Day 3

Getting up at 7:30AM is now starting to become normal, my usual wake summer wake up time is around noon so the past couple of mornings have been rough. I was late for breakfast and just grabbed a croissant and a water and headed to the van. We first headed to pick up cleaning supplies at a local store in downtown Hinche. Mops, brooms, glass cleaner, buckets, pine sol, and many other clean utensils we got. I didn’t hang around much to see how much all of it cost but I’m sure it was a ridiculous amount of money being that all the things we bought have to be imported into the country. We also stopped and bought some fans for inside the buildings. The shop we bought the fans from didn’t have electricity, so Dustin and James went across the street to a shop that did have electricity and made sure they worked. Next we went to purchase more drinks (coke and water). We buy bottled water and coke everyday, it would make more sense if we just bought a big quantity of it at once but we just buy the drinks and ice for our cooler before heading out to work for the day. While we were stopped buying our items I decided to get out of the van and introduce myself to the people we buy our drinks from everyday. I met three little girls named Yoland, CiCi, and Stefanie.


I sat and talked with them and Stefanie’s mother for about 5 minutes showing them pictures of people who have bought I love Haiti T-shirts from me. Haitians really get a big kick out of seeing all the people I have sold shirts to and taken pictures with. They smile and laugh. Every picture I have taken with a girl they ask if this is my girl friend, and I say no es zanmi mwen (no its my friend) they usually always laugh about that. All of my black friends who have bought a shirt from me they ask if that person is Haitian and I say no il amerikan. It really is a lot of fun showing the album around and letting Haitians see all my good friends that have supported their country with money and the awareness and love the shirt shows. After that we headed back to the hotel to grab things that we had forgotten. Finally we headed on the bumpy road to the orphanage.

Once we got to the orphanage we started unloading the van and got straight to cleaning. We started on the visitors quarters. Each and every room need to be swept and mopped and the window slides needed to be cleaned again. Four rooms total and two bathrooms. We went to work sweeping, and mopping. None of these buildings have air conditioning and it sometimes is even hotter in the buildings than it is outside. We skipped lunch again, to continue working taking advantage of the daylight we had, the buildings don’t have electricity yet. Finally we finished all the rooms and bathrooms and that concluded our work for the day. James took some of the group to see the orphanage school that is being built right next to the orphanage compound. I decided that taking a nap under a tree sounded more appealing, so I’ll check out the school some other time. Once they came back we loaded back into the van and headed back to the hotel.



Daryl and I cleaning.. its so much fun!

We got a litte break before we headed out for diner so I decided to take a shower. During the day we don’t have power because the generator is only on at night. So I took a cold shower in the dark. The shower I have doesn’t really have a shower head, its more like a faucet. None the less after a long days work I would shower in any cold water even if it came out of a straw. The soap I shower with is a medicated soap the hotel provides us with. Its called Fitso and is suppose to eliminate and protect me from bacteria. The water people shower with in Haiti isn’t safe to drink so I guess the soap helps. Even though I shower in dirty water my soap is designed to kill the bacteria… makes sense?? Well anyway I’m sure to keep my mouth closed during my showers and I use bottled water to brush my teeth. To be honest I don’t even wash my hands in the water from the faucet. I have hand sanitizer that I use to cleanse my hands. After my shower I got dressed and hung out around the pool area with Dustin, Jenna and Darly before we departed for diner. .

We were having diner at another hotel here in Hinche. This hotel is located on the other side of the city and the roads leading to it are three times worse than the roads to the orphanage compound. Finally we arrive to the hotel and it pretty far outside of downtown Hinche. The hotel is located on top of a hill and is very well put together. The landscaping and hotel design was very impressive. We walked into the bar and restaurant area and sat down. We were brought a typical Haitian meal, rice and beans, some sort of meat (in this case it was chicken), plantain, and a vegetable tray. Haven skipped lunch I was starving so I loaded my plate with, rice and beans, some corn from the veggie tray and put some creole sauce on top of all of it. I’m not a big fan of plantain so I didn’t even bother getting any. I brought with me two packets light tuna that I had brought from the states. I just tore into those and mixed it in with my rice and beans, corn, and creole sauce. Two plates of that and a coke was diner. After diner we headed back to our hotel. When we got back we made plans for the next day and headed to our rooms.