Sunbathing for Christmas: I could get used to that...

So, I went to Haiti over the holiday. Vacation? Well, I guess a little bit. Otherwise, I was shooting pics and vids for Longchamp Charities, an amazing little 501(c)(3) founded by a great friend of mine, Marjorie Longchamp, and her best friend, Béatrice Brice. They operate on a very simple principle: Haitian children would have a much better chance at success if there was a way to eliminate the basic barriers to their advancement. It's hard for children to be children, and to grow into functional adults, if they are encumbered from the start by lack of food, shelter, and security. Longchamp Charities, or L'école de Mme. Bébé, as they say there, grants children with these very simple things, and all they ask for in return is that they go to school.

Some 70-odd kids live with Bébé on her sprawling property in Thomassin, Haiti, in what looks like, to me, some post-civilization Carthaginian neverland. It's beautiful. And although it recalled the most exciting of my Lord of the Flies fantasies, there was very rigid structure to the kids' days and nights. Schooling plays a central role there; kids will stay up till past midnight studying if they have not learned their lessons fully, even on Christmas. They drill eachother when they're bored on multiplication tables and French grammar, in preparation for any of Bébé's feared drills.

Of course, I had my reservations about going to Haiti in the first place. I heard many horror stories about what happens to people in Haiti, both from the "media", and from my hosts themselves. Bébé herself, was kidnapped 2 years ago, and shot in the liver. She was stuck in a traffic jam, at a somewhat reasonable hour in the day, in a very busy intersection. They pointed a machine gun at her head, and forced her out of her car. Three hours later, she was found lying in the street three blocks from the site of her abduction, and people just stepped over her body as she lie bleeding. Her life was saved, but she still bears a nasty scar, and is incredibly prone to infection. I asked her if she'd ever buy a gun to protect herself, and her children. She said no, because she doesn't want God to ever question her faith in Him. As you can probably surmise, Bébé is a force to be reckoned with.

My trip was, above all, eye-opening. I could write pages and pages about my time there, but I don't believe that would do it justice, and nor do I want to cast any sort of mystery over the land, its people, or my time there. I'm just lucky I got to see it. I took about a gazillion pics and vids while there, and it's all up on my flickr account. Here's a guide to the photo sets I made:

L'école de Mme. Bébé

This set contains lots of pics of the grounds. We're trying to drum up about $10,000 for repairs to the grounds, which will include finishing up the top two stories of the house, and turning the bottom floors into a mess hall and dormitory for the kids. Bébé's longterm goal for the organization is to hire more in-house teachers who can supplement the kid's learning in school, teach them practical trades like sewing, cooking, auto maintenance and such, and who can mentor the kids. We'd like to be able to accommodate these new hires on the top floors of the house, and move the kids into the lower floors. Also, they'd serve as private rooms for any volunteers we have on the property.

School

Here are some pics demonstrating what schooling is like for some of the Longchamp Charities kids. Although the kids were on holiday when I arrived, they were still studying ahead: getting a head start of next trimester's lessons. The girls featured in this set are all at the top of their class, and were rewarded with a special overnight trip to Cavaillon right before Christmas.

Cavaillon!

On December 22, we took a trip to a beautiful town called Cavaillon, 4 hours north-east of Port-au-Prince. OMG we were 15 in an SUV for 4 hours, it was ridiculous. Seven of the girls were packed in the back of the car, one girl was sitting on my lap in the front passenger's seat. Halfway through the trip, she vomited all over me, totally squashing any urges to procreate that I might have previously harbored. We stayed at the town judge's house, who also owns the town radio station and rec center. This trip was special, because two of the girls, Arnilde and Christhilde, are from there, and they got to see their family for the first time in three years. The girls' family, who were so proud of their daughters, and happy to know they have been taken care of under Bébé's supervision, gave us loads of peanut butter, sugar cane, chickens, and a turkey to take home with us. This was a very warm gesture. However, spending 4 hours in a cramped SUV with 2 live chickens, a screaming turkey, and 11 sugar cane sucking kids was kind of the last thing I wanted to do.

Bébé's Kids!

Finally, here are some great shots of the kids. Believe me, they're an amazing bunch of little people: fun-loving, happy, and inquisitive. Just like any kids. It was a lot of fun to spend my holiday with them, and I felt honored by their welcome.

BTW, if any of these pics have stirred the philanthropic bone in your body, feel free to support us by donating via PayPal here. What's beautiful about this organization, is that it's not one that hinges on your pity: these kids are being given a chance to make it, and also, equally importantly, they're given a chance to just be kids. They're doing such great work out there: let's hope they can continue it!