Schools are on Spring Break right now in Haiti. Last week we contacted all of our families enrolled in the School Sponsorship program and asked them to come in Wednesday and Thursday for updates with the children. Susie has also worked hard on getting photos of siblings that have been adopted to give to the biological families when they came.

I arrived at the main house Wednesday morning to a packed courtyard! People flooded out from the waiting areas, under the carport and into the yard. Every spare chair we had was set out, and still no where near enough places to sit!

Nikki came down to help translate, and between her, Susie, Emelyne, Patrick, Magaly and myself we got through 147 kids the first day! Taking short videos and pictures of each child and family to send to sponsors in the coming weeks. Susie was able to get photos for almost every family of their biological child.

I loved watching the reactions of the families, especially the siblings, when they saw the photos. It was not what I had expected at all. I thought they might regard them with sullen acceptance, a tinge of bitterness? Not the case at all. The children’s faces lit up when they saw the image of their sibling. Huge smiles! Genuine happiness, whether it was simply seeing a photograph of them and how they had changed, or they are delighted at the fact their brother or sister is experiencing a life void of challenges they’d known. I saw no trace of jealousy. One boy took a photo of his sister and clutched it to his chest.

As each parent held the photographs, they smiled, some beamed. I think what I saw on every face was the pride a parent feels in their children. They were proud of who this child is, and proud of the choice they made to give them to be adopted.

It was a busy couple of days, and so rewarding. Huge thanks to everyone who sponsors for our education program. YOU are making a difference in the lives of these families!

Nothing in Haiti moves very fast. Jobs that would take a few hours in North America take several days in Haiti. We’ve had a vehicle at the mechanic for nearly 6 months now. The office has been having weekly trouble with the copier, then we wait a few days for a repair man to come (Recently the repair center has asked us if we could bring the 500+ lbs copier to them. Seriously.) leaving us with maybe two or three days a week to make copies.

Concepts like costumer service & satisfaction or business ethics have yet to be embraced by Haitian culture. This often becomes one of the biggest frustrations to non-Haitians living in Haiti. It doesn’t make any sense to us. But its not our country, so learn to love it or leave it. Or at least learn to live with it.

We have a wonderful lady volunteering with us right now. Jill lived in Haiti for two years in 86 and 87 in one of the most notorious slums of Haiti, Cite Sole. In fact she left during the evacuations when Baby Doc was overthrown. When she told me today that GLA is a well run organization for being in Haiti, I felt it was a pretty high compliment coming from somebody who knows!

I was thinking about it more tonight. I have to give all the credit to God. He has assembled the most amazing group of individuals to do the work He set forth. We all mesh and sync very well together. We communicate well, get along great and genuinely like each other. A lot!

Things get done, not as fast as it feels like they should sometimes, but I realized we’re much less like a well oiled machine, and more like a well fed donkey. Not always very fast, but steady and willing, waiting for God to throw on the next load.

Tear filled eyes, big bear hugs, and goodbyes. Nearly every first time volunteer leaves GLA this way. I’m going to sweepingly assume almost every visitor leaves Haiti this way at the end of their first trip. Something inside shifts, shaken comfort zones, a change in perspective. It grips you, shakes you up and leaves you changed.

What is it about Haiti that takes a piece of each heart? Its an enthralling, exhausting, incomparable, head shaking, heart wrenching place to be. With no promise of future or happy endings, Haitians take joy simply in living. I marvel at the strength of these people. I’m saddened that they resign themselves to believing  that things will never improve.

My family and I went home to Colorado for a visit the end of March and got back to Haiti yesterday. As happy as I was to visit friends and family, (and oh how I’d missed the ease of American living!) I missed almost everything about Haiti. I missed the beautiful faces of the all the kids and my wonderful co-workers. Missed the palm trees and tropical flowers, the warmth, people everywhere you look, street markets, kids in school uniforms running after taptaps.

When volunteers leave GLA I try and sit down with them for a goodbye interview. They let me know how their children developed in the time they were here, and give me feedback of their overall experience at the orphanage. One of our older volunteers had said to me earlier this year during her interview, “I came here expecting to make a sacrifice. But really, I found it was no sacrifice at all” were her words as she stared down at little Osmika in her arms, trying to hold back tears.

Haiti gets into your blood and continues to circulate through your heart long after you leave it.

God blesses us with volunteers of many talents. Earlier in this month a former adoptive mother came to volunteer her time and brought wall stencils and paint to add some color and cheer to the nurseries & balcony. She also decorates cakes for a living and brought us special food coloring, frosting tips and pastry bags. She even decorated a few cakes for everyone while she was here!

We often get amateur and professional photographers. They are gracious to let us barrow their memory cards and snatch some amazing shots. I wanted to share a few with you from Amy, who went home just earlier this week. Completely stunning.

With adoptions finally underway again we are seeing a steady stream of parents coming to GLA to appear before judges and file papers as part of the adoption requirements. The system so far is moving along a lot faster than it was pre-quake.

Last week we had a family come, this week we’ve had two. Of course its emotionally intense, meeting their children for the first time. The outgoing children practically leap into their new parents arms, without even realizing this is the person they will know for the rest of their lives. The timid ones take a little time to warm up to their parents. Sometimes they even scream the first time they meet, which rattles many new parents, and understandably so. I’m sure the moment is played out in every head differently, and of course reality never matches our expectations. Hopefully it surpasses it, but not always.

Even so, getting to watch the very first meeting between parent and child is a sight to see.

Usually living in Haiti inhibits my keeping up on the rest of the world’s current events. I have a vague awareness of revolutions in the middle east, the economic conditions in the United States, whatever other headliner takes the media’s current center stage. I pretty much “hear about it”, but honestly don’t pay much attention. Not here, when we see the aftermath of the media’s last disaster obsession everyday.

However it is not possible to overlook the devastation Japan is going through right now. I hate to equate the Japan disaster with the Haiti’s. Obviously, any major disaster, like earthquakes, leave destruction, chaos, fear, survival and heartbreak in its wake. Reading about the tragedy, seeing the photographs, takes everyone in Haiti back to our earthquake. But Japan is going through its own unmapped territory. Despite the similarities they are experiencing their own separate tragedies, all too real for those living through them.

The worst part about the media descending is that eventually, once the story is played out, enough heart wrenching photos are taken, it lifts, takes off, hovers again briefly for anniversaries or public interest, and all but disappears, leaving the centerpiece unwatched, and often forgotten.

Here in Haiti we are sending our thoughts and prayers to Japan. I pray that through this tragedy there is an outpouring of love and support from everywhere, that they stay warm in the cold, that they discover the whereabouts of loved ones, and that healing comes quickly.

Today while Susie was taking photos in the nursery, she gave Sony a belly tickle. He smiled. And there it is! Sony’s first picture of his smile.

Tucked away on a shelf on the balcony there is a book very special to us. Inside it every child has a few loose leaf pages devoted to him or her. Kind of like a journal of each child’s character and development over the time they’re here. It’s filled with little stories and updates about every child, all written by their volunteers.

Susie uses some of the information for her adoption updates, I get a lot of my stories to blog about, we get a much better picture of the children through the eyes of those who spend the most time with them. The original papers are kept until the child finally leaves GLA to join their families.

I like flipping through the pages, seeing all the different hand written paragraphs, remembering each volunteer during the time they spent on the balcony. It’s a very important part of the day to day at the main house, and a special biography for a family to treasure long after they are united with their child.

My last post I wrapped up by telling you how Sony is getting settled in. On Friday I was spending some time in the nursery and realized how many of the children that first came to us small and scared are boisterous and thriving today!

Wadely has become Mr. Social. He loves to verbalize, and although he’s not saying many words, he gets his point across- “play with me!” (My heart is very much wrapped around his pinky finger)

Faland came in right before the new year, a timid little thing who was very wary of strangers. She has achieved a quiet confidence in the nursery, no longer cries when new people come in and seems to be very contented. She’s a beautiful little girl!

Christoph is a charmer. He waves at every person who catches his glance. He is still very skinny and is getting all the worms out of his system, but he’s eating well, I think he’ll plump up pretty quick.

Sony is starting to play on his own. I tried to entertain him with a game of peek-a-boo, and I could swear is saw the corners of his lips just start to form a smile just for a second! The first laugh he gives me will be a happy victory moment!

To be witness to these transformations speaks God’s grace and mercy out loud. These last few weeks as we’ve been taking in so many new arrivals at both houses I’ve pondered over what might be going on in their little minds? GLA is unlike any place they’ve lived before. Most of them have never known three meals a day, clean clothes each day, warm pajamas at night, toys to play with.

I asked Molly what seemed to make the biggest impression on the new kids, she told me that almost all of them get excited over sleeping in a soft bed for the first time.

Each month for updates Susie takes down the current height and weight of every kiddo in GLA’s care. That’s a lot of numbers, I don’t know how she keeps them all straight! Yesterday she had to get the heights of all the new babies that had come in over the last two weeks, including Sony, who has been having a hard time adjusting. She was worried Sony was going to have a melt down trying to get his height so I offered to lend a hand.

We went upstairs, and followed Dixie and Susan’s advise to pick him up without speaking to or looking at him. He was pretty much looking miserable on the nursery floor surrounded by the other kids zipping back and forth. Without making eye contact I lifted him up and waited for a reaction. So far so good. We walked out to the hallway where the measuring board is. I laid him down and he began to protest, but only mildly. Susie jotted down his height and I picked him back up for a cuddle and dared addressing him directly! He tolerated me with pure un-interest. I expect we’ll start to see the corners of a smile in a week or two! A little bit of love, security and good food goes a long way, can’t wait to see what even a little more will do!