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...[God] so blesses me, that I might live to see another day, for though my home and my food have been taken, my soul and my life have been saved." The man immediately sprang to his feet, and with his heart full of faith and lips full of song, he began to pick up the pieces.
-Jonathon Trousdell (Read the Story)
**************************************************************Wow. So I guess it's been a few months? I suppose it's time for an update.
Crazy story #1: The Ministry of Education says No School
For one reason or another a week after the earthquake, Haiti's Ministry of Education mandated a country wide month long school shut down. This meant that schools from PAP to the provinces had to turn away students. Unfortunately we're a boarding school, couldn't send kids home (they had no home), and could not have kids running wild around campus with no structure. So, one week after the quake we started with our "peracurricular activities" which just so happened to be in the classrooms and just so happened to resemble class. However, we did not start school. Heh. Heh. In all honesty, we couldn't start. We only had about a third of our students, so we could not move forward with our curriculum.
Walking around campus, you would see volunteers wrangling kids...there might be an aftershock scare with entire classes tearing out of classrooms because a loud truck drove down the street or a gate was opened. Maybe we've developed a twisted sense of humor, but after a while, it was a little funny.
On Feb 12th, we decided to hold the Ministry to it's word and start up "school" even though we did not have all of our students. Students were told to bring their uniforms and start studying for exams. Then we had three early morning aftershocks (4:30, 1:40, 1:45) that scared most kids into leaving. Over the course of about five hours we went from students in to mid 200s to to students in the low 100s. That day has been dubed the mass exodus. The day after the mass exodus, we were visited by a Haitian Police who was just scary enough to turn our "school" back into "peracurricular activities." But, we were not shut down since we're a boarding school with about 100 kids who would otherwise be on the streets or in the tent cities. The police turned a blind eye.
Today, we're back up into the high 200s. Sisyem and Sankyem are almost all back. All of our students who were injured are all back. Kids still flinch at loud sounds; some may even stand up, but then teachers yell "it's okay, it's okay, " and we nervously laugh about it afterwards.
The Ministry did not in fact stick to its original opening date, nor it's second, but instead has extended it's manditory school shutdown to April 1st. Which will probably lead to the biggest and most fantastic April Fools joke ever. "Heh Heh, Country, April fools!" Again, humors are now a little twisted, so please bare with me.
Crazy story #2: Collections
Post quake, we seem to be collecting things at LCS. Students, children, animals, we really don't discriminate.
Students still stay during the weekend. However, this weekend we were down to nine kids who can't go home. Most of the students who stay are my sisyem kids whose love for mango hunting is only matched by thier ability to find delicious mangos.
Crazy story #1: The Ministry of Education says No School
For one reason or another a week after the earthquake, Haiti's Ministry of Education mandated a country wide month long school shut down. This meant that schools from PAP to the provinces had to turn away students. Unfortunately we're a boarding school, couldn't send kids home (they had no home), and could not have kids running wild around campus with no structure. So, one week after the quake we started with our "peracurricular activities" which just so happened to be in the classrooms and just so happened to resemble class. However, we did not start school. Heh. Heh. In all honesty, we couldn't start. We only had about a third of our students, so we could not move forward with our curriculum.
Walking around campus, you would see volunteers wrangling kids...there might be an aftershock scare with entire classes tearing out of classrooms because a loud truck drove down the street or a gate was opened. Maybe we've developed a twisted sense of humor, but after a while, it was a little funny.
On Feb 12th, we decided to hold the Ministry to it's word and start up "school" even though we did not have all of our students. Students were told to bring their uniforms and start studying for exams. Then we had three early morning aftershocks (4:30, 1:40, 1:45) that scared most kids into leaving. Over the course of about five hours we went from students in to mid 200s to to students in the low 100s. That day has been dubed the mass exodus. The day after the mass exodus, we were visited by a Haitian Police who was just scary enough to turn our "school" back into "peracurricular activities." But, we were not shut down since we're a boarding school with about 100 kids who would otherwise be on the streets or in the tent cities. The police turned a blind eye.
Today, we're back up into the high 200s. Sisyem and Sankyem are almost all back. All of our students who were injured are all back. Kids still flinch at loud sounds; some may even stand up, but then teachers yell "it's okay, it's okay, " and we nervously laugh about it afterwards.
The Ministry did not in fact stick to its original opening date, nor it's second, but instead has extended it's manditory school shutdown to April 1st. Which will probably lead to the biggest and most fantastic April Fools joke ever. "Heh Heh, Country, April fools!" Again, humors are now a little twisted, so please bare with me.
Crazy story #2: Collections
Post quake, we seem to be collecting things at LCS. Students, children, animals, we really don't discriminate.
Students still stay during the weekend. However, this weekend we were down to nine kids who can't go home. Most of the students who stay are my sisyem kids whose love for mango hunting is only matched by thier ability to find delicious mangos.
We have a new batch of puppies at the school, plus the two old dogs, plus the four old puppies. Simply put, we have a lot of dogs, and at least the six puppies are cute. The others are pretty darn ugly.
Beyond puppies and students, we also seem to be attracting children. After the earthquake, there were two parents who decided that they could no longer take care of their children, so they gave them to a guy who was going to take them to an orphanage. The whole situation was pretty shady, so Christina decided to go find the kids, and once she got the parent's support, bring them back to the zone. She found them at an orphanage/mechanic shop, and with the parents, had to literally pull them out of the orphanage. The plan was to keep them at the Moynihan house until we could get them to the Sister of Charity's orphanage. However, the sisters wouldn't take them since they still had a parent, and they couldn't stay at the Moynihan's overnight since they aren't an orphanage.
So, Christina and I set up a day care/preschool for 7 of the kids from the orphanage plus two whose parents work here during the day. After one week, we are doing pretty well, and we're figuring out how to do it. I've given up both sankyem classes in order to help during the day. I didn't want to give them up, but there was no way to do it all, so I'm trying to focus on the positives of the situation.
Here are the positives:
1. The kids are adorable.
2. After only a week the kids are already less agressive.
3. It's a fun job.
4. I have little kids to play with all day.
So, that's all for now...hope you enjoyed the update.
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