Jesus is always there for everyone who calls on him, at any time and any place. Third Day recorded the song "Cry out to Jesus". To watch the video follow the link to:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=S-WwrL5jCSM
Sunday, September 13, 2009
haiti update - september 13, 2009
“The righteous cry out, and the Lord hears them; he delivers them from all their troubles. The Lord is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit.” Psalm 34:17, 18
Hi! This week was busy with the medical program. On Wednesday morning we went with Deedee and Natasha to the village of Bonnette to pick up Samson Felix and Guerdeline Beaubrun. Deedee is taking in Samson and Dorothy is taking in Guerdeline. Natasha is running the orphanage while Dorothy is in the United States. I call the part of the village that we visited downtown Bonnette because the houses are more closer together there. The children enjoy it when visitors come to the village. It would be good if a team could come in to do a vacation bible school for the children one day. There are several children who show signs of malnutrition. Paulna told me that the people think that the children have orange hair because they bathe too much in “l’etang” (a nearby lake). They don’t understand what malnutrition is. It would be good to find a way to provide regular medical care especially to the younger children in this village. We recently got a large donation of vitamins and I want to try and visit the village on a weekly basis to at least provide some children with the vitamins that they need as well as monitoring children that are heading towards severe malnutrition. Samson is one of these children. When Deedee got him home she tried to feed him and he vomited everything up. Chris came over to give him an injection to control the vomiting and he was able to keep some liquids down. Samson’s body was starting to shut down because of the lack of food. He was to the point where he couldn’t eat. He is now able to take sips at a time but the next couple of weeks especially will be important for him. Pray that he will be able to start taking in more fluids at a time as his stomach gets used to having food. If Samson had not been removed from the village he most likely would have died before the end of the week. Natasha had the same problem with Guerdeline. Guerdeline at the beginning couldn’t suck from a baby bottle and she could only take in small amounts at a time. Natasha used a syringe to feed her. We give the Lord thanks for those willing to help children in need. Pray for the efforts of Deedee and Natasha/Dorothy as they bring back Samson and Guerline to good health.
When we were on the “highway” heading from the village to Port-au-Prince we had to stop because a man in his underwear was walking down the middle of the road holding a large rock in each hand. There were some people following him at a distance and a large coach bus that transports people from Port-au-Prince to Santo Domingo in the Dominican Republic was stopped too. We couldn’t move forward either and the man walked by Kimosabee and he told us not to bother him. He then went on his way and we were able to move forward as well. There are always lots of surprises traveling on the roads of Haiti!
Wednesday afternoon, on Airport Rd. a vehicle hit an elderly lady as she was crossing the road near Bernard Mevs Hospital. As is common in Haiti, it was a hit and run and the driver took off. The impact caused the woman to have compound fractures of her right arm and leg. I don’t know what internal injuries she may have had as well. She was conscious and was able to provide the phone number of her family. Medecin Sans Frontieres has a hospital nearby and they cared for her. There are no crosswalks in Haiti and a busy road like Airport Rd. can be difficult for pedestrians to cross.
I went to visit a lady in the neighborhood who just got out of the hospital. Last week we were contacted by her family and asked to transport her to the Medecins Sans Frontieres Maternity Hospital. She wasn’t in good shape when we went to her tin shack in Cite Jeremie. She has anemia and her eyes were yellow and she was very weak. Every bump in the road that we drove over caused her pain and we drove slowly to the hospital. Medecins Sans Frontieres is a busy place and they can’t take in everyone. I was praying that they would receive her. Her baby was delivered the next day and she was in the hospital for a week recuperating. She looked a lot better when I saw her this week and her baby boy is in good health! The week in hospital and delivery of her baby cost the family nothing. Pray for the work of Medecins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders) here in Haiti. They help a lot of people who otherwise would not have access to medical care.
There were not very many children who came for the first day of classes and we will start classes this Monday instead. We registered a few more students this week. The police have a strong presence on the streets providing security for students. Not many students were walking the streets this past week. Parents across the city are having trouble paying for books, uniforms and school fees. Pray for all the missions who offer a free education. The medical and pharmacy students are still causing trouble downtown. Several have been arrested. The state university is canceling the program until the problems are resolved. In answer other students from another faculty at the state university responded by throwing rocks at vehicles. Pray the problems get resolved amongst the students and leaders of the state university.
“Cousin Johnny” of Jeremie came for a visit this week. He is Fedner’s cousin. He brought gifts of food and live poultry products. Benson now has a chicken and rooster to fatten up and Manu has a rooster. The children are looking forward to having chicken dinner once they are big! We are keeping them on the roof right now so that the dog can’t eat them. Cousin Johnny told me to tie up the dog so that the roosters and chicken can roam free but I asked him what would the rooster and chicken do if a thief came into the yard. The first night Benson and Manu were carrying their pets around and wanted to keep them inside the house so that they wouldn’t get wet in the rain. I told them that they make a mess and they said that they sleep at night too and are only messy in the daytime. They learned a lesson that evening and didn’t want to keep the poultry in the house anymore. The children are very observant. Benson came up to me the second day and informed me that his roosters’ foot was swollen. He showed me and told me that if it dies we can’t eat him. I told him that I didn’t have medicine for a rooster. Cousin Johnny says that the rooster’s feet were sore from being tied on the long journey from Jeremie. By the end of the week the feet were not swollen and the children keep checking to see when the chicken will lay an egg. When we get visitors I am going to ask them to build a chicken coop for the children’s pets. Benson is talking about raising pigeons too and Doudeleimy’s father mentioned giving us a turkey during our last visit to the village. Pretty soon we will have a regular barnyard here at Coram Deo!
We finished the week with 3 weeks without electricity. Friday I bought another small line and did what a lot of Haitians do. We paid somebody to get a “prise”(connection) in another location of the EDH line that works. It was legal though because the line was connected through the meter. Saturday morning EDH showed up and replaced their broken EDH line. EDH just got a grant of 5 million US$ from the World Bank to improve electrical service. Maybe this is why they came and fixed the line. I went up to the workers and explained about the prise and told them that everybody in the neighborhood told me that they wouldn’t show up and that is why we didn’t wait for EDH. I asked them if they could hook up our regular line properly and those workers were not impressed with my request. They told me to contact the person who put up the prise. The prise works great! In the middle of the night EDH gave electricity and we were able to pump water to the roof and can live in luxury again with running water, showers (with the rains this week our water reservoir is full) and lights! The invertor doesn’t work but hopefully it is just a fuse. Pray we can get this fixed too. Kimosabee is getting some maintenance work on his front end this weekend. Next on the repair list is to fix the washing machine where someone cut the power cord. Always something to fix!
That’s all the news for today. Have a good week!
Karen Bultje, Coram Deo
Hi! This week was busy with the medical program. On Wednesday morning we went with Deedee and Natasha to the village of Bonnette to pick up Samson Felix and Guerdeline Beaubrun. Deedee is taking in Samson and Dorothy is taking in Guerdeline. Natasha is running the orphanage while Dorothy is in the United States. I call the part of the village that we visited downtown Bonnette because the houses are more closer together there. The children enjoy it when visitors come to the village. It would be good if a team could come in to do a vacation bible school for the children one day. There are several children who show signs of malnutrition. Paulna told me that the people think that the children have orange hair because they bathe too much in “l’etang” (a nearby lake). They don’t understand what malnutrition is. It would be good to find a way to provide regular medical care especially to the younger children in this village. We recently got a large donation of vitamins and I want to try and visit the village on a weekly basis to at least provide some children with the vitamins that they need as well as monitoring children that are heading towards severe malnutrition. Samson is one of these children. When Deedee got him home she tried to feed him and he vomited everything up. Chris came over to give him an injection to control the vomiting and he was able to keep some liquids down. Samson’s body was starting to shut down because of the lack of food. He was to the point where he couldn’t eat. He is now able to take sips at a time but the next couple of weeks especially will be important for him. Pray that he will be able to start taking in more fluids at a time as his stomach gets used to having food. If Samson had not been removed from the village he most likely would have died before the end of the week. Natasha had the same problem with Guerdeline. Guerdeline at the beginning couldn’t suck from a baby bottle and she could only take in small amounts at a time. Natasha used a syringe to feed her. We give the Lord thanks for those willing to help children in need. Pray for the efforts of Deedee and Natasha/Dorothy as they bring back Samson and Guerline to good health.
When we were on the “highway” heading from the village to Port-au-Prince we had to stop because a man in his underwear was walking down the middle of the road holding a large rock in each hand. There were some people following him at a distance and a large coach bus that transports people from Port-au-Prince to Santo Domingo in the Dominican Republic was stopped too. We couldn’t move forward either and the man walked by Kimosabee and he told us not to bother him. He then went on his way and we were able to move forward as well. There are always lots of surprises traveling on the roads of Haiti!
Wednesday afternoon, on Airport Rd. a vehicle hit an elderly lady as she was crossing the road near Bernard Mevs Hospital. As is common in Haiti, it was a hit and run and the driver took off. The impact caused the woman to have compound fractures of her right arm and leg. I don’t know what internal injuries she may have had as well. She was conscious and was able to provide the phone number of her family. Medecin Sans Frontieres has a hospital nearby and they cared for her. There are no crosswalks in Haiti and a busy road like Airport Rd. can be difficult for pedestrians to cross.
I went to visit a lady in the neighborhood who just got out of the hospital. Last week we were contacted by her family and asked to transport her to the Medecins Sans Frontieres Maternity Hospital. She wasn’t in good shape when we went to her tin shack in Cite Jeremie. She has anemia and her eyes were yellow and she was very weak. Every bump in the road that we drove over caused her pain and we drove slowly to the hospital. Medecins Sans Frontieres is a busy place and they can’t take in everyone. I was praying that they would receive her. Her baby was delivered the next day and she was in the hospital for a week recuperating. She looked a lot better when I saw her this week and her baby boy is in good health! The week in hospital and delivery of her baby cost the family nothing. Pray for the work of Medecins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders) here in Haiti. They help a lot of people who otherwise would not have access to medical care.
There were not very many children who came for the first day of classes and we will start classes this Monday instead. We registered a few more students this week. The police have a strong presence on the streets providing security for students. Not many students were walking the streets this past week. Parents across the city are having trouble paying for books, uniforms and school fees. Pray for all the missions who offer a free education. The medical and pharmacy students are still causing trouble downtown. Several have been arrested. The state university is canceling the program until the problems are resolved. In answer other students from another faculty at the state university responded by throwing rocks at vehicles. Pray the problems get resolved amongst the students and leaders of the state university.
“Cousin Johnny” of Jeremie came for a visit this week. He is Fedner’s cousin. He brought gifts of food and live poultry products. Benson now has a chicken and rooster to fatten up and Manu has a rooster. The children are looking forward to having chicken dinner once they are big! We are keeping them on the roof right now so that the dog can’t eat them. Cousin Johnny told me to tie up the dog so that the roosters and chicken can roam free but I asked him what would the rooster and chicken do if a thief came into the yard. The first night Benson and Manu were carrying their pets around and wanted to keep them inside the house so that they wouldn’t get wet in the rain. I told them that they make a mess and they said that they sleep at night too and are only messy in the daytime. They learned a lesson that evening and didn’t want to keep the poultry in the house anymore. The children are very observant. Benson came up to me the second day and informed me that his roosters’ foot was swollen. He showed me and told me that if it dies we can’t eat him. I told him that I didn’t have medicine for a rooster. Cousin Johnny says that the rooster’s feet were sore from being tied on the long journey from Jeremie. By the end of the week the feet were not swollen and the children keep checking to see when the chicken will lay an egg. When we get visitors I am going to ask them to build a chicken coop for the children’s pets. Benson is talking about raising pigeons too and Doudeleimy’s father mentioned giving us a turkey during our last visit to the village. Pretty soon we will have a regular barnyard here at Coram Deo!
We finished the week with 3 weeks without electricity. Friday I bought another small line and did what a lot of Haitians do. We paid somebody to get a “prise”(connection) in another location of the EDH line that works. It was legal though because the line was connected through the meter. Saturday morning EDH showed up and replaced their broken EDH line. EDH just got a grant of 5 million US$ from the World Bank to improve electrical service. Maybe this is why they came and fixed the line. I went up to the workers and explained about the prise and told them that everybody in the neighborhood told me that they wouldn’t show up and that is why we didn’t wait for EDH. I asked them if they could hook up our regular line properly and those workers were not impressed with my request. They told me to contact the person who put up the prise. The prise works great! In the middle of the night EDH gave electricity and we were able to pump water to the roof and can live in luxury again with running water, showers (with the rains this week our water reservoir is full) and lights! The invertor doesn’t work but hopefully it is just a fuse. Pray we can get this fixed too. Kimosabee is getting some maintenance work on his front end this weekend. Next on the repair list is to fix the washing machine where someone cut the power cord. Always something to fix!
That’s all the news for today. Have a good week!
Karen Bultje, Coram Deo
Sunday, September 6, 2009
VIDEO - BRING THE RAIN
This week we have had a few rain storms but no tropical storms or hurricanes!
The group Mercy Me have recorded a song entitled "Bring the Rain". God is to be praised at all times, even in times of rain. His grace is sufficient. Follow the link to:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=e8HgAVenbUU&feature=related
The group Mercy Me have recorded a song entitled "Bring the Rain". God is to be praised at all times, even in times of rain. His grace is sufficient. Follow the link to:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=e8HgAVenbUU&feature=related
photos - bonnette - part a
This happy girl is Wiliamise. She has an untreated hydrocephalus. A couple of years ago her father refused surgical treatment. He said that it was her back that caused the trouble. In cases like this I leave it up to prayer and for the Lord to decide and He decided to provide a measure of healing! Her head circumference is no longer growing larger.
She now can stand! Praise the Lord for His healing mercies!
Samson Felix is an 11-month-old child who is miserable with his situation. He can not stand unassisted because he is weak. His feet are swollen and he is in the beginning stages of kwashiorkor malnutrition.
The face shows it all. Pray for those in Haiti who are hungry.
This young girl has orange hair which is also a sign of malnutrition. Her older sister is holding onto her. It is difficult for the youngest in families. When a pot of food is cooked the youngest quite often are fed last. It is a survival strategy for the families.photos - bonnette - part b
While in the village this grandmother and her 7-month-old grand-daughter came up to me. She told me that the mother died last month and that she needed some help.
Babies in villages like these really suffer when there is no mother who can breast-feed. Pray we can find someone to help this family out.
These are the 3 musketeers (they are all around 5 years old! These children all have various orthopedic problems. The boy on the left is Miguelson Pacomme. We brought him back from Bonnette to see Mallery who is staying at a guesthouse in the community. The other 2 children, Lovely and Lucson both recently completed 6-month tuberculosis treatment of spinal tuberculosis (Potts syndrome). All 3 children will need surgery in the United States. Pray help can be found for the 3 Musketeers!
Miguelson's legs are "wispy legged". It makes it uncomfortable for him to walk and his knees hurt.
Naphtalie Bazile and her mother came over to visit. She had surgery a year ago in the United States for hydrocephalus. She will be seeing the Miami Neurosurgery team here in Haiti in October.photos - school
Several parents came to the house this week looking for help for a school for their children. Achetane Jean is a 13-year-old girl who has never attended school.
Maxime Rene is a 12-year-old boy who also has never gone to school.
Noriliane Therny is a 15-year-old girl who has never been to school. Even though we can't help a lot of children it is great that these children will get the opportunity to learn how to read and write.
Widgine Pierre Jean is a 15-year-old mentally handicapped girl who has never gone to school. One of my prayers is that one day we can offer vocational trades here at Coram Deo. The girls could learn to sew. Pray that one day this will be possible. I have confidence if it is the Lords' will it will happen.
When the EDH company came to trim trees in the neighborhood the men who sit around on the streets refused to help to clean the streets of the limbs. Actually they wanted me to do it. I thought I would take a shot of the lazy welders who work in front of the house. They just work around the garbage! Pray that we can help the community to become environment friendly!haiti update - september 6, 2009
“But blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in him. He will be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream. It does not fear when heat comes; its leaves are always green. It has no worries in a year of drought and never fails to bear fruit.” Jeremiah 17:7,8
Hi! Saturday night reminded me of Hockey Night in Canada! In Haiti though it wasn’t hockey that was being played but soccer. Brazil was playing Argentina and these teams are like the Toronto Maple Leafs and the Montreal Canadians. Since our television went “poof” last week and we didn’t have electricity the older guys went in search of a television to watch the game at a friend’s house. Manu is a soccer fanatic and his favorite team is Brazil. He knows the names of all the players. Because it was evening I wouldn’t let him go out with the older guys but there was a television on at the restaurant near our house, which is owned by the Cadeau family. Manu managed to crawl between the legs of the men standing at the door and then under the table and managed to end up right in front of the television set. He had a good view of the match! I sat outside in front of our gate in my Canada chair with the other children and listened to the game on the radio. Pastor Octave was sitting on the street too in front of his house with his radio. It was a good match and Brazil won 3-1! Every time when Brazil scored there was a roar of cheers going through the neighborhood.
EDH still hasn’t fixed the broken line in front of our house but I figure with the doubling of the electrical rates in August I have saved one month of electricity bills now that the line has been broken for 2 weeks. The school program here at Coram Deo opens on September 7th and we registered a few more children into the program this week as well as registering Paulna, Fedner, and Herold at the schools that they will be attending. Pray for all the school programs that are opening. Funding is very difficult right now and we try to cut corners as much as we can (instead of pumping water to the roof we bucket the water into the house to reduce usage of water so that we don’t have to purchase water as often) as well as primarily relying on the Feed My Starving Children rice meals for our food (this is a real blessing!). Please consider a donation for our programs here at Coram Deo.
Naphtalie Bazile came to the house with her mother this week. She went to the United States a year ago for hydrocephalus surgery. She is doing well. Her head looks bigger and we are going to make sure that she attends the October hydrocephalus evaluations with the University of Miami Neurosurgery team. On September 12th the Smile Train plastic surgery team will be operating out of the Baptist Mission Hospital in Fermathe until the 19th. on children and adults who have cleft lips and palates. Please keep these life changing surgeries in prayer.
We drove out to Bonnette this week to return Ednerson and Michelore to their families. They are now healthy and can reintegrate with their families again. We give the Lord thanks for Deedee’s efforts at helping these children. Doudeleimy Beaubrun is a child in this village who went to the United States for surgical treatment of clubbed feet. Now her feet are normal. Her father is an elder in this village. Because of this connection the village sees how a life can change for a handicapped child and they seek to help other handicapped people in the village. Paulna and Michelore are 2 other children in this village who were helped with orthopedic surgeries. Miguelson Pacomme is a 5-year-old boy who has severely curved leg bones and he walks awkwardly because of this. A photo is on the Coram Deo blogsite. We brought him back to Port-au-Prince to meet with Mallery, an American who is staying at a local guesthouse. Pray that help can be found for Miguelson. Doudeleimy’s father brought us to the homes of 2 families who are having problems. Samson Felix is an 11-month-old baby boy who is weak from kwashiorkor malnutrition. A grandmother showed her 7-month-old grand daughter. The mother died last month. Pray that we can find someone who can help these 2 babies. One of our goals here at Coram Deo is to try to change attitude in the community towards the handicapped. The village of Bonnette is one community that has been changed. Handicapped people are helped and efforts are made by the people of the community to get them help. The next-door neighbor of Rachel’s mother (who suffered a stroke a couple of years ago that left her paralyzed on one side of her body) helps the mother to lift a pot of food on and off the cooking fire. In this way the mother can still have independence of cooking the food for her family. Last week when I stopped by to visit this mother she was cooking the family’s daily meal. I found out later that she had set aside a portion of the meal for me because she thought I would stop by her house again before heading back to Port-au-Prince. She is so thankful that her baby daughter is getting help at Deedee’s. Handicapped people in this village are not hidden and are part of the village life. It can be done in other areas as well. Pray that more missions will focus on helping the handicapped.
One mission that works with handicapped children is Hopital Nos Petits Freres et Soeurs (Little Brothers and Sisters). They have a physiotherapy program that offers free physiotherapy to the poor in the community who have handicapped children. Each week 50 handicapped children go horseback riding at Chateaublond, which is located in the Tabarre region of Port-au-Prince. 2 of these children were selected to represent Haiti at the 6th International Equestrian Games for Children, which were held in August in Germany.
The Haitian government ratified the OEA (Organization of American States) Interamerican Convention for the elimination of all forms of discrimination against handicapped people this week. This ratification will protect the rights of the handicapped and provide opportunities for their insertion into society. Handicapped people are given the same human rights and same fundamental liberties as other people. Pray for the work being done for the rights of the handicapped here in Haiti and in other countries of the world.
August finished with no tropical storms or hurricanes affecting Haiti! This is a real blessing. In a report published by Maplecroft (a British organization), Somalia, Haiti, Afghanistan and Sierra Leone were named as the 4 countries most vulnerable to climate change in the “Index of Vulnerability to Climate Change”. Of the 28 countries at extreme risk, 22 are located in Africa. The 6 factors considered were: economy, institutions and governance, human development and health, ecosystems (forests, human impact, soil erosion), security of resources (water, food, energy) and population and infrastructure. The government of France is trying to assist Haiti with some of its flooding problems. Etang Miragoane is a lake that flooded and hasn’t receded. As a result the bridge connecting the west department to the south is submerged. The government had to create another transportation route as the road could only be traveled by canoe. France is funding $200,000US$ from August to October 2009 to improve the situation. A professional diver determined that the increased elevation is primarily due to the obstruction of filtration points where the lake water runs naturally to the sea. Debris in the form of stones, trees, clothing, mattresses, leaves and plants are blocking this natural flow. Clean up work has already lowered the water levels by 50 cm. Pray that the government can improve the natural drainage areas that are in place.
That is all the news for today. Have a good week!
Karen Bultje, Coram Deo
Hi! Saturday night reminded me of Hockey Night in Canada! In Haiti though it wasn’t hockey that was being played but soccer. Brazil was playing Argentina and these teams are like the Toronto Maple Leafs and the Montreal Canadians. Since our television went “poof” last week and we didn’t have electricity the older guys went in search of a television to watch the game at a friend’s house. Manu is a soccer fanatic and his favorite team is Brazil. He knows the names of all the players. Because it was evening I wouldn’t let him go out with the older guys but there was a television on at the restaurant near our house, which is owned by the Cadeau family. Manu managed to crawl between the legs of the men standing at the door and then under the table and managed to end up right in front of the television set. He had a good view of the match! I sat outside in front of our gate in my Canada chair with the other children and listened to the game on the radio. Pastor Octave was sitting on the street too in front of his house with his radio. It was a good match and Brazil won 3-1! Every time when Brazil scored there was a roar of cheers going through the neighborhood.
EDH still hasn’t fixed the broken line in front of our house but I figure with the doubling of the electrical rates in August I have saved one month of electricity bills now that the line has been broken for 2 weeks. The school program here at Coram Deo opens on September 7th and we registered a few more children into the program this week as well as registering Paulna, Fedner, and Herold at the schools that they will be attending. Pray for all the school programs that are opening. Funding is very difficult right now and we try to cut corners as much as we can (instead of pumping water to the roof we bucket the water into the house to reduce usage of water so that we don’t have to purchase water as often) as well as primarily relying on the Feed My Starving Children rice meals for our food (this is a real blessing!). Please consider a donation for our programs here at Coram Deo.
Naphtalie Bazile came to the house with her mother this week. She went to the United States a year ago for hydrocephalus surgery. She is doing well. Her head looks bigger and we are going to make sure that she attends the October hydrocephalus evaluations with the University of Miami Neurosurgery team. On September 12th the Smile Train plastic surgery team will be operating out of the Baptist Mission Hospital in Fermathe until the 19th. on children and adults who have cleft lips and palates. Please keep these life changing surgeries in prayer.
We drove out to Bonnette this week to return Ednerson and Michelore to their families. They are now healthy and can reintegrate with their families again. We give the Lord thanks for Deedee’s efforts at helping these children. Doudeleimy Beaubrun is a child in this village who went to the United States for surgical treatment of clubbed feet. Now her feet are normal. Her father is an elder in this village. Because of this connection the village sees how a life can change for a handicapped child and they seek to help other handicapped people in the village. Paulna and Michelore are 2 other children in this village who were helped with orthopedic surgeries. Miguelson Pacomme is a 5-year-old boy who has severely curved leg bones and he walks awkwardly because of this. A photo is on the Coram Deo blogsite. We brought him back to Port-au-Prince to meet with Mallery, an American who is staying at a local guesthouse. Pray that help can be found for Miguelson. Doudeleimy’s father brought us to the homes of 2 families who are having problems. Samson Felix is an 11-month-old baby boy who is weak from kwashiorkor malnutrition. A grandmother showed her 7-month-old grand daughter. The mother died last month. Pray that we can find someone who can help these 2 babies. One of our goals here at Coram Deo is to try to change attitude in the community towards the handicapped. The village of Bonnette is one community that has been changed. Handicapped people are helped and efforts are made by the people of the community to get them help. The next-door neighbor of Rachel’s mother (who suffered a stroke a couple of years ago that left her paralyzed on one side of her body) helps the mother to lift a pot of food on and off the cooking fire. In this way the mother can still have independence of cooking the food for her family. Last week when I stopped by to visit this mother she was cooking the family’s daily meal. I found out later that she had set aside a portion of the meal for me because she thought I would stop by her house again before heading back to Port-au-Prince. She is so thankful that her baby daughter is getting help at Deedee’s. Handicapped people in this village are not hidden and are part of the village life. It can be done in other areas as well. Pray that more missions will focus on helping the handicapped.
One mission that works with handicapped children is Hopital Nos Petits Freres et Soeurs (Little Brothers and Sisters). They have a physiotherapy program that offers free physiotherapy to the poor in the community who have handicapped children. Each week 50 handicapped children go horseback riding at Chateaublond, which is located in the Tabarre region of Port-au-Prince. 2 of these children were selected to represent Haiti at the 6th International Equestrian Games for Children, which were held in August in Germany.
The Haitian government ratified the OEA (Organization of American States) Interamerican Convention for the elimination of all forms of discrimination against handicapped people this week. This ratification will protect the rights of the handicapped and provide opportunities for their insertion into society. Handicapped people are given the same human rights and same fundamental liberties as other people. Pray for the work being done for the rights of the handicapped here in Haiti and in other countries of the world.
August finished with no tropical storms or hurricanes affecting Haiti! This is a real blessing. In a report published by Maplecroft (a British organization), Somalia, Haiti, Afghanistan and Sierra Leone were named as the 4 countries most vulnerable to climate change in the “Index of Vulnerability to Climate Change”. Of the 28 countries at extreme risk, 22 are located in Africa. The 6 factors considered were: economy, institutions and governance, human development and health, ecosystems (forests, human impact, soil erosion), security of resources (water, food, energy) and population and infrastructure. The government of France is trying to assist Haiti with some of its flooding problems. Etang Miragoane is a lake that flooded and hasn’t receded. As a result the bridge connecting the west department to the south is submerged. The government had to create another transportation route as the road could only be traveled by canoe. France is funding $200,000US$ from August to October 2009 to improve the situation. A professional diver determined that the increased elevation is primarily due to the obstruction of filtration points where the lake water runs naturally to the sea. Debris in the form of stones, trees, clothing, mattresses, leaves and plants are blocking this natural flow. Clean up work has already lowered the water levels by 50 cm. Pray that the government can improve the natural drainage areas that are in place.
That is all the news for today. Have a good week!
Karen Bultje, Coram Deo
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