My Best New Year’s Ever Was...
…In Haiti!
Ou vle remen danse?!
I loved being in Haiti with Partner’s in Development, on a mission trip during New Year’s a little while back. We threw the best party ever for the children. Everyone had popcorn, a hard boiled egg, extra spicy peanut butter and jelly sandwich, orange kool-aid, and were greeted with the special surprise of a soccer ball. It is so funny, but they put hot peppers in peanut butter in Haiti, which is hard to find in the US; it’s very good. We had a polaroid camera to take pictures so all the kids could bring them home, which was a very big hit. We played so many games, and sang karaoke. Dancing and singing with these kids was the best time ever. Autumn made paper airplanes and wrote wishes on them for the children, and they all went to the roof to fly the planes into the sky! I love playing soccer down there, I could play soccer with those kiddos forever. It is tempting to spend forever down there, Haiti has my heart, I bet they would love if I were down there playing soccer and make-believe, or singing karaoke with everybody.
Look at how pretty they look! Everyone always dresses up down there in such pretty dresses.
I was holding really cute twin girls whilst filming this, so it is wobbly. Nevertheless, you can see a little singing! I’m a baby holder, I needed to hold as many children as I possibly could all the time on this trip. After that week in the clinic, I think I held every baby in Port au Prince! Everyone really wanted me to hold their baby, there were lines and lines of women wanting to hand me their babies. They know how to make a girl feel special in Haiti, and I can never turn down a cute innocent baby. Those days in the clinic turned into a ‘Madi hold my baby’ festival, which I loved very much. Sometimes, they wanted to braid my hair while I held the babies, and I actually paid them to braid my hair because it looked very nice. A big thing was telling women that it is okay to give bottles of water to the babies, if they run out of milk to help them stay hydrated. We had a lot of slow IV drips for dehydrated babies, it was sad to see, but I sent down a lot of baby bottles for donation once I was back home. I donated a lot of specific things I noticed a need for in addition to money after the trip like, gauze, infrared thermometers, automatic blood pressure cuffs, shoes, clothes, tooth brushes lots of little things. I have to tell you, it helped a lot of other volunteers that I sent the infrared thermometers and scrubs down for the next trip. Those little things make a huge difference and a few girls completely forgot long pants. Haiti is one of those places where it is over a hundred degrees and humid, but you need to wear long sleeves with long pants, and 98% Deet to keep the vampires or mosquitoes away. Holding all those little babies, is something I think about all the time. Of course, I had gloves on to protect the babies from the bug spray or anything that could have been on my hands, and I swaddled the babies so they were extra safe.
One day there was a very little baby, I held in the palms of my two hands, and on my chest, for a very long time while the mama was with the doctor; I’ll never forget the mother and child. It was a very powerful experience.
Snowballing off of my lifeguard days in college, I have ACLS, PALS, BLS and CPR certifications from Upstate Medical University, which is nifty for being an active outdoorsy person; those certifications make for an expert baby holder. A lot of lifeguards take EMT classes too, you play every position on the field in a way. There may not have been a station to scan the card of all my certifications down there, but I sure did have them in my pocket with my passport card and fifty dollars all the time. Those tests are really difficult to pass, the pre-test, the mega code, and the test you need over a 90 on after the three day class; like a marathon. Between stay away lacrosse camp and all my medical certifications, I felt prepared to go on the trip with my group of eight from my nice little college. PhD or MD was a very long debate for me, I worked really hard to be able to go either way in life taking all those tests, fighting for my competitive spot…
I should see if someone else has a better video sometime, because I have a shaky hand from holding all the kids…
EVERYONE SMILES IN THE SAME LANGUAGE!
St. Michael and St. Peter Church, here in Syracuse NY donates money, supplies, and does mission trips to the same area of Haiti that I went to, all the time. When I was down there, I thought I was dreaming to look up from making cement bricks to see a little boy wearing a ‘Marcellus Lacrosse’ pinnie. I could not believe it. It is very cool that both locally where I live, and my school all the way in Maine both contribute to the same cause. My friend from growing up, Courtney, goes to this church, and literally donated all of those lacrosse pinnies; I showed other pictures to her family. I recognized that lacrosse pinnie! No matter where I go in life, my small town follows, I’ll never shake it off. So surreal, small world. Honestly, I died and went to heaven when I noticed a family with such beautiful eyes wearing pinnies from my alma mater’s lacrosse team that I always played on growing up. It’s like I met my biggest fans, and needed to give them some more clothes whilst embracing the experience. I also had the privilege of giving them some clean water and lunch, while building a house just a few over from their lovely home. It was nice of them to invite me over for a play date. Some things are meant to be, god guides us to places for a reason. :)
My plastic surgeon, and longtime family friend from the lacrosse coaching of our dads and tournament years growing up, also volunteers in Haiti. Not only donating ‘Marcellus lacrosse pinnies’ and vital necessities, he performs volunteer vital surgeries that truly save lives. I could have gone with him and his daughters to Haiti, but the SJC trip worked better with my schedule that year. In Ecuador, he surgically created ears from cartilage for many suffering from being born without ears. Dr. Locastro is a true genius, and very generous to perform volunteer surgery on his many mission trips around the world. Though it may appear someone sick on my trip brought those and planted them to haze me, there are several ways that those old lacrosse pinnies from my alma mater logically were where I worked to serve god.
Me and Amanda digging for gold, or something to make a ton of bricks out of…. we later built the houses with! I gave a man my hat before we flew back home, he loved my hat and likes running a lot which I thought was super cool.
I left all the clothes I had brought there plus supplies such as food, antimicrobial clothes, shoes, work gloves, medical gloves, sunglasses, extra masks, first aid stuff, all the things. I gave my bottle of malaria pills to the clinic… I flew home with my passport, phone, clothes I had on and room for rum, vanilla, and french roast coffee in my suitcase. Later, once we were back, I gave PID my zebra suitcase for another group to bring supplies down with! A year after that, PID ended up with several of my pink zebra suitcases, because they liked the first one so much. My boyfriend had to give me his way less fun black suitcase and sunglasses, because I gave all of mine away… They love zebra patterned things down there, so between the shirts and my bags, those donations were the biggest hits. I gave a nurse I really connected with in my time down there in Haiti, a zebra top and Winnie the Pooh Bear scrub cap that said ‘I have my mind on my hunny and my hunny on my mind’ she just loved it. :)
I have to tell you, my favorite thing to give away were dolls! I went to the dollar store and Walmart before I went to Haiti, and bought a ton of dollies for the children. Dolls are always fun to give, especially for a doll collector like me! I still like to play with dolls too, imagine my delight having all these sweet little girls to play with on my Haiti trip!
Beyonce has nice videos from her trip to Haiti.