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
