Thanks to the generosity of Landtek, and their desire to honor the memory of Jim Birch, we now have two turf covered courtyards inside BLB! Jim Birch was traveling for business with Landtek and, like Brit, had not been in Haiti for very long. About three hours, in fact. He too perished when the Hotel Montana collapsed on January 12, 2010, leaving behind a wife and young daughter. Through their shared experience, Lisa and Megan Birch have become very good friends to Len and Cherylann, and to all of us here at Be Like Brit.
Friday night, even though the turf installation was incomplete, the children and staff came downstairs to see what was going on. The playing and laughter that ensued brought smiles to the faces of the crew from Landtek, and the joy on the faces of the children was overwhelming! What a wonderful new addition to Be Like Brit and such an amazing tribute to Jim "JB" Birch.
Our sincere thanks go out to Marty Lyons, Anthony, John, and Bobby for making the trip to Haiti from New York to install this professionally in honor of your colleague and to help the children of Be Like Brit! I think it's safe to say the guys had a great experience and were truly touched by the innocence and joy of our precious timoun. In addition, the crew presented Len a donation for $17,500! We're so very touched by this amazing generosity!
We were also busy with bringing a few of our children to various places for medical care this week! When it comes to medical care, we are so fortunate to work with some of the best providers in Haiti. Local facilities in the Grand-Goâve and Petit-Goâve areas are basic at best. They are able to handle basic things like fevers and the routine cold or flu, but when it comes to more extensive tests and diagnostics, we must travel to a clinic or hospital outside of the area. This past week, we traveled about 2.5 hours to our southwest to the St. Boniface Haiti Foundation, and for the first time to Mirebalais, to the Partners in Health/Hopital Universitaire de Mirebalais, about 4 hours away, north of Port-au-Prince.
Our children do remarkably well with these long road trips, for the most part. Sometimes, the children get nausea from the bumpy and rocky drive. Most of them are not used to traveling this far by vehicle and it can present some interesting issues. As a result, our "on the road" survival kit now includes empty plastic bags (for any number of emergencies), latex gloves, hand sanitizer, hand and face wipes, baby wipes, band-aids, and lollipops. It's quite the collection of preparedness - indeed, not so dissimilar to a baby bag you might find in the States!
We're happy to report that the children who we brought to see doctors fared very well, and there are no issues or concerns to report! The lollipops were well earned, for sure. We also never needed to use the plastic bags for any kind of emergency, for which we're very thankful.
Christ-Love at the St. Boniface Haiti Foundation in Fond des Blancs, Haiti
Many of you have read on Facebook that we had a bit of an issue with our plumbing and/or septic system this past week. I say and/or, because as I write this, our friend Bobby from Lifeline Christian Ministries, along with Len, Gama, and our Plumber Jackson are working on figuring things out. It's been quite the process! It's amazing to see how adaptive our children and staff can be in the absence of those facilities we've routinized them with over the last year. Without much of a hitch, we were able to turn to Plans A, B, and C (okay, maybe even D, E, F...) while Gama and the crew worked to sort out the problem. With any luck we'll have things back to normal by day's end!
By the time you read this, the crew from LandTek has finished and left Haiti - in the air likely on their way back to New York. What an amazing job they have done. You cannot imagine the amount of fun that the children have had on this new turf in just two nights. I even caught the caregivers sitting around last night on the grass, working on their laptops, talking with each other, even one of them just star gazing. It's like we've transformed the courtyards into these amazing gathering places; to play, to relax, to reflect. We can't describe enough how amazing this is going to be for us, and can't say thank you enough!
We also welcomed our newest group of Britsionarys to Brit's Orphanage last night! After a long day of travel, the group from Kenton, OH (with a handful of Canadians!) came up the mountain just after 5pm Saturday. This is a wonderful group, and we're blessed to have medical personnel including pediatric nurse, a dentist, dental hygienist, and more!
The group is lead by Pastor Scott Johnson from St. John's in Kenton. Scott has been an incredible supporter of our efforts at Be Like Brit. Scott has been responsible for the successful installation of and fundraising for our high speed wireless internet, which is not cheap in Haiti. Through his church and through his unwavering passion and drive, Scott has advocated on behalf of Be Like Brit so much so that we're receiving more and more support thanks to his efforts. We've not once seen a bill for our wireless internet connection ~ and Scott is also heading up efforts to bring in more and more tele-medicine equipment, which is so critically important for us to be able to communicate medical needs and seek advice and guidance from our directors in the States.
We know that they will be very busy giving our children their thorough check ups, working with the community in outreach clinics, and seeing most of our staff over the course of the week! The rest of the group will be busy building an earthquake-resistant house for one of our employees who lost her own home to the quake 4 years ago. We can't wait to share that progress with you over the course of the week! Be sure to stay tuned!
Child Spotlight - Steeve
We hope to start telling you more about each of our children. Of course, there are some limitations on what information we can provide you with, as we always want to protect the inherent worth and dignity of the children who come to live with us at Be Like Brit. Obviously, their personal histories and backgrounds are information that we don't share ~ but I can tell you a little bit about Steeve.
Steeve was our 8th child to enroll here at Be Like Brit. He was born on February 14th, a Valentine's Day Boy! He came to us just one week before his 9th birthday. I didn't know it at the time, but a story Len told me later on made me feel that sense that Brit is definitely playing a part in the way things work here in Haiti. So many times these serendipitous moments just make you scratch your head and wonder - how can this be? One can only believe in coincidence so much.
Len told me the story of how Britney was found in the rubble of the Hotel Montana on February 14, 2010, and for him, that is the day that she died. Sadly, that is the day the reality of what happened to their precious daughter was no longer deniable. Their hearts were broken on this day, the day of St. Valentine.
So, when we brought Steeve in, and learned that his birthday fell on that same date, we had to wonder if that was meant to be - perhaps to give that date a new meaning, and while the grief of what happened on February 14, 2010 will never go away, perhaps this boy coming to us, born on that day and month, brings some reason to be hopeful and joyful, too. To ease the pain in some small way...
Steeve came to us from having lived with his grandmother in a nearby neighborhood. A quiet boy at first - and even once having run away from school in his first week with us, he's adjusted so well. We lovingly call him "The Runner" because early on, he worried so much about his grandmother that he had to go back to see her - just to be sure she was okay. Today, a year later, he's a sweet, special, loving, helpful, intelligent young man. He's our technologically savvy child, who just last week had to show me how to change the projector settings over in order to show a film. Who would have thought a year ago that this 9 year old boy who had lost his family some years prior would be teaching me something like that?
Watching Steeve pray that first night at Be Like Brit, just over a year ago now, I knew that this boy's life would be forever changed. I'm confident it's for the better. I'm confident that things working in mysterious ways, serendipity, chance, coincidence - call it what you will - all happen for very specific reasons. The joy that Steeve brings to us every day is just one of those reasons. We're so very proud of our boy!
It's incredible to think in terms of years. He's been with us over a year already - and on Friday will celebrate his 10th birthday with us - the 2nd birthday he's celebrated with Be Like Brit. What a wonderful gift for all of us to have such a special child in our lives...
With an even busier week planned ahead, be sure to keep up on our efforts on our facebook page! Like, comment, share - spread the word! Have a wonderful week, and thanks for reading!
