Unexpected Kindness

By Guest Blogger: Tiffani Lumbatis (who left for home today… we love you and will miss you!)
After hanging out with the LaDigue village kids, I trekked over to Barbancourt (a neighboring village) with Troy, Ray, Esther, Andrew, and Robenson. It was a fun walk with many sites to see-all the different fruiting trees and plants, cows, horses, mules, etc. At one point on the trail, we had to cross a swift running river. We took off our shoes and socks and very cautiously waded across, to the amusement of the local children who were watching. On the way back when we were preparing to cross the river, a lady was washing her clothes in a metal basin. She was very friendly, but she kept trying to tell me something that I didn’t understand. When I had crossed the river and was starting to put my socks back on, the same lady was handing me a skirt she had brought to wash and began wiping off my wet legs. I thought it was very sweet of her to let us use her clothing to dry our feet and legs so that we wouldn’t get our socks wet. She even made the effort to cross the river with us so that we could use her cloth. This shows the character of many of the Haitian people. Though they have very little, they are still willing to give of themselves and lend a hand or a smile.
When we got to Barbancourt, we entered the other Lifeline school, which is also one of the 9 feeding stations. The new school building is still at the beginning stages of construction; the canteen building that is there serves as both the school for the kindergarten through second grade and as the dining hall. When we walked in, there were about 50 students all in uniform watching the teacher (and us), and one little boy was sitting along the wall wearing an orange shirt. This was “my kid”, Michael. I started sponsoring him last summer and have been excited to meet him ever since. I said “bonswa” and gave him the green and black soccer ball I had brought him and took a few pictures. I wish I would have gotten to play ball with him, but it was time for the kids to eat. Before they ate, the school kids wanted to sing for us. They sang 4 or 5 songs in Creole and were very good. When they were finished singing, we handed out the metal plates containing the meal of beans and rice. After the school kids were served, the village kids started making their way inside for their meal of the day. Robenson said they feed about 300 kids at the Barbancourt station, which I thought was pretty amazing. It’s cool to see how much $20 a month can do when it’s all put together and used for God’s kingdom.