Quick update (from Haiti!)

This is her pensive face.

After a partially stressful but mostly uneventful day of travel, I arrived in Haiti yesterday afternoon.  The stressful part came at the very beginning, when I was told at the ticket counter when checking in for my first flight that I may have arrived too late to get on the plane (because, you know, I was flying out of the oh-so-busy mega airport which is Easterwood Airport, along with all of 23 other people).  Nonetheless, I headed through security (which was enlightening, as I learned that peanut butter is, in fact, a liquid--who knew!--and is therefore not allowed in carry-on luggage).  After my suitcase was ransacked and my peanut butter found

its new home in the security trash can, I walked all of ten feet to the gate and boarded the plane.  Too late to get on?  Nope (though I did probably break some sort of airline regulation in not arriving a full hour before the flight, so I'm thankful for the graciousness of whoever could have decided to be a stickler to the rule and keep me off the plane).  I was, however, fairly flustered by this point by the events of the preceding twenty minutes, so rather than being my usual introverted, don't-want-to-talk-to-the-passenger-in-the-seat-beside-me self, I actually went into Starbucks mode and ended up visiting almost the entire flight with an older gentleman who was on his way to Florida for a conference.

From that point on, things were fairly uneventful.  Once I got to Port au Prince, I made it through customs and found my suitcases in record time.  And for the first time ever, I made it all the way out of the airport without help (sans cart, too, because there were none left).  I suppose this is a matter of pride, but not in the way you might think if you've never been through the Port au Prince airport.  Typically Always there are people everywhere trying to "help" you with your luggage (whether you want/need help or not, though the chaos of the airport tends to make assistance seem necessary), and the fee expected for such assistance is generally quite ridiculous (and every single person who so much as touched your luggage wants paid).  Though I have very much in my favor the ability to speak Kreyol and to state that I don't need 8 men to push my 1 cart of luggage, I have never before managed to ward off all who want to help.  Now that I'm thinking

decorating

 about it, though, perhaps it was the very fact that I didn't have a cart that kept anyone from trying too hard to help me (I mean, who really wants to drag around 150 lbs of luggage without a cart? me, apparently.).  So anyway, I made it all the way outside of the airport fairly easily (though I am sooooooore today) and looked for my ride....which was nowhere to be found.  The minutes on my Haiti cell phone had expired, so I borrowed a phone from one of the airport workers to call Gertrude.  She said they were coming, and so I sat down and waited.

And waited.

And watched two more flights arrive.

And waited.

Finally, an hour later, Gertrude and several of the kids arrived.  Port au Prince traffic is normally a mess (to say the least), but yesterday it was absolute chaos, which is why it took them so long to get to me.  And to get back to the house, which is maybe 2 miles from the airport, it took probably at least thirty minutes.  So I was more than ready to get there and to see the kids!

When the gate to the orphanage opened for us to drive in, I heard my name being chanted by several of the kids.  So good to be back; I've missed them!  I found Christina right away and carried her around as I greeted all the other kids.  She is quite the talker now (though she's got her own language; it's not English or Kreyol!).  And she is, of course, still the cutest ever :)

I'm about to lose battery on my computer, so here's a quick summary of today:
- I spent the morning playing with the kids who don't go to school; Christina and I spent quite awhile with Roseline, who is a very sweet older girl who can't speak and spends her time in her wheelchair.  She has the most beautiful smile, and between me and Christina, we even had her laughing a few times.
- I got out the "sponge game" for the younger kids to play with this morning, and it was a huge hit.
- In the afternoon, I brought six of the kids upstairs (the only place to be able to have any sort of control/organized activity) to decorate the shower curtain "road map" mat.
- Later I had Wilberson and Mimose come up to play the matching game that Callie made; they loved it!

That'll have to be all for now.  Tomorrow I'm planning to go to Heartline in the morning.  Not sure when I'll be able to post again, but thanks for all your prayers!