in itself was worth going to Haiti for. She told me that she loved me too and then we went off to play some games. We posed, we danced, we did some handshakes, we laughed, we had so much fun. Her name was Alexandria. Every once in a while she would wonder off to see what others were doing, but she would call out my name with the biggest smile on her face. I would holler her name back and she would smile and then come back to me.
We played with the children until about 5:00pm and then we ate our dinner. After dinner we had a little bit of free time, so we sat out on the porch. We had free time for a couple of hours, so it gave me a lot of time to just think. I thought about how precious the people of Haiti were. The people here have only a few possessions, but the joy and excitement they all seemed to have was just eye opening for me. We Americans, have everything we could wish for, while they don't. We Americans complain about so many little things, while the people here are just so grateful for everything. It just kind of proves the things, possessions don't make a person happy. The only thing that can make a person happy is Christ.
So when the day ended and we were in our beds, under the mosquito nets, I was just so excited to see what the week would bring. I was ready to make a little difference in the world, starting with the land of Haiti.
This down below was the video of our first day in Haiti.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xw4FdpVSlxY&t=116s
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