Water, the Origin of Hope
Everyday we take water for
granted. We brush our teeth with
it. We drink it out of the water
fountain, we even use it to flush the toilet.
How could you live if you no longer had easily accessible water? That was one of the many situations we faced
in Haiti.
Anse-a-Pitre is a small border city
in Haiti which although impoverished, has had many excellent streams of life
emerge within the community. One example
of these streams was the organization we visited every morning, Sadhana
Forest. Sadhana Forest, is an
approximately 4 year old community on the edge of town that has begun working
on reforesting its grounds and the community with trees that are native to the
region. Sadhana Forest specifically
picks trees that can provide food for the community to provide both the
nutritional and horticultural benefits.
This need exists because much of the native forestry in the Anse-a-Pitre
region has been cut down to provide wood and charcoal for fires. Now the soil in the region has become very
sandy and unfit to grow new trees.
Sadhana Forest has taken this
challenge and has spent a large effort in developing sources for water within
its community. This water for watering
plants, cleaning, and drinking. These
efforts are the beginning streams, as described in Ezekiel, of fresh water that is necessary to try and
address larger issues within the community.
They have produced a pocket community in Anse-a-Pitre that is almost completely
nutritionally sufficient, and is providing outreach to the community to bring
trees out into the community, teach the community about these trees, and ensure
their success as both a tree for the region, but also a source of resources for
members of the community, who have no regular access to certain nutritional
goods or water. Furthermore, because the
local market only meets on Monday and Friday, access to fresh food on other
days of the week can be difficult without a local source. Sadhana Forest is working to become a
contributor to alleviating this issue by bringing the fresh water throughout
the community.
One of the many people we met on our
trip was Eddy. Eddy is a former
inhabitant of Sadhana Forest, and is a strong member of the community in
Anse-a-Pitre. After he left Sadhana, he
started his own garden on a plot of land within the community. On his land he has planted many plants
including thousands of cedar tree seedlings.
These seedlings, each in individual soda bottles will be distributed
throughout the community. In order to keep his seedlings alive, Eddy has
acquired a deep fresh water well at his residence. In addition, he is working with his neighbors
for access to water for his garden through the shallow canal system in
Anse-a-Pitre.
Eddy has taken steps to be
educated in permaculture through both local education and online
education. This education has allowed
him to understand the values of proper soil enrichment, and the correct
heterogeneous gardens he needs to plant to sustain the health of the entire
garden. With this knowledge he has
helped influence many in the region to become better stewards of their limited
resources, even including his father.
This has allowed many in the community thrive with a better
understanding of the resources they have.
Again, Eddie is both physically and metaphorically planting trees to
bring fresh water to a new region. He
does this for the love of his family, the love of his community, and the love
of God.
These are just a snippet of the
experiences we all witnessed on our trip to Anse-a-Pitre of individual leaders
within a community expanding the reach of
the physical fresh waters, mixed with the fresh waters of God and
spreading the word throughout the community.
I invite you to ask any of us about our experience in Haiti. The stories I have just described are just
the foundation of thriving community that is overcoming challenges of limited
resources and using the spirit of God to lead them along their journey.
Amen
-JacobThe Water that Cleanses
Bonjour! I’m not sure if you all know, but this was
my first trip out of the country. I was inspired to take this journey by
Kara’s enthusiasm for the land and people of Haiti. I had always thought
that people living in third world countries were dirty and sad, which came from
many of the images that we see of poor people around the world on television,
but I was wrong! The people living in AnsePitre were very clean and
well-dressed. It was clear that they washed both themselves and their clothes
often. I was amazed at how dirty I became while working on our project
and how clean most of the Haitians were despite doing the same job.
One way that I connected to the people of AnsePitre
was during the times I needed to wash in order to become clean. Early in
the week I partnered with Ronnie, a 15 year-old boy to do a load of
laundry. We had worked together all day and now it was time to get our
dirty clothes clean. He clearly had a great system going and had even
soaked his clothes during our lunchtime. I was the novice and he helped
me to get my “load” started, despite not speaking the same language. It
was at this point that I began to feel part of the community at Sadana and
accepted by the people of AnsePitre.
Later in the week, I took bucket showers in the afternoon before going
to work with the children at the school. One day when it was time to
shower about 3 other men in the community had the same idea at the same
time: the three shower stalls (think woven palm leaf walls for privacy)
were occupied. One of the men we worked with earlier that day, Tu Tu, saw
me struggling to find an open stall. He was nice enough to ask the men to
join up together to leave a stall free for me AND he filled my bucket with
water. I was able to communicate with him enough to understand that it
was my bucket he filled and say thank you for his efforts. This man, who
has a lot less than me, was able to give me the gift of grace by helping me to
wash and be clean.
-Sarah
The Water that Binds
We weren’t very ambiguous about the theme for this morning’s
worshp.
Scripture, Reflection, Visual aids
All pointed to...
Water!
Throughout the whole week,
Water was on our minds,
First thing in the morning.
Making sure we had clean water to drink,
Remembering not to use the sink water to brush teeth,
Walking across the dry, hot road to the border.
A bridge that used to pass over a river,
But now just passes over a rocky ditch.
It hasn’t rained in this part of Haiti since April.
When I was preparing for the rest of the group to come,
I worked on a reforestation project.
We watered every day at 6:30 in the morning.
We’d fill five gallon buckets—
I started with two at a time and was demoted to one—
And walk back into the deserty bakara to water the trees
we’d planted.
Walk and walk,
About ten minutes or so.
Dump the water—one bucket per tree—
And walk back to the tap to refill.
One.
There were about 300 trees planted out in that bakara.
We needed water for cooking,
Washing dishes,
Doing laundry.
Water, like Jacob said,
Is the foundation from which all life flows.
It’s how we’re made clean,
Like Sarah talked about.
But as the week went on,
The eight of us,
Ambassadors from this church immersed in another community,
Found ourselves connected through water.
The more people we met,
The more we were bound together.
And so our final scripture reading is about the waters of
baptism.
Water that flows into the cracks and the chasms,
Water that transports and transforms,
Water that makes us into one people,
God’s people.
Now the Bible is a lot of things,
But it is not a depiction of perfect people.
It’s not a picture of this idealistically unified humanity.
From the very beginning,
The Bible chronicles divisiveness.
It spares no details on how hard it can be to live together.
There’s the sibling rivalry of Cain and Abel, Noah’s sons,
Rachael and Leah,
Jacob and Esau,
Martha and Mary,
All the way down.
From Joseph and his brothers
To the split of the twelve tribes of Israel.
Any type of division we can experience,
You name it,
It’s in the Bible,
From a little bit of jealousy to a disagreement about the
law,
to all out war.
the Bible testifies to a brokenness between people
that has plagued us as far back as memory goes.
What’s going on in our world today—
The things we prayed for this morning,
The things we don’t know to pray for—
Are nothing new.
They are huge, and they are close to God’s heart,
But they are not new.
Haiti has suffered political, economic, and social isolation
Since independence in 1804.
The United States didn’t even recognize them as a country
until sixty years later.
There have been struggles between our country and theirs,
And with their neighboring Dominican Republic as well.
Our team this week stayed right on the border between the
two,
And crossed over freely,
While Haitians were turned away
And buses were emptied out in search of stowaways.
There’s a population in the Dominican Republic of Haitian
descendents,
A few generations removed from farmworkers who migrated from
Haiti.
These folks live on the outskirts of town in places called
bateys,
Similar to the townships in South Africa.
The Dominican Republic has revoked their citizenship because
they are of Haitian descent,
And the Haitian government doesn’t recognize them either,
Because they were born in the Dominican Republic.
There is a fierce divisiveness,
A widening chasm,
And these people have been caught in the middle.
On our first day of the trip,
We stopped to visit one of these bateys.
How did we find out about it?
Susie Turner!
Her uncle Steve started a ministry here in the bateys,
And so we drove over there to connect with Jessica,
The missionary who works there now,
running the Least of These Ministries.
Jessica and her team are in the chasm,
in the middle of the divide,
feeding people.
God just called me here, Jessica said.
She’s about my age,
And her parents, who used to live in Frederick,
Just up and moved down to work with their daughter full
time.
God called, and God provided a way.
Our first group picture was in the church that Jessica and
the batey residents helped to build.
Pastor Ramon was our host.
These people opened up the doors to us,
Called us brothers and sisters,
Prayed for us before they even knew us.
We were bound together by a greater love,
Baptized in the same water.
Just three days later,
We met another man who dwells in the in between,
A man whose strong faith roots him in a place where it’s
hard to have roots.
Rafael is both Haitian and Dominican,
And manages to be a trusted friend on both sides,
When it might be easier to just pick one.
I am here because of God,
Rafael told us over dinner,
God put me here,
And it’s all about God.
Rafael puts on concerts for youth from both sides of the
border,
Leads a VBS,
And helps groups like ours go back and forth.
He used his truck to haul 800 pounds of cement for us,
Among other things.
“See, I am making a way in the desert,”
God says in Isaiah.
“See how the new thing springs up!”
The Bible testifies to more than just brokenness,
More than just the misunderstandings and selfishness and
callousness that divide us.
God’s word is a call to care,
A vision for connection,
A command that we beat our swords into ploughshares,
Stop for the guy on the side of the road,
Mend what has been torn.
In his letter to the Corinthians,
Paul paints a picture of a church that is knit together by
the Spirit.
One spirit,
One water,
One baptism.
Pastor Ramon, back in the bateys,
Had a different theological education from me, for sure.
Maybe Jessica and I wouldn’t agree about everything
when it comes to how to run a ministry.
Rafael and I come at parts of scripture from very different
angles.
But we were all baptized with the same water.
The same spirit calls us—
Calls me and each of you and each of the people in all of
these pictures—
It calls us to work together,
To figure out what that great vision is,
For a people united,
A people filled with good things,
For humanity restored.
And that’s why I go to Haiti every year,
That’s why we invest in trips,
Instead of just sending money over.
Because we were meant to live together,
Not in separate worlds,
Not like this,
Where we don’t hear cries or realize how hungry people are,
How hard they have to work to get by.
We were made to work together,
To put our minds together to come up with new ideas.
You should have seen Jacob with his engineering skills,
Conferencing with people from India, Israel, Haiti, the DR,
Maine, about how to build this shade structure.
A little mini UN right in Haiti,
Except no one was arguing.
Everyone was in it to win it for something bigger than their
own egos.
This kind of learning,
This kind of relationship building,
Has long term effects that no one can predict.
Long after this shade net is torn down,
We’ll remember each other.
Whether you were on the trip this year,
Or a part of it through your prayers, your gifts, or your
kind thoughts just this morning,
You’re connected with a community in Haiti that loves you
very much,
Not for what you’ve done,
But for the God you praise by working.
When this week fades a little bit and becomes another
memory,
Our baptisms will still be valid,
That water flowing between us,
Filling the chasms
And seeping into our bones
Will still be activated,
Still ready to change us,
Any one of us,
And all of us together.
Remember your baptism,
Each and every day,
And remember the body it calls you to be a part of.
Remember, and be thankful.
Amen.
-Kara
Reflections on a Week in Haiti (7:02 service )
It’s interesting that the theme we used -- led by Reverend Kara -- for today’s Sunday morning service was WATER. That’s the first thing that struck me--and probably all of us--in Haiti : the dust, the scarcity of water, the lack of rain. We, and plants and animals, do all need water. It’s precious, though we tend to take it for granted until we’re in a place where it’s neither plentiful nor clean.
No doubt water was (and is) a key concern in the land of Israel. It comes up a lot in the Bible. Two particular passages come to mind, from Isaiah.
Isaiah 44:3 “For I will pour water on the thirsty land, and streams on the dry ground; I will pour my Spirit upon your offspring and my blessing on your descendants.”
This verse particularly reflects the first experience we had in Anse a Pitre: going to church at Galilee Baptiste. We’ve just tried to give you an idea of what church is like there. It lasts a while(!) and it has a lot of variety – Sunday school, bible-verse-memorizing, lots and lots of singing, a good long sermon. Everyone was dressed for Sunday, especially the little girls many in bright yellow dresses, some of the women in bright hats or bandanas or with white doilies on their heads. We were welcomed warmly. Everyone seemed full of joy and energy; the littlest kids were mostly very patient and stayed with it, right through the service. Many of the prayers and the hymns spoke of hope for a better future in the next world, and perhaps in this one. At Galilee Baptiste the way to that better world is clearly through Jésus who was absolutely the center of the service—with much praising, hand raising and singing!
Beyond church -- the next day -- another water passage from Isaiah seemed relevant as our BUMC group learned about the “greening” efforts in Anse a Pitre -- replanting trees and vegetables. As you know, Haiti has been terribly deforested over many years. People usually have no other source of fuel for cooking so they cut trees and gather wood for daily use. We did see a wind farm of tall modern wind turbines as we drove past Barahona and towards Santo Domingo going to and from Anse a Pitre, but a wind farm requires a distribution system and that is still lacking. We saw solar ovens at Sadhana Forest—using sunpower, usually to dry or cook beans. Clearly energy, especially for cooking, is still a big issue and deforestation contributes to the heat and dryness which are so striking around Anse a Pitre. Restoring tree cover and adding vegetation will help relieve this and slowly begin to restore a better climate while increasing water levels.
In chapter 41, verse 18-20 Isaiah says: “I will open rivers on the bare heights, and fountains in the midst of the valleys. I will make the wilderness a pool of water, and the dry land springs of water. I will put in the wilderness the cedar, the acacia, the myrtle, and the olive. I will set in the desert the cypress, the plane and the pine together, that they may see and know, may consider and understand together, that the hand of the Lord has done this, the Holy One of Israel has created it.”
We saw that Holy Hand at work in Anse a Pitre -- particularly at the Sadhana Forest project and also in the garden and seed nursery of Rev. Kara’s friend, Eddy.
At Sadhana Forest, where we had vegetarian breakfast and lunch each day, we met volunteers from several countries -- India, Canada, US, Israel (the director) and several young, local Haitians. Volunteers working the early shift (6:30 – 8:30 am) go out to hand-water the many trees they have planted. This has to be done early before it’s too hot to head out with heavy buckets toward the mountains and around the several acres of land at Sadhana Forest. Other volunteers work from 9:30 to 12:30 making lunch and taking care of other jobs (like cleaning the composting toilets!).
The Sadhana staff also give away fruit trees -- and plant them in water-filled mounds, mulched with old clothes -- around people’s homes. This way the locals help care for the trees too. Altogether, Kara tells us, Sadhana Forest has planted more than 34,000 trees of all kinds. We also learned that over the last several years, the tree planting effort has actually raised the water level by about 6 inches so far. It hasn’t rained in Anse a Pitre this year at least since April.
One afternoon we had a tour of a plant nursery , a garden not far from Sadhana. We were invited by Eddy, a young Haitian whom Reverend Kara met 3 years ago. He used to come to Sadhana Forest at night to read for his exams by electric light (solar). He had no electricity at home. Eddy has really informed himself about perma-agriculture or what I know as organic or eco-agriculture. He has a large variety of plants and vegetables in his garden, under a shade net rather like the one we were building in the school yard near Sadhana Forest. Eddy also had several hundred small Cyprus trees (about 2 months old I think) raised from seeds from his mother’s tree. He doesn’t buy seeds, but gathers them from local plants and sources. He enriches his garden soil by growing corn and other crops to turn back under to add nitrogen and structure to the exhausted soil. His watering system was especially noteworthy -- it’s a bit precarious and, appropriately, based on trust and hope. Although there is a well, he really has little or no water for the garden. Now he is using water from a neighbor’s hose. Despite some early reluctance, Eddy has persuaded his neighbor to share water since it will do good for the community and for Haiti.
What does Eddy see for his future?... he wants his neighbors and his father (a farmer) to adopt his kind of gardening -- more nutritious and good for the Earth. His father, who began by saying “I’m your father I know what is right,” is beginning to trust his advice. A good start!
I worked at the World Bank quite a few years ago and since then with a French agriculture research organization providing their local office in Washington—connecting them to projects planned and underway at the World Bank and sometimes the Inter-american Development Bank. The current president of the World Bank, Dr. Jim Yong Kim, actually began his development work in Haiti more than 25 years ago. He co-founded “Partners in Health” with Dr. Paul Farmer and others in 1987. You may have heard of a book about Dr. Farmer’s work in Haiti -- Mountains Beyond Mountains [full title: Mtns beyond Mtns: The Quest of Dr. Paul Farmer, A Man Who Would Cure the World]. You might like to read the book. It won a Pulitzer prize in 2004.
In the agriculture sector, the World Bank and the IDB mostly give grants (not- repayable) to Haiti to finance things like improving the extension training system for farmers, to better connect farmers to markets, and to improve plant and animal health standards so as to reduce losses and allow for more marketing and exports. These projects are designed by bank staff along with governments and, increasingly, with local organizations.
So for me, this trip was a wonderful first-hand experience about the need to involve local, small farmers and residents in improving their future and their development. In this light, for the last 4 years I’ve developed a close friendship with a French couple who are researchers with CIRAD (my French ag research group). Andre is a specialist in land rights and land tenure in Africa and elsewhere. He’s developed programs to help give small farmers a certificate for the land they “own” and are using. Issuing certificates is being done increasingly through decentralized, local institutions—rather than by the central or provincial government. If they have some form of title, small farmers are freer to invest and improve the land where they are working.
Cecile, Andre’s wife, is a geographer with a keen interest in valuing ‘local knowledge’. She wants to see local knowledge able to hold its own against big top-down theories which governments and lenders sometimes impose – even with good intentions – and without much local input.
So – I have a couple of big takeaways from this wonderful week in Haiti. One is the usefulness and the fun of creating people networks, community. Kara talked about that this morning. These networks flow from BUMC (new and old friends there) to young Haitians who Kara has connected us to and ripple outwards from there. I think encouraging local leaders like Eddy and Rafael (another young Haitian-Dominican whom Kara met just the week before we arrived to join her) is key to improving life for Haitians.
Another take-away is the thought that big-money, top-down loans and grants can be useful, but connecting at the local level is essential to meet real needs and help create lasting change.
Between Sadhana Forest and Eddy’s nursery, change is happening. A large number of trees and plants are growing—if not all the ones mentioned in Isaiah, at least many which are indigenous to Haiti and can slowly help soften the hard, hot climate and bring the blessings of shade and more water to Anse a Pitre. May God continue to bless this work.
-Jill
