“Contend, O Lord, with those who contend with me; fight against those who fight against me.” Psalm 35:1
Hi! This week was a busy week with the medical program. The fuel shortage is over now and the gas stations are functioning normally again. Lukner arrived in Cayes and met up with Chrisno’s mother, Joanna late Saturday afternoon. They ended up leaving Cayes on the midnight bus to Port-au-Prince. One of the passengers that was on that bus with them ended up traveling without his shoes. He got on the wrong motorcycle to go to the bus station and ended up getting robbed. The thief took the money that he had and liked the guy’s shoes so much that he ended up going to the bus station in his bare feet. As part of Michaelle Jean’s visit to the Cayes area the government of Canada presented the Haitian police force in this area with 24 brand new 4x4 pickup trucks and 22 motorcycles. Maybe the police will be able to catch more thieves now. Canada is also going to construct/rehabilitate 14 police stations in the south with an investment of 3.2 million dollars so that there will be more places to put thieves. Canada will be helping Haiti with 555 million dollars in assistance over the next 5 years.
We picked up Vanessa and Chrisno at the airport on Sunday and Joanna was able to see how much her son has improved. Joanna is pregnant with her second child and told me that she doesn’t know how she is going to look after Chrisno. She wants to see him adopted and live a better life in the United States. We are making arrangements with Angel Missions to see how this could be done. Pray for Chrisno’s health now that he is back in Haiti and also for his family. Pray for plans being made to help Chrisno and his family.
That same day, Vanessa Jules and her mother came by the house to say hello. Vanessa is a 2-year-old girl who was operated on here in Haiti in November for her hydrocephalus. She is now able to sit and hold her head up. She is a happy and bright girl who talks well. Her mother has been sleeping at a church in the Croix-des-Bouquets area since being discharged from the hospital. She is also pregnant with her 10th child. The reason that she is now sleeping at the church instead of her home is because she wouldn’t listen to her husband’s order to abandon Vanessa. Now Vanessa and her mother are suffering the consequences. Pray for them as they struggle to survive.
A mother from the Bel-Air area of Port-au-Prince came to the gate this week looking for help for her sick baby. Jackenlove is a 7-month-old baby who has kwashiorkor malnutrition. She told me that she wants to put her baby in an orphanage. Right now Jackenlove is too sick to be in an orphanage and we brought him to the Missionaries of Charity where he will be treated for his malnutrition. Jackenlove has a twin brother who is also sick. We saw him the next day and he is not in as bad shape. The mother told me that she could look after one baby but not two. The mother is also handicapped and has only one functioning hand. The other was burned off in a fire when she was a baby. Pray for Jackenlove and the plans being made for him as well as his twin brother and his mother as she does the best she can to look after her family.
There is a young child in the Bernard Mevs hospital who has a large tumor growing out of his right eye socket. The eye was pushed out by the growing tumor. A visiting eye surgeon from the United States examined him on Friday at General Hospital where he has been performing surgeries for a week. Dr. Branson and his wife have done eye surgeries in 45 different countries. His vision is to train national eye surgeons in their own countries to become better eye surgeons. He has a lot of patience. 4 times he has left surgical tools at General Hospital and every time he has come back to find them gone. He believes in the “teach a man to fish” principle. I told his wife about the lack of ear/nose/throat surgeons in Haiti and she told me that maybe one day they could talk an ENT surgeon into coming to Haiti. Dr. Branson and his wife are both Christians and know that the changes they would like to see in eye surgery will be long-term and in God’s time. Pray for their efforts in “teaching a man to fish”. We will be taking the child to get a cat scan done on Monday to see if the tumor has metastasized to the brain. If it has there is nothing that can be done to help him but if the tumor is contained to the eye socket region, he may be able to benefit from surgery in the United States. Pray for this child and the mother who does whatever she can to help him. Sister Genevieve, the Colombian nun who works at Bernard Mevs told me that when she told her that her child needed a blood transfusion she went out to the streets and begged for the $50H ($6US) needed for the transfusion.
Friday morning we were driving down Delmas when a large crowd of people were walking up Delmas. There were rara music bands and a float. It was a political “manifestation” for one of the candidates in the upcoming senatorial elections in Haiti. Friday was officially the last day for candidates to deposit their registrations at the electoral office on Delmas. These candidates were accompanied by their supporters as they went to register. It was a festive environment but it made circulation of vehicles on Delmas difficult. The manifestation that passed us had a few thousand people in it. Things were orderly until we saw a group of people turn around and starting to run back down Delmas. We were near the Econotire business when we heard some people shouting and pointing at a couple of guys standing near the entrance of Econotire and calling them thieves. A “hockey fight” with fists and sticks broke out in front of the pickup truck and we turned into the Econotire parking lot to get away from it. The mob of people beat up these thieves badly and when they were done they carried them away and headed back up Delmas with them. I guess they were looking for police to hand the thieves to. We didn’t see any police or UN in sight. One of the people in the mob came to me with his broken stick and told me that they couldn’t let thieves into the manifestation. Then someone else called out that there was another thief across the street by the gas station and this man then ran across the street to help beat up this thief as well. I don’t know how they can tell who is a thief and who isn’t with so many people around. I had my camera with me and was able to sneak a photo.
That’s all the news for today. Have a good weekend!
Karen Bultje, Coram Deo
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