boom boom ain't it great to be crazy?

On Sunday I stayed home from church with the babies. Before the babies came, Sue would stay home with Sonson (age 2), Dianna (3), Francesca (2), and Joshua (10 months). Since the babies are here now we switch off staying home with Sue and the little kids to help out. Next Sunday Katie and I will send Sue to church and stay home with them. Sue hasn’t been to church in almost a year because she’s had so many little ones! I think she’ll really enjoy that. So anyway, staying home was really nice. Church is always about 4 hours long and in Creole obviously. There are people who walk around and yell at you if you fall asleep or sit when everyone’s standing. They also yell at antsy kids. I’m one of the antsy kids. So staying home was actually a nice break. It was really relaxing. Oh, it was also really relaxing because the babies slept obscenely well. I put them in bed around 7 and they didn’t wake up until 1:45 am!! That’s almost 7 hours! I was stoked. So my morning was relaxing. Once all the kids went down for their naps I mopped a little. Then I got to sit on the porch, drink my coffee, and read peacefully. I was happy when all the kids came home because I had a good quiet break. Sue, Katie and I went to the market after to get the weekly supplies of powered milk, baby formula, diapers and a snack of ice cream. Yum! Sunday’s are good.

Monday was also a good day. Katie and I went with Sue to Port Au Prince because her internet wasn’t working for a few days. We went to the Digicel headquarters which was HUGE. It was air conditioned and very fancy. Katie and I played count the “blan.” We counted over 20. I joked with one white guy that in Haiti, white people flock to air conditioning like bugs to a light bulb. I was really excited because I got to sit on a couch in the lobby. Oh, the things I take for granted when I’m in the U.S. After digicel, we went to a big supermarket that is almost like walmart. Almost. Then we got to go to Epidor which I was STOKED on. I got french fries and they were DELICIOUS. However, it wasn’t all kittens and rainbows because both Katie and I felt sick afterwords. Boo. We didn’t get back to Sue’s until pretty late. I missed the babies and Katie said I kept talking about them when we were out. I was worried they’d forget to feed them or something… Haha. Don’t worry, they were alive when we got back.

On Tuesday Katie and I were so excited because we were going to take a trip to the beach! There’s another orphanage close bye that has an 18 year old American girl who has been teaching them English for three months. She is due to go home in a few days and wanted to take a day to go to the beach with us before she left. We got picked up at 8 and were on our way. We never made it to the beach though because we got three flat tires. We ended up sitting in the back of that truck for almost 8 hours. It was ok for a while but then we got hungry. We ate food from street vendors which made both Katie and I sick today. I’m still not feeling well. Every time something happens that doesn’t go along with my plans here in Haiti, I relearn that I need to not have expectations for anything. It’s better if I just learn to go with the flow. Things like getting a flat tire mean something completely different here in Haiti. There’s no AAA to call on your cell phone to come fix it within an hour or two. In this case, we pulled to the side of the road, found a guy with a motorcycle to drive to see if he could find a tire that fits the truck. It took about 3 trips back and forth to different venders and bringing back the wrong size. About 20 people came out to watch and help fix the tire. I love that about Haiti.

I think most Americans would have acted completely different if they were thrown into a situation like that. My first reaction was to be angry that we had to hang out in the back of a truck getting dehydrated rather than on a beach drinking a coconut. But things like that happen here. They happen everywhere. The difference is that the solutions are not as easy here as they are in the states. It’s a wonderful thing to be able to call AA A and get your car fixed within the hour, but it’s also a wonderful thing to see people care about each other and lend a helping hand. Things in Haiti are way different than the States. A lot of things aren’t better or worse, just different. It’s easy to write a place like Haiti off as dirty, pitiful, or miserable. But that’s not what makes up Haiti. There’s a lot more to Haiti than just the dirty streets and poverty. There’s community, conversation, caring and so much more. Some things are harder to see up front but it’s so cool to be here to learn more about both the good and bad of this country. I thought we’d go to the beach yesterday, but it didn’t work out. Sometimes that’s how things go. We ended up having a good time anyway and I have 8 more months to try and make it to the beach. I am on an island for goodness sake!

BTW the kids watch this Christian music video called Cedarmont Kids or something. It’s by kids, for kids. It’s awful. I am so sick of the songs. One song goes“boom boom ain’t it great to be crazy” and it’s forever suck in my head. There’s also one song called “Old Time Religion” which is the worst. You’re welcome for that interesting detail of my life.