Day 5: The Market

The beginning of the day was a little bittersweet as we realized it would be the last full day here in Haiti. Breakfast was eggs, fruit and toast again. We loaded up the trucks for one last trek up the mountain and went on our way.

When we got there, we split up in to 3 groups to do home visits. I was put in Tom's group which was bound to be entertaining. After a short walk we arrived at a modestly sized house for rural Haiti. When we actually walked up to the house we saw the woman who lived there washing her floors.

We were encouraged to ask whatever questions came to mind. Mostly they centered around general stuff, what her day looks like, how old her baby was, etc. Their way of life is so simple compared to ours, but it seems like they are way happier as a whole. We were invited to walk around in her house which was 4 rooms, a dining room, a bedroom, a smaller bedroom and a partially outdoor patio type thing that she was washing the floor of when we walked up. She had some kind of nice furniture, a fairly nice bed and stuff but she had a separated kitchen thing. There was no chimney, just the roof was about 6 inches above the walls to let smoke out.

The girls helped the woman shell beans for the week while Tom, Alex and I talked to Francky and his brother Charles hi was with us. We asked if they wanted any help but they didn't need it. Kayla held the woman's daughter and played with her. 

We walked back down to the cars after a while and played with the kids for a bit. A bunch of them had heard we were going to buy things they made so they all made little bead necklaces out of some string and a plant that happens to be hollow. I bought one for a dollar and I'm probably going to hang it from my rearview mirror or something. The people of Chadirac set up a market with coffee, hand made bags made out of woven thatch (I think), and embroidered cloth goods. I bought an orange thing for my girlfriend and a red and blue thing because it was cheap and the lady selling it was really persistent.

I bought the necklace later from the vendors outside our hotel. When we got done with that we went back to the cars to play with the kids. We had another little dance party and I blew bubbles for them to pop. The kids in the pic aren't really dancing but this is right when we started before they really understood what was going on.

We played with them for about 2 hours and I taught a kid the English words for a few things, writing the words on concrete in chalk. No matter where we went the kids followed us, you could tell they knew we would be leaving them again, and this time we wouldn't come back.

When we had to leave we hugged and said goodbye to the kids. I found Tooie (Tiwil) and told him that I'd be back next year if the group comes again which I hope it does. I really hope he understood.

We left and started to go back to the hotel but had to stop halfway down the mountain and pull off the "road" to let a planet sized dump truck up the road. It may have been a normal sized dump truck but on these roads just looked bigger, but I'm pretty sure it was the size of a small planet. I didn't get a picture of it because I was just dumbfounded that a truck that size was climbing a 50° plus incline around a hairpin turn.

Anyway, when we got back to the hotel, we bought some stuff from the vendors outside the hotel. They all pretty much had the exact same stuff so it was clear they bought it somewhere else and were just reselling it, so I didn't feel bad talking the price down.

After that we had dinner, it was the best red snapper I have ever had along with what was probably goat, mixed vegetables, potatoes, and rice.

Being the last night here, during our worship service, we prayed for almost 2 hours straight, shared our PODs and sang. Tomorrow we are leaving early to go and do the tour we were supposed to do during the first day in Port-au-prince.