StephenByxbe.com

To start off… I will apologize to all of the dedicated readers. There was NO way to write a blog last night and leave you hanging the way it would have ended. So I thought it would be better to not do one at all and then do an AMAZING one tonight. Also, Pastor Leon took over my computer for the whole night

Ok. So here’s what happened. We have had two weeks without a team. Bill Glass (Mr President) came down and visited and also Dale, Bob and Rick came down. So during this time we were able to work on stuff that needed to be done to the guest house, organize, catch up, review AND relax. Since we are in Haiti for a year, we need to get the full Haitian experience. That includes traveling. We have been hearing about Jacmel since we got here so Leon said let’s go. We jumped in the truck and headed off. I got to drive the whole way. It was so much fun.

I knew we had to drive through the mountains to get there, but I didn’t know we were going to drive on top of ALL the mountains to get there. It was the most beautiful 3.5 hr drive ever. While driving we always had an amazing view off the side of the mountain. When I say side of the mountain… I am very thankful that they had guard rails. Right over the guard rail there is nothing other than 100′s of feet to free fall. It was a beautiful drive.

On the way, we drove near Leogane. This was the center of the earthquake on Jan 12th. The outskirts were damaged badly. Huge houses were completely leveled, schools knocked down and everything in between. Pastor Leon pointed out a witch doctors house that was destroyed. He said before the earthquake it was one of the most impressive houses in the area – 4 stories tall and HUGE – now it is pancaked.

The ride to Jacmel was beautiful, but it was also the hottest ride I have ever been on. I was sweating so much I was glued to the seat. I haven’t driven in so long, so it was exciting to be able to drive again. While we were driving through the mountains, we came around a corner and a big tap tap truck had run into the side of the mountain. People were jumping off and running and screaming. It caused a little bit of a landslide on the front of the truck. It was kind of scary and crazy. The people were very scared. Right down the road the UN was clearing the roads from a lot of landslides, so we were having to drive on one lane roads that were winding in and out around the mountains.

When we pulled into Jacmel the goal was to find a Hotel. We roll up to the first place, Leon hops out.. comes back and says they are full. So we decided to go check another. Same thing… no rooms. Leon then remembers he has an American friend that lives in Jacmel so we went by her house. She had a group staying with her but gave us a recommendation. We left, in search for the next place, trying a few places in between, however, we got the same answer. By this time we are ok with sleeping on the beach. After asking 5 different people we FINALLY find the hotel. When we pull up, we all looked at it and said this might be a little out of our price range. Lol. Thank the Lord it all worked out. The reason all of the hotels were booked is because most of them were damaged in the earthquake and only had about 4 – 6 rooms available.

While we were checking in, Nathan ran out back to check out the beach. It was amazing. We were nestled in a little bay area. There was a little beach area surrounded by cliffs. So beautiful. We immediately ran for the cliffs and attempted to jump off but it wasn’t deep enough at all. We instead climbed down and all over this rock that was as sharp as glass. Not the best idea. We got bored pretty quick so we jumped in the pool.

As we waited for dinner, everyone pulled out an electronic device and started typing away. It was sad that we couldn’t go one day without computers. We all joked for awhile and then partook in some amazing food.

I woke up friday morning around 6 am and headed down to the pool to join everyone. We relaxed and swam for awhile and then continental breakfast. Right after breakfast we headed to an even better beach. It was great. There was beach for as long are you could see. Clear water, and a HUGE coral reef not far from the shore. We swam out there and played on the reef for a while. At the edge of the reef it dropped off about 20′. We jumped in a swam around the bottom. There were tunnels and lots of cool rocks that we swam through. On top of the reef there were some crazy pieces of coral or something. I got stung all over my legs. They burned for a long time, but seeing that reef was worth it. After that we ate lunch. 2 words – fresh lobster!!! AMAZING.I asked..”Where are we?? Because this is certainly not Haiti.. or at least the Haiti I know!” Haha. Leon assured me that this was only the beginning!

After lunch we packed up in the truck and began our search for the water fall – Bassin Bleu. I had seen pictures and was so excited about going. After a few attempts to ask people where it was, we picked up a guy and carried him with us. On the way there we had to drive through 2 small rivers and use 4WD the whole time. If that doesn’t explain it, we were driving straight up the mountain. We were on the very edge of cliffs going straight up with no guard rails. We started sliding backwards one time, but it turned out ok! You can’t drive all the way to the falls, so you have to park and walk about a 1/2 mile. When we got there we had to pay another guide to go with us. He walked with us to the falls. (He also told us where we couldn’t jump from – not cool). Turns out, the guy that we picked up on the side of the road, his sister and and brother in law work right where we were going. Such a small world. The hike in to the falls is very pretty but the falls themselves are AMAZING!!!! It reminded me a lot of Jack’s River in north Georgia except way cooler and in Haiti! We jumped off of 25-30′ rocks and cliffs, explored caves and swam. So relaxing. We were doing back flips off of everything and having a great time. Pastor Leon was loving it.

Jacmel is very clean. It was nice driving through town. After we finished with the cliff we loaded in the car and started our next journey – The ride home. It is such a beautiful ride. While we were driving we saw a little stand selling fruit. We stopped by and bought some of the most amazing fruit ever. I can’t explain it to you now neither can I spell it (pronounced – Co-saw). All I can say is that it is the most intriguing fruit I have every seen – and delicious.

We made it back home around 7pm.. just in time for dinner.

Thanks for everyone’s prayers while we were traveling. I have left out a lot of details because my eyelids and REALLY heavy at the moment. I will add some more details soon.! If for some reason parts of this made no sense… it’s because I was asleep!

Have a good weekend (Pase bon weekend)

Always with love!

Stephen

This blog is closed for April 29th. Please go read Nathan Lee’s blog – harvestforhaiti.com. Thanks for your patience.

When we arrived in Haiti and drove through Cite Soleil, I was pretty sure it was the dirtiest place I had ever seen. However, this week it has gotten even dirtier. Just when I thought it couldn’t happen – it did. They started cleaning the canals (which are just huge piles of trash and crap). This is no small task. There are numerous canals. They have 2 – 3 backhoes working on each one, scooping it out in dump truck and driving it off. The only problem is that the backhoe drops trash everywhere and then the dump trucks track it everywhere. There is trash and nastiness all over the road and so much dust in the air.

Not only that, digging a foundation in Cite Soleil is pretty disgusting. I think I touched on this yesterday. When you dig you are just digging through trash… nasty. That’s all  have to say. But one positive thing about this. We are slowly working to help clean up the areas and help provide these people with a great place to live and show them that God loves them.

Today started out a little frustrating. I had to load up supplies from all the job sites in Terre Noir and take it Cite Soleil. I started at 6:30am. By 7:30 I had everything and I got Rebekah, Sabrina and Byambison to ride along. We dropped everything off at the site and then we went to pick up cement near downtown PAP. We were parked on the side of the road and I was talking with the cement people trying to get everything arranged. I then walked off to pay the guy. As soon as I got around the corner I heard screeching tires, dogs barking, people yelling and chaos. I immediately thought something had happened to the girls so I ran back to the car. Byambison was with them – so don’t think I left them alone. When I got back to the car, There was a lady that had been hit by a tap tap next to ours. It hit her head on and threw her into the ditch. It was a very sad sight. I am pretty sure it broke her legs. We wanted to help but there were some issues there. Pray that she was treated and is doing better.

The rest of my day consisted of gather roofing supplies for 4 roofs that we are working on in Cite Soleil. It is so weird to not be able to go to one store and get everything you need. I was exhausted at the end of the day after moving TONS of roofing supplies. I was so exhausted I left my phone at the last lumber yard. We had to turn around and go back. I made it home today at 5:30pm. It was a really long day.

Today was overall a great day, and a good example of a normal workday. VERY BUSY!

This Saturday we will be off of our break from teams so pray for us as we get back into the groove of hosting teams.

Remember we are raising money to purchase an ATV to help us move supplies and materials from job site to job site. If you would like to contribute contact Susan Frost – sff1@bellsouth.net

I hope everyone is doing great. I miss you and love you all,

Stephen

Well… maybe not… but today was a good day. I have been sleeping in a hammock for the past few days and it is the best sleep I have had in weeks! I did not want to get up this morning.I finally did. I have separated the Haitian teams right now so some of them meet in Cite Soleil and some in Terre Noir. I got the T/N workers together and to the site and then did some house keeping and met the others in Cite Soleil. We are digging a foundation right now and yesterday we got it down about 3 feet. This morning when I got there we had about 8″ of water in the bottom of the trench. This was not good. Working at sea level is not much fun – o yeah… working on a trash dump isn’t much fun either. We had to change the design around just a little to accommodate for the high water level. We made a few other changes to the lay out and then I let them work. I moved to the next site were we are fixing some walls and re-roofing a house. When I walked in, the guy was laying some block – not very straight. But the best part about it was he had blocked a PALM TREE into the wall. not just a random palm tree, but a 35′ tall palm tree that was leaning REALLY BAD. I didn’t even know what to say. I just starred at it – and then I brought in another worker to see what he had to say. He just repeated “Oohh this is bad… very bad.” So we decided just to tear down the wall and move it a little bit out of the way. Yeah…

The next house is another house where the home owner couldn’t wait on us to get there, so we are doing more corrective work now that normal. We are working inside one of the smallest houses imaginable all up on ladders trying to get the house ready for a roof. However, its not as easy as it sounds.

The next house was partially knocked down by the wall at the C/S compound, so we are rebuilding it. The guy that lives there is fairly old and doesn’t move very fast, so it has to been fun working with him. I love the pace down here in Haiti. Things happen when they happen.. and if it doesn’t happen today it will happen tomorrow. Fun stuff..

Around 1:30pm the Blanchard Resort Staff went on a field trip up the mountain to visit the Baptist mission and this really awesome old fort! It was AMAZING. It was so beautiful.. this is one of the most beautiful places I have ever seen. Haiti is beautiful. I definitely want to move here now! After our field trip we were riding around in the car taking millions of pictures when BMB told Nathan “every time you pose for a picture you look so monumental.” Not exactly what he meant to say… but we understood. It made for a good laugh and a few more.

We stopped on the way home at a place called Mun-Cheeze and got a pizza and burgers. It was a fun time socializing with just the long term folks.

OOoo I forgot to tell you something about yesterday. I was walking to one of the job sites in Cite Soleil I saw a kid with one of his eyes closed. I walked past him and on my way back out I stopped to see what was wrong. In talking with him I learned that he was playing with some friends on a home made cart that is made of wood and wheel barrings. While he was riding a nail flew out of the board and hit him in the eye. It was at night so none of the clinics were open and they went to the hospital but there was nothing they could do by that time. It has been almost a month and he has lost sight in his right eye. This was so sad. To see such a young kid to lose his sight.

On to a happier note, I am making hundreds of new friends. They are all between the ages of 1 and 8 called ti moun. All the children of the neighborhood come running and waving when we show up for work. It is so much fun. They love to talk so much. So I will sit with them and talk and play a game or two. They are amazing kids. I wish I could move them all out of the dirtiest place on earth to somewhere where they could live a better life.

Time for some amazing sleep… in the hammock!!

Always with Love,

Stephen

Today was a REALLY long day.. which is going to result in a shorter blog post tonight because me hammock is screaming my name!

This morning was sad.. we had to ship Mr. President back to the states. We had a good week with him. It was great having him down to check everything out.

2 of my construction crews finally made it to Cite Soleil this morning, so that stretched me a little bit having to bounce between 4 job sites in Cite Soleil, Blanchard  and Terre Noir – using a tap tap – that everyone else needed as well. I made it work some how and eventually called in a back up tap tap to help.

The first site at Cite Soleil we are digging a full foundation to rebuild a house that the church wall fell on during the earthquake. The ground in Cite Soleil is AWFUL. C/S used to be a trash dump – and still is. So imagine digging there. You run into tshirts, bags, plastic bottles, and just random trash. We are also right at sea level so the foundation fills up with water pretty fast. We have to be pretty creative with how we do this.

The second job site is correcting and stabilizing some work a lady did to her own house because she couldn’t wait two weeks for us to get there. We will also re-roof her house. We had to go assess the house this morning and go pick up supplies. It is so hard to get supplies to these houses because there are tents in every single road and the houses are so close together you have to walk through this ity bity maze to get there.

It was an interesting time at the job site this afternoon due to some unwanted confrontation that I had to deal with so it really slowed our progress down, but I learned that the workers really like me! So that’s a plus. Haha.. I wasn’t very happy for the rest of the day so I have just tried to relax. I am about to go read for awhile – Donald Miller’s “Searching for God knows what.” Pretty good book so far.

Hopefully the blog will be a little better tomorrow.

Always with love,

Stephen

I love Sundays. There is something about going to a church where I don’t understand ANYTHING other than; Thank You Lord, We Love You Lord, God Bless Us etc – that is really exciting.

We started off the day at Blanchard Church @ 6am. We stayed there until 7:30am then jumped in the truck and headed to Cite Soleil church. At Cite Soleil I had to check out a few things with the water system so I missed most of the service. While I was out looking at the water system I missed a Haitian wedding that took place during the service. I was disappointed to have missed that… I’m pretty sure I’ll see another one! We stayed at Cite Soleil until 8:30am and then rolled over to Repatriote Church, which takes place under the “Leon Dome.” The Ridgecrest Team (small shout out) named the HUGE white tent at Repatriote the “Leon Dome.” We caught the last few 20 – 30 mins of church at Repatriote. After church Sabrina was “attacked” by small children. I looked over and I think there were 20 kids sitting around, on top of, behind, in front of her and just hanging all over her. It was really cute. Bill and I were looking at the gate keeper’s new house that is being built. We are using some new methods of construction, and it is the first to be built this way. While we were over there the gate keeper’s son came over. He is the CUTEST kid in the world. I played with him for awhile and wanted to take him with us (as did everyone else) for the rest of the day.

After church we went back to Terre Noir (Blanchard Compound) and relaxed for an hour or so until Pastor Leon and Mrs Jacky were finished with church. We all went out to eat lunch and this small haitian restaurant. This place has the best juice in the WHOLE WORLD. Well, maybe not the whole world.. but it is really good. We all got pumpkin soup for lunch.. and I don’t know how to explain this pumpkin soup other than AMAZING. It is going to be added in to the menu for the Blanchard Resort (& Spa).

After lunch we went on a scavenger hunt for fruit so we could make some more smoothies. Kudos to Mr. President Bill. He is the SMOOTHIE KING. Last night we mixed up some smoothies that were so good we had to stock up on fruit to do it again. So we stopped by the grocery store and 2 street markets to get fruit.

This Sunday was an actual day of rest. We didn’t leave town we just lounged around the compound and rested. Nathan and I put our hammocks up and took an afternoon nap. Following the nap I did one last tour of job sites with Bill and Leon. We walked through Terre Noir/Blanchard and talked with some people and just looked around.

Mr. President Bill leaves tomorrow. He will be missed. It has been great having him here and we look forward to his next trip down.

Good news! I am booking my first trip home. I will be back in the states on Sept 10 – 21. I will start in Columbia SC and Charlotte NC and work my way down through Dublin & Macon GA. I am looking forward to seeing everyone!

Have a great night!

Always with Love,

Stephen

Saturdays are an interesting day. They feel like they should be a day off… however, it’s a hardworking day just like every other day of the week. So – that means – up and at ‘em bright and early. Clothes, breakfast, toothbrush and then it’s off with the workers.

The workers are awesome.. no joke. They do great work and they don’t play around (anymore   ) So they got everything they needed – sand, gravel, cement etc and I let them get to work.

I returned to the compound to find Sabrina very sick, so we immediately started making phone calls to get her in with a doctor. In the background I heard power saws. That meant more bunk beds were being built. We are currently able to hold 16 women and 18 men in bunks. We are slowly expanding.. one bunk at a time!

Around 8:30am I headed towards Delmas 16 (that is a road name FYI) to meet Nadege at the bank. I have only heard horror stories about the bank, so I wasn’t sure what to expect. She had her brother go to the bank before it opened and hold a place for me until I arrived. Praise the Lord for Nadege’s brother. I stood in line for 2 hours and then sat for 1 hour filling out paperwork. The crazy thing is that collective 4-5 hr wait was a short wait. I want to apologize now to all the banks in the US that I have ever been upset with – you all are doing a FANTASTIC job. And a special thanks to my bank.. Suntrust.. I have been very upset with you in the past… for numerous reason… but I love you.

The bank visit drug on until 12 – 12:30pm and I had sent Marconelle away so we were on foot now. We stopped by a few stores and then made our wait to Pastor Leon’s house. We sat down and rested for a few minutes, had a coke, talked with Mrs Jacky and then headed to the supermarket to wait for Marconelle to pick us up. I finally remember to buy milk. So tomorrow we can have cereal!!! While walking around the store (that I have been in a thousand times) I spotted a grill. I pulled the box down and it is a 3 burner, table top,  gas grill. We have been looking for this for a long time. Best thing – it is reasonably priced. In the buggy goes the grill. Now on the menu – omelets, scrambled eggs, bacon etc! I can’t wait to try it out.

Once I finally made it back to the compound I just needed to relax. We all sat around and caught up, I took a brief nap and then we spent some time doing devotions. Dinner tonight was the always amazing crab soup.

Just a quick update to the individuals who have been down here so far. We have the supplies in hand to create the canopy on the roof!! So the next phase of Blanchard Resort starts next week.

Hope everyone is doing great.. I miss you all!

Always with Love,

Stephen

Well today is Friday. The end of the week is drawing near. A day of rest will be greatly appreciated. No beach this weekend though.

Today I had a financial meeting with Bill and Leon from 6:30 – 9am. It was a good meeting going over funds and details for rebuilding and repairing houses. Today I was put in charge of all new home construction and repairs. So my day to day tasks will change a good bit, as I won’t be dealing with the guest house as much.

After the meeting I rode my bicycle out to check on the job sites, which a white person riding a bike gets a response equivalent to what we would expect to see when Jesus returns. One house was completely finished yesterday, the second house is being stuccoed now and the 3 foundations all have slabs poured on them. We have made some amazing progress on all the sites. I look forward to doing some more work in Cite Soleil in the next couple days – hopefully tomorrow.

The job sites were running smoothly this morning. I picked up some extra supplies and let them continue to build. Bill, Nathan and I then headed to Cite Soleil to talk with Mrs Jacky about using part of the recreation field as a supply drop point and then drove over to the hardware store to order the supplies for our canopy. I cannot wait for the canopy to be finished. It is going to be amazing.

The afternoon was spent visiting the job sites, going over supplies with the lead workers and planning for tomorrow. I was able to do some random chores at the compound after work while Nathan, Bekah, Sabrina and Byambison built some more bunk beds.

Dinner was amazing tonight. We had fried chicken (again – a couple nights in a row) with a cream corn and beans mixture + potatoes, carrots and green beans. Soooo good. After dinner we did a small worship service and devotion time that we are working into the standard routine for all teams. We also had a staff meeting where we assigned jobs and duties to help spread the weight of the teams.

I sat with the engineers/architects/builders after dinner and discussed the logistics of the new houses we will be building. We are going to be building some amazing houses. I believe tomorrow will be an overflow of meetings from today. I will find out soon.

Just a reminder about the current fundraiser. We are raising money to buy some small ATV/ utility vehicles to help us carry supplies in to difficult areas. If you would like to help with this effort please contact Susan Frost @ sff1@bellsouth.net

Thank you so much for all of your prayers and support. I could not be doing this without all of my friends and family – and new friends that I have just made! You all are a blessing!

Keep in touch.

Always with Love,

Stephen

President of Haiti Outreach Ministries that is. Wednesday morning started off early – getting things ready and inline to pickup Bill Glass (HOM President). Regular morning… nothing too exciting, but off to the airport around 11am. Flights were a little backed up but not a problem. We finally spotted them (Bill & Sabrina, Sabrina is another long term worker) and off we went. We made it back to the compound, got them settled in, ate lunch and then Leon joined us to do a tour of all the job sites.We started in Terre Noir/Blanchard where we are currently working. We have almost finished 2 houses and 3 foundations. They were very happy with all of the sites. That was a relief! I was glad that there were no problems with anything. After Terre Noir we went to Repatriote to look at some sites that Leon is building now and some sites that we will be starting soon. These seem like short stops that I am talking about but we spent hours at each place. We then headed to Cite Soleil. We toured the compound and that work that is being done there, then we walked around the corner to some of the job sites and to the house that we completed there before.

We made it back to the compound around 6pm. It was a really long day of touring and checking out the construction work. A very productive and great day. Dinner was fun. It was the 4 long term workers, Byambison and Bill. We were able to talk through a lot of things and start working on specific jobs around the compound.

We also bought a blender the other day so we tried it out last night. We made an awesome Mango/Banana smoothie! So refreshing!

Now on to Thursday…

Up and at ‘em early. Woke up this morning and we still had power (becoming a regular thing now) and checked some emails. Started around 5:15 – 5:30, just couldn’t convince myself to get out of the bed. Bill got up around 5:30 so I decided I would get up and get breakfast. Breakfast was short because I needed to jump in the shower before we started work. So as soon as I got out of the shower all the workers were here. I got their tools ready and sent them out. I went on a short supply run and then took Bill back to the job sites. He got to interact with some of the workers today and show them some things we are changing in the design of a house. After we finished the “Tour of Homes: Haiti Style” we headed to Cite Soleil to meet with Bob + Associates (aka the American engineers, architects and builders) to discuss the master plan for Cite Soleil & Blanchard compounds. It was a very interesting meeting, as we learned a lot about HOM their goals, history and plans. I thought it was going to be a short meeting.. maybe until lunch… but we ended up staying until about 4pm. After C/S we went to Repatriote to take some measurements and let them see the site.

Today seemed like a non-productive day, however I feel like I accomplished a lot today learning about the master plan and what is about to take place. There is about to be some major changes and additions that are going to take place. I am excited to be a part of them.

While we were sitting around waiting to leave C/S a group of school kids came up to us wanting to play. We were playing some games with them and having fun. They were saying that we were beautiful and that I looked like Jesus! Haha… my long hair must be getting close to the goal. After that they started braiding mine and Nathan’s hair. It was a lot of fun interacting with them. They are the cutest kids in the entire world.

Since I slacked on my blog last night, I typed it up early today. Hopefully nothing exciting happens in the next few hours because I will forget it before tomorrow night

Also, a fundraiser for the next few weeks. We are in need of a small utility vehicle – like a gator, mule or cart with a bed on the back – to help haul supplies to job sites. Some of the roads are very bad and very narrow. This would help us get cement, stone, sand and re-bar to the sites without having to haul it in by buckets. If you would like to help financially with this project, please contact Susan Frost – sff1@bellsouth.net for instructions.If you have a vehicle you would like to donate please let me know and we will ship it.

Thank you so much to everyone who has been praying for me and Nathan. It is greatly appreciated.

Always with Love,

Stephen

Alright! I have been hiding for a few days.. not really but we finally got the generator hooked up (correctly) and running now. The only problem was that there is a shortage of fuel in the country. So today I drove around for a few hours searching for fuel. It was crazy. One place wouldn’t let us fill our containers because they said we were going to go sell it for more money on the side of the road. Ridiculous.. but whatever.

Last night it rained for a long time – and it was raining this morning so I wasn’t sure how many workers I would have… but fear not – They ALL showed up. They got their tools and off they went. I stayed at the compound today and did some painting. There were some spots in the “Resort” that just really needed to be repainted so I started working. Around 9 I went with Marconelle and Byambison to the store to get some simple items… and some not so simple items. We want some folding plastic tables so they wont get damaged by the rain. You would think that would be easy to find… not so much. I found some other things we needed and then headed out.

This is where the fuel adventure started. From 10am until 2pm we drove around in search of fuel. Not gonna lie… it was awful. While we were driving around, I saw a town the was flooded really bad. There were houses filled with water. Water up to the doors on cars. Hundreds of houses flooded. We have had so much rain lately and it’s only the beginning of the rainy season. It is so sad to see these people living in such poverty. Their houses were not damaged by the earthquake – but yet they constantly get flooded. I don’t even know how to explain it.

After I returned to the compound I started painting some more. Also, I bought a bicycle today and Bruno brought it to me! I am so excited to have a bike.. haha. Back to painting. Byambison and I painted the hallways in front of the girls and guys dorms. They look so nice and clean.

After dinner, the welder stopped by to discuss the canopy that we are building on the roof. We are designing a lounge-ish type of place that will be relaxing for the guests of Blanchard Resort

Since we have power – it might be a movie night….

Thanks for following.

Always with love,

Stephen