Some notes from Harley’s journal:
Saturday
Today we are taking a break from documenting students. It’s been quite a task because the school has grown from 500 students to 639 +/-.
Being an active bunch we decided to take a hike to the forts above us built in the late 1700’s to protect the country against Napoleon’s armys, what a view of Dessalines from up here.
Not wanting to waste the trip to Dessalines we next visited the Saturday market in town. The market here makes Pike Place look like a kid’s popsicle stand. You can buy any thing from a machete, fresh fish, shoes, and maybe a donkey. All the fresh food made Dixie hungry so off we go to one of the local “soda” stores to sit and watch the market sellers stroll by carrying their wares back and forth for sale. What an interesting world! Attached is a picture of a local religious building. As the saying goes, “A picture says a 1000 words.” In this case it is the story of religion and how confusing it can be. Believe it or not this “church” is a witch doctor’s home dedicated to Voodoo, Haiti’s national religion. Pastor Louinet purposely chose this area for our church and school because of the strong presence of voodoo here which in this case has taken on a Christian look complete with Christ on the cross.
Sunday
God has blessed the work of Hope in Haiti and Pastor Louinet here in Haiti. Pastor Louinet is over 14 churches and 14 schools. The school we are presently working at is in Nan wo, Haiti. The Nan wo school is preschool through 9th grade. Once a student graduates 9th grade, if they desire to continue their education, we enrolled them in a nearby school grades 10 through 13. Our problem has been an inability to supervise their attendance, progress, and commitment in the new school. We have struggled with this for several years with no good solution.
Praise God. We now have a solution up and running… It’s called Nan wo schools first 10th grade class, which hopefully next year will be the first 11th, 12th, and 13th grades. All I can say is this is exciting and very good.
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