History

July 2010 Recap:
Another big trip of 30 people we worked with the kids at Kay Anj, on a bridge, on micro loans, at baseball practices.  We all really bonded as a team, sharing insights and joys every evening at “Roses and Thorns”.   We also saw the birth of our matching non-governmental organization in Haiti: Espoir Haitien.
January 2010 Recap:
Michael led a team of 30 people that worked on a variety of projects. These projects included the staffing volunteers at “The Haiti Mission” Clinic, providing food and medicines to the Cap Haitien hospital servicing Port Au Prince earthquake victims, installing a solar pump to provide water running at the Helping Haitian Angels Orphanage, putting up street lights up in Bel Aire, painting a community church and building a bathroom, building a large playground in the city park, building a house for two elderly women, building a school, distributing 1000 meals in the Bel Air neighborhood, donating 500 lbs rice to an earthquake refugee camp, and sending a doctor and medical supplies to a hospital in Gonaive with earthquake victims.
Jan 2011 trip: Canceled.
The state department issued a strong warning for travel to Haiti in January because of the political instability around the elections. Our sister groups and the United Methodist Volunteers in Mission canceled their trips. Our primary contact in Haiti asked us to wait to come. With disappointment we canceled this trip.
July 2012 trip:
We once again headed back to Cap Haitian to work on sustainable engineering projects. We worked on making street lights to help increase the safety and security of the streets of Bel Aire. We also worked on putting a roof on the new EH office so that we could begin to make use of the space and meeting with local churches and other communities leads. The goal is for the EH office to be a central meeting area for multiple groups. Hopefully, in the future the office will be used to teach English, hold Bible studies, teach small groups of people some vocational skills and to host a food program.
On this trip we also had a dentist who was able to work with Dr. Ray’s medical team. She pulled a lot of teeth in the Grison Guarde area and help greatly to reduce pain and suffering in that area.
One of my personal highlights was that one of the team members brought their guitar and played music nearly daily. At the Mont Joli, he played music with the Haitian musicians and even gave them a harmonica. It was a joy to watch and listen to people who can’t speak the same language, make music together.
As always, we left with a strong desire to come back and a heavy heart at all the work that still needs to be done. We stand committed to our motto of “little bit by little bit, we will arrive.”