![]() Thanks to the generous support of Rendez-vous: Haiti’s friends, I brought shoes, clothing, jewelry for a start-up boutique stall, four solar powered chargers, funds for 8 months electricity bill, two new sewing machines to make and repair school uniforms and we are able to cover the tuition for the second year at the university so that Mirlaine and Samuel can hope to become teachers. During the summer they both worked at the Foyer and each earned a few dollars that will be used for books, and such things as printing the required documents. Maud gives them rice to eat that they can prepare themselves. Their issues remain to feed themselves (how to purchase the needed propane to cook with and other ingredients to flavor the rice and have a more complete diet? They also need the rent money and funds to pay for electricity and to buy drinking water. To make things harder, Maud has recently been told that all 6 young adults living in this location will have to vacate the premises because the owner is taking his house back. Maud is actively looking for a new place for the young adults that must leave the Foyer by law when they are over 18 years old. ![]() Our solution is to fix the home of Jo: this devoted woman who takes care of the children daily, cooking, dressing, and solving the multiple issues of life and soothing the sleep the latest baby abandoned at the Foyer. Agnes, 8 months old now, has taken over Maud’s double bed while Maud sleeps on a cot by her side, she is cherished by all! Few babies get this much devotion from so many: a truly heart-warming sight! It is still a wonder for me to see how welcome and loved each new baby is in this bustling home already so filled with children. ![]() One of my goals on this trip was to catch up with the young woman I met at the airport in July. She is an American and a nurse who recently married a Haitian translator. Maud had been looking for an English teacher and Haley jumped at the opportunity to get some income and get to know a project involving children. I attended her classes, taught the other two and we talked about pedagogy. She has never taught before but is eager to learn… and available for a very reasonable cost. The day I arrived, she was taking polaroid shots of the students and had them write on index cards what their strengths and qualities were: a good way to help them build confidence, feel special and …..learn English. RVH is funding this new initiative for three months trial period hoping to find the funds to help Haley learn more about teaching ESOL with an online course as well as pay her salary for the rest of the school year. Our $320 a month investment in this program seems very reasonable when considering learning English is such a valuable tool to gain jobs. She teaches in the two new high-school classes that opened this fall on the campus of the Foyer and must follow the curriculum set by the Haitian government. ![]() My presence in Haiti also enabled me to have lengthy conversations with Bully, Fredline and Edouardson in particular. Edouardson has decided to try to find a life in Grand Goave. Being an orphan, now 25 years old struggling for everyday food and not finding employment has been hard. He has been doing the necessary research, knows he can live cheaper and set up a business with less start-up funding if he is outside of Port au Prince. His plan is to start a café with a TV and to show films and soccer games for instance, in a fairly populated area where this kind of facility doesn’t exist. We have roughly estimated he could pay a year’s rent for the little house he found and get started (including building a basic bathroom) for $5,000. After mentoring him for 7 months, watching him struggle to provide for himself, I feel he has what it takes to succeed. He and I worked on a Kiva profile to help him raise the needed funds. As soon as it is ready, we will promote it on our Facebook page and…keep our fingers crossed. As for Bully and his girlfriend Fredline now in her final year of civic engineering, it was really neat to spend an afternoon with them and go over their accomplishments and future plans. RVH provided seed money for the revolving funds that will be used to give the selected 6 adults a start in their micro-businesses. We hope this loan will stimulate the immediate area in Tabarre while providing an income for desperately poor women. Bully and Fredline interviewed 32 families and heard the ideas and plans that they had if only they could have some startup funds. Out of these, 6 made sense. Bully and Fredline will draw a contract indicating the terms of the loan and repayment schedule. The plan is to then help another group of people. We are all three aware of the weighty challenges this project presents and the real possibility that it will fail. The feeling is that, to try is better than to do nothing and that there is a very real possibility that the micro-businesses will succeed at least for some of the 6 candidates. This is happening thanks to the trust and generosity of friends of RVH. ![]() Our other contributions were compensation for Belo’s unsolicited metal sculptures that helped him pay his tuition, pay the children for their crafts and art production. I was delighted to see how Jean Mark’s work has evolved and as always, am impressed by Samuel’s paintings and the way he brings the mundane scenes he paints to life! My trip also allowed me brings the latest increment of support for the 13 children sponsored by friends of RVH. This $40 a month donation is one of the main resources of funds for supporting as well as covering the cost of educating the 129 children currently at the Foyer. Other groups also involved in this system are Grandir en Haiti from France and Fendli from Canada and we are always looking for more committed donors. Finally, one of the many fun things I get to do when in Haiti is to purchase Haitian craft for our fundraisers. I am always amazed by this country’s beautiful and colorful creativity. And this time, in addition to mamba (peanut butter), I was also able to buy cookies produced in the new bakery at the Foyer. Students in French 104 at Loyola are getting this treat! They wrote, as part of their course assignments, letters for the children at the Foyer and are receiving some letters back. This year for the first time, some students also volunteered a few video clips showing the life on Loyola’s campus and Thelus in Haiti did the same to show our students a glimpse of the life at the Foyer.
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AuthorCatherine Savell Archives
November 2023
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