Tag: Jacmel

2021 Review and Looking Ahead to 2022

Happy New Year! While 2021 was a hard year for many of us, we want to pause and look at the positive work that Hands and Feet Project (HAFP) is doing in Haiti. Then we want to look ahead to our plans for 2022.

2021 Year in Review

Throughout 2021, Hands and Feet Project has continued to provide families and to preserve families for children in Haiti. New families are being supported to enable children to stay with them, children have been reunified with family, more children have a safe place to stay in our daycares while their mom & dad work, and new children have been brought into HAFP to provide loving families. There are even more requests for assistance from families in our community as the challenges of finding work and food continue. We are thankful that HAFP continues to have the ability to meet the needs of so many.

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Life in Haiti Update

Hardship often prepares an ordinary person for an extraordinary destiny. -C.S. Lewis

The challenges of a pandemic and politics continue to be a burden on Haiti. They also impact the ministries and other organizations that work there. The instability continues to affect the tourism industry and short term mission trips in a big way, resulting in countless jobs lost and a significant reduction in income for many people and businesses. Here’s a recent newsletter from Hands and Feet Project that provides an overview of the current issues and the impact on each area of our Circle of Care. This covers a lot of key areas of our work and how we’re accommodating the challenging times.

If you aren’t already a subscriber to the Hands and Feet Project newsletter but would like to sign up, you can do that here. They share details and information about the programs and kids that affect all of our campuses and offer a wider perspective than our work that focuses primarily on caring for kids in Jacmel.

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It’s a Beautiful Day in Haiti!

Taking Kids to School

It’s a beautiful day in Haiti today! Here are a few short video clips from our drive to school. The 2019-2020 school year is wrapping up and some schools are doing final exams. The new school year starts in the next month or so, depending on the school! Most schools will only have 2 weeks off before the next school year starts!

The potholes are getting bad again, as you can see in the first video. Other sections just got patched and are still holding up okay. We hope you enjoy the videos.

Modified Open House in Rochester

We are excited to share that we’re heading back to Haiti at the end of the month! In order to see as many people as possible before we leave, we’re having a modified open house for those in the Rochester, New York area. On Friday, August 21, we will be at Panera Bread in Penfield from noon to 3 and 5 to 7:30. We are asking people to reserve a time slot, if possible, so we don’t have a large group there at one time. You can reply to this message, reply to the open house event on Facebook, text us, email us, send a web site comment, send a carrier pigeon, or just come visit us when you have the time available.

Returning to Haiti

Shadows at Sampson State Park in New York
Feeling tall at Sampson State Park

Regarding our return to Haiti, the borders to Haiti opened last month, and we found some affordable flights from Rochester. The number of airlines and flights to Haiti have been reduced, so the trip to Haiti now requires an overnight layover, but we worked it out so we are meeting up with other people along the way and fly in together.

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May Reflections

Haiti and Holidays!

Happy Mother’s Day to all of our caregivers!

Can you believe May is nearly over? Memorial Day is now behind us in America and the unofficial summer season has arrived after a long, cold winter and spring in many places. Florida was not one of those cold places, and, of course, neither was Haiti! In the last month, Haiti has also celebrated Labor / Agriculture Day on May 1, Flag Day on May 18, and Mother’s Day on May 31. It’s been a busy month! We’ve celebrated each Haitian holiday from afar as we’ve been in Florida for several months and are now in upstate New York (the Rochester / Finger Lakes region, not the New York City area!)

Haiti Happenings Update

So what have we been up to this month? We’ve been working like crazy to care for our kids during this coronavirus lockdown while looking ahead to next steps as our kids learn and grow. Our days are often filled with Zoom video calls, and WhatsApp calls and chats – the tools we use to communicate with our Haitian and American coworkers. We’re so thankful for the dedication of our essential staff in Haiti and for all the work they’re doing to keep the campus running smoothly and keeping food and supplies for the kids coming in. We have many changes that we’re working on, and of course it’s a bit more difficult to manage change remotely, but we’re moving forward with everyone’s help. We’re moving kids as they hit the maximum age for our campuses, we’re making campus safety improvements, overseeing repair and maintenance projects, and preparing for more of our kids to head out into the community and beyond.

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Haiti, Health and Wellness

Jacmel Campus and Haiti News

Hello everyone! We hope and pray that each and every one of you and your families are safe, healthy, and able to find all the essentials during this lockdown period. We also pray that you have a wonderful Easter weekend as we reflect on the death and celebrate the resurrection of Jesus.

Thank you all for your prayers and encouragement as we continue to lead our staff in Haiti from afar. So far, Haiti only has 30 reported cases of Coronavirus Covid-19. Only a few cases have been reported in the Jacmel area so far.

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Tomorrow is Giving Tuesday!

Give the gift of care this Christmas
Giving Tuesday heart logo #GivingTuesday

How were your Thanksgiving, Black Friday, Small Business Saturday and Cyber Monday? Can you believe tomorrow has yet another special name? It’s Giving Tuesday! And Christmas is coming soon! (If you’re not familiar with Giving Tuesday, you can find information about it here.)

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Thanksgiving 2019 Update

A warm hello and Happy Thanksgiving to everyone from the Caribbean! 

We try to take time here and there to remind ourselves of the beauty in Haiti and not to just take it for granted.  As the USA has dealt with some very cold weather already, we are thankful for a little break from the heat and not seeing many temperatures above 90 F.  Thanksgiving FoodIn this season of Thanksgiving, we want to reflect on other things that we’re thankful for….and it starts with the amazing donors, supporters and friends that are all essential to making this journey possible!  Thanks for all your prayers, financial assistance, encouragement, conversations, care packages, and sharing our social media posts.  We can’t do this without you and really appreciate each and every one of you.

We’re thankful for the wonderful Thanksgiving dinner we had with local friends old and new.  It was great to get together and enjoy a turkey dinner with a variety of other foods and people!  There was an amazing spread of dinner and dessert items!  

We’re thankful for power!  As I sit and write, we are enjoying power from the local electric company.  We have endured 14 weeks of ongoing protests about government corruption and the many side effects of money not being spent where it would best help the people and the country. Continue reading “Thanksgiving 2019 Update”

September Update – Schools and Roadblocks

September is always a very busy month in Haiti. The final preparations for school usually fill the first week, including delivery of new school uniforms, finalizing school shoes for everyone, getting haircuts, purchasing and laminating the last of the school books, loading and distributing school backpacks, and planning routes to get all the kids to their various schools on time. By the time September rolls around, the kids are often ready to return to school…and so are the staff!!

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