Tiwil

10/25/2009

1 Comment

 
If anyone reads this and has the capability to help or knows of someone that has the power to help, please please PLEASE email me: [email protected]
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Dear Friends - 

I want to help Tiwil (real name Anderson, dont know last name because its a french name and they all sound the same to me) get a visa for many reasons. I cannot start with any other reason except that his heart is more precious than anyone can imagine. I have not seen such a tender, loving, humble heart in many people. And it is only by the work of God's redemption that someone can have a heart so tender in a land so desolate. I keep learning more of his story, so I will share some of that...


He is 24 and became a Christian about 4 years ago through going to school on site where we live. His mom died in 2007 and he still feels sadness because of that, because his mom loved him a lot. Last year during the massive flood, his house was washed away. He was swept away about a mile and then grabbed hold of a tree and climbed up it, watching many Haitians float by screaming. He cannot swim though so he was forced to watch unable to help. His sister had her infant daughter swept away in the flood and she died. Tiwil has known much sadness and yet the other day when we were having a hard day here, he went home and cried for us because he felt so sad that some of the Haitians had been treating us poorly. If anyone spends 15 minutes with him, their heart would soften at the site of his heart for people and his infectious laugh.

So that explains why I love him, now I want to explain why I want him to be able to come to America. It is every Haitians' dream to come to America, but that doesn't mean every Haitian needs to come. (I do not want to turn Haiti into another America, but I do want Haitians to have the opportunity and ability to provide for their families and have hope to live tomorrow.) Still, I see in this man a heart for people that is special.
And I want his horizons to be broadened. Growing up in a Haitian village makes it very difficult to understand life on a broader picture than just that village. I pray that with his heart and passion, and a bigger understanding of the world, he could bring hope and change to many people in his native country. To do that though, he needs to learn English, as any person who partners with American supporters needs to be able to communicate with them. And the best way to learn English is to live in it and be immersed. I have seen this first hand from living in Haiti for 6 weeks, and already feeling like I can communicate with anyone (though, of course, sometimes on a limited scale). So, I want Anderson to be able to come to America to study, to see, and to gain a broader perspective of the world our God is redeeming.

And I am so excited about the possibility of showing him amazing things we take for granted. Today I showed him Google Earth, and he had no idea there was such technology available to have photos of the whole world. Three weeks ago was the first time he had ever seen the internet. He has never used a computer. He didn't (gasp) even know that Michael Jackson had died. The world in a Haitian village consists of only that village. The struggle of making sure there is food to eat for the day leaves no room to worry about what else is happening in the world.

All that being said, I also hate that a dear friend of mine has to sleep on a concrete floor every night and has to worry about where the next meal will come from. I want to help him, and we feed him as much as we can without causing problems with the community  by only feeding one and not the other 5,000. (we still need Jesus to come multiply our bread). But my friend Anderson is special, and I hope that in learning English and being given the ability to dream, he can help to feed all 5,000 one day.

A visa is nearly impossible to get for someone from his social realm. But it is no more impossible than multiplying bread in front of 5,000 people. Jesus can and still does work miracles, and thus we are hoping for another one here

 
So there are these noises. Strange noises. We hear them every once and awhile and they come from outside our fence. We feel the most likely candiate for producing these noises is some sort of small monkey. Haitians say it is just a cat. I think it might be a mixture of both. I will try to capture a photo or sound of this strange beast... to be continued
 
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One of my favorite things in this life is the sensation of time stopping, just for a moment, becuase it reminds me of the freedom I have to live outside my own mind and thoughts. When time pauses, my worries fade and I am just truly, fully present in the moment. For me, these interruptions most often take the form of daydreams, captivating movies, music, laughing and nature. Nature, for me, is very up and down. Sometimes God allows me to take nature in like a baby opening his eyes for the first time, but other times I am so far in my own thoughts and doings that I bypass nature completely. There's nothing like being out in nature to experience nature. Since being here, I have this growing interest in the complexly simple grandness of nature. 

-On a side note-
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Here is a picture of the new bridge we built. Designed by Jay and Zack. Delayed by Jeremy. Supervised by John. Created with left over wood from old concrete forms. 

 
 
So today… what a day, I experienced so many emotions today I am exhausted, spent. Today was a reminder of how human I am and how broken the world is. So let me start from the beginning:

I woke up, well rested. I have moved from the house into the dormitory because we have 3 guests here, who were definitely needed today. I put up two giant mosquito nets, found the most comfortable pillow, put on the coolest looking most comfortable sheets the Canadians left here, all right under the fan. It was the first night I slept with bare minimum clothing without a shred of fear of a full on bug flesh feast.

I came to breakfast- pancakes Diana made- woofed em down and then got ready for building day. We are building a new bridge over the bo-bo bridge that’s there now. We got about 85% done before lunch (2:30 pm) through a lot of sweat, I mean A LOT of sweat, and sunburn.

For lunch we had Bison Burgers from Teds Montana Grill- which was Rawesome! Reina and John and Kelly (I don’t know if I told you but we have vistors!!!) brought them down as a special treat for us. Then we went over to the orphanage, gave them some new shorts they brought as well, and then prepared for our game.

Yes, we had a game. What does that mean? Well the local Cabaret boys love to play the “blans” (whites) in soccer. I got some nice shirts by way of ESPN (shout out!)(or sell out…)(or trying to show everyone that im cool)(all the above) while I was in Cali, so now both teams have jerseys. The Haitians showed up about an hour late so our game went into the night. And as the night surfaced, so did all the underlying emotions of the day.

We lost the game 5-2. Why did I just write that? Any sane person would say, “Uhhh I literally don’t care what the score was of your random pick up game in Haiti was…” That is the correct response. Yet I took the game way too seriously and was legit mad that we lost. Afterwards I wanted to kick the ball into the river. I got snappy with Zack. I didn’t even shower after cause I was so mad- good one Jeremy, were you thinking that if I was sweaty and stinky everyone would know that I’m mad and have sympathy for me, ohhh boo hoo… I don’t know, but it didn’t take long to see that I am, after years of Jesus Rehab, still a sore loser, which indeed makes me a loser and reveals my need for Jesus more now than ever.

Jesus has a way of revealing to me how pathetic and microscopic the things that frustrate me are by showing me scope and relevance. It actually usually takes only a few minutes… 

In the case of tonight, I’m gunna keep it simple, my poor sportsmanship faded in a millisecond when I realized people in our house, in Haiti, all over the world are dealing with far greater issues. I, we, came down here to love orphans, learn culture and address problems as we encounter them. Sounds heroic huh… I thought that’d consist of community development, providing shelter, food, clothes and education to orphans and just cleaning up Haiti. Things are NEVER as they seem. Even being here for only 5 weeks, everything has flipped upside down. A big difference between Haiti and America, in Haiti corruption and greed are fully present, fully visible while in America corruption and greed are a secretive, behind closed doors poison. I guess that’s because Haitians are so poor and desperate they don’t care what anyone thinks of them while we Americans get the luxury of hiding behind our walls of status and possessions…

Tonight I rediscovered the greatest need in Haiti and it all comes back to the Gospel and relationships. Haitians, as well as Americans, are des-per-ate for loving relationships. Everyone in the whole entire scope of human history has been wronged, hurt, beat up, stepped on, abused, mistaken, confused, scared, sad, ect… We each choose to deal with it in ourselves, and those of us that do catch a glimpse of the pain and brokenness in this world. We can see it in our neighbor, our friend, family, co-worker too. What a grim and dark place this world is without hope. I have found all hope to be fleeting… except one. Jesus is literally the only thing I can cling to here in the darkness of Haiti. Jesus and His justice. His mercy. His peace. His grace. His hope.

Haiti is revealing.

We as a human race all have different symptoms of the same disease.

There is a cure and He is good.

 
 
So about the false post… Elliott Cherry broke into my account and thought itd be funny to post that cause I havent been able to blog things for awhile… real funny e, now half the world is pissed….

That leads me to my time in Cali- lotta ups and some downs. Here’s a few blurbs of my time there:

I got to see many friends and make many new friends aka Tony Hale, Johnny Hugs, Callie Ham and her roomies (kinda upset about that free Moby concert), Roadtrip Nationers, Wagners Wedding Party (emphases on PARTY), Espn Risers, like Team USA softball, someone who had made out with Natalie Portman (he’s from East Hampton)… I have tried and tried but I just can’t get that dagger out of my heart…

I chilled in the LBC, spent a week with the Wagner’s and not just any week, their first week of marriage- ah lovely- Venice, La Jolla, Hermosa, laughed a lot, was very close to calling to 911 (ask me of you wanna know), got thousands of dollars of sweet merchandise for Haitians for free and drink liquid with ice on a sofa in air conditioning!!!

But I’m back and it’s nice to be here, I can hear the choir singing in the background, its hot but I like it… On Monday, I will start as the P.E. teacher in the school on our campus (its not called a compound anymore, too prisony). 300 kids, many many miscommunications and misunderstands to come. I want to build a playground with pull up bars and parallel bars and labyrinths (it’s a dream okay?!) and other fun things to play on in front of the orphanage. The team in December, God willing, will build a basketball slash soccer hybrid court. People are coming this week about a bread factory. In January, we start to rebuild the bridge the flood took away so cars/trucks can drive can drive into our compound. All the while, we got orphans to love on, Creole to learn and that God to seek.

And I saw this yesterday…
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Glad to be back...