Church, cabaret and school tomorrow!

Good afternoon everyone!

I just wanted to write a quick post to you before dinner to tell you about my day so far... I went to my first church service at the Church of Hope this morning. It was so neat to gather and worship together with all of the Haitian people. The whole service is done in creole, so I didn't understand much of it, but a lot of the songs that we sang, I was familiar with the english version, so as soon as I recognized the tune I would sing the english words. It was a neat experience!

After church, Rachel invited me to go along with her and Patris (a Haitian friend of hers who works on the mission), into Cabaret for lunch. She said that usually on Sundays she takes a trip to her favorite Haitian restaurant called Yolty's. So we went down to the road and waited for a tap tap (Haitian taxi) to come and pick us up. Once one came along we jumped in the back of the truck and held onto the wooden fence around the outside. It was quite a ride! 

But as we entered the village of Cabaret, I was stunned at what I saw... As you probably know, Cabaret was one of the areas in Haiti that was hit very hard during hurricane Gustav. I could hardly believe my eyes as we drove... Cement homes literally torn to pieces and roads totally washed out. And yet the people were still carrying on their regular routines washing their clothes in the dirty water and selling their goods along the roadside. I hope I can figure out how to post pictures in this blog which will help you get a glimpse of the disaster.

So once we reached the restaurant, Rachel and Patris led me inside where stray dogs and chickens wandered freely under the tables and into the kitchen... I tried not to think about it as I ate, but the food was really good! I had fried bananas and chicken with rice and a haitian sauce. Delicious!

When we finished, we walked through the village and Patris bought two large sticks of sugar cane for us. We jumped back onto the tap tap and when we arrived back at the mission he cut the outside off and gave me a piece... I had never had anything like it in my life. Rachel taught me how to eat it by biting off a chunk and sucking out the juice and then spitting out the bark remains... It was really good!

So now I am back in my apartment and could just about go for a nap!

I want to ask you before I go to keep my in your prayers tomorrow morning as I start my first official day of teaching. With so much going on, I really haven't spent much time preparing these last few weeks, and although the first week will be a lot of settling into a routine and establishing the routines, I hope that I can spark a passion and excitement for learning with my kids. So pray that I have enthusiasm and good ideas for our first week together.

I will try to post sometime this coming week and let you all know how it is going!

Thank you so much for your prayers! Love, Diana