This is an 18month year old girl I was able to hold while at the RC.  Same age as IzzieI woke today to Roosters outside my window and the sound of people getting their water from the pump that is also there.  In Haiti most all families don’t’ have electricity and water is brought to your home by fetching it.  Life and routine here is different.  My mind still can’t wrap itself around the living conditions of the people here.  I wish I could explain it to you but I can’t.  I think you have to actually come to a third world country to ever have any understanding of it.  To them its life they have always known and they and can’t comprehend anything different because they don’t know anything different.  But for me it’s looking at things through the lens of eyes that know better.  The one thing that remains true I think that is that Haitian people are very strong.  To be old here in Haiti and live a life means you are a strong person.  I see many strong people as I pass by on the roads here.  Strong, beautiful people.  I see many kids here as well.  They seem to outnumber the older people.  I think that is because life expectancy here is shorter than  most places.

We loaded the truck today for a 1.5 hr ride to see Licia at the RC.  I have been waiting for a while for this day.  It was everything I expected but nothing I expected.  Can that happen?  The place was much smaller than I thought it would be.  There were more kids there than I thought there were.  What Lori and Licia are doing is amazing.  From the clinic to the RC they are devoting their lives to helping people.  The clinic was closed for today but on any given day there are 200+people that come through.  I played hard with kids today.  Tried to smile and tell them Belle a lot which means “beautiful”.  To all the people who are making the lives of these kids different thank you.  Licia… you are my hero.  I know I am just another face you look at but to me when I look at you I see this amazing woman who gets it.  Who knows God has called and is calling her to something and you live each and everyday giving your life away.  That is what it’s all about right?  To give your life away? I want to give my life away.  Thanks for being that example to me.

Adoption – I promised myself that I would not think about it while I was here this week.  However each and every day I am finding that I am thinking about it every minute of each and ever day here.  Why is that?  Why can’t I just not think about it.  So I think, dream, watch Aaron and Jamie with Story and Amos.  Watch the Livesay family and their beautiful children and then I dream about our own journey toward adoption.  My husband wrote in a letter he sent me to read when on the plane that he was excited and ready to follow my lead on our journey in my personal passion for adoption for our family.  I wonder if he will be wanting to eat those words when I get back.  This trip has done nothing but confirm to me the need that children have here for families and for freedom from a life of poverty and it’s only been the first day.  I can’t wait to start our journey.  I’ve been able to gather some wonderful information while here and will be hopefully visiting an orphanage on Thursday before we leave that seems to be a place that comes so highly recommended if you are going to start the adoption process here in Haiti.  Maybe one of the reasons for this trip was to be able to get access to this information.  Who knows.

So that is day 2.  I am still blown away by the people in this country and their way of life or lack of life.  It does not seem fair.  To see freedom and plenty and see a people who are not free and don’t have… It sits very heavy on my heart tonight.