last days

It's hard for me to believe that in less than a week I will be leaving Haiti.
Time went so. so. fast.

While I am looking forward to sleeping in a bed again. And eating something other than rice & beans.
I don't have the right words to express how much I have come to love this place in such a little time. Haiti doesn't look very lovable on the outside. It's dirty. It's caous. It's corrupt. It's drenched in poverty.
But it gets into your skin and all of sudden you realize that you can see some beautiful treasures beneath the surface of the destruction.

There are many stories to tell of tragedy. Many stories to tell of hell on earth. Some days I just feel numb because I don't really know how to relate or how any words of mine could possibly help.
But there are also stories of victory. Stories of redemption. Stories of HOPE. Stories of boldness.

The people that I have spent my time here with, the haitians, are the real heros of these stories. I will leave. Most of us from developed nations will leave.
But these young men and women that I have spent so much time with will stay.

I wish you could meet them. I wish you could meet Wiclif, he talks so fast that you can hardly understand him & dresses like he is straight off the streets of New York and he is seriously hilarious. His parents died when he was a kid so he & his brother grew up in an orphanage. He tells us how he used to get scared at night & would cry all the time with no one to comfort him.

Last week, he busted his butt helping us complete a water tank at another orphanage. His gentleness and love for the kids was something else.  This is what is going to change Haiti.

small things. with great. love.

The students that we have been working with here all have stories to tell. Some of them used to enslaved to voodoo. Some are from the biggest slum in the Western Hemisphere, Cite Soleil. and they are determined. to change their story. their families stories. their nations story.

from corruption and diaster.
to beauty and hope.

I believe in them. You have to start somewhere. And they are.
They are starting with what they have in their hands.

And I am blessed. Just to have been able to spend a tiny bit of time with them.
We need new heros. And I have found some.