Haiti - February 4th, 2010

Yesterday, I started out the blog post by writing "If you could, please pray that God gets her cell phone working. She has a Blackberry but they can't figure out how to get it working. You'll see in the email messages below, she's a little frustrated that she has to keep borrowing phones from everyone else." Tonight, the phone rang around 10:00 pm. It was Janice. She said, "Guess whose phone I'm calling from? MINE!!!!!". They figured out how to get it to work, so we have phone communication now. AND...Sprint has announced that they are waiving all charges on calls from Haiti until the end of March...so it's FREE!!!! Thank you Jesus!


As you can imagine, she had lots to tell me, and of course, wanted to know how the kids were doing, so I spent a lot of time letting her know how things were going here. She said that many of the patients they have been seeing have chronic issues and it's been good to help them provide medical care. For those of you who have asked about her safety, it seems that they are hanging out with the Marines while in this village, so security is not an issue. They are staying in military tents, and sleeping on military cots. The heat is tough to work in by day, and she told me to tell Michelle Hansma "good call on the scrubs". I guess some of her co-workers are in jeans, and struggling with the heat. Pray for the team. The 24 hour bug is being passed around...not good.

Below is a message I got tonight from Nate:

Today we drove thru a lot of destruction to a town 3 hours away. In some places the road was cracked in 2. About 20 of us crammed ourselves and 2500 pounds of gear into a beat up rejected US school bus. I think each wheel had about 3 lug nuts. We arrived at the town and immediately began seeing patients. These docs and nurses are amazing. Fixing ugly wounds, sowing hands back together often in 85 degree heat and no electricity. I've been using my French all day helping to translate. The US marines are building us an OR so they are here. The Navy corpsmen have pitched in too. We are sleeping outside in tents while here, but we are comfortable. Thanks for praying.

And finally, a picture he texted of me at Janice at work. This was yesterday.



Thanks for all your messages, and encouragement. I told her she was having quite an impact here based on the comments I've received from people. Her response was "Really?!?!" Typical Janice, showing kindness and not thinking anything of it. Blessings to all of you!