Sunday, June 25, 2017

Day 5!

Hello friends and family! It’s Max back again (are you sick of me yet?) and the team had a super fun, full day today. It was a very early morning with our day starting at 5:30am for church. The team went to Church on the Rock, a local church that is only a few blocks from the compound. The building is a large warehouse that has been converted to be a church. There is a stage in the front and in front of the stage are rows upon rows of pews. The church service is a very powerful and moving spectacle to see and I know a lot of our team members enjoyed the experience. They can tell you about it themselves when we are back state side. After church the team regrouped at the guesthouse for pancakes prepared by yours truly. FYI they were fantabulous. The team then loaded up for another big day of water truck visits. Both stops went very well, but personally I think the second stop was the most moving for the team. We hadn’t been to the stop before but the moment we stepped off the truck we could tell that they were in more need of our service than other stops. One of the most powerful things we saw was the selflessness of the children. These kids, maybe four or five years old, came to us holding their baby siblings and lifted them up to us for them to be loved on. The children, even though they hadn’t had attention from us and they probably needed it too, offered up their siblings to be loved by us and I think that is another great example of the life lessons Haiti teaches us. Sometimes when I am down here it almost seems these lessons are too perfect or too scripted to real, but all of us know, that’s exactly what being in Haiti is about. On a lighter note, I checked off another thing on the “Things not to do while in Cite Soleil” bucket list. I took a bath in Cite Soleil. I took a bath in the poorest slum in the Western Hemisphere. I regret nothing. The little girl I was with was the cutest thing and she thought it would be a great idea for me to get clean while she was getting clean! This however, creates a paradox. I will close with this question! The water truck day was amazing as usual for the team and we headed back to the guesthouse to clean up for our afternoon trip to Healing Hands for Haiti. HHH specializes in creating prosthetics and doping therapy for victims of injuries and amputees. We got to tour their building and see how they run their show. Going back to things you didn’t think you were going to do when you got up in the morning, we all got to see some 3d printers. I had never seen one before and who would have thought the first time I would see one would be in Haiti. Ryan and I also got to talk to one of the nurses while she was helping a man with some lower back therapy. This was funny for two reasons; one, Ryan currently has a lower back injury that was very similar to the one that the man had; and two, the nurse was from Cuba and spoke zero English. Ryan and I ended up translating for the group and learning about electro-shock therapy, in Spanish, in a country that doesn’t have Spanish as one of its primary languages. Good stuff. The team then ended our day by heading up to Grace Village to eat at Fleri. We had a bunch of great pizzas and some amazing desserts that gave us a great end to our day. Tomorrow we head for Montfort, a deaf orphanage, and a cool mountain metal market for some shopping and bartering with the venders! So now I will leave you with the question.

If a man bathes in the poorest slum in the Western Hemisphere, is he clean or is he dirty?

Max Nelson

Day 5!

Hello friends and family! It’s Max back again (are you sick of me yet?) and the team had a super fun, full day today. It was a very early morning with our day starting at 5:30am for church. The team went to Church on the Rock, a local church that is only a few blocks from the compound. The building is a large warehouse that has been converted to be a church. There is a stage in the front and in front of the stage are rows upon rows of pews. The church service is a very powerful and moving spectacle to see and I know a lot of our team members enjoyed the experience. They can tell you about it themselves when we are back state side. After church the team regrouped at the guesthouse for pancakes prepared by yours truly. FYI they were fantabulous. The team then loaded up for another big day of water truck visits. Both stops went very well, but personally I think the second stop was the most moving for the team. We hadn’t been to the stop before but the moment we stepped off the truck we could tell that they were in more need of our service than other stops. One of the most powerful things we saw was the selflessness of the children. These kids, maybe four or five years old, came to us holding their baby siblings and lifted them up to us for them to be loved on. The children, even though they hadn’t had attention from us and they probably needed it too, offered up their siblings to be loved by us and I think that is another great example of the life lessons Haiti teaches us. Sometimes when I am down here it almost seems these lessons are too perfect or too scripted to real, but all of us know, that’s exactly what being in Haiti is about. On a lighter note, I checked off another thing on the “Things not to do while in Cite Soleil” bucket list. I took a bath in Cite Soleil. I took a bath in the poorest slum in the Western Hemisphere. I regret nothing. The little girl I was with was the cutest thing and she thought it would be a great idea for me to get clean while she was getting clean! This however, creates a paradox. I will close with this question! The water truck day was amazing as usual for the team and we headed back to the guesthouse to clean up for our afternoon trip to Healing Hands for Haiti. HHH specializes in creating prosthetics and doping therapy for victims of injuries and amputees. We got to tour their building and see how they run their show. Going back to things you didn’t think you were going to do when you got up in the morning, we all got to see some 3d printers. I had never seen one before and who would have thought the first time I would see one would be in Haiti. Ryan and I also got to talk to one of the nurses while she was helping a man with some lower back therapy. This was funny for two reasons; one, Ryan currently has a lower back injury that was very similar to the one that the man had; and two, the nurse was from Cuba and spoke zero English. Ryan and I ended up translating for the group and learning about electro-shock therapy, in Spanish, in a country that doesn’t have Spanish as one of its primary languages. Good stuff. The team then ended our day by heading up to Grace Village to eat at Fleri. We had a bunch of great pizzas and some amazing desserts that gave us a great end to our day. Tomorrow we head for Montfort, a deaf orphanage, and a cool mountain metal market for some shopping and bartering with the venders! So now I will leave you with the question.

If a man bathes in the poorest slum in the Western Hemisphere, is he clean or is he dirty?

Max Nelson

Day 5!

Hello friends and family! It’s Max back again (are you sick of me yet?) and the team had a super fun, full day today. It was a very early morning with our day starting at 5:30am for church. The team went to Church on the Rock, a local church that is only a few blocks from the compound. The building is a large warehouse that has been converted to be a church. There is a stage in the front and in front of the stage are rows upon rows of pews. The church service is a very powerful and moving spectacle to see and I know a lot of our team members enjoyed the experience. They can tell you about it themselves when we are back state side. After church the team regrouped at the guesthouse for pancakes prepared by yours truly. FYI they were fantabulous. The team then loaded up for another big day of water truck visits. Both stops went very well, but personally I think the second stop was the most moving for the team. We hadn’t been to the stop before but the moment we stepped off the truck we could tell that they were in more need of our service than other stops. One of the most powerful things we saw was the selflessness of the children. These kids, maybe four or five years old, came to us holding their baby siblings and lifted them up to us for them to be loved on. The children, even though they hadn’t had attention from us and they probably needed it too, offered up their siblings to be loved by us and I think that is another great example of the life lessons Haiti teaches us. Sometimes when I am down here it almost seems these lessons are too perfect or too scripted to real, but all of us know, that’s exactly what being in Haiti is about. On a lighter note, I checked off another thing on the “Things not to do while in Cite Soleil” bucket list. I took a bath in Cite Soleil. I took a bath in the poorest slum in the Western Hemisphere. I regret nothing. The little girl I was with was the cutest thing and she thought it would be a great idea for me to get clean while she was getting clean! This however, creates a paradox. I will close with this question! The water truck day was amazing as usual for the team and we headed back to the guesthouse to clean up for our afternoon trip to Healing Hands for Haiti. HHH specializes in creating prosthetics and doping therapy for victims of injuries and amputees. We got to tour their building and see how they run their show. Going back to things you didn’t think you were going to do when you got up in the morning, we all got to see some 3d printers. I had never seen one before and who would have thought the first time I would see one would be in Haiti. Ryan and I also got to talk to one of the nurses while she was helping a man with some lower back therapy. This was funny for two reasons; one, Ryan currently has a lower back injury that was very similar to the one that the man had; and two, the nurse was from Cuba and spoke zero English. Ryan and I ended up translating for the group and learning about electro-shock therapy, in Spanish, in a country that doesn’t have Spanish as one of its primary languages. Good stuff. The team then ended our day by heading up to Grace Village to eat at Fleri. We had a bunch of great pizzas and some amazing desserts that gave us a great end to our day. Tomorrow we head for Montfort, a deaf orphanage, and a cool mountain metal market for some shopping and bartering with the venders! So now I will leave you with the question.

If a man bathes in the poorest slum in the Western Hemisphere, is he clean or is he dirty?

Max Nelson