Haiti in Focus Podcast

Day 1 - My First Time in Haiti After The Earthquake

The Internet connection is so bad here. Last night, I was even plugged into a phone line, and it still was horrible! So, I am awake again at 4 AM, and my first thought was “I can’t wait to tell the Scott all about this!”

I CAN NOT imagine being a first time visitor here in this recovery time. To our surprise, there were hardly any whites/foreigners on the plane ride down. I have in fact, seen few foreign women anywhere. From the air you can see patch after patch of blue plastic tarps – the refugee camps. The baggage claim was located in a make shift warehouse building because the airport building had huge cracks in it from top to bottom. There were virtually no immigration, customs, security checks.

Because of the change in our location, Do Do and Arnold could not find us. It was about 30 minutes of complete madness – and over 200 lbs of baggage, CJ was trying to keep track of. Finally I borrowed a cell from a nice guy and connected with Do Do and told him where to find us.

His car looks like something out of a war. The trunk, back seat and doors were completely smashed from the earthquake, but he had it partially fixed so he could fit me, CJ, Arnold, and all our stuff in the car. No windows, no locks, no shocks and the car overheated every 10 minutes, so we had to keep stopping and asking people for water to pour into the carburetor.

Tent city after tent city was everywhere, along with lots of begging children. On one of our carburetor stops, a new mother came up to me with her one-month-old baby girl and BEGGED me for money so she could get her daughter to a hospital. The baby was throwing up, diarrhea, and barely moved. I found it amazing that she had the faith to start the journey from where ever she was calling home these days, hoping to find someone to help her on the way. We hadn’t even exchanged money yet, but gave her $20 USD. I prayed hard that her daughter would make it. I think the thing that struck me was how she approached me. This woman was not used to handouts. She was polite, quiet, and surprisingly calm, but her eyes were earnest.

The earthquake has affected countless here, yet life does go on here in many ways. Everywhere you look there are signs of life. Women selling fruit on the side of the road, guys selling water bags, cars honking, people walking with water buckets on their heads. What was so striking to me was that people were doing life – directly next to or on top of mass graves. The mass graves are unexplainable. You can see the mishmash of stuff. Flip-flops, concrete, papers, and clothing. The living around have blank expressions everywhere. The smells are unlike anything I have ever experienced in all my years of coming to Haiti.

Houses flattened, buildings on an angle that defied logic. How could they still partially stand and not slide into the streets? The Caribbean Market (Like Giant or Weis in Haiti) was unrecognizable. Three stories of grocery and furniture - I have shopped there countless times over the years – a huge mound of cement blocks and God only knows how many dead.

Our hotel is located one block from an enormous tent city in the center of Petionville. People bathing in buckets on the street, TONS of UN, Red Cross, and Haitian Police with machine guns are EVERYWHERE. Every third vehicle is some type of aid. Our hotel is far better than

I expected. We had never been here before. We were pleased to find that we had a two-room suite! Air conditioning, electricity, a small patio, two restaurants, a TV (CJ of course had on some basketball game…), a fan, two sinks, and private bath with WARM water!!!! YAY!!!!! Even though it is offensively hot here and I have been here many times, I have never gotten used to a freezing cold shower.

After checking into the hotel, we made our way up to Haiti Satellite, near Baptist Haiti Mission. One of our goals on this trip is to do some research on what it would cost to start our own tuition free online university location, instead of sending our students to poorly ran or now nonexistent computer trade colleges. The first step is to find out about costs of internet, find a classroom location, etc.

Haiti Satellite  is owned and operated by an American guy, a pastor and the host of a Haitian TV show, highlighting on location segments of all the great things about Haiti. Haiti Satellite is THE Internet provider in all of Haiti – 97% rate of all Internet connections to its customers. All the big organizations use this company because it is reliable. So we sat down with the head IT guy and were disappointed to hear that an internet connection like this is sticker shock times10! $4,000 initial start up and $800 per month. This is JUST for internet needed for kids to take their on line classes.

As we were getting ready to leave, the Joel Trimble, the owner, came in and introduced himself. We sat down and had a lovely chat about our vision, University of the People, the type of space we were looking for, etc. Of course, upon finding out I too was a host of a TV show and

podcaster, he took us into his studio to show us his current show being post produced. DoDo and Arnold said this guy’s show is the number one show in all of Haiti.

After throwing around some of our connections in Haiti, a few business cards later, a view of our website and a clear understanding of our vision, he has offered us a 16X12 office/classroom space – at his corporate office ALREADY EQUIPPED WITH SATELIGHT POWER – on the side of a mountain 15 degrees cooler than the town below – 10 minute drive to Baptist Haiti Mission on the same road – 5 minutes from a Guest House that he owns which is almost a mansion – electricity –  a private locked entrance for our students – shared bathroom for our offices – RENT FREE.

We pay for utilities and monthly internet KBs, between $500 and $700 per month total!!! It was so obviously a God moment and nothing short of a miracle to us! There are a few logistical issues to work out. For exampleI am not sure how many KB I will need to run 5 laptops simultaneously, date of semester start times, etc., but the most challenging prayer and major purpose of this trip was answered 5 hours after we arrived on Haitian soil.

Curt and I are looking now at a budget, etc – we need to bring down a small team this summer to build a wall separating this huge office space he has into two separate rooms, build some work stations, paint, and of course start interviewing potential students.

Pastor Joel - everyone knows him; both the heads major organizations and the poor Haitians who has a TV and can watch his show – he is a man of good character and has been in business decades in Haiti. Did I mention he is married to a feisty Italian!!??

Once some of the details are ironed out logistically we will make a contract, so everyone is on the same page. He has been praying for years for tuition free online university to come to Haiti’s poorest! How cool is that???

After that, we went up to Baptist Haiti Mission to see all of our missionary friends. Deborah and Kirk had a baby girl last week at the Baptist Hospital. This makes 5 kids for them. Chris Lieb is – as usual – running from pillar to post trying to get it all done. Prior to the earthquake he had a sound studio built outside his office that he is very proud of. We saw all the damage to the mission compound – the brand new convention center, bathrooms, and workers living spaces fell into the side of the mountain during the quake. About 2 dozen Haitian men were still removing all the rubble with small shovels while we were there.

Back at the hotel, Curt and I were just in shock about the whole day. It was A LOT to process in one day. And now, as I sit here in my queen size bed under the air conditioner typing furiously I wonder what today will bring.

The plan is to go to downtown and see the damage, visit Crann computer college to speak with the Dean about how our students are doing, eat, then go back to Do Do’s house for a meeting with Veronique (the mother of our adoptive daughter), our students, and graduates, then eat a big meal prepared by Geraldine (DoDo’s wife).

Pray for safety, for me not to be overwhelmed. I sensed God speak to me and say: “Welcome to your new job. A new vision to help my people.” It was confirmation to me in my spirit that we are on the right track.

Talk to you soon,

Kris

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Kristen Hertzog

Executive Director

Haitian Connection Network

kristenhertzog@gmail.com

www.haitianconnectionnetwork.org

www.haitiinfocus.com