Today started out a bit rough. The hurricane hit hard last night (inside joke) and i haven't slept much in recent days and i think it may have caught up to me.
Today we painted some steel storage shelves and then went up to the town of titanyen and looked at one of the schools and dropped off supplies. after that, we loaded up 56 bags (85# per bag) of cement mix, which was nearly unbearable. honestly i looked at it as a workout, since i hadn't done any formal exercise in recent days, i decided to jump in the trailer with barrett and start heaving the bags up on our shoulders and carrying them out to Jamin and steven as they stacked em up. Barrett has been battling a shoulder injury, so eventually it turned into my job of heaving the bags to jamin and steven. i was on a roll, but the heat, humidity, and dusty-ness took its toll on me. i sweated so much during those 15-20 minutes that i think i was dehydrated the rest of the day. thank goodness i had some of my rehydrate along for the trip otherwise i would have been in big trouble. I was able to grind out the rest of the day. After that i was working with nickie just outside the compound walls, where we were cutting pipes on the drain. the pipes were too close together and debris was getting caught up in the drain and backing up the water and causing issues with some flooding. i was a little on edge for some reason and the pipes were being stubborn as i was trying to break them. I even let a little curse word escape my lips out of frustration (oopsy).
after that job that i felt inadequate at, nickie and i headed down to the compound's entrance where there was a big drainage that was getting clogged by a big stump. it's hard to imagine the pollution in haiti, so just imagine a pretty nasty drainage ditch. nickie is a tough redneck, so we jumped down there without gloves and started grabbing hold of this nasty log in this nasty drainage system full of garbage, feces, and lord knows what else. while we were working on moving this log, a haitian man even walked by and looked at me and gave me a look like we were crazy and made a sign with his hands that basically said, "dude, where are you gloves!"
good news, we made it out ok. the only thing that is getting to me at this point is the itchiness. my hand has a pretty nasty rash on it, my ankles are swollen and itchy from some bug bites, and the skeeters are getting me at night. Man i must be a delicacy to skeeters cuz they just feast on me!
After dinner and our team debriefing pastor jamin and i got to pray for more of God on my behalf. it was a great experience as I've never really had anyone pray on my behalf with such sincerity and intentionality before. I know this was a big turning point, in an already big turning point in my relationship with the lord.
Today we painted some steel storage shelves and then went up to the town of titanyen and looked at one of the schools and dropped off supplies. after that, we loaded up 56 bags (85# per bag) of cement mix, which was nearly unbearable. honestly i looked at it as a workout, since i hadn't done any formal exercise in recent days, i decided to jump in the trailer with barrett and start heaving the bags up on our shoulders and carrying them out to Jamin and steven as they stacked em up. Barrett has been battling a shoulder injury, so eventually it turned into my job of heaving the bags to jamin and steven. i was on a roll, but the heat, humidity, and dusty-ness took its toll on me. i sweated so much during those 15-20 minutes that i think i was dehydrated the rest of the day. thank goodness i had some of my rehydrate along for the trip otherwise i would have been in big trouble. I was able to grind out the rest of the day. After that i was working with nickie just outside the compound walls, where we were cutting pipes on the drain. the pipes were too close together and debris was getting caught up in the drain and backing up the water and causing issues with some flooding. i was a little on edge for some reason and the pipes were being stubborn as i was trying to break them. I even let a little curse word escape my lips out of frustration (oopsy).
after that job that i felt inadequate at, nickie and i headed down to the compound's entrance where there was a big drainage that was getting clogged by a big stump. it's hard to imagine the pollution in haiti, so just imagine a pretty nasty drainage ditch. nickie is a tough redneck, so we jumped down there without gloves and started grabbing hold of this nasty log in this nasty drainage system full of garbage, feces, and lord knows what else. while we were working on moving this log, a haitian man even walked by and looked at me and gave me a look like we were crazy and made a sign with his hands that basically said, "dude, where are you gloves!"
good news, we made it out ok. the only thing that is getting to me at this point is the itchiness. my hand has a pretty nasty rash on it, my ankles are swollen and itchy from some bug bites, and the skeeters are getting me at night. Man i must be a delicacy to skeeters cuz they just feast on me!
After dinner and our team debriefing pastor jamin and i got to pray for more of God on my behalf. it was a great experience as I've never really had anyone pray on my behalf with such sincerity and intentionality before. I know this was a big turning point, in an already big turning point in my relationship with the lord.
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