Mid-Week Report...TGIF!

The commentary after dinner went something like this: “Megan, are you writing the blog tonight? OK, great!”, and my Dad saying, “Oh, good…we’ll write it together! What’s a blog?” And then after reading through the last few postings, I am anxious about posting my (our) re-cap of the day across the internet and through cyberspace for all to see, but here goes!

We started our day at 5am, which is beginning to feel like a normal wake-up hour…breakfast at 7am (thanks for the scrambled eggs today, Dad!) and we’re all ready for naps and lunch by 10am! At 9am, we headed out towards Port-Au-Prince, hoping that by heading out a little “later” we would avoid the morning rush hour through the streets. Our intention was to go sight-seeing in the downtown, hardest hit areas that are still recovering from the damage of the earthquake over three months ago. Recovery is a tough word to use in order to describe what we saw…the general feeling is that the damage is done, and life is continuing on. It was eye-opening to observe the random devastation spread around the city. We could drive down one block and see two buildings standing and open for business, the next one in a pile of dust that people had to climb over and around in order to get to the next two buildings in the same row that are open and functioning. Rubble is piled in the main streets, making them nearly impassable, and the rubble is piled in the side streets, which are now closed to anything other than foot traffic. Morning rush hour was indescribable before the earthquake, and is now overwhelming to be a part of – thank goodness neither one of us are driving!! Cars that were crushed or have become broken-down, are stopped in their tracks, often in the middle of the road as an obstacle to avoid. We heard the occasional sounds of sirens, presumably coming to the aid of impaired motorists and the few car collisions that we witnessed, but no one could get through to help, and the rest of us were just trying to get by and move on. Roads that were probably designed to be two-lane roads hold 4 cars across, and tap-taps on the sidewalks! Very few traffic lights are visible and honored…we made several maneuvers that required easing our way through inches of space on either side of the truck.

We had the good fortune to stop at a restaurant for lunch and were able to get fries and ice cream – a real treat! Our other errands to hit on the way home included a stop at the “Eco Depot”, a personal favorite of Dad’s…I even lost him temporarily inside, which is typical…he was in his element – right Mom? One more stop at the lumberyard (third stop in three days at this same lumberyard – those guys start smiling and high-fiving when they see us pull up!), where we loaded up with 20 more 2x4x16’s to continue our bench and temporary church re-building in the afternoon. As a point of reference, the lumberyard stop also included a 1x8x14 and a 1x4x14 and the total cost for rough lumber that we will still need to sand, plane and paint cost us $330 (US, not Haitian dollars!) A quick stop at home to load up on icy cold beverages and we returned to the Orphanage – we were able to finish the extension on the church space and re-work the temporary classroom space being used by the preschool and Kindergarten children. Stable roofing, walls and tarps are now in place. One bench proto-type was completed, so our efforts tomorrow will be to mass-produce benches for church on Sunday. Megan and Brad joined the cast of Avatar, and painted the church wall blue…we were pretty messy by the end, but the girls were eager to help and supplied us with rags to clean up (“More blue here, Megan!”)…honestly, how did I paint a wall and end up covered in blue?!

14 hours after we rose, we were seated around our dinner table enjoying time to re-group and refresh our minds and bodies with the conversation and great food provided for us. We are still waiting for the power to come on today so that our batteries (for the power tools…we recharged during dinner!) can be charged up and ready to go for tomorrow…Marie says it will happen – she has FAITH! At this point, we’ve had electricity for about 6-8 hours total in the past four days since we arrived…our flashlights and bug spray are constant companions as the sun begins to set! We have 10 rechargeable batteries to operate our four power tools, and they need to be recharged more frequently than in the States because of the increased temperatures and heat down here. The temperature was a cool 97 degrees in the shade today, with climbing humidity and very little breeze…we’ve got our fingers crossed for a nice evening breeze and maybe even a little rain shower?!? We haven’t felt much of a breeze and have not had any rain all week…Isn’t this the rainy season?

Time to sign off, so we are ready for Bill’s 5am alarm – the one that sounds like a rooster downstairs….I (Megan) still need to try to get a shower in before the water runs out for the night! Until then…

Ed and Megan Grimaldi