“Hey you, chocolat! Hey you, chocolat!”
This was the greeting we received from the children today as
we entered Cite Soleil for our water delivery.
😊 The excitement clearly evident in this
little song became a regular greeting at each stop and “Hey you, chocolat!” became
our anthem for the day.
Today was a day full of emotions, some welcome and some
challenging. Ranging from the joy of the
children who ate up all of our affection to the heartbreak experienced as we
watched the challenges that the residents of Cite Soleil experience on a daily
basis (both in terms of their need for fresh water and their living conditions). It was certainly a day we will not soon
forget.
This morning, we left the Healing Haiti guest house in our “tap
tap”
and set out for the filling station, where we met up with
one of the water trucks to deliver water.
As we got of the tap tap at our first stop, we were immediately met by
the arms of children and found ourselves holding two, three, and sometimes up
to five at a time. It was quite an experience! While some of us were holding children so
parents could fill up their water buckets, others were holding the hose to fill
buckets, and still others were helping residents carry their buckets back to
their homes.
A major lesson for our team today: Though many Haitians live in material
poverty, we found that some of their smiles were among the brightest we’ve ever
seen. Many of the children we
encountered emanated joy in the midst of (what may seem to us to be) very
difficult circumstances. We are very
fortunate that our basic needs aren’t even an afterthought in our day to day lives,
but we have much to learn from our brothers and sisters in Haiti about how to
be content in all circumstances.
by- Walter and Justin
