The other side of the donation chain

I receive a text message from the Pastor just before dinner was to be served asking me to come down to the orphanage to help with something. I responded that I would be right down, asked the other missionaries to wrap a plate of diner for me, and headed down.

On my mind was that the Pastor wanted to talk about our trip next week to Cäiman or perhaps something about the rest of the week. The reality I found out when I got there was that he was expecting some chairs and wanted some help with the unloading. I thought sure, I'd love to help out, love doing this type of stuff in Haiti.

I probably should have started getting suspicious when more and more strong young men started to show up. It began to look like Pastor called in a lot of the young men from the church. And the the truck came.

Not a pickup truck. Not even a box truck. A full shipping container in the back of a truck. We opened it up and it was packed floor to ceiling.

The good news was it contained student classroom desks (with gum still on the bottom) and brand new mattresses. It also contained lots of firefighter gear which was a bit puzzling and I asked the Pastor if he was planning to start his own fire department. He said that it was to donate to the city.

So into the truck Frandzy and I went and worked at a pretty good pace until the container was empty and everything was in the centre's courtyard. It was important to empty the truck quickly as it was not able to fully back into the centre and was blocking the street. I am glad it was evening, because I can't imagine how hot inside that container would be in the heat of the day.

With the truck unloaded the next task was to move the desks to the second floor classrooms and the rest to the third floor storage. Again, thankfully not the heat of the day. Everyone chipped in and we went from a full container to everything where it needed to be in about two hours. Even some of the older children pitched in and I am very impressed with their strength and stamina; both the boys and the girls.

The children and even some of the older "children" enjoyed trying on the firefighter gear.

Once done it was back to the guest house. My mission mates brought out the food, ice, and cola. That iced cola never tasted so goo and a big thank you to them for saving me diner.

Tonight I pray a a prayer of thanks for the donation to the centre and for all the hands that helped unload it. I pray that it will be put to God glory to help educate and care for the children. I also offer a prayer of thanks for my mission mates for the help tonight. Amen.

Location:Ruelle Samba,Port-au-Prince,Haiti