Manman mwen ak Papi mwen ap vini deman!

What a week it has been already! Saturday I started my new job and the last 5 days have flown by. Saturday I woke up and had to prepare for the teams that were coming in that day. So I was running around trying to get the Guest Dome clean and making sure I had enough beds ready. I was so exhausted physically and mentally that I was nauseous so I decided to sit and right as I put my but on the chair the team pulled up. AS IF!!! (that was for you Brianna) Anyways so I got back up and ran down to the Guesthouse to greet the team meanwhile Lindsay is at the beach with a Team and Jeremy is doing a river walk with the other teams. So I showed the teams their rooms, got them settled in and told them they could wonder the property and go visit Hope House kids. I text Lindsay and told her to come get me when she got home from the beach because I was going to lie down and I went and crashed on the couch! What a day!

Sunday was pretty good! I woke up and put out breakfast for the teams, had a quick shower and headed down the hill on Lindsay and I’s ghetto ATV. After church we took the teams to Gwo Papa Poul (GPP). Side story- I text “BB”(the owner of GPP) Saturday night at 9pm and told him we had 100 people coming, this is the most people I have ever gone with to GPP in my whole 5 months… lets just say Lindsay and I were not looking forward to this and had very little hopes for it to turn out well. So We had soo many people we had to take 2 bus loads, I headed with the first bus load and we sat up stairs and they brought up the drinks and then the food started coming out too! Lindsay arrived with the second load about 30 mins later. I didn’t go down stairs until after I collected the money and brought it down to BB and Lindsay asked how it went I my response was “ACTUALLY- really good! How bout you?” We were really impressed. We had 100 people fed and happy! Good work GPP!

Monday to Wednesday are a blur! Going to the grocery store was a highlight. Other then that my job involves making sure the kitchen ladies have what they need to make food and getting supplies from the warehouse, answering a million questions a day and driving around a lot on my ghetto ATV running errands! I dropped in to bed the last couple night but was relieved that today was a little slower then yesterday!

I want to publicly say a HUGE thank you to Brianna and her family who have been a huge help to me. Between the 4 of them they have fixed the shower in the upstairs of the guesthouse, cleaned out my storage room in the guest house, set up a water cooler in the guest dome, put garbage cans in every room of the guest dome and are now organizing the guesthouse section of the warehouse! They have been incredible I don’t know how to thank them enough… what they are doing is going to make my life so much easier!

So now I will explain the title of my blog… Translation: my mom and my dad are coming tomorrow. For the last week or maybe longer I have been going around saying this creole phrase with the amount of days left until they come. Ana and Mina have been saying it too! The above is what I have been saying today! Tomorrow the day has finally arrived when I get to show them my world! I couldn’t be more excited! I can’t really sleep right now that’s why it is 12am and I am writing a blog!

I can’t wait to introduce them to all my new friends, my favourite foods, favourtie places, let dad eat all the watermelon he can eat in a week (can’t wait to have watermelon seed spitting contests with him), mom eat all the mango she can eat and letting my daddy drive me on the ATV. (hes kind of excited about that too!)

I can’t wait for them to see all the reasons I have fallen in love with this place.
For now I am going to try to go to bed and I will write again in a couple days and maybe even have mom write a blog for me!

Love, Blessings and Manman mwen & Papi Mwen!

Leeann

My Birthday week in Haiti!

A week ago today was my 21st Birthday and I feel blessed to be able to able to celebrate it in Haiti. The morning started off by opening cards and presents from home that mom sent with a paramedic! (Thanks Hilary) It was special to be able to open things from home as it was a little tough as this was the first time I wasn’t home for my birthday. Eight o’clock came and it was time for school, I walked in the classroom and Diana was wearing a pink skirt and a pink shirt… that was just the beginning… first Ana and Mina walked in all decked out in pink, then came Bridgely wearing his sisters pink shirt, Sammy, Teagan and Maddy entered next. Grayden has a pink shirt he sometimes wears but the funniest one was Riley who walked in wearing Sammy’s bright pink ‘Jonas Brothers’ t-shirt. They were all wearing pink for my Birthday!!! Check it out!

For Lunch we went to Yolty’s my favourite Haitian restaurant on a tap tap with my best friends in Haiti! Sadrac, JR Diana, My newest roommate Sarah and a bunch of the interns came out for lunch! I had goat! I love Haitian Food!

That evening we had a party at home church… for the Rumfords leaving Haiti and my Birthday. It was a fun time of just hanging out with Staff away from work. We had dance dance  revolution and guitar hero going, some DJ earworm and of course Cake!

Side note: The Rumford’s are a wonderful family that has been here at the mission for 10 months. Grant is a paramedic was the Emergency Medical Services Director (Man, did God know what he was doing when he called Grant to Haiti) His wife Sandy was the Haiti One coordinator. Grant and Sandy have 4 Children Michelle, Madison, Sammy and Riley! This family became my family away from home. I felt at home in their house and knew I was always welcome even when I was sick. Grant was a good Daddy and took care of me when I was sick! (Thanks Dad) I will miss them all very much. Pray for them as they Transition to their new life in Canada.

Friday we headed to the beach for the last day of school! This day was especially special for Maddy and Teagan as they graduated from grade 8. As a special surprise for them Diana and I stayed with the girls over night at Indigo! It was so much fun spending time with our girls. They are such wonderful young ladies already and I can’t wait to see how God uses them!

Check out Diana’s blog to see a poem she wrote about our school year.

So overall I have a fabulous Birthday week other then burning the back of my legs at the beach  and not being able to sleep on my back for 2 nights. This week I am enjoying hanging out with the van der Mark kids before I start my new role with teams and Teagan, Grayden and Bridgely head off to Canada with Laurens.

In other news we have Tropical Cyclone activity happening in Haiti. Which means scattered thunder showers and winds. The wind is wonderful but the unpredictable rain can stop! We even had hail on Sunday after church. It making the days cooler and nice for sleeping!

Will write again soon!!

Love and Blessings and summer fun!

Leeann

Grab your Kleenex!

Firstly I want to share a video with you all… You may remember me blogging about a boy named Job some time ago. You may remember that he left mission of hope to go to Austin Texas to receive medical care.

The following is a video of his story from the time he was dropped at our gate to where he is now! Job is such an incredible boy with a story of Gods love. He has touched the lives of everyone he has met. I miss him very much.

CLICK HERE TO WATCH THE VIDEO 

Password: jobstory

Second I want to share with you a story about a precious little girl who came to the mission last week. I only know pieces of her story so I try to tell you the best I can. 

Her name is Rose Marie and she is 12 years old. Both her parents passed away sometime around December of last year. She was soon taken in by a family, not sure if they were any relation to her. While she was with this family she was treated like a slave, the beat her with a sugar cane stick… so bad they broke her arm and the bone was sticking out. When the earthquake happened she was able to escape this family and is now at an orphanage about 40 minutes north of us. Through our Haiti One connections the orphanage director contacted Mission of Hope and said that they had 40 orphans who hadn’t been seen by the doctor in a long time and within those they also had a little girl with a broken arm. Due to limited medical care in country this little girl has had this broken arm with the bone sticking out for 5 months now. Last week praise the lord was surgery week so our awesome team of surgeons was able to operate on Rose Marie’s arm. I met Rose Marie as she was waiting to go into her surgery… She was scared, as any 12 year old would be, as anyone would be.  I told her that I was praying for her and that I would come visit her when she was done her surgery. She smiled! Her surgery went well and was up and walking around the next day.  She was gone when I went to the ward yesterday but I was told she is back on Thursday. I am looking forward to seeing her again.

I have said this before but I’ll say it again… I feel so blessed to be a part of such an incredible organization that loves people the way God does. God is using Mission of Hope in truly amazing ways and I am blessed to be here and witness it all.

Love Blessings and Kleenex,

Leeann

Surgery Week Again!

Surgery week means many things here at the mission and for me personally. On Saturday we had a few teams arrive and among those teams came doctors, nurses and surgeons. Sunday afternoon we there were a couple scheduled appointments for a pre surgery consults. Among those appointments was my good friend Gabby.

So yesterday surgery’s begun… it also never fails that we have a trauma come in that the surgeons end up operating on.  I don’t know the details of the late night surgery last night but they were calling him "Machete Man" and it had something to do with his arm and a machete while he was trying to chop down a tree.

I personally really like surgery week… I love going down to the Patient dome at night. This month is a special surgery week because my good friend Gabby is back. You may remember me blogging about him in February and March. Gabby had a skin graft done in February and not all of it took so they are trying again tomorrow. In February I met Gabby down in the ward and went down almost every night to play cards. So last night after dinner I did just that! Thankfully it wasn’t as far of a walk then the high school ward. I walked into the ward very excited to see all the patients. There were also a couple more familiar faces from last month.

As I sat with Gabby playing cards and chatting; Gabby’s English is pretty good but there were a couple times I would say something to him and he would say he didn’t understand and would ask if I knew how to say it in Creole, 75% of the time I actually did! I think back to February when I would hang out with him… I was very limited on what I could say to him because I didn’t know Creole. So last night was a very exciting moment for me realizing how much Creole I knew and it was very useful last night! I still have a long way to go but it gave me a burst of encouragement to keep working at my Creole.

So for the next couple weeks I am looking forward to visiting the patients in the ward, chatting with them with the limited Creole I know but I always learn more Creole during my visits down the ward as the patients sometimes teach me and the translators help me speak to the patients as well.

Pray for the many people who will be getting surgeries this week. For many people these are life-changing surgeries (some still from the earthquake). Pray that we will not only help change their life physically but pray that we show God’s love to them while they are in the clinic and the Patient Dome/Ward especially those who don’t know him.

Love, Blessings, visiting patients!

Leeann

Prayer Requests:

-Pray for Gabby as he has his second skin graft done tomorrow. Pray for all the medical staff working on him tomorrow.

-Pray for Ana and Mina’s adoption. They are only a few steps away from being Canadian. Pray that everything would happen in Gods timing.

-Pray for all the teams who are coming in and out of MOH as the summer arrives.

-Pray for My parents who arrive in Haiti in 23 days!

-Pray for my mosquito bitten legs to heal. My legs have looked horrible for almost my whole time here and they are finally starting to heal. Simple request but I am tired of looking diseased.