The Farrells Full House: Haiti

Ryan came back from Haiti this past Wednesday and wrote the post below on his trip.

I would like to start out by saying I am not a blogger. This is my first blog post and I thought it would be appropriate to talk about the recent mission trip I went on.

I decided to go on a mission trip to Haiti. Originally I was going to go to the Amazon, but I felt something compelling me to go to Haiti instead. Out of the 10 people that were going, 8 were from Immanuel and I only knew 1. The two people that were not from the Church turned out to be invaluable. They are two younger guys that were born and raised in Haiti until the age of 5, then they moved to the states. They now live in Arkansas and play football for another one of the guys on the trip. They not only served as all important translators, but they also added a sense of calm to the group that was refreshing.

The journey started for me one day when an email went out to the Haiti group that said our Pastor in Haiti was expecting someone in the group to preach. I began to feel convicted and let our group leader know that I did not want to, but if no one else would step up, I would do it. I have never preached before and this made me extremely nervous and anxious. Lance (our group leader) informed me that no one else would probably want to, so I should start preparing. Through the help of my MasterLIfe teachers, Bob Beach and Chris Ahne, and some helpful tips from others, I started to form a sermon around Discipleship, Obedience, and the Disciple's Cross.

I worked on the sermon for about two weeks off and on, and the night I finished I let Wendy read it. Her response: "It's really booky"... Yikes. Basically I had come up with a dissertation on discipleship that would put most people to sleep... Then having to feed it through a translator, it was sure to bomb. This made me feel a lot better about the whole situation. I decided I would put it up and finish it later on the trip... Hopefully being able to pull it out of the dictionary it seemed to fit in.

The trip started out about as smooth as it finished. I had come down with what was probably strep throat and needed a personal favor from a friend to call in a zpak. Luckily he was able to and I hoped this would make me better. We were slated to leave Thursday February 21 around 6 in the morning. I got a call at 9:30 the night before letting me know that our flight had been cancelled and that I needed to finish packing (I hadn't even started yet) and get to the church at midnight. In order to make it to Haiti before Saturday, we would have to make our connecting flight in Dallas. We would leave at 12:30 am and make our connection. Tensions were a little high at first because it had been icing and no one knew the conditions of the roads.

We made it to Dallas alright and then Miami. It was about this time my voice completely left me and I felt a fever coming on. Once we landed in Haiti, I began to feel better, probably because of nervous adrenaline. We witnessed our first drama as some men outside were about to throw down over a tip we didn't need to pay them for handling our bags. Our pastor had arranged some help and I am not sure where these guys fit in. Regardless, we paid them off and continued on to our Missionary house.

Driving through downtown Port au Prince was a different experience. Roads went from bad to worse. The devastating effects of the earthquake were immediately noticeable and the whole place seemed to be rock, concrete, and trash. People were lined up everywhere trying to peddle goods, scrap through the trash, and find something to eat. As we pulled up to the house we would be staying at, I saw our armed guard that I referred to as "Shades". I am not sure if his shotgun made me feel better or not. He looked like a Haitian version of the Terminator. The house was pretty good and the bathrooms were interesting. It was here I pondered the same question every morning... What's the point of a stall if the door closed against the toilet? Hot water was not a luxury we had on this trip, nor consistent AC. Usually we were too tired to care though. The pastor let us on to some helpful information... To Haitians all us "blondes" (Americans) look alike. I thought this was incredibly funny.

Loading up the van with the armed guard in the background

Pastor Sanousse in front of the missionary house

The first full morning we made our way to the first spot of the Eye Clinic we would be setting up. We carried about 300 lbs of gear with us including a refractometer, 2000 pairs of glasses, a laptop, and a small printer. Our mission was to give sight to the blind and share the salvation story with those that needed to hear it by way of salvation beads. We would pass the time everyday by jokingly starting a rift between warehouse workers (inventory) and office people (laptop and refractometer). This would also help as a divergence against everything we saw. We set up shop in Kenscoff, a small settlement a couple of thousand feet up in the mountains.

Tent Town in Kescoff

Setting up eye clinic

Carrying some equipment to the church

Figuring it all out

Local potty... I called it a "lean to" because you had to lean against the wall to go number 2.

Familiar site. Trash just littering the ground

The view was beautiful and almost made you forget about the devastation below. We had to hike about a quarter mile up the mountain because our small van loaded down with 14 - 16 people at all times couldn't quite make the trip. Once at the church, I noticed something. Trash. Everywhere. In town it was easy to disregard it amongst the sites, but up here it just stood out. It is just a way of life for the Haitian people. I saw empty Styrofoam everywhere along with bottles and miscellaneous paper. We saw about 80 people total that day and I learned how to use the computer to try and find matches for peoples prescriptions. It felt good to help them out. Some people had -10 vision in both eyes and had not owned a pair of glasses. Think about the difference that would make.

The next day we set up shop in the Pastor's church in the middle of Port au Prince. We had to drive up a dried out river bed through a market. When we got off the van, I will never forget the smell, sights, and sounds all around me. The river bed was filled with trash, fesces, and broken bottles and more flies per square inch than I have ever seen in my life. The Haitian heat combined with burning plastic and trash in the distance made the aroma that much more inviting. Filling the air was the sound of Haitian music. I don't know who was singing, or what the song was, but I was sure it was a song of grief and despair. You could feel the emotion in the singers voice. I started to look around and noticed half houses, tents, and bunkers stacked ontop of each other seemingly going on forever. In the riverbed was a boy playing with a kite. He seemed to not notice, or care that he was playing in the midst of all this filth. Around him were pigs and goats nosing through the trash for something to eat or a place to plop down in the shade. Everything seemed incredibly surreal to me.

Boy playing in the river bed

View of Port au Prince

Walking equipment up

Pastors Church

Church from back looking forward

Outside the church and the roof

View from my post. I wish those warehouse guys would get back to work

180 degree panorama from church roof

We made our way through the labyrinth of housing and up the hillside. Seemingly out of nowhere we popped into the church. This was little more than a concrete bunker with windows. Somewhere in the Church I felt a presence. It was a sharp reminder that God can use anyone and anyplace to further His cause and message of hope and salvation.

As we saw patients that day, kids would be looking in on us with curiosity through the windows. The police came by with loaded shotguns and asked if we could see them as well. Who in their right mind would say no? The whole time they were being seen and trying on glasses, I just kept praying that they would find something they wanted... And that the gun laying against a pew pointed at my buddies head would cooperate. Thankfully it did. A little later a woman brought her son up to be seen. I could barely look. A thyroid problem had pushed his eyes out to the point of busting and deformed his face and body. We couldn't get a good reading with his eyes being the way they were. He was so happy to be seen and wanted a pair so bad. I didn't know how to react to this. Here was a boy whose life is literally ticking away and the simple joy of a pair of glasses was all he was focused on. He needed serious medical attention but that luxury was not available. I still don't know how to process that whole situation. Later we saw two witch doctors as well that were drunk. All in all it was a very emotional day. We ended up seeing about 100 people and gave away 120 pairs of glasses including readers.

That night I would concentrate on rewriting my sermon. I had talked to the pastor and he kept referring to love. I needed to rewrite the entire message of discipleship and obedience into a message of love for Christ and the love of Christ. I needed to add some personal examples of how prayer and meditation would change my life forever and how the saving grace of Christ is sometimes only evident when your life has hit rock bottom. I would concentrate on my own journey, my own mistakes, my own black pit that I found my life in, and how only Christ could pull me out and turn my life around.

The next morning in the church we had given out glasses the day before, in an open air service that filled the hills, I gave my testimony and life story to a group of Haitian believers through the translations of Pastor Sanousse. As much as I would like to think the Holy Spirit made an impact on that small church that day, that my sermon on the importance of creating disciples for Christ would change someone, it was me that was probably most effected. I probably will never experience the goose bumps I did that day ever again. This church had one outlet, a keyboard that kept messing up, a bass, and a drum set that looked like it was held together by duct tape. Somehow this set up produced the most raw and honest worship I have ever heard. The sound of the voices, the crying out, the singing to God that I heard that day raised my hair and still gives me goosebumps as I think about it. The worship that came from those peoples mouths was pure and you could feel the reliance on God to provide. No lights, no powerpoints, not even 4 walls, and God was alive and well in that place.

The only thought that kept passing through my mind was why do most people have to be broken before they are willing to pour out their hearts for God? Why must we think that we have it all figured out when we are comfortable and doing well? I could only dream of the services and worship that would come out of our own church if everyone had the reliance on God that half these people did.

View outside the church

People even try to sell us things in the van

View from on top of the mountain

Monument down town just before my curse

Wonder if they are FDIC insured

Preaching in Haiti

Paintings were everywhere

I am convinced that the number one industry is Beauty Salons

After church we went on a short tour around town. We got out of the van in front of where the palace used to be. As I was walking around the common space in front, I felt a presence different from in the church. I turned around to see a man following me about 3 feet behind. He kept with me stride for stride and the look in his eyes is hard to describe. He kept following me and playing with something in his hand. He kept mouthing things and wouldn't look at anyone else. I went and stood next to our group and he stood with me. I tried shaking him and couldn't so finally I ran back to the van and shut the door. He stood outside for a while continuing to stare daggers at me and finally went to the front of the van and did some weird dance and left. I am pretty sure he was either insane or put a voodoo hex on me.

On Monday, my birthday, we went to another part of Haiti about 2 hours away, but about only 20 miles or so. We never seemed to get away from traffic or roads that had man sized craters in them, so travel took a while. I was feeling a little confused at this point. We had thought we were helping people out all week, but everywhere we looked, it was just despair. I was never the one fitting the glasses on people, so I never really saw any reinforcement that we were making a difference. We pulled up to the Church we were setting up in that day and it was completely made out of signs and tarps. A lonely generator supplied the power to the one outlet we would have to use for all of our equipment. The power kept cutting on and off and somehow we saw 160 people that day.

On the way back, a few minutes down the road, God would provide me with the reinforcement I needed. We passed an old man walking down the road and when he turned around, I saw a pair of glasses on his face that still had the tag. The only think bigger than those frames was the smile on his face. As we passed, he gave us two big thumbs up and a happy wave. That let me know we made a real difference. That was the best birthday present I could have gotten.

Day care center

View of some of the equipment

Inside the tent church

Trying on glasses. Edge of Darkness movie poster made half the roof

Rick contemplating his next piece of sage advice

At least in America you get thrown in jail before you get molested

Birthday celebration. Sugar cane cokes and Haitian ice cream

The next day was bittersweet. We were leaving. I wanted to get back and see Wendy and my girls, but to just leave this place seemed wrong. We arrived at the airport and the drama started. Our plane kept getting delayed and finally we knew we wouldn't meet any of our connections. We ended up staying in the Haitian airport for almost 8 hours before we took off. That was the beginning of our 25 hour track home.

Looking back, I am happy I went... Even if I did get a curse. It is a reminder that we are incredibly blessed. I felt the undeniable presence of God amongst the trash in the river bed. I heard a lot of sage advice from a guy named Rick. I got to know some good friends (who enjoyed dry humor and running their mouths about as much as I do to pass the time) and hopefully helped raise the quality of life for some 300 people, if even a little bit. Hopefully our visit was an encouragement to the believers and gave them the strength to continue serving Gods mission amongst the challenges they face every day.