Days 316 – 322 (9/30 – 10/6)

Sunday – Wednesday – I decided that I needed a break from the Guest House routine and took 4 days of personal leave to recharge my batteries. Somehow Haiti got on without me.

Thursday – Back to work today refreshed and with a much better attitude. I’m sure that everyone around me is pleased. With 4 teams at the Guest House a cheery disposition is a good thing to have. Today is also my son’s birthday, Happy Birthday from Haiti to Minnesota, Bill Jr. You can’t possibly be as old as the calendar indicates. Also newly arrived at the Guest House is Una Jones, our boss from Volunteers in Mission/UMCOR in New York. Una comes down to see us a couple of times a year and this visit is to discuss our plans for the final year of the Haiti Response Plan which ends in October 2013. We’ve been discussing this among ourselves and have some ideas on how we would like it to continue, but Una is the final authority. I see many meetings in my future.

Friday – This morning we sent 2 teams off to the airport and home and welcomed 2 more teams flying in from the states. It’s going to be a busy month. After lunch we had our first staff meeting with Una. We spent the first part of the meeting bringing her up to date on all of our various projects. Then she brought us up to date on what is going on at UMCOR - and it wasn’t very encouraging. Apparently the Board of Directors has made drastic cuts in many program areas and laid off about 35 people in New York. It doesn’t bode well for the Haiti Response Plan beyond its’ 3 year mandate. Hopefully we’ll be able to do some strategic planning in the next few days.

Work on the Guest House Renovation, particularly the Swiss House, and the Staff Annex continue although a lot slower than I would like.

Saturday – Still a lot of team activity this morning. We sent 1 team to Leveque; 1 team to Guillette; 1 team to the airport and home and welcomed 1 new team in from the States - lots of people running in many directions. The staging area under the carport sometimes looks like a beachhead at Normandy.

This afternoon I had my 1 on 1 interview with Una. She was very complimentary about the work I have been doing and said that because of my work in Haiti they (VIM/UMCOR) have determined that my role needs to be filled from the very beginning of any new disaster relief response. Then she asked me what my plans were for the future (my current contract ends 11/19). She would like me to continue for at least another 6 months and help in the transition of the program. I told her that I would love to continue to help, that I still had a passion for Haiti and its’ people, but that I have promised my family I would come home. If we could work out an arrangement where I could come down and be in-country for shorter periods of time, I could probably do that. She said that she wouldn’t object to that kind of an arrangement and asked me to write a proposal that would work for me and we would discuss it.

We all went to dinner at the Quartier Latin, one of our favorites. It was a pleasant ending to a very interesting day.

An apology to the few that read this (especially my Mother) for falling so far behind in my journal. The days have been very full with a lot of projects underway and at days end I’ve kind of collapsed.  When you don’t keep this up this at least several times a week you lose some of the detail and days tend to just run into one another. However, I will try to catch up the best I can.

Days 311 – 317 (9/23 – 29)

Sunday – Today was finally pool painting day. Eric and his crew started painting at about 6:00 A.M. We need to get 2 coats of paint on the pool and deck before it gets too hot. After breakfast we got the COR (Church of the Resurrection) team off to airport after their week’s work in Petit Goave. With no more team activity today, Tom, Danette and I went up to Hotel Ibolele to have lunch and spend a few hours around the pool. When we got back the pool was done and looked great. Eric said they actually got 3 coats on before it got too hot. Now  we have to hope that we don’t get any heavy rain for a few days. It has to sit for at least a week before we can refill it.

Monday – This morning I met with Engineer Abicher about the Guest House Renovation Project. The team activity is going to increase measurably in October and we’re going to need the Swiss House completed to house all of the people. He assures me that he’ll get it done in time, but I know it’s going to take constant nudging to make it happen.

This afternoon we had 2 teams return from working on a sanitation project in Don Don. This is a project that is no longer on our VIM/HRP priority list, so they have been working outside of our program – that is they do not receive matching UMCOR funds and we do not coordinate their on-site work. We do, however, take care of their in-country logistics of food, cooks, lodging, transportation and translators.

Tuesday – We got our 2 “Don Don” teams off to the airport right after breakfast and then I had to rush to a meeting with Pastor Paul. This is a continuation of our Site Review Committee meeting from last week. We are applying for an UMCOR grant on behalf of the EMH to help with the completion of the Mellier church. Since Lauren James the UMCOR/EMH Liason is on personal leave, I got assigned the task of writing the grant. I submitted a draft last week and am still waiting for feedback. We’ve had to draw a line in the sand as to what this grant is going to cover. We’ve already spent way too much money on this project and are requiring that the church and the community step up and take some responsibility in its’ completion. We have committed to completing the basic structure but feel that they should participate by doing the finish work. I know the meeting this morning is going to be Pastor Paul trying to pressure me into asking for more grant money – and I wasn’t disappointed. However, I told him that UMCOR has made it very clear as to what they will and what they won’t pay for. If I apply for more, the grant will be rejected and he will have to wait until the Board of Directors’ next meeting in April 2013 to reapply. He wasn’t happy.

Wednesday – Warren McGuffin’s team arrived from the California/Nevada Conference this morning. Warren and I were on one of the first teams to work in Thomas almost 2 years ago and our team started the hot lunch program there. Warren took that initial program and is transforming it into a complete, self-sustaining food program. He is setting up micro enterprises in computer technology and agriculture to enable the local community to sustain the lunch program. He has reached out and gotten corporate funding and technical support and even has Harvard Business School putting together a business plan for a Cyber Café/Computer center at the school. The purpose of his current trip is to explain his plan to Pastor Paul and the EMH leadership and for his team to do survey work for the solar power and internet hook-up at the school.

The meeting with the EMH this afternoon went quite well. The leadership was quite interested in Warren’s plan. Edzair Paul, the EMH Director of Education, was particularly excited about establishing computer classes at the school – complete with laptops, software and training. The future plan is to expand this program to other schools in the Circuit.

Thursday – This morning after breakfast and seeing Warren’s team off to Thomas, I grabbed Spana and the Dmax and went off on a quest to buy a small propane torch. The crew working on the Guest House Staff Annex need one to burn channels in the Styrofoam panels for electrical conduit and water pipes. It should be an easy task to find a torch that you could pick up in any hardware store in the States for about $20.00. Right? Wrong! The first 2 places we went to didn’t have anything. The 3^rd place had one but wanted $120.00! The next 2 places didn’t have anything. Finally, Spana drove down into the heart of old town Port-au-Prince and found a little hole in the wall store that had an iron grill door. They wouldn’t let you in the store. You had to stand outside and tell them what you wanted and they would bring it out to you. You slipped the money through the grill and they opened a little door at the bottom and passed the merchandise out to you. They had one! They wanted $65.00 dollars for it, but by that time I was almost ready to go back to the other store and pay the $120.00. By this time it was 2:00 P.M. We had spent over 5 hours finding something that would have taken 15 minutes at Home Depot and we still had an hour in traffic to get back to the Guest House. I should have known better. Not only did it take most of my day, but I missed the open house and dedication of the new 2^nd story addition at the UMCOR office on Delmas 54. They always have good food at their affairs. Darn! When I got back, a new team had just arrived from the States.

Friday – After breakfast we got the new, small team off to their worksite at Thor. Then – I got to demonstrate my new propane torch to the Haitian work crew. They were totally amazed at how fast you could burn a channel for pipes, and conduit and recesses for plugs and switches. Everyone wanted to try it. I have a feeling that this floor is going to have more plugs than any building in Haiti. After lunch we had another team arrive from the States.

Saturday – After breakfast and getting our team off to Leveque, I had a meeting with my 2 site engineers working on the Guest House and Annex. I’m still struggling with having them follow a schedule. No matter what you put down on paper, they are determined to do it their way. I hope we will have the Swiss House finished it time for the big influx of people in a few weeks. I’ve kind of given up on predicting a finish on the annex and the reality is that I might have to shut it down before it’s completed because some of the funding didn’t come in as anticipated. It’s disappointing, but a reality in non-profit work.

On a brighter note - this afternoon we started to refill the swimming pool!