Days 65 & 66 (11/18 – 19)

Friday – Today was another Haitian holiday it was Battle of Vertieres Day commemorating the final revolutionary battle against the French. Like most holidays I’ve observed so far, nothing much happens except the schools, government offices and some businesses close down. Sort of like the U.S.

There has been a meeting going on most of this week of the EMH Educational Advisory Committee which includes representatives from the 105 Methodist schools in Haiti. Today Jim Gulley gave a presentation on strategic planning complete with sample forms. They then broke into smaller groups to do planning in their specialized areas, health, finance, curriculum, reconstruction, etc. Jim asked me to participate in the reconstruction roundtable. It was a very interesting process. First of all, my lack of Creole skills was a handicap but, Pastor Marco Depestre, the Port Au Prince District Superintendent and Secretary of the EMH sat next to me and gave me periodic summaries of what was being discussed. It became very clear that no one really grasped the strategic planning process and were just airing the problems they were having in their local areas. In two hours they only got to the first item on the agenda which was to do an inventory of all church owned real estate – a task that could easily be done by Christmas. They decided that someone (task not assigned) would have it done by March 2012. The business models and methods that are an underlying part of our culture are unknown down here.

Today was also my first meeting as an official member of the EMH Project Management and Advisory Team. (Yes, our work goes on even on a holiday) Nothing was really different. I’ve been working with these people for a couple of months now and have established a good relationship with them. But, I did feel my credibility factor increase a notch. Part of the scheduled agenda was to discuss with Roger LaPlanche, the EMH Head Engineer, several specific areas of construction quality concerns. But, I thought, what the heck, let’s go for it. So – I held up my copy of the Guide for Good Construction Practices in Haiti and said, “You know, this is a very good book. Is there any reason we cannot adopt this as our standard for all of our projects?” I expected some push back from Roger but instead he said, “I think that would be a good idea.” I was stunned and I’m sure stood there with my mouth open. He said that it would be difficult to implement. So, I suggested that we get all of the site bosses together and go through the book and tell them that this will be the new standard. He thought that that was a good idea and would set the meeting up right away. Sometimes it’s hard to argue with success. Two home runs in two days was more than I could hope for.

Saturday – This morning we got 3 teams to the airport at the same time - 28 VIM team members on the same airplane. Look out American Airlines! Then Tom left for Furcey to pick up his wife Wendy and her team. And John rode to La Caye to pick up the team there. He’ll overnight there and come back tomorrow. So – with nothing going on until the Furcey team arrived later in the afternoon, Sarah and I just kind of kicked back and relaxed. Life is good.