Last thursday March 31 st we have moved Kay Angel into our new “temporary” home. Dave Bird from Calvary Chapels had chosen the color “Peach” for us, when he painted the house last week with his group of volunteers, but to me it looks totally like the Dutch National color ORANGE The house turned out so beautiful, it feels immediately like a real Home to us.

The kids were so excited when I went to pick them up from school and we did not go back to our campsite anymore, but straight to the new house. After I had brought them to school at 6.30 in the morning we immediately moved all our stuff in 2 trips to the new home, with the great help of yet another group of volunteers from Calvary Chapels and their big truck. So the kids found their new home completely decorated already, and all their toys, beds etc and the group of volunteers to welcome them and spend some playtime together.

By 11 AM our kitchen was already full up and running so that lunch would be ready on time.

Our first weekend in our new home we worked very hard on our garden, we got 3 truckloads of gravel, “sab de mer” so that the kids can play outside without any mud problems.

Youseline and Estania helping out with the gravel.

The rest of the garden was cleaned up and in 2 weeks time we will start the garden project with the kids. The idea is that every child will have it’s own garden to tend to and grow things that we can eat, like carrots, tomatoes,aubergine, squash, persil, cabbage etc etc

There is even a perfect spot for our car to be parked, safely away from the street.

Every evening after dinner Youseline, Estania and Melinda are doing the dishes.

They are very dedicated to this chore and our dishes are spotless

Sunday afternoon memory game

Our front fence is being decorated just about every day with different designs.

It is just so beautiful to see our kids play their little hearts out in the safety of our own front yard, they are beyond happy in their new home, and so am I. Every evening, totally exhausted from all this play they fall asleep right away like little rocks.

And after this first fantastic weekend in our new home came monday morning, quarter to 7, time to go to school.

Idoris was our little boy who, even though he just had turned 3 last May 17th 2010, looked like a 6 months old baby, because he was severely handicapped.

On May 17th 2007 Idoris was left at the doorsteps of the Albert Schweitzer Hospital in DesChapelles in the north of Haiti. According to the doctor who examined him at that time he was a day old, and at that time it was not apparent something was wrong with Idoris.

The last 2 years Idoris has been in our care. He came to us through a physiotherapist friend of ours, Chery Kay who was working at that hospital at the time and took notice of Idoris. She told us he was laying in a little crib, appeared to be blind, deaf and paralyzed, was only given milk through a tube straight into his stomach 3 times a day.

No-one seemed to have the time to hold him, rock him, give him love and affection. It was a very sad existence for Idoris. Chery then asked us of we could please take him, and of course he was welcome with us.

From the moment Idoris came to live with us we started to try to find out what was wrong with him, in hope for a cure. After many tests, a head-scan, MRI and an examination by an American neuro-surgeon it turned out that Idoris had microcephalie. This is a condition in which the head does not grow along with the speed the body grows, and in his case it was even worse, he also had liquid in his head, so not enough space for any brain tissue to develop. So Idoris had no brain tissue, just the brain stem.

Nothing could be done for him, no medication, no operation,  nothing could cure him. The surgeon told me that the only thing I could do for Idoris was to keep him as comfortable as possible, that that way he could still live for many years to come, but he also told me to prepare myself for the fact that Idoris could die at any given moment just like that.

It is still a mystery to me how this sweet little life was able to function, breathe etc the way he did without any brain tissue. Every few seconds Idoris suffered a little seizure, by some doctors explained as a spasm, which made his little head shake.

He always had trouble breathing, more than once did we rush him to the hospital in the middle of the night, or at 6 Am one time, because he was not breathing anymore, had a high temperature of  103 F and his eyes had turned away in his head, showing us only the white.

2 of those 3 times it was “false” alarm, the moment the doctor in charge at the emergency room came to look at him he turned “normal” again, his temperature had dropped and his eyes were back to normal. One other time we had to admit him to the hospital and he spend 10 days on oxygen and a drip.

When Idoris was hungry or in pain, had problems again with his digestion and needed a suppository to be able to go to the bathroom he was able to cry to let us know about it, but in all those 2 years I have never seen him smile or laugh.

I find it very intriguing that one can cry, because you are hungry or in pain, even without brain tissue, but that happiness, joy does not have a clear form of expression in that stage of awareness. But I am sure that even though we never heard or saw Idoris smile or laugh, he did have the best life possible for him with us, and that he did experience some form of happiness or contentment, at least I really wish that for him.

I have always felt that somehow he was aware of it, every time I held him, touched him, fed him etc. His eyes would always roll around more than usual at those moments, as if he was searching to see me.

He received so much love, attention, affection etc the last 2 years with us, I hope that that made up some for his first year in this life that he passed quite miserable and lonely. Since the last year Idoris was able to eat more substantial food, like baby food. It could take him almost a full hour, but with a lot of love and patience from us feeding him he did manage to eat 2 cans of baby-food a day.

The week before he died Idoris had us worry a lot again. He was having a mild temperature, and so as usual we did all the obvious tests for him, like typhoid, malaria etc, you do in the tropics when someone has a persistent temperature.  It turned out that he had malaria. And even though his temperature that week had never surpassed 101 F, in fact his temperature 1 hour before he died was 98 F, and since friday he was on anti-malaria medication, most likely the malaria was too much to handle for him.

Last Thursday June 17th we buried Idoris on our new land. Between 4 and 5 PM that afternoon all our friends and staff came to say goodbye to Idoris. For 1 hour our staff sang and prayed for him in the front-yard of the old damaged orphanage, where we held our wake for him. After that we took him to his final resting place with a few close friends.

In Haiti you are allowed to bury your loved ones on your own land, and in Haitian tradition we had build him a “kav” a tomb which is above ground, see pictures below.

According to Haitian beliefs the first person buried on a piece of land, automatically become the “Baron” of that land. Which means, that that person becomes the protector of the land and all who live on that land………….who is us in the near future.

So from now on it is Baron Idoris.

Baron Idoris was very dear to me, I was totally in love with this little boy, he was so cute and adorable, and very special in his own way. A little miracle that he was able to live this long, without brain tissue, blind and deaf, his little body totally stiff.

We really miss him a lot, but at the same time we also do feel at peace with it and glad for him that he has some rest now, and does not need to struggle so much anymore for every next breath.

ADIEU BARON IDORIS

Please be aware there are pictures of Idoris’ body at his wake in this gallery

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.

To move the kids at night from the Unicef tent into the sleeping tents is very challenging and stressful under those heavy rains. So we had to come up with something better than our tent-site for now.

Obviously the construction of our new orphanage will take a few months before that will be finished. Dave Bird and his wife Darlys have moved to Jakmel post earthquake for a period of 3 years to help several projects, schools and orphanages to rebuild, be it temp shelter or permanent housing for the future.

Every 2 weeks they host and feed a group of volunteers and put them on local projects.

For 2 days and 2 nights we put our kids up in the basement of Leviya Hotel across the street from us, and worked from 7 AM till 7 PM to build this new temp house.

We took down our current camp site, and with the help of a bulldozer and many trucks of dirt mixed with rocks, we evened out our little piece of land and raised it quite a bit. After living on it for the past 3 months the whole ground had sacked, and it had never really been straight to begin with.

At first we had planned to build a strong corrugated roof over our campsite, but while building we saw many possibilities to make it more into a “real” home. Recycling materials we already had as well. What used to be our floors we now used for our new walls, and our former plastic sheet roof is now our new floor.

A week later we finished the details, like putting in  a screen to keep bugs out, but to let some air in so the house will not be too hot under the strong Haitian sun. A few truckloads with river stones to fill in our front yard and keep it mud free, and a little wall between us and the public road to keep out the muddy river that road turns into every time it rains.

The Unicef tent is now connected to this new house and is our sleeping area. The house houses our dining room, the school for Youseline, Melinda and Estania, the tv / play room, our little clinic with all medication for our kids. And this new home is so much cooler than the hot tents we had before.

We are all super happy with this new home, life has again become less stressful to us.

A big thanks to the volunteers who build this for free for us, and to all of you who have donated to us, so that we were able to buy the necessary materials!!

The kindergarten Claire Fontaine, where 4 of our kids go to school, Yakime, Luckson, Kettia and Yakime’s younger brother Sylvaince was heavily damaged by the earthquake, unsafe and closed.

But since the end of March this school, which used to be walking distance from our orphanage has re-opened, mind you all the way at the other end of Jakmel on a rented piece of land, with make shift class rooms that are open to all the elements.

First the highest class that Yakime (4 1/2) and Luckson (4 1/2) attend was re-opened. After 2 weeks the direction was able to re-start the second class that Kettia (3 1/2) is in, and just last week the youngest, Sylvaince’s (3) class started again.

Our kids love to go to school so they were so happy school has started again. And of-course it is even more fun when you are driven to school in our cool new car.

Youseline, Estania and Melinda are still home-schooled and their school is out at 12.30 PM so they love to come with me at 1 PM when I am picking up the 4 kids from kindergarten.

And last but not least Pazapa has also re-opened last week. Pazapa is the school for handicapped children where Martin goes to 3 mornings a week. His school starts at 8.30 AM so first we drop of the 4 kids at the kindergarten and on the way back Martin and 1 of our nannies at Pazapa. Since Martin is severely handicapped he always needs to be accompanied by an adult.

So that is a very full car every morning, but our new car has plenty of space for all of us.

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.

New too are the signs for help.  Some of them are simple, hand-scrawled signs saying HELP! and a phone number.  Those with more resources post more elaborate listings of their losses:

Although Jacmel wasn’t subjected to the same scope of descruction as Port-au-Prince, many landmarks are gone or shadows of their former selves:

The local Kindergarten is destroyed along with the house next to it shown above.

One of the four gas stations in and around town.

Hotel Florita, built in 1888.  Only one of the shutters remains of chambre trois, the room I stayed in during my last visit.

About 3,000 of the displaced found temporary shelter in a camp set up by the Venezualean army on a soccer field.

One of the homeless there is Tektek, a friend of Lia’s.  I happened to run into him in town and he took me to his new “village”.   His new “house” there is a 6 by 8 foot section of tent with a mud floor and a rip in the roof:

Our current digs consist of a 400 sqft. UNICEF tent and a few smaller tents arranged around a central play area, all wedged between a public road and a hotel.

While the kids are fairly healthy and content for now, as soon as the rains arrive in April and the hurricanes in August, life will become hard.  Keeping thirteen kid, many with major health issues, safe, happy, fed and educated in a tent is a major feat.  Hats off to Lia for managing the day-to-day

The staff is already stressed by the added strain

While I was there, we covered the area as best as we could with a huge tarp to keep the sun and rain out,

Relief to this situation was supposed to arrive while we were visiting.  This brings us to the major disappointment of the trip: the domes never arrived while we were visiting.  One delay after the next has kept them in a warehouse in Miami till now.

A huge positive development, though, is the fact that the orphanage secured the perfect piece of land for the orphanage:

It’s one and a half acres in a rural area just outside Jacmel, near the airport, nestled among small farms.  There is plenty of room for our dome, a house for Lia, a guest house for visiting volunteers, a garden, play area…

Here we are, celebrating the signing of the paperwork that makes the property ours (from left to right: ?, Frantz, Lia, Gala, Katherine of Bumi Sehat, Reginald, my mother Erika):

How are Rochel, Frantz and Ambroise, you ask?  Just fine, actually.  Here they are resting after a long day at work:

Our rescued dog Toutous is doing well also.  Despite her paralyzed back, she gets around and is very playful.

On Wednesday, we attended the grand opening of Bumi Sehat, a birthing clinic just down the street from us.  Reginald is the administrative director:

A part of their clinic is housed in the exact same dome that we are expecting.

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.

A big YES on my end ofcourse.  So today some students from the film-school came to visit us with Charlie Libin and Jim McCullagh from  Friends of Cine Institute with a huge generator, Honda ES6500. They also brought a whole bunch of electrical cords, and light bulbs.

At the same time  UNICEF gave us a 42 square meter tent  yesterday, that they will come and set up for us tomorrow, monday. That tent will function for the time being as our dining area, kids safer play ground, and our home school.

The days will be so much better for us and our kids when they are not out in the open all day long. So when the tent is set up tomorrow the crew will come back and install our electrical system for us. The generator is full with gas, and they also donated a 5 gallon container full of extra gas to us.

I will keep you all posted, and needless to say we had a great Sunday with all these gifts, we are very happy!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Ever since the earthquake happened I have been wanting to talk about our staff, and show you all their damaged or totally destroyed houses as well. It took me until today to finally find a moment to write about them, and also collecting photo’s of their homes to show you.

Elmas Juselene, 1 of our cooks. Her roof had fallen down on her 1-story home

The worst off of our staff are the two laundry ladies, Fernande and Ginette. Both their homes were destroyed completely. Then there is Elmas, 1 of the cooks, her house is not livable any more, the roof fall down. The rest of the staff various from minor damage to major cracked walls, not sure yet if those can be repaired or if they would have to rebuild.

I am hoping that we as an organization will be able to fund-raise enough money not only to rebuild our orphanage but also to reach out to our staff and help them rebuild and /or repair their homes as well.

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.

Watch the video produced by FilterPure:

Lisa Ballantine, Executive Director of FilterPure, is in Port-au Prince addressing the need for safe water. She writes, “I am overwhelmed by the situation of the people living here and touched by this tragedy. We are here with a group of 14 people working together and bringing in water filters for these families, trying as hard as we can to overcome this serious problem.

LISA SHAVED HER HEAD IN THE STREETS OF PORT-AU-PRINCE: A CHALLENGE TO WOMEN TO PURCHASE A LIFE SAVING WATER FILTER WHICH COSTS ABOUT THE SAME AS A HAIR CUT. Learn more about FilterPure’s Hope For Haiti Project here: http://www.filterpurefilters.org/h2o4haiti/index.htm

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.

Our petty cash has been out of money for 9 days already. Luckily I was able to borrow some money, for us to continue to take care of our kids, and buy the things we need, like fresh produce.

Everybody is out of money. It’s a real problem, very, very real. It is also the end of the month and our staff needs to be paid.

Since we started this orphanage August 2007 I have always managed to pay our staff on time. Even though we have had many problems before. From funding problems to two years in a row big hurricanes, with lots of damage and all banks closed for weeks. No electricity for 4 months etc etc.

So this whole past week I have been breaking my head over how to get enough money here to take care of my staff, because I really do not want to start now to let them down, when life is even harder and more challenging, than life in Haiti already is, when things are “normal”.

Somebody told me last Wednesday that some banks have opened in PaP, and that there are huge lines that reach all the way into the street. I decided to take my chance with that, and asked my friend Reginald if I could borrow his car to drive to PaP. He agreed and came with me, along with 2 other friends to be my “body-guards”. Going to take money out of the bank in PaP under these circumstances can be potentially dangerous.

We left very early Friday morning and arrived in PaP at 9 AM, only to find the BNC bank on Champs de Mars closed. That bank had been open the day before. It took us till 1.30 PM, and a flat tire later to find a BNC bank open all the way up in Petionville.

I spent about an hour standing in line, not too bad. When I finally got to the teller, I was told that there is a limit on what one person is allowed to take out, regardless on how much money you have in the bank. So I was not able to take out the full amount I need.

Luckily later that day I found a friend who was able to lend me the rest, so our staff will be paid on time. After the bank we continued to go up into Juvenare, a neighborhood next to Petionville. Reginald’s father lives there and Regi went to check if the house was still standing, since his father happened to be in Miami at the time of the quake. The house is very badly damaged.

And then……….. his car broke down. It was around 5.30 PM. We ended up spending the night at Place Boyer in Petionville, outside in the street. Then yesterday afternoon I found a ride back to Jakmel with a friend from Jakmel who happened to be in PaP.

It was very sad to see PaP, with all the destruction, and the way so many people are now living in the street, without proper tents, in make-shift huts. So many people are now living in such bad conditions.

We passed countless collapsed buildings where the smell of dead people was still very strong. So many people must be still under those rubbles.

I am happy to be back in Jakmel, but very sad and very, very tired.

PaP Haiti Earthquake Photos

This afternoon we have moved into our new home. It has been a lot of hard work, the last 2 days setting up this new home, but it looks and feels great.

We made it that we have shade the whole day long over our new playground. And our kids are finally back in a place that can feel like a real home after 15 days. A much safer, cleaner and healthier place than the dirty, dusty street we have been living in for the last 15 days.

We are all super tired, but it will be much easier, less tiring, with our new set-up to care for our kids. Getting some sleep has been very, very difficult for the last 15 days for most of us. So hopefully in the next couple of days when we all will have a feel of “normalcy” again, we can start to rest up a little.