“Receive my instruction, and not silver, and knowledge rather than choice gold; for wisdom is better than rubies, and all the things one may desire cannot be compared with her.” (Proverbs 8:10,11)
Hi! We received some great news this week. Wednesday the Ministry of Education announced the results of the state exams for the students who are in 6eme AF. 6eme AF is the last level of schooling for elementary students. Passing these exams allows the student to proceed to secondary school. We had 8 students participating and all 8 passed. The special part of it is that these students were all 5eme AF students at the beginning of the school year and they completed 2 years of education here at Coram Deo in one year. Yvens Cherisier is a 5eme AF student at Adoration Christian School and studied here at Coram Deo to for the 6eme AF state exams and he passed. He now will be skipping Grade 6 at Adoration and enrolling in 7eme AF at their school. Manu is in Grade 6 at Christian Light School and he wrote the exams too. He passed as well. That makes 10 for 10 and a 100% pass rate! Across the nation 255,540 students participated in these exams and 72.39% passed. It is great to have a school program that is about the national average and you can’t get better than 100% :) Everyone here was happy with the results and we are going to hold a celebration meal here for everyone! Josue Marcelin and Jn. Eddy Alexandre not only helped these students during the regular school hours but gave of their spare time to help these students study and prepare them for the state exams. The parents did their part by making sure that their children did their homework and studied at home. Praise the Lord for this special moment!
The first day of classes for the new school year will be September 3rd. The government will once again be subsidizing some of the textbooks used by the students and we will be eligible to buy some of them at subsidized rates through Henri Deschamps. Next week we will also determine what books need to be purchased. Pray for funding for this year. It was a tight year last year but we made it through alright. We try to make the textbooks last for at least 3 years. Before handing them out to the students we tape the soft-cover corners and sides and then make plastic covers. Our students and sponsor students were given the books at the beginning of the year and all the books that were handed back at the end of the year were in good condition, ready to be used for another year!
The Mission of Tears/Coram Deo committee has been busy for the last couple of months preparing to hold a golf tournament fundraiser for our work here in Haiti. If anyone would like to do some golfing and support Coram Deo at the same time please contact Tim Bos. I give the Lord thanks for a supportive committee who strives to help our work here in Haiti. Pray for all the preparation work that is being done to host this golf tournament.
The beginning of the week were holiday days here in Haiti. Carnival des Fleurs was held here in Port-au-Prince. Tens of thousands of people attended the festivities. 8 people died, 350 were injured and 38 people arrested during the festivities. 5,000 policemen provided security during the carnival days. The first Carnival des Fleurs was held in 1916 and the last one was held in 1973.The government will now make the Carnival des Fleurs an annual event to be held in the last weekend of July.
This coming week will be a busy one. A team of 60 people coming from the states of Virginia, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Texas and Washington will be in Haiti to do mission work. It is always great to see people come to Haiti to give of their time and skills in the love of Christ. The Haitian people appreciate this assistance. On August 7th and 8th there will be a chiropractor clinic and also teeth cleaning here at Coram Deo. Health education seminars will be held for our teachers and other interested people in the community. A few of our Coram Deo people will be helping as translators during the busy week of activities the team will have at the various mission locations. Pray for all the arrangements the team is making and that everyone will stay safe and healthy. Pray for all those who will be helped. We will be going through the neighbourhood to announce the clinics.
Recently we have experienced some of the effects of crime in our neighbourhood. On Friday Manu was walking with a friend near the market area of Cite Aux Cayes when he saw a man running down the street. A policeman too was running trying to catch him. The policeman was shooting in the air and people ran for cover. Manu ran into a corridor area.
A couple of weeks ago a thief entered into a garage in our neighbourhood and was removing the signal lights from vehicles. Before entering into the yard he poisoned the 2 guard dogs. Someone in the neighbourhood heard the noisy thief and a police patrol came to investigate. The thief ran from the police. He was pursued down our street and the police shot at him. This event occurred around 3:00am. The thief died on the street 2 houses down from ours. In the morning the people here at Coram Deo went to the site. The man had been shot in the back. The owner of the garage was angry to find that his 2 guard dogs were killed. He came with his vehicle and drove over the dead thief lying on the road. Then he turned his vehicle around and did the same thing again. In Haiti thieves are not respected. The body was finally removed around 11:00am. The police have a difficult job. On Tuesday in the Martissant area an armed gang set up an ambush and attacked a police patrol seriously wounding two police officers. Several policemen have been killed this year. Pray for the police as they attempt to provide security here in Port-au-Prince and also for the people here as they go about their everyday activities.
To end this update on a happy note, Aflac and her ducklings are growing. It is so fun to watch these baby ducks. Aflac will bring them into my room and quack to get my attention. They then gobble up the food that I give them. As I was writing this update Pachico came into the room and asked me to look. He had a pigeon perched on his shoulder. It looks like our animal population here at Coram Deo is expanding. Next on our children’s wish list is a rabbit and parrot.
That’s all the news for today. Have a good week-end!
Karen Bultje, Coram Deo
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