A Day in the Life...

The sounds of roosters crowing and motorcycles roaring by.  The sounds of big, creaky dump trucks bouncing by on dirt roads.  The sounds of dogs barking and sweeping on the driveway.  These are the sounds I hear as I get ready to start a new day. 

It's hot, first thing in the morning, through the day, doesn't cool down much in the evening and its hot at night.  You do get used to being sweaty all the time, but there is much more appreciation for a shower sometime during the day. 

It takes time to learn to plan on doing things, not on when it works best in your schedule, but when electricity is on...doing laundry, taking a shower with water pressure, using the microwave...

I really appreciate our house here.  Even with all the work that comes with running a house...electrical surges, plumbing leaks, big heavy iron gates to open and close, 20 keys to get around and into different rooms...it is a good and safe house; and it is all too apparent that many do not have the luxuries we do in having a secure, dry place to live.  When we went to visit and pray with the families who had a new house built for them in the "Projet Logment/Housing Project," they were so happy with their 16x20 foot, 3 room house, with cement block walls and a tin roof.  They were so happy because it was a significant step up from where they had been living previously...in a makeshift tin/wood structure, under a tarp, in a pup tent...now they have solid walls and roof, an iron door that locks... However, for me, coming from my lovely 3 bedroom, 2 bathroom, kitchen, dining room, living room, playroom house, with a fenced in yard, I looked at those new houses and thought, "I would not want to live in a house like this. No running water, no electricity, no bathroom (most people will build an outhouse outside their home, no screens on the windows...it would be a hard life."   

"Tout moun pa gen menm fos/ Not all people have the same strength,"  Makson, my housekeeper said when I was explaining that the people were very thankful for their new homes, and were happy and proud to be living there, but I would not want to live in a house like that.  He was saying that not everyone has the ability to have a nice house like we do, but maybe you could take it another way too.  Not all people (people like myself) have the strength to live like these poor families, and be happy and content with that.  Ideas on housing here are definitely relative to what you had before. 

A knock at the gate.  One of the many "street kids" that come by for a drink of water, a cracker or granola bar, a kind word.  They are sweet children, they break my heart.  They will sometimes tell me at 4:00 in the afternoon, that they haven't had anything to eat since the morning of the day before...then they will put the granola bar I give them in their pocket so they can take it home to share with their brother and sister, who haven't eaten for a day and half too.  They take turns and they share, because they are used to not having things for themselves...they love to see Joel, the 3 month old who is as big as most 6-9 month old kids here...to see his smiles and feels his baby soft hair.  I love my children, and it is hard to see the difference between their lives and the lives of the many children living in poverty around us.

Love one another...for this is the fulfillment of the law.