by Jonathan
As I’m flying to Miami with our Men’s group I’m am honored to have spent a weekend with such a wonderful group of guys who exemplify what “Selfless” means. They left Thursday Evening for Boston and then went on the 6am Flight to NYC, after a brief stay they flew to Port au Prince and landed around 2pm on Friday. I left Grand Goave around 11am with Gama in our 6 year F150 that my son Bernie donated to Be Like Brit, almost 4 years ago. As we got on Route 2 for our 1.5 hour drive to the airport the truck started to stall every time we slowed down for a speed bump, there are 9 of them in De Four, the town next to us. What this means is Gama would have to shift into neutral and start the truck while driving over the speed bump. By the 3rd or 4th time that the truck stalled, Gama had mastered how to keep us going forward. “ It’s Haiti “ as we say, you have to have plan B, C & D to get things accomplished. Because we had Ti-Papi’s Van going as well to pick up our Men’s Group, I asked Gama to call them and have them meet us at our Mechanics Garage in Port au Prince, which they did. Fortunately, the group had 11 hockey bags and all of them could go on top of the roof of the van. Without our men’s group even knowing what had been happening in Haiti we greeted all of them with a great big smile, love in our heart and a relief that we made it on time.
The Men’s Group consisted of 2 of our BLB Board Members, PJ who is the Headmaster at Eagle Hill School and an original board member along with Paul who is President of Country Bank. Their guests include Pat who is President of an HMO plan, Doug who is a lawyer with a local hospital in Worcester and had going to Haiti on a mission trip on his bucket list, Rock who is a Medical Doctor and a Haitian American along with Sean who is a Real Estate Developer and a Philanthropic Trustee. Mark who is a type 1 diabetic thought he would never make it to Haiti, but after sponsoring two of our children, he decided to make the trip. We truly had a well-rounded group of guys who only knew PJ and Paul and not each other. I personally loved that Dr. Rock hadn’t been to Haiti for 4 decades and had wanted to go to BLB as his first visit in 43 years. He was amazing with the children and staff as he speaks fluent creole and even took the time to treat a couple of our staff and children. Rock was so appreciative for what everyone has done at BLB and for his homeland. Pat had a terrible tragedy having lost his son in a car crash right after his college graduation many years ago, Pat has been a huge supporter of BLB over the past 5 years and we are blessed that they all joined us this past weekend as they traveled for 30 hours and spent 1 full day in Haiti to help our children at Brit’s Orphanage.
I spent the week working with our staff on empowerment, and segregation of duties. I love the Haitian Culture, it’s one of respect and faith, the conflict comes in when we discuss Free Will? So as we shift the norm at BLB and we empower our children to be free thinkers, to dream, to believe that nothing is impossible even though they live in the poorest nation in the western hemisphere, it’s a challenge, but not impossible. I love our children very much, they are all unique in their own special way, they have been dealt a terrible hand being orphaned for 1 reason or another, but they also are the luckiest kids in Haiti as they receive unconditional love, 3 meals a day, their own beds to sleep in, a Caregiver for every 5-6 children, the opportunity to learn English, thanks to ABCMouse.com and Kid Orange Tech, a Holistic Education, Spiritually, Intellectually, Emotionally, Physically so they can develop into productive citizens and future leaders of Haiti!!!
From Amanda
Tuesday night we had a first for our BLB family. It was just before dinnertime when I was sitting in the office discussing the day with Rosenie, our Haitian Program Director. We suddenly heard a child screaming. Immediately we both jumped up and went to see what was going on. Before I made it to the door, Rosenie turned an said to me “We need to go to the hospital!” Ok! I grabbed the keys and my wallet and out the door we went. It was as we were on the way to the truck that I realized this Tuesday was about to get a lot more interesting. I’d been to the ER several times in the states, and I knew I was about to have an experience I’d never imagined before. We got to the hospital in town before I realized it and since Rosenie suggested we would need to go to the next town, I immediately jumped on the phone to call Gama. We were sitting in the hospital when Gama and Francky showed up. We waited about 20 minutes to be seen, poor Love Na finally had time to calm down but you could tell from the look in her eyes she was in a lot of pain. The doctor saw her and said she needed an x-ray, so we went to the door on the other side of the room to wait for radiology. A group of women sitting in the waiting room told us we would be better off going to the next town, Petit Goave, because we would likely be waiting until 10 pm for the power to be turned on to allow the x-ray to be taken. After another 15 minutes, we decided to do just that. Gama brought us to the hospital in Petit Goave where we were received and seen in a much quicker fashion. The doctor brought us into the room and told us that yes the arm was broken. He then set the bone to heal, casted her up and we were on our way. Love Na fell asleep while we were in the truck on the way back to BLB.
Love Na was a trooper through it all. While we were in the hospitals waiting, I found whatever way I could to keep Love Na calm. We took silly selfies, watched some videos of her BLB brothers and sisters and looked at pictures that I had on my phone. We learned while we were waiting that she’d fallen off the monkey bars while she was playing out side. As I’m still learning the language to some extent, I am not always able to understand everything that is being said, so this made the emergency visit to the hospital even more interesting as I was lost at moments looking to Gama, Rosenie and Francky for direction and guidance. The urgency of getting care for Love Na was the same for all of us. Knowing that the quality of care is not at the same level as we would generally find in the states, I was much more conscious of what was going on in the hospitals than I would have been in the states. Was the doctor doing what he should be doing? Was Love Na getting what she needed? Was this being done in a timely manner for her? These are just some of the questions that were going through my head. Rest assured, Love Na was taken care of well and is now sporting her lovely white cast with a few signatures on it. She’s no longer complaining of pain, but instead that it’s itchy! And boy was she upset on Saturday when she realized she couldn’t go to the beach!!! I have to say; I was pleasantly surprised with the quality of care and treatment that we received once we got to hospital #2. However, this experience also made me very grateful for the medical capacities we have available in the States. Thank God this wasn’t a more severe injury and that we were able to easily access what we needed.
From Len
In closing it’s been a wonderful and fulfilling week at Brit’s Orphanage, we have our staff ready and set with clear expectations, our children are full of Love and Happiness and our leadership is ready for our first full year of 66 children and 80 staff members at Brit’s Orphanage. Stay tuned next Sunday as we will have Kristin, our Amazing USA Director for the past 3 years write about what’s going on at “the OC” in Worcester, MA! Thank You for helping us help the children of Haiti at Be Like Brit Orphanage, if you like what you read, please Like Us and Share this link with your Family and Friends on Social Media…
