Bamboo, English and Konsey Updates

Tuesday turned out warm like yesterday reaching the low 90's added by the nights not cooling off as much as earlier in the month.

Late last week Cory only gave the new timber bamboo a 60% chance of living after the trip North as both plants lost most of their leaves. 

Today at noon in full sun neither plant's leaves drooped and both plants pushed out new leaves this week!

So unless something eats them both should survive their move to the North. 

Cory and guys continue to prepare the yard for the team. Cory repotted some plants as we prepare for the warmer, drier weather. 

Anna continues to practice volleyball with the school team.

Eli started a new ministry today by taking some time after school to help Dr. Winick, our local dentist to practice his English pronunciation.

This will be a mutually beneficial relationship as Dr. Winick helps Eli with his French and Creole.

Our French professor showed up yesterday for the first time after the Warsaw team. I'd assumed he did not come on the 13th or other days because the local school is on vacation.

He'd assumed we would call and confirm.

He completed editing the Konsey book so I gave him a few new topics I plan to add to the next edition.

We plan to have French tomorrow afternoon and then restart following the KCC team's visit next week. 

9 April 2010

A bit of a cool front this week makes it feel like spring in the north.

School went well. Still waiting for the standardized tests to come in the mail.

Went down to clinic a few times. Now Chris does most of the questions and exams while I translate, clarify and add bits and pieces. The young internist even asked me advice on a case. An elderly man, bitten on the leg 20 days ago-his blood pressure is very high, some chronic edema some acute. All in all he looked good for a 90 year old in Haiti.

The last couple of weeks the kids and I combine tree planting with school work. Agricultural Day falls on May 1st in Haiti. This year it will be on a Saturday but we plan for Cory to visit 2-3 schools on Friday or Monday. As of right now 1001 small plastic cups planted with tree seeds sit by the house.

Some are needed for the clinic patients as well.

Chris and Kathleen finished up their English classes with testing this week. They will share one more week with us before their return to the USA on the 18th. We will miss them.

Cory happily hauled in dirt with charcoal dust and rice hulls this week by the truck load. He also connected with a man in Port Margot who may be able to purchase and transport culture multiplied cooking bananas from the Dominican Republic for a very good price.

Lots of spring flowers brightening up my house and yard. Guess at their names and then I'll see if Cory can help me identify the ones I do not know.

Dec. 5th

We enjoyed a FAST couple hour visit from some of the team from LaGonave yesterday. They arrived just as Chris and I were walking up after finishing clinic.

Our Christmas decorations are now spread around the living room and we received our first Christmas card this week. The decorations will stay up until the end of

January when my folks come for a visit.

It may be in the 80's and sunny out but the Christmas carols still fill the air with cheerful notes that bring up lots of good family memories.

Thankful that our daily prayer partners for the clinic in December now number over 60! And many have told us that they are sharing the request with others. Thank you.

A new prayer request is for our baby Moringa trees-the ones that the kids are planting in cups. Some kind of illness or disease has attacked many of the trees. We continue to give out the healthy looking ones but Eli has over 100 in the 'sick area'.

Chris and Kathleen have completed their first English classes. Shortly they will start filling up their second set of classes.

Oct. 10th

Saturday, Cory is out 'playing' with his new toy. With all the rain around here it is a constant battle to keep the weeds at bay. Some you would recognise as mild house plants but went growing in the tropics they can be come monsters! So Cory is going to see if a weed whacker can help.

Chris and Kathleen survived their first week of English classes. A few issues still to work out but all in all I think they have done very well during their first 7 weeks. They are still learning and processing the experience on a daily basis. Thanks for praying for them.

Cory's birthday is coming up on Monday. Some of the early presents that he bought with money from his folks this summer were orchids. Now the ones he brought from the USA are still small but he bought a larger one on his last trip to Port-au-Prince. Here is it's first bloom. He is hoping in time that the selling of orchids could be a small business opportunity for someone.

We had a good week at school and clinic. [Picture of kids with local guavas. Cory's first dragon fruit]

It was a relief to see Dr. Viximar back and to know that the new doctor was going to work twice a week. Thanks to everyone who remembered to pray for me during my 'solo' days.

PLEASE don't stop praying. As it so often happens in my life I trip up when I let down my guard. The last two Saturdays I was on call. I was prepared to have the clinic call me but when your ready and prepared----nothing happens. So today-happy in the knowledge that I have the weekend off who comes to the door but the nurse.......for 'hiccups?!?!?'

I didn't respond well. I instantly became defensive and grumpy. But she said she thought that they would go on to Limbee if they weren't seen by the doctor. While I didn't actually stomp my feet I was on the inside- I hadn't even had breakfast yet.

I wish I could report that by the time I walked to clinic the Lord had changed my heart but I can't. I grumbled my way though questions-further frustrated with the fact that the gentleman had had no appetite, stomach pains and frequency on urination for over a month while visiting another country. "What county could you possibly been visiting that didn't have a clinic or doctor?? Were you on a star?" Yep I really said this.

After a whole month of waiting they come on a day when the laboratory is closed. So after the exam showed nothing serious, and some counseling about losing weight, returning for labs, and following for his diabetes and high blood pressure I returned home.

It was on the walk back that I finally heard the Lord softly speaking about my attitude. SIGH! Will I ever grow-up and lose this selfish part of me? I'll apologize to the nurse and if I have a chance to the gentleman.

So keep praying!! The Lord isn't done with me yet. I'm amazed that He can work through sinners like me.And for that I'm thankful. Thankful as well that He is a Lord of grace, forgiveness and unconditional love because I fall short so often. Thanks Lord.

18th Sept. 09

94 degrees F and hazy. Almost 3 p.m. and school is winding down. Cory took a half hour walk to Genner's garden and graphed some mango trees. He reports that despite the delay of the rainy season and need for rain-the trees still look good. Some crops are hurting while others are still doing fine.

We are happy to report that the Moringa Mountain Project has restarted-since last Saturday we have planted 330 Moringa seeds in small cups. Chris and I are giving out the last few trees that remain in cups from the plantings last spring.

Chris and Kathleen have now passed the one month mark. They are preparing to start testing and interviews for the two English classes scheduled to start Oct. 1st.

In preparation for the rains we have also been rounding up some of the pretty pink crocuses that are scattered thought out the lawn. They are now being planted near the edges of sidewalks [where some were already growing]. The foreground group were there while the others were transplanted the day before the photo.

21 Jan 09

Windy out with a breeze and 81 degrees. Clouds covering the sun. The smell of fresh cut grass and sounds of kids playing are in the air. I can also hear the guys working in the garden, Anna chatting and Eli in the kitchen working on science.

Yesterday Cory tried to help a few guys see the Presidential Inauguration but... We rarely watch video feed on the computer and never for very long. So about 10 Cory set up the computer for them on the table outside. Just as the important people had arrived we reached the limit of our Internet usage for the day. The rest of the day we could sent and received E-mails only very slowly and no video.

English class we talked about jail, prison, words ending in 'ay' and colors. Next week I will not be leading the class as we will be at the airport picking up the folks. YEAH for our side!

We are all trying to clean up and prepare for the team. Cory plans on picking up cargo and shopping tomorrow in Cap.

Unfortunately the banana plants he was hoping to pick up will not be on the plane. The paperwork couldn't be done on Monday-a US holiday and then they found that they need an import permit for part of the paperwork. So we don't know if we'll be able to get bananas yet.

14 Jan. 2009

Had hot chocolate this morning as we were a bit chilly. Nothing near you guys in the North but 70 in the tropics is cool. Sunny days and no rain but still heavy dew. Trees are growing.

We have now completed our 100th lesson of Sonlight. We rush ahead with the books that mom reads out loud. The children just told me that if we get finished early they will come up with books for me to read.

Cory spent yesterday getting things ready for a order of 700 baby banana plants from the USA next week. To fill pots and plastic sacks he went and got four truck loads of rice hulls from the local mill. The owners are related to the gardener and were happy to let him have the hulls in exchange for some plants.

The pile of hulls had partially burned-Cory didn't mind as he would of mixed in charcoal dust to improve the soil but now he will not need as much.

English class was interesting. I can hardly get anyone to talk. Finally after asking several times what topics they would find interesting we had the following list: jail, the presidential inauguration, soccer, police, and immigration. Should be interesting but not as hard as 'the universe'.

Planted another 100 Moringa seeds today. A few of them had already sprouted with a germination test. Found 3 cups with double trees and so separated them. We now have a total of 900 cups planted as part of the Moringa Mountains Project.

As part of the straighten up the house campaign yesterday we sorted video tapes. In hind-sight we should of left more video tapes on LaGonave. No one told us that they would be in danger of molding. So we packed up a large box to send back to LaGonave with videos for little children. Also had to throw out a bunch who had fuzzy mold growing on the edges of the tapes-SIGH.