Ve’ahavta in Haiti: Last Day, a Report From the Ground

Day 4 Haiti

We had yet another wonderful day. I must tell you that as I write there is a tremendous thunderstorm – the first rains I’ve experienced here so far.

Our morning began with a meeting with our partner Food For the Poor (FFTP) Haiti. Ve’ahavta is working with FFTP Canada to facilitate four shipments of food and one shipment of educational supplies to Haiti between now and March. FFTP Haiti is a massive operation with major distribution capabilities to 3,000 local partners. They also run local projects – feeding programs, a medical clinic, orphanages, schools, homes for the aged and the disabled. House of Hope (HOH) managed to get on their registered agencies list and now gets monthly allocations of rice and beans along with other items that FFTP may have on hand, including shoes, clothes, etc. On top of this, our shipments over the next seven months will ensure that HOH gets its full monthly requirement of rice and beans (they go through 30 fifty lb bags of rice per month) which will free up some funds to support other aspects of daily life at the orphanage. We are also planning to ship 3,000 kinder kits this December.

After our meeting, we were treated to incredible hospitality at Gachette’s beautiful home. We got to see the photos of his amazing children and ate a delicious traditional Haitian meal. Alison and I could hardly believe it when we saw a huge bottle of Manischewitz wine on his wine rack! He loves the stuff. We explained how that wine is the ultimate experience of shabbat in Jewish households around the world, and Gachette immediately suggested we open it. So if you can only imagine, Alison and I were soon sitting on a rooftop with Debra and Gachette in Port au Prince, sharing a meal, toasting with Manischewitz and teaching our colleagues how to say “l’chaim”!

Alice soon joined us, and after Debra and Gachette left for a meeting, she took us to a local market where we invested in the local economy by stocking up on crafts. One of Alice’s “kids”, an artist named Pierre Jules, had joined us and brought, at our request, some of his paintings which we were thrilled to purchase to support his art career. I am sure his beautiful work will hang proudly in Ve’ahavta’s offices and local classrooms very soon.

After returning to the hotel and reconnecting with Gachette and Debra, we soon left again. We had been invited to join Ruth Messinger, President of American Jewish World Service (AJWS), at a roundtable she had organized at a hotel in Petionville. Ruth has been in Haiti this week as well with a contingent of AJWS supporters. It was a tremendous opportunity to share with them the work that Ve’ahavta is doing in Haiti. We were then invited to join them for dinner and listen to two women connected with the microfinance organization Fonkoze share the incredible story of their work in Haiti. Fonkoze are local partners of AJWS. Ve’ahavta is a member of the Jewish Coalition for Disaster Relief (JCDR), a coalition in which AJWS plays a significant role. Fonkoze was a recipient of a grant from the JCDR. As contributors to the Coalition’s Haiti fund, we have directly supported Fonkoze’s work in Haiti and it was an unexpected and thrilling opportunity to receive an in depth overview of their incredible efforts here.

Gideon Hersher, JDC’s representative here in Haiti, was there as well. As he drove us back to our hotel, I reflected on a chat I had briefly with an editor of the Jewish Forward, who was at the roundtable this evening. She said, “there is a Jewish story here in Haiti”. Leaving the meeting I thought, “there certainly is”.

I can’t believe how quickly our time has flown and how full it has been. This is a wonderful and heartbreaking place. We have seen some incredible need and have seen firsthand how our work is making an impact at the community level. It has been wonderful to make connections with so many partners and learn more about some amazing work that is being done. There is still much to do.

Tomorrow morning we fly home and begin to build a three year plan for our continued work in Haiti. I am looking forward to that process. I must acknowledge and thank the wonderful Alison Cohen, a member of our Board and a long time Ve’ahavta supporter. Alison’s cross cultural experience (she cycles around the world) and project management savvy (she is a consultant in that area), as well as her humour and generosity of spirit and her deep sense of humanitarianism made her an invaluable addition to this trip and I am grateful for her involvement.

Thanks as well to my colleagues in Toronto who have been making every effort to share my postings and the incredible work Ve’ahavta continues to do with our network of supporters. See you all again very soon!

-Sarah

Posted by Vanessa |