Sacrifice in French or in English is the name of a beautiful piece of land that we were able to purchase with great financial help from our donors in The Netherlands. This is where we will rebuild our orphanage. The expectations are that it will take years before the clean up in Haiti is completed, and buildings will be rebuild. So it is really fantastic that we found this piece of land just outside the city of Jakmel to rebuild our orphanage.
Sacrifice was owned by a very good friend of mine, Reginald Turnier, who “sacrificed” it to us for a very reasonable price.
In 2 days, on Wednesday 19 and Thursday 20 May 2010 we build a temp house with the help of Dave Bird from Calvary Chapel and his group of 12 volunteers.
For weeks now the rainy season is in full gear. Lots of heavy rains, wind and too many problems for all of us who are living in tent camps. There is mud everywhere, the water with mud enters our Unicef tent every-time it rains.
The plastic roof that covers our daytime area does not hold up under the heavy rain etc etc.
This is a preview of
Kay Angel Orphanage’s New Temporary Home – Jacmel, Haiti
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Read the full post (576 words, 36 images, estimated 2:18 mins reading time)
Thursday 29 April 2010:
I am madly in Love……………………….
with our new car: A great Toyota Granvia minivan, diesel, 4 cylinders, 3 liter engine, imported straight from Japan by a local car-dealer, year 1996, only 80,000 miles on it 
This car makes such a difference in our life, makes life so much less stressful, gives us freedom and a little more normalcy in life again, even-though the orphanage still lives in tents.
Toyota Granvia minivan
Visiting Haiti has never been easy. After a few trips, though, I had gotten used to the nation’s peculiar blend of chaos and charm. Post-earthquake, the recipe has changed. “Now with Extra Chaos!” is the unfortunate, new reality in Haiti.
You would think that the flood of media images would have appropriately set my expectations, but they couldn’t suppress the visions of the suffering witnessed by buildings like these:
There are tents everywhere now. On fields, by the side of the road, and even on median strips of major city streets. Three feet and a thin sheet of Coleman Nylon is all that separates people’s “bedrooms” from honking, speeding, diesel-spewing, 24/7 traffic.
Tuesday 2 March 2010:
This morning the team from Unicef came at 7 AM to set up the 42 square meter tent they had given us last saturday. It is quite a big structure and it took a whole team to set it up. They anchored it in the ground at several places to make it a safe sturdy home.
We then created a ground cover with tarps and moved in our school, dining room, tv room and playroom / afternoon napping-time room. It feels so good to be “indoors” again.
Sunday 28 February 2010:
Last night my very good friend Andrew Bigosinski from Cine Institute called me to tell me that there is a whole crew made up of gaffers and grip that came in from New York with a container full of donated generators and other electrical equipment. They call themselves Friends of Cine Institute, and are donating and installing full electrical systems to those who are in need for that. Andou (his Haitian nickname) asked me if we could use one.
This is a preview of
Generator Donated by Friends of Cine Institute Jacmel Haiti
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Read the full post (264 words, 14 images, estimated 1:03 mins reading time)
Sunday 14 February 2010:
Happy Valentine’s day everybody.
We spend the day today working very hard to give our kitchen staff a better workplace. Since the earthquake made our home unsafe, we had moved our kitchen outside into the front-yard, and the area was covered with a big piece of tarp. But wind and rain really created many problems for our staff to cook the meals to feed our children and staff.
Sunday 7 February 2010:
Today we were visited by a group from TCAT. Through my friend Joe Duplan they had heard about us and donated 5 FilterPure clay water-filters with special silver lining baked into the clay to the orphanage.
Please check out their website at: http://www.filterpurefilters.org
We will now be able to filter any kind of water to drink. We will also start using the filtered water to bathe our children with, since they have compromised immunity systems due to their HIV + status. The air and ground is full of dust, germs and microbes.
Saturday 6 February 2010:
Over the last 2 days I received many calls from my Dutch friend Geert van der Kolk, via a satellite phone from a boat. He is a journalist, writer who lives in Washington DC. He is also a very good sailor, and has made many trips to Jakmel on his sailboat in the past.
He asked for my help, because he was on his way to Jakmel on a big sailboat / schooner with as captain Jared Talarski, and was unable to get in touch with any of his local contacts, or the mayor’s office to receive them.
They were coming in on saturday morning around 10 AM. They had left Miami 8 days ago and had sailed non-stop to reach Jakmel with all sorts of aid.
If you would like to follow their journey check out their blog http://www.libertyschooner.com
Thursday 4 February 2010:
The Canadian navy has visited us several times this week, to come and scout the need for toilets. We do need that very much, so they located a good spot across the street from us and marked the area. The next day a big bulldozer came by to dig the hole.
The day after, today they came back to install our new toilets. There is no room for it, so we will find a solution for that, because we do have a lot of rain these days. The hole is also not very deep, it is just a temporary solution they said. I think our kids will fill it up in no time
Sunday 31 January 2010:
The last 2 days I spend going to the bank and back!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! None of the banks in Jakmel have opened their doors yet, since the earthquake.
Our bank, BNC bank has big cracks in the walls and word has it that this bank might stay closed for some time. The Western Union is open, but they are not able to serve their clients, since they have no money and are also waiting for their bank to re-open.
TRANSLATED FROM DUTCH TO ENGLISH
Arjan van der Veen of the Commercial Boats sailing from Den Helder we got the offer to be shipping goods to Haiti, with the schooner brig “Tres Hombres”.
Soon the 28th day because they would all leave. Lia had been specifically stated that we currently need them and so we had power to collect from all beaten. Resulting in a large trailer full of diapers, vitamins, soap, footwear, apparel and stationery, and some surprises. Wednesday we got this stuff on board and took up about 2.5 m3 cargo space. Tents had already Lia of the Marines, so that we could strike action.
Jesula was born on April 11th, 2007. At about nine months old her mother passed away from AIDS and Jesula was left at an orphanage. The nuns prayed very hard for Jesula but against their prayers, she tested positive for HIV. 
Thursday, July 22, 2010
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