18 Oct Canadian Trip to Haiti: Day 1

A United Brethren work group from Canada traveled to Haiti on October 17 to conduct medical clinics in our churches. Joan Sider is sending daily reports for the team. Here is her report for Monday, October 17.

We are thrilled to report that we have arrived in Haiti–and as I write this, we are experiencing our first power outage. However, since we are in the guest house, a generator will soon have power up and running. But imagine–there are so many who are now in total darkness.

Our team was thrilled with Air Canada. We were quickly seen to this morning, and when we arrived in Montreal, we were pleasantly surprised by the size of that airport. Nothing like Toronto’s or Miami’s–so much less walking. Having no customs to go through until we arrived here was great.

Here in Haiti, it was a snap. Pastor Richard knew one of the agents, so we moved swiftly through. The airport personnel, particularly the baggage handlers, seem to be much better organized, and we weren’t bombarded with the many men trying to assist us by carrying our bags.

One thing that was a bit disturbing at the beginning of our day–we knew that we each had to pay $20 for our second piece of luggage. However, we were two bins too many, making two of us have a third piece–at $225 each. So with the $20 for each of us plus the two third bins, we paid $590. But here is the God thing–we were told by the person at the desk that we could likely recoup most if not all of this money. All I need to do is write to Customer Relations at Air Canada and tell them why we had this much luggage and that it was going for charity purposes. A letter will be written, you can be sure.

We have decided that at our debriefing times, we will talk about “God moments” and keep a record of them each night. We’ve started, and everyone shared several that we experienced this first day. Jordan will be our secretary. It will be encouraging to us at the end of the week to see how God is revealing Himself in so many different ways.

We are a tired group tonight. Most of us were up very very very early–so I’ll say good night.