First and foremost I want to thank all of your for your support and interest in my endeavours abroad and for following my blog! It is very important to me to have all of your love and support.
So...as you can see, we are headed back to Haiti!! This time there will be 4 of us...a fabulous group of trouble-makers! This time it will be me, Jenna, Jenna's cousin-Anna, and my Dad-Nick! Jenna and I are very excited to introduce the country we have a strong love/hate relationship with to 2 of the most important people in our lives!
The goal of this trip:
Well, the main goal always become diluted with side goals whenever you work in a developing country. But, the main goal of organizing this trip to Haiti is to assess the progress of the non-profit organization that we started; Health Care for Haiti. We have transferred all the money that was raised to a bank in Cap Haitien and want to be there on the other end to ensure the money makes it into the correct hands and that the orphans are all paid for to go to school and to continue to live in the orphanage with room and board provided.
For those of you who don't know about the organization - after Jenna and I spent a month in Haiti following the Earthquake in 2010, we tried to assess the need and develop a project to help alleviate this need. What we saw was that there is a severe lack of health care workers, and that the country has an outlandish amount of orphans (estimated 850,000 since the earthquake!!).
We spoke to many orphans while we were there and despite their hardships, there was an overwhelming desire among them to find a career that involved giving back and helping their fellow Haitians. Many of them expressed desire to become nurses, doctors, teachers, ministers. Anything where they felt that they could help poverty-stricken people in Haiti. However, due to the lack of financial support and minimal resources, orphans who are not adopted are only supported until age 16, at which point they must leave the orphanage and school and fend for themselves. Still only children, they must find a way to survive on the streets of Haiti. When they spoke of the future, they knew this reality and so didn't dare to hope to pursue their dreams, resigned only to their fate. It is a horrible thing when a child cannot dream or even have hope.
These are the thoughts Jenna and I were struggling with on the flight home from Haiti. What could we do to address the needs that were so obvious to us?
We came up with Health Care for Haiti and began fundraising. It was hard work...harder than we could have ever imagined! But we had a goal...we wanted to begin the next school year funding 4 orphans to go to trade school to learn how to become health care workers in Haiti while also paying for their room and board.
Thanks to our amazing friends and family, and many fabulous physicians at SLU and WashU, we were able to raise the exact amount to fund these orphans!! It costs only $50 per month for one child to be educated, fed, clothed, and have a bed to sleep on. Only $50 per month!! Many of us spend more than that on a single dinner! We have enough to pay for 1 year. The course is 3 years long...so we will need to raise the same amount for the next 2 year as well (marketing plug here....if you are interested in donating any amount it would be VERY MUCH appreciated!!).
So, this trip is to ensure the money is being used correctly. We also are bring a video camera with us so that we may record interviews with each of the orphans that we are funding. This way, we can bring back these videos and all of you who have donated money will be able to see exactly where your money is going!
We are also planning on helping with the Cholera epidemic, painting a school, education at the orphanage, and much more! We will be gone for 9 days only this time, so it will be quick and busy!
I will keep this updated about our adventures along the way. Thanks again for following!
