My life was changed forever when I decided to go with a group from my church on a mission trip to host a bible school in Croix des Bouquets, Haiti. I had been warned prior to going that it would change my life in a drastic way, but no one could have prepared me for the amount of brokenness and heartbreak I would witness. Flying into Port au Prince, even from the air I could see that the homes were dilapidated, and the ones that weren’t, were pretty close to falling apart. I could see trash and pollution in the ocean and piled up on the land, and debris still left over from the earthquake that happened in 2010. Landing in the airport was nerve-wracking. There were a dozen or so men all lined up along the walls yelling at the group in
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Any ditch, pothole, crack, is filled with trash. On the sides of the street there is people sitting outside of their dilapidated houses and shops, there’s children running around half clothed, dogs and chickens scavenging for any food they can, goats laying on graves, vendors selling trinkets they’ve made and drinks like Coke and Toro. There were people making food like grilled goat, and plantains. I could smell the intoxicating scent of beans and rice cooking in big, black kettles over a hot open. Finally, we arrived at the orphanage and were greeted by dozens of children, all smiling and ready to play. They grabbed my hand and said “vini” or “come” and dragged me off to under the huge mango tree or onto the porch. They examined my pale skin, freckles, and birth marks, marveling at the fact that my moles were the same color as their skin. They looked at my finger nails, nose, teeth, tongue, and looked me as if I was a test subject in a lab. They laugh and say something in creole to each other, and run off to play soccer or swing. To me, Haiti is a beautiful country, surrounded by water, speckled with mountains and deserts. It is a diamond in the rough, it shows what people mean when they say that there’s beauty in the brokenness. When I was told that Haiti would change my life in a dramatic way, I did not expect it to change it so
Any ditch, pothole, crack, is filled with trash. On the sides of the street there is people sitting outside of their dilapidated houses and shops, there’s children running around half clothed, dogs and chickens scavenging for any food they can, goats laying on graves, vendors selling trinkets they’ve made and drinks like Coke and Toro. There were people making food like grilled goat, and plantains. I could smell the intoxicating scent of beans and rice cooking in big, black kettles over a hot open. Finally, we arrived at the orphanage and were greeted by dozens of children, all smiling and ready to play. They grabbed my hand and said “vini” or “come” and dragged me off to under the huge mango tree or onto the porch. They examined my pale skin, freckles, and birth marks, marveling at the fact that my moles were the same color as their skin. They looked at my finger nails, nose, teeth, tongue, and looked me as if I was a test subject in a lab. They laugh and say something in creole to each other, and run off to play soccer or swing. To me, Haiti is a beautiful country, surrounded by water, speckled with mountains and deserts. It is a diamond in the rough, it shows what people mean when they say that there’s beauty in the brokenness. When I was told that Haiti would change my life in a dramatic way, I did not expect it to change it so