Betz Trip February 2011
What a team we had…what a time we had! Let’s start by saying that even though I was dumb enough to book our flight on Superbowl Sunday, God took care of the details right from the start. To make a long story short, all 10 of us and 21 pieces of luggage got bumped in Chicago, we received $475 worth of vouchers, each, stayed in a Miami hotel and watched the Packers win the Superbowl! That’s the way to start a mission trip!
Then on to Haiti…Austin and Zach picked us up in an OLD truck. We rode in the back of it through the Port au Prince countryside/tent cities. It was really fun! Let me remind you that there are no “rules of the road”, so Austin is quite at home behind the wheel in his country of Haiti!
We would start each morning with a devotional and Jim Ornell talked about the “paths” that we might take throughout life. One of my favorite verses was Proverbs 20:24 NLT that says, “The Lord directs our steps, so why try to understand everything along the way?” This was a good reminder for the week ahead.
We then prayed for a good turnout for our Kids Club the next day. Actually we wanted 50 but I prayed specifically for 200 by the end of the week. Well, over 250 kids showed up the first day. Add to this… one Awana game circle, 8 leaders unfamiliar with Awana, 100 degree temperatures, and then let’s all try to do it in Creole…PRICELESS. We gave each kid a headband with their team color. They had a blast! I told a Bible story with Austin interpreting and the trouble came when I THOUGHT we would learn a Bible verse, hand out notebooks and do a craft. That all got blown out of the water. We started handing out notebooks and a mob ensued! We walked, or should I say ran away, and regrouped for the next day.
There were less kids the next day (I guess some were upset they didn’t get a notebook), and we had a great time! They ran those Awana games like every other Awana club, mostly inside the pins, but they laughed, cheered and fought for the center pin. They even made up cheers for their team colors…Wooj, Ble, Le Jeune, and Verte. Loved “tug of war”.
Kids Club was our attempt at reaching the community outside of the orphanage. We met Gabriel who is about 16, speaks some English and helped us on the team lines. He lives in an 8 x 8 stick home with his mom and 8 siblings. What a heart he has! We were able to take him a suitcase full of food, some clothes, money and other supplies. He and his mom were so grateful. He needed money for his school uniform.
We met Galio, our song leader in the video and all around helper and interpreter. He lives behind the orphanage and is just the nicest 18 year old kid you’d ever want to meet. He loves the Lord and was so excited to help us out. We were able to give him a suitcase, shoes and sunglasses. Pray for him.
There was a little boy named Ronaldo who accepted a “gift” I had used for visual aid in my Bible story telling about how Jesus is the “gift”. He was able to tell me all about Jezi and what He did for us. I’ll pray for him as he tries to make it in his difficult world. The next day, a sweet little girl recapped what we had talked about in our first Bible lesson. She was right on! At least that’s what Austin says, seeing he’s the only one who could understand Creole. Bless her little heart!
With the kids in the orphanage, we made 12 x 12 squares on which they would draw “What Jesus Means to Me”. It turned out that every cook, nanny and worker also drew a square! Lynn and Shari sewed them all together to make 3 quilts and we hung them on the walls down in the play area (“echo chamber”) of the orphanage for all the kids to see. They also absorb a lot of noise generated by 48 kids.
Austin and Moriah taped a Four Square court on the floor and we also started “double dutch” jump roping. The kids were really good! We didn’t even have to teach them how to break the rules for Four Square…they figured it out all on their own. They’re ready for SBR now! Good thing Moriah was around to be able to keep up with those kids. Youth has it’s advantages.
Jim and Zach got the whole kitchen and hallway painted a bright yellow! It just “sung” as Jim would say. They moved all the medical supplies downstairs to what will now be the clinic, which opened up a lot of space in the kitchen area for mission teams. Mark taped and drywalled this area for a fresh coat of “singing yellow paint”. Sheila led the girls in organizing and deep cleaning the whole kitchen with Bonnie’s help. It looked so nice! Now Bonnie can have a fresh start in her kitchen (a new stove would be nice though for anyone interested in helping out). Let me also say that Sheila will forever be remembered for her delicious egg salad too!
Meanwhile, down in the 100 degree inner sanctum, or tomb, as they liked to call it, the guys were remodeling the boys bathroom. It was in such terrible shape when they started, and by the time they were done, it looked like it should be in a Hyatt Hotel somewhere.
They said it was difficult to work with all the little boys around all the time, but as Ken said, “At first I was aggravated, then I tolerated it and finally I loved it!” The boys just wanted to help and learn. When Ken would ask for a tile, they would say “Salami”. OK, salami it is! Get me a salami! (We figured out later they were saying TILE in Creole which is CERAMIC). It’s now salami to them. Those little boys loved working with Dan, Jim, Mark and Ken.
The water was backing up in the shower drains and Dan had to find what was plugging it. It turns out pieces of tile were down there. The guys wanted us to make a necklace out of that tile for Mike Snider, the director, just so he could remember it. So that’s what we did. Along with one for each of the guys. They’re collector’s items now.
Another highlight of our week was the passing out of dresses for the girls. Eight year old Gracie Stevenson from Woodbury, MN, a friend of the Betz’s, sent out an email to everyone she knew, asking for dress donations for Haiti so the girls could go to church. What a beautiful bunch of dresses she collected. The girls, workers, nannies and cooks were soooo….excited to choose their dress and try it on. We also had some hair embellishments and cute shoes and flip flops. I don’t care what country you’re in, girls LOVE to SHOP! It was so much fun and they had so many to choose from.
My friend, Leslee, sent along a suitcase full of flip flops. As much as the girls liked to “shop around”, the boys were happy to get their flips, get their treats and get back to throwing their foam airplanes, sent by a couple of girls from Michael’s Craft Store in Wausau, off the staircase and into a roped off target. How much fun can you have in one day?
The kids also had new curtains made for their bedrooms, thanks to Shari, Lynn and her friend who donated fabric from her quilt store. What a blessing and how it cheered up those rooms. The girls were giddy! (in Creole of course)
And the kids favorite… our TREAT LADY, Bev. She and Sheila (the easy mark) would have those kids up there for any reason, just so they could give them a treat. Those kids haven’t had treats like this before. I think I gained weight! Bev not only brought all the treats down to Haiti, but made them in an oven with no temperature guage and without all the necessary ingredients all the time. Hey, chocolate is chocolate, right!?
At the end of each day, Dan would close with “God is Good” time, just like Jim Jeske used to do on his mission trips. We would laugh and then share how God had answered so many prayer requests. We grew as friends in a whole new way. When you serve together, that’s when you really add a new dimension to your friendships. What a blessing!
Thanks, Austin, for giving us the vision for Haiti. Thanks Mike and Bonnie for your ministry at the orphanage. Our lives will forever be changed by the experience.
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Thanks for going, and thanks for taking the time to post the experience for others to enjoy. God bless Haiti.
Great to hear about your experiences.My son Kyle leaves Friday to head down there with Don Shire Ministries. I know it will be life-changing for him.