Day 2 in Port-au-Prince

We made it safe and sound. It took a while with a snow delay in Detroit and had to wait for a plane in Cap Haitian because the pilot had to wait two hours for fuel. With three hours of sleep we arrived in Port-au-Prince around 2:30 - 3:00 PM on Wednesday the 10th.

I got to sit in the cockpit in the Bimini flight from Ft. Lauderdale to Cap Haitian, very cool. A little scary on the landing I have to admit but very cool. As we flew over the mountains to Port-au-Prince we could see how they had stripped the land of all the mahogany trees. The Island used to be 50% mahogany trees now it is 1%. Once over the mountain and over PaP you could smell the burning of brush and garbage. Then as we came down we began to see all the makeshift tents. They are everywhere some have nice Colman tents that have been handed out or some shelter boxes they call them, but very very few. Most have just sheets if they are lucky maybe a tarp or plastic. It poured down rain last night, what a mud hole. These roads are the worst I’ve ever seen. There like driving in the mountains on four wheeler trails, very hard to get around.

We stayed at a hotel last night and tonight-9 of us in a 2 bedroom. We have very spotty internet. We seem to have it after 9:00 pm. We will be moving out to the house tomorrow but have no internet out there. The system we brought down doesn’t work in Haiti but we found a missionary who also does dishes that said he would give us a good deal on one that works down here. We got the water working today that was an Amen. The sewer is Ok to, because it is a septic system and the pipes are hardly under the surface of the ground, another Amen. We have to get a stove hooked up and I am going to have to run new lines. Tomorrow we are going to get blocks and mortar lined up to start building the second floor on the house next week when a team arrives. Things are accessible but finding them is interesting and then everything is high dollar.

UNICEF ran out of the shelter boxes that I thought we were going to get. I think we are going to need to build something for these people. Everyone is really worried about the rains and that rain last night soaked a lot of people. There were riots down by the UN tents this morning because of the rain. I think they feel that the UN is holding out on them because some got tents and most don’t. Not sure, just the way the Haitians talk.

Pray for someone in the government to come up with some kind of plan to get these people in homes (all of them).

I am very tired will talk later.
Blessings,
Rob