Wednesday & Thursday

On Wednesday we headed up the mountain to Baptist Haiti Mission (read more here: http://www.bhm.org/). We visited the bakery, museum, "zoo", and gift shop/restaurant. 

We ate lunch at BHM...and our view wasn't too shabby! :)

From there, we heading up to The Overlook. From here you can see all of Port au Prince! I love coming up here for many reasons...one of the most obvious is the beauty! Another is to understand that it is really not that big of a city (geographically speaking), but when you're in the middle of all the hustle and bustle, in hours of traffic...it sure seems much bigger!  

 This view really puts it into perspective! You can see the Caribbean on the left all the way to Lake Azuei on the far right! 

On the way back down the mountain we got a sneak peak at one of the beautiful, colorful villages!

We stopped at The Apparent Project on our way back to the Guest House and got to see the gift shop and enjoy a refreshing smoothie! The Apparent Project (AP) offers opportunities for Haitians to be able to provide for themselves and their families, empowering them to rise up out of poverty and keep their families together, to avoid relinquishing their children to orphanages. AP helps with distribution and sales of handmade products created from discarded materials (like cereal boxes and oil drums). Here is an amazing video that gives you a little peak inside AP: https://player.vimeo.com/video/161863916

On Thursday we headed north to Titanyen. We passed the mass grave site from the 2010 earthquake. They are turning it into a garden-type memorial. 

There is a wall around it now and they are erecting a monument in the middle. On the walls of the second photograph there is a dedication and the names of many of the donors.    

We headed to Barrett & Carrie Todd's new house. They founded the Sport Disciple program, an international, multi-sport, Christian Discipleship program that raises a new generation of selfless Christian leaders to reach the nations for Christ through sports. Here is a video in which Barrett explains the program (https://youtu.be/n8i7cPkNK1w?list=UU7sVEF3tfK1NeZb4NZkOosQ)

...since this video was created, the soccer fields are up and running! The season starts in July!   

 We "suffered" a little at their new home, swimming and enjoying the view while we waited for a delicious Haitian lunch of chicken, rice & beans, sauce, and smashed/fried plantains. Yum!

From the Todd's house we headed to Rosie's for some refreshing ice cream, smoothies, and mocha frapps and shopped a bit in the boutique (https://kaylagrooters.com/rosies/).

Our last stop of the day before heading back to the Guest House was at a new orphanage the Todd's learned about through their Sport Disciple program. It was quite an experience. Unlike many other orphanages, there is not a wall around the land/compound. The kiddos broke my heart and touched it more than words can express. I hope to post some more pictures soon...but I'm waiting on some women from the group to share them with me via dropbox or email!