Our team from Salem has arrived safely in Haiti. Eight of us flew out of LAX at midnight. We arrived in Miami about 10am. The rest of the team met us in Miami, including our leaders Regina and Angela, and we all flew out to Port-au-Prince together around 1pm.
Pastor Amie learned that members of her former congregation are on one of the other teams here this week.
We met several wonderful and friendly Haitians along the way. Ellie practiced her Creole with a gentleman at the gate. Anastasia's seatmate was a woman with a three-week old baby who only spoke French and Creole but they managed to have a nice conversation.
We got through customs without any issues and found our tap taps. The ride to the guesthouse was an E-ticket! The kids noticed the lack of seatbelts right away. We also saw a herd of goats just walking down the street in town. You don't see that in Glendale!
We settled in and had a brief meeting to go over what to expect. Then, after dinner of taco salads, we did our first word of the day. Pastor Amie had the idea to use paint sample strips to write our daily words on so we can have them as a reminder.
Our words were blessed, relief, homesick, peace, unexpected, over-heated, content, nervous, anticipatory, interesting, glad, wonderment, hectic, and blessing.
After dishes and some relaxing, we had a brief devotion where we shared how we are are connected to Salem and we learned about Regina and Angela's faith communities in Minnesota.
We went over our schedule for the week. We have some really exciting things planned. We are excited to be able to share our adventures with all of you this week.
James wants everyone to know that he wants to pet a walking stick. We will try to get a photo if that happens.
Thanks to Lindsey for picking the title of today's blog post.
- Anastasia
