July 3rd, 2014 – 8:48 pm
Sorry about the delay guys! I was just having too much fun
with all the kids last night to fulfill my duties. But I promise to make it up
to you. And before I forget, thanks to all of you who have commented! It’s
really awesome for me to show my trip buddies messages from their friends and
family and well… I love all the complements… Keep ‘em coming – if you must (she
says in a jokingly humble voice).
So continuing on from last night’s post:
We came back to Main Campus for lunch before heading back
into the village. We were told originally that we would be going to see Leon
(who is a former MOH Village Champion) and spend the entire afternoon helping
out with his children’s club. In other words, we were supposed to be playing
with the adorable Haitian kids for hours. You know how when there’s a kid who’s
like, too nice, and all the other kids
take advantage of him? That’s what became of Kensington yesterday afternoon. Instead
of doing that, our leaders decided that we were such a selfless and flexible group
that we would sit in the cantor for about two hours. Literally. I mean, we did
do something, but it wasn’t what any
of us had expected.
We picked up a bunch of boxes full of rice and beans in
little packages that weighed 33 pounds each from the depot on Main Campus. This
was after the cantor drove us all the way down the mountain, we turned around,
and came back up to the depot. We then drove to the Bercy campus, which is a
twenty-five minute drive, and dropped off the greater part of the shipment. The
food is going to be used next week when MOH holds VBS for a ton of kids. We
were there for a good fifteen minutes. After that, we had to drop off the rest
of the boxes in Leveque, another fifteen minutes away. When we got there, we
were all a little tired of being in the cantor and a lot kid-deprived. The kids
swarmed our bus as we pulled into the school grounds, and we were told to just
get the boxes off the bus, into the building, not play with the kids and get
back into the bus as soon as the job was done. By this point, we were all
getting irritated. Literally, we were all completely on the bus by 1 in the
afternoon. We didn’t get to the Kid’s Club in Source Matelas until after three,
and we needed to be back at Main Campus by four. So basically, we had thirty
minutes with the kids we were supposed to spend the entire afternoon with.
The kids in our group (haha, I got out of it because I’m a
legal adult!) had to put on four different skits in front of the children which
were then translated to the Haitian kids. On involved sucking at sports, one
was about getting a bad grade on a test, one about being lonely and another
about being hungry and thirsty. Daniel played Jesus in all four skits,
pretending to pray with them, talk to them, hug them and carry them to the
finish line. They were really hilarious and very fun to watch.
Before that happened, a few of us adults got pulled into a small
shack to make the kid’s snacks for the day. They were basically really ridiculous
hot dogs, with giant, misshaped buns and “hot dog meat” that looked like snake
in the way that it was skinny and twisted at the ends. Basically, they looked
really unappetizing. Danni and I cut through the buns (and Danni with great
difficultly due to using the equivalent of a butter knife), Dale put the meat
in the buns, Evan sauced the buns with ketchup using another knife and Melissa
and Dave wrapped the end product in napkins and put them into a bowl. It was
hot and stuffy and awful. Then we ran out of meat, and Danni and I were out.
The really awesome thing that happened though was that I saw
someone I recognized from last year leaning against a fence in the very back of
the Kid’s Club. It was Stanley! Last year we met him on the day that we were
picking up trash in the village. He was one of the older kids who told the
young guys to stop chasing us with the tarantula and had a dance-off with Ed in
the middle of the street. And the absolute best thing about him is that he
speaks English! So there’s no awkward pauses and gazes as we try to communicate
alone or use a translator. He told me how happy he was to see me, how excited
he was that we were all in Haiti and he would take a few moments out of our
conversation to separate some little boys who were fighting. A true gentleman.
He even asked me to take a picture with him! I was really excited about that
one. I mean, how many girls my age can say they got a personal picture with a
Haitian?? I think it’s pretty cool anyway. He’s a sweetheart.
Unfortunately, we had like, ten minutes, and then it was
time to leave. Bad planning. It seriously ruined my day and killed my vibe man.
Not cool, not cool. When we got back to the campus, a group of us decided to go down to Madame Cheap Cheap's. Emi and I bought the coolest presents for all our family members. Plus, she got a machete and I got a really cool painting that was made by a guy with no arms or legs. And it's beautiful. Unfortunately, we don't have the bargaining skills that our stepdad used last year, so we spent like, way too much money on everything. But it's ok. I like what we got!
Then we had dinner and guess what! We had a lot more free
time. Like always. Danni and I went to watch our group play soccer with some of
the Haitian kids that live on campus, and then we moved over to watch a 2v2
basketball game. And then we somehow missed the time where our group was
cleaning up the kitchen. Which honestly, did not bother me. Eventually, we
headed up to the rooftop for the larger group time, where all of the groups
staying on campus share stories from their day, there’s a little praise and
worship, and then there’s like a few words and some prayer. However, we were
supposed to wait for Russell, who works at MOH and I have no idea what he does –
but he does have some very cute kids that run around here. Anyways, he was
like, running late from the same presentation at a different campus, so we were
stalled.
I’m going to be honest, Jeremy had annoyed me all day. Until
this point. He was the staller for the evening. He got up in front of all of us
and introduced us to “Order Up” which is really just a different form of Simon
Says. It was absolutely hilarious and awesome. We played two different rounds.
The first round, Dave won. Kensington erupted into cheers. The second round,
Joe won. Kensington erupted into even louder cheers. Basically, we dominated,
and we wanted everyone else to know too. I think that’s why Jeremy moved on.
This time, it was a “Repeat-After-Me-Song.” And this is how it went:
“I went down to the river
To take a little walk
Meet some turkeys
Had a little talk
Then I scrubbed the turkeys
And threw them on the line
Now we can have turkeys
Any old time!”
Yeah, if you thought that was weird, you should’ve been here
to experience it! Jeremy actually came up with it himself and it was hilarious.
Each time we repeated it, he would play with a different volume. And then there
was some animalistic screaming, and then there was just screaming. And I was
crying because I was laughing a wee bit too hard. And it was just the best
thing that’s ever happened to me.
…you had to be there I guess.
Then we had team time and yeah. We played a lot of games and
the kids hung out all night. It was really fun! We’ve quickly become a family
in the last few days and I know it’s going to be really hard to part ways in a
few days.
Be sure to comment!
Katie Coming to You from Haiti
Can't wait to play the turkey game with you guys.
ReplyDelete