Days 40 & 41 (10/24 – 10/25)

Monday – We awoke this morning to a new surprise. Another truck load of block had been delivered. Oh, lucky us! Since this would be our last work day, we were determined to make the most of it. The mortar and block “conga line” and the road to site “block party” continued all day. But when the day ended, most of the walls were up to full height and they had poured most of the structural columns. And, best of all, the blocks had all been moved from the road. We were all tired, but proud of the amount of work that had been accomplished during our mission in Thomas.

Following showers and our last Lou Lou dinner we had a final gathering of all of our team and Haitian staff and representatives of the Thomas church. We had developed very special relationships with all of these people so there was a mixed feeling of warmth and sadness. Warmth because we were surrounded by our friends and sadness because we knew we would be leaving them tomorrow. Both James Lazarre and his father thanked us for our service and presented us with certificates of appreciation from the Methodist Church/School of Thomas Haiti. Then they broke out the Cokes and a beautiful cake baked by the teacher of the afterschool cooking class. And as you might expect with this group, there was quite a bit of singing going on in between.

Tuesday – We were all up early and, fortified by a couple of cups of coffee, started to pack-up. Then we shared our last great breakfast with Lou Lou and Ginette and continued with our packing. There was a lot of checking and cross checking going on to make sure that all of our tools and equipment that had to be returned to the Guest House was accounted for. We also had to sort through our belongings and make several piles of clothing and supplies that we were going to leave behind. But, by 8:30 we had everything stacked-up against the security wall in front of the school. Lazarre assembled all of the children in the sanctuary to give us a farewell. He and James again thanked us and asked Joel and I to say a few words. Then they sang us a song and all of the secondary children came up one by one to shake our hands. There was hardly a dry eye on the team.

We hugged and said goodbye to all of our Haitian friends and promised to return. It was especially hard on Loni and Linda who had developed a close relationship with several of the children.

We loaded all of our gear on the truck and climbed aboard the van for a day of sightseeing in Port Au Prince. Johnny, our driver took us downtown where the team got to see the ruins of the Catholic Cathederal, the Presidential Palace and other government buildings. Then we drove up into the mountains to the Baptist Mission where we had lunch – a hot dog for me – and did some shopping at the vendors around the mission. The next stop was at the Overlook where you have a spectacular view of the entire Port Au Prince area, where 3 million people live.

We got back to the Guest House in time for dinner (naturally) and then had a debriefing with Tom, John and Sarah (the UMVIM staff). Everyone had a chance to summarize their experience and it was wonderful to hear the heartfelt comments. The staff later told me that it was one of the best debriefings they had ever had and they wished that all of the teams that came to Haiti could have as good an experience as we had. Everyone went on line to check their emails (I had 264) and then went to bed.