Lascahobas

After saying goodbye to Herodion in Hinche, Ruben and I headed to Lascahobas to take on our next assignment.  We loaded into a van and were on our way.  The van was packed door to door.  Myself and 19 other people rocked back and forth as we ventured over the poorly maintained dirt road.  We reached the pavement and from there the ride was much better. Just as I started to doze off, our driver abruptly pulled over to the side of the road.  He went around to his front right tire, examined it, and then began to jack up the car.  We all piled out and moved over to the shade.  The driver decided that the highway was the best place to change his break pad. The passengers were none too pleased, and the general consensus was that the driver knew the problem existed long before we left, but didn’t want to delay and miss out on the money from a van full of people.    We impatiently waited while he finished up, and within an hour we were on our way once again. 

My instructions upon arriving in Lascahobas were to ask a motorcycle to take me to Bernadette’s house. Adam ensured me that they would know the way.  Lascahobas is a smaller town and Bernadette is a big name in the community, everyone knows and respects her.  We arrived and the driver knew just where to go. I paid him and we went inside.  Bernadette is an eccentric character whose friendly personality and hard work has made her a local celebrity.  She runs a school just up the road from her house and has quite the arsenal of XOs.  Unlike most schools, Bernadette’s school signs the laptops out to the students who take them home and bring them back to the school only for class.  Most places this is a bad idea but Lascahobas is a great town for this model.  As I was saying, Bernadette is a huge figure in the community.  Everyone knows her and knows that the XOs belong to her.  The community looks out for each other and looks out for her XO’s. Upon my arrival they had 46 laptops signed out to kids at the school.

The first day we went to school and were taken up the laptop room.  Bernadette opened it up and we got to work.  I booted up my laptop and checked the school server.  Everything checked out so now it was time to check on the laptops.  Despite the school being set up with a new 12 volts electrical system 6 months prior to my arrival, they had been experiencing issues with charging the laptops. I found a good battery and used it to check through the 75 laptops that were laid out in front of me.  All but six were in perfect working condition and all but three I was able to salvage.  The next day we passed out 65 of those laptops and Thursday we had 3 laptop classes running simultaneously.  The total number of laptops was 109.  Next it was time to address the electrical issues. 

The school has 2 permanent solar panels that run from the roof to a charge controller that converts the voltage to 12 volts.  The charge then travels to a set of 4 batteries connected in parallel, and then back up into the charge controller.  From there the wires carry the charge to a power strip that was connected to the wires by wrapping the wires around the prongs and taping them with electrical tape.  Definitely not a conventional set up but after a few minutes of confused stares I traced the flow of electricity.  I looked around the room and found a voltmeter, a familiar tool that I have used in physics lab multiple times.  I took off the plastic tips and got some readings.  After a few skype calls and a good amount of discussing we decided it would be best to detach the 3^rd set of wires from the charge controller and connect them directly to the batteries.  This allowed us to get the 12 volts we needed to charge the laptops.  After fussing with the touchy wires for a while, we were able to have 9 laptops charging at once on the 12 volt system. 

The next day, the job was to address the state of the other set of 2 batteries connected in parallel.  These batteries were connected to wires that ran to the roof and had two ports for connecting a rollable solar panel.  Inside the computer room, the batteries had a wire running to another power strip able to charge 9 more laptops.  Based on the voltage being produced by these two batteries, it was easy to tell that the solar panel had been in storage longer than it should have been.  I took it out and carried it to the roof where I attached it.   One of the frustrating aspects of volunteer work is that at some point you leave, and the job is no longer in your hands.  Especially with technology, maintenance is important. Whether it was ignorance or laziness, the maintenance was not getting done.  Laziness I cannot fix, but as an educator I can do my best to cure ignorance.  I took a second to enjoy the lovely view before heading back to work. In the bottom of the frame you can see the rollable solar panel providing charge to the batteries.

After a few hours of tinkering with broken laptops I went and checked the voltage across the portable system.  30 volts across the solar panel, and 13.4 volts across the battery flowing into the second power strip.  I hook up the remaining laptops, and all and all was able to charge 16 laptops on the 12 volt system.  Ruben and I smiled at our success and he ran off to get some lunch.  One of the children had brought me a laptop with a faulty keyboard, so I disassembled one of the broken XOs and was able to swap out keyboards.  He came back a few hours later and was extremely happy to have his laptop back in working condition.  The school has a pile of laptops that they claim are broken, a few seemed to have software issues but some are just good for parts.  After discussing it with Adam and Sora, we decided it would be a good idea my last day to run a workshop where I would teach a few of the best computer how to swap out parts. That was set up for Friday, but Thursday I would get the chance to do some teaching.          

I spent most of the morning Thursday tinkering and was able to fix a couple more laptops.  My lesson plan was to bring my mother’s favorite game show to the children of Lascahobas, Jeopardy.  The school has a terabyte school server the kids can connect to, called Internet-in-a-box.  The hard drive contains Wikipedia in dozens of languages, Khan academy educational videos, and other educational tools and software.  I created a list of 16 questions and arranged them in a grid with 4 different categories.  The questions were designed to be difficult enough so that the kids would have to use the laptops to look up the answers.  A sample question was “how big is Haiti in kilometers?”  The categories were, the universe, Haiti facts, America facts, and Famous people.  The kids went straight for the questions about Haiti and searched the depths of Wikipedia for the answers.  Each correct answer was met with a celebration by the team receiving the points.  I asked a question about back home that I knew would be easy for the kids to find; “What is the capital of Michigan?” They got searching and a kid in the front row raised his hand.  I walked over to examine his answer.  He got to the page on Livonia, although his answer was wrong, it was cool to see that he had a great enough access to information that if he wanted to he could read all about Livonia Michigan, or the big bang theory, or general relativity, or anything that might spark the imagination.  A few minutes later I heard one of the kids in the second row sound out the correct answer. I awarded her team the points and with that they sealed the win. The class came to an end and Bernadette came in to address the kids.  They thanked me for being their guest teacher and for the work I was doing repairing the laptops.  I said goodbye and went back to get some rest before my final day. 

On the final day I met with the teachers of the XO program.  I explained to them how the electrical system worked, and emphasized the importance of keeping everything well maintained.  One teacher especially seemed very eager to learn and seemed to understand my explanation.  I’m optimistic that when Sora and Nick arrive in mid-December, there will be very few issues.  After we worked through that and I answered their questions, I met with the star students of the XO program.  I taught one pair of kids how to disassemble the front of the laptop, and we replaced a broken screen.  The other group learned how to disassemble the bottom of the laptop and we replaced a keyboard.  The kids were intrigued, and their nimble hands made it easy for them to work on the tiny laptop.  We put everything back together and had two more working laptops.  We cleaned up and I left behind a screwdriver so that they could tinker.  I could have spent the rest of my time in Haiti at Lascahobas, fixing laptops, and teaching, but come Saturday it was time to say goodbye.     

Lascahobas provided some unique challenges that raised a lot of frustrations, but reflecting on it, I’m optimistic for the kids.  They have great leadership in Bernadette, and they have some very able and willing teachers and students.  I look forward to reading Sora and Nick’s report after their visit.  Now I am back in Port-au-Prince where I will spend the next 10 days bouncing around the city teaching and working on connectivity issues.  I arrived in Haiti 2 months ago today.  It’s been a wonderful journey and I have truly enjoyed both teaching and learning everywhere I go.  I look forward to finishing strong.

Hang on,

Sean 

   

Hinche

So after my week in Port-au-Prince, I took a trip back to America to see friends and family.  I left from Communitere and headed to the airport early on the morning of November 1^st.  After getting overcharged for my taxi ride, I piled into the airport and worked my way through security.  Haiti is an exhausting place to work, and as much as I love what I’m doing, it was nice to be able to take a break for 10 days.  After my 7 hour layover in Fort Lauderdale I boarded the plane for Detroit.  I sat next to a lovely 50 year old couple from Toledo.  The husband David and I chatted the whole flight, and occasionally his wife would jump in.  They left me with a book on neuroscience and religion.  Not particularly my area of interest, but I’m sure my mom will enjoy reading it.  I said goodbye to them and walked out into the frigid outside world to meet me girlfriend Michelle. I saw her soccer mom van and made my way over to receive a long overdue hug.  We got into the car and I drove back to my house.  It was great to be with her once again, and it was great finally be able to drive myself. We got home and I was introduced to my new dog for the first time. His name is Bo and he’s a labradoodle.

I spent the rest of my week off relaxing and seeing some familiar faces.  I went to Oakland on Tuesday and with Michelle’s help we were able to surprise Nicole Vitale ( @gingermermaidd ) for lunch. Along with some others we took a trip to Burgerz. 10/10 would recommend.  Later in the week I went up to MSU to visit some other people.  When I got there I hung out in the one and only Eden Rock apartment 203, and caught up with everyone.  Later in the night I got to see my blogs #1 fan Lucas Wilson ( @sirlucaswilson ) and we got some bubble tea.  The tea itself sucked but the experience was a 7.8/10.  The next day I headed back home to finish up my vacation.  I went on a few dates with Michelle, including a Plymouth Whalers game.  Our favorite player Sonny Milano scored the game winner in a shootout.  Sadly Tuesday the 11^th my vacation came to an end.  It was nice to see everyone once again, but it was time to gather myself and finish what I set out to do.  My dad drove me to the airport and I boarded the plane heading south.  After my overnight layover in Fort Lauderdale, I flew to Haiti and it was right back to work. 

Ruben met me at the airport and we headed to Communitere so I could drop some stuff off.  I gathered what I needed and we started our journey to Hinche.  My goal for the 5 days there would be to assess the status of the school server and the laptop program.  Ruben and I bounced around a few taptaps and finally arrived at our van that would take us the rest of the way.  We loaded in and waited for the van to fill up so the driver would leave.  2 hours, 15 people, 1 mattress, 1 box spring, 1 microwave, 1 fan, and 1 propane tank later, the van was pack on the interior and exterior and ready to go.  We pulled away from the city and the scene quickly became open fields, and then mountains.  We continued our climb, winding back and forth.  Looking back toward where we just came from was a breathtaking view.  The roads shoulder dropped off into a steep slope that feel drastically before curving and leveling out into the flat valley that is Port-au-Prince.  From the mountains you get a much better idea of the size of the capital city.  The buildings run from the mountains edge up to the mouth of the ocean which was shining brightly in the afternoon light.  We continued up and down left and right, and a few hours later we arrived in Hinche.

Upon arriving we were greeted by Herodion, who would be hosting us during our time there.  We got some rest after the long day of travel and started at the school the next day.  The school, St. Andres, is just a stones throw away from where we were staying, so we walked over and began our work.  I checked the school server and initially everything looked great.  They school had electricity for starters. They turned the server on as soon as I arrived and I was able to connect right away.  This made me optimistic for the rest of the week. The hardware was functioning and that’s the first step.  After examining the server further we found an issue with the way that the server was storing the data.  The Unleash Kids team back home was able to fix everything remotely and within a few hours the software was functioning properly also.  I went out to eat with Ruben and Herodion and we celebrated a successful first day. 

The next day I returned to the school to examine what had been going on with the laptop program.  The laptops had apparently not been getting used recently and the job was to figure out why.  The hardware and software was working so we suspected the problem was bureaucracy.  I met with one of the programs teachers Darus and asked him why things had come to a halt.  His answer was that the classes stopped because the money stopped.  He and the other teacher, Herodion, had stopped getting paid and as a result the classes stopped running.  The school is sponsored by a group from California and they pay a lot of money.  A portion of that is supposed to be allocated to paying for the laptop program, including hardware, software, and teachers.  The school and its’ director managed to maintain the first 2, but failed to pay their teachers.  Darus has been working with the laptop program since  October 2013. Based on the journal entries from the XO laptops, I can tell that most weeks we was running the class 3 or 4 times a week. In January 2014, Herdion joined the program and the two split the work load.  It’s unclear exactly how much either has been paid, but it’s very clear that there has been a mismanagement of funds that has led to two hardworking teachers being underpaid and under-appreciated.  There’s a lot of speculation as to just where these funds are going, but they are definitely not going where they were intended.  I was insured by the schools director that classes would be running again by next week, but I find that unlikely.  I may come back in December to visit with my brother. It will be interesting to see if any progress has been made. 

After a bleak Friday, we decided that Saturday I would visit a local tourist trap, Bassin Zim.  After an 8 mile motorcycle ride up and down a dirt road we arrived at the gate, Herodion explained that I was in Hinche for a short period of time and wanted to see the sights.  He let us in and we rolled up to the water’s edge.  Bassin Zim is a beautiful waterfall that flows down the rocks and into a reservoir that leads into another river.  

The view was amazing and when I finally took my eyes off the flowing water I realized that I was surrounded by a group of 5^th grade Haitians eager to give me a tour.  They are used to having Americans, and they know enough English to communicate all the important ideas.  We walked up a path to the right of the mountains and we headed up to the caves.  The first cave we saw the called the big cave.  Water flowed from a natural spring in the back up the cave and trickled out down a small river at the caves enterance.  Along the side wall a series of bee’s nests sat staring back at me.  I walked up the river and the kids warned me about the bees to my left and about the bats overhead.  The cave was magnificent. The walls were covered in writing from tourists who had visited.  There were also cave paintings that the Haitian guides claimed were native Taino drawings.  I don’t know if I buy it but if true the drawings have an eerie connotation.  Columbus landed in Haiti in 1492 and the Spaniards enslaved the native Taino people. By the turn of the 18^th century the natives had been all but wiped out.   We pressed on into the cave and I looked up to see an opening that had been repelled into by some more adventurous Blan than myself.  We exited the cave and went to the river’s edge to see where the falls began.  The water rushed by below and I took it all in. Below is a panoramic shot.

We headed back down the steps and on our way down we visited the little cave.  The tour guides explained that it was a cave that was used to house voodoo rituals.  Again I was skeptical that this may just be what they tell tourists to scare/excite them, but I played along and one of my guides, Jonas, took some pictures. 

After leaving the voodoo cave we went back down to the water’s edge.  The kids asked me if I could swim and then asked me to race them.  I laughed and accepted their challenge.  We got into out swim attire and the kids whined about the cold water.  It was nothing compared to what I’ve swam in back home.  John was the only one brave enough to get in with me and we raced to the other side of the reservoir.  It wasn’t really that close but the kids were cheering me on the whole way.  We got out on the other side and climbed up the rock face and relaxed for a while. 

After swimming for a while longer, we decided to call it a day and get back before the day came to an end.  Bassin Zim was a good way to end what was otherwise a pretty frustrating week.  Fixing technical difficulties can be challenging enough, but bureaucratic difficulties are a totally different beast.  I wish everyone involved at St. Andres all the best, but I am not optimistic.  If progress is to be made there will need to be a reallocation of responsibilities.   

I’ll be spending the next 5 days in Lascahobas which is about an hour south of Hinche.  There I will be again be assessing server issues, but since I am arriving on a Monday, I will be able to resolve issues early in the week and teach later in the week.  I look forward to getting back to my forte, teaching. 

Hang on,

Sean                

    

Cazeau

Following my work in Grand Goave, I headed back to Port-au-Prince.  More specifically I spent the week at a school in Cazeau.  The facility is part school, part orphanage, and part church.  I visited there earlier in my trip and taught the scientific method with Dyna.  This time around I focused my efforts on tech support.

Cazeau is one of the schools funded by Ken Beaver the founder of Hope for Haiti's Children.  Everyone in the Unleash Kids organization agrees that Cazeau is a promising place on the brink of success.  The school has one of the best teachers I have ever had the pleasure of working with in Dyna. They have plenty of XO's for their after school program, and they also have something called Internet-in-a-box. This is a terabyte hard drive that connects to the school server.  On the hard drive is all of Wikipedia in 5 or 6 different languages, Khan Academy's educational videos, and Project Gutenberg's collection of free eBooks.  So just by connecting to the school server, the students can access any and all of this information.  Doing so makes it much easier to ensure that the kids are using the internet for good, and not evil.  A lot of what I have been doing is structured guided leaning, which is undoubtedly beneficial, but the Internet-in-a-box allows for self-guided, exploratory learning.  It allows the students to discover their own truths rather than just eating the fruit of knowledge that I spoon feed them.  My challenge for the week was getting everything in order.

Sunday and Monday were spent as diagnostic days.  I had my phone running a Skype call with our tech experts and they walked me through the steps.  A problem would arise, I would report it, the group would discuss it, come to a consensus, and I would take the necessary steps to resolve the issue.  By Tuesday we had everything set up and ready to go. I tested it out by looking up some articles on things back home. I planned to return Wednesday, explain the set up to Dyna, and teach a class with her on Thursday.

Wednesday rolled around and I headed out to the school to start my day.  I walked down to the nearest intersection, hopped on a taptap and got off at my stop.  After saying hello to the excited schoolkids, I went over to the orphanage side to get everything ready.  I did not have a translator and was greeted by a man they call Zekie. He and his wife Sonya live in the house I worked in all week, and they oversee the orphanage. I said hello to Zekie and he spit out a long Creole monologue.  I wasn't able to get everything but the gist of it was that they did not have electricity.  I later found out that the reason they didn't have electricity was because someone had stolen the city electrical wire running from the school to the orphanage.  This was a disappointing setback to say the least, but I was reassured that the problem would be fixed the next day.  I went over a few things with Dyna and headed back to Haiti Communitere while the wires were replaced.

Thursday I came back to a school with working electricity.  The crew working was extremely efficient and I was able to get everything set up right away.  The next step was to just wait for Dyna to come so we could get a class going.  The hours came and passed and I saw no sign of her.  She was not teaching her usual day class and I began to grow concerned.  I did not have my Haitian phone with me that day so I had no way to reach her, I hung around the school and met a group of kids doing the same.  I spoke all the Creole I could in hopes of figuring out the situation with Dyna and her class.  The kids informed me that she would not be coming and that there would not be class that day.  I made the most out of my time with them and played some soccer before leaving for the day.  When I got back to my phone I saw that Dyna had taken a sick day, but she would be back Friday.  Things never seem to quite go as you plan, especially in Haiti, so I've learned to be flexible.

Friday I got to the school an hour early and had some time to kill before Dyna arrived.  I rounded up a group of kids and we played a game of pickup basketball.  My 6 foot frame was a bit of an advantage playing with a group of 8-12 year olds, but I did my best to make sure everyone got their moment of glory.  Dyna showed up around 1 and I switched gears back to teacher mode.  I showed her the basics of how everything worked and ensured her that if she needed any support she's be able to contact myself or someone else in the organization.  She's an extremely gifted teacher and right away she saw the benefit in being able to access the near infinite amount of information.  I left very optimistic that by my next visit she will have made amazing progress.

After Cazeau, I headed to Silar's orphanage.  I went back to the main intersection by Communitere, and boarded into a moving van along with about 35 other people.  I tend to stand out in Haiti, and as a result I was the topic of discussion during our 15 minute ride.  No one spoke to me directly, but there was an ongoing argument on whether I could speak Creole, and if I could understand what they were saying.  One woman had a fairly strong opinion that people coming to Haiti really should just learn the language, according to her it isn't that difficult to learn.  Eventually I blew my cover by letting out a smirk.  The secret was out and everyone seemed to rejoice the fact that I knew what they were saying.  I informed them that I am still learning Creole, but I can understand a little bit. One of the passengers, Carlos, befriended me and volunteered to help me get to my destination.

Carlos wasn't much help but I appreciated the gesture.  I arrived at Silar's and said goodbye to him and wished him luck.  At Silar's I preformed more diagnostics in an effort to resolve the issues with his internet.  Silar runs an orphanage of around 70 kids.  They do not receive nearly the funding that a lot of places do, but Silar knows how to make every penny count.  He's an amazing guy and he does amazing things.  With Adam's help we were able to determine that the internet supplier had, for some reason, not reset his data for the month of October.  We are currently waiting to see if the new month brought new internet.  Regardless we will be contacting them soon to recover our lost month.

It was a busy week and I did a lot more tech work than I ever thought I would be doing.  The problems are never finished and you definitely just have to roll with it.  I enjoy every day off that I can get, it gives me a change to refuel and recharge.  I don't know what's in store for me next, but I'm confident that I'll be able to handle it.

Hang on,
Sean            

        

Grand Goave: Week Three

Going into the week I was under the impression that I would again be without a translator.  Sunday night I received the wonderful news from Sora and Adam that this would not be the case.  Jeanide, who I worked with in Port-au-Prince, had managed to find time in her busy schedule to make the trip east, to help me throughout the week.  She left Monday during the morning and arrived when I returned from school. I thanked her greatly for coming on such a short notice and began to lay out my lesson plans for the week. 

Tuesday I decided that I would introduce the scientific method to both classes by using the same sound experiment I used at Cazeau.  The experiment is very simple.  Line up 4 glass bottles each with a different amount of water in it, then ask the students which bottle will have the lowest pitch.  Asking a question is the first step of the scientific method.  Next is to do research.  For this I had the students pull up the Wikipedia page on sound, and they did a little bit of reading.  The class came to the consensus that sound is a wave, and the different amounts of water would cause different pitches.  Step 3 the kids formed a hypothesis.  All guessed that either 1 or 4 would have the lowest pitch.  Step 4 we performed the experiment and found that bottle 4 had the lowest pitch. The class then recorded their results for step 5, and for step 6 we drew a conclusion.  As the amount of water increases, the pitch decreases.  Not a ground breaking experiment to say the least, but definitely simple enough to convey the proper procedure when doing scientific investigation. 

Wednesday I had planned to teach a music class with Mistro.  He is the piano player in the church’s band and he could definitely teach the kids one or two things about how to read and play music.  He has been terribly unreliable during my time here, but I figured if I gave him a chance to teach something he truly loved, that maybe he would take some initiative and show up.  Once again he let me down.  It was 10 O’clock and time to start class.  He was nowhere to be found.  Instead of proceeding I decided to take the lesson in a different direction.  Watching the kids type up their reports the day before, I noticed that very few knew the proper typing technique.   I drew a blown up picture of a keyboard on my whiteboard and demonstrated the proper hand positions.  The XO’s have typing software, and I set aside the first hour of class toward practicing their newly acquired skill.    For the older kids, I let them do with the last hour of class whatever they pleased.  To my surprise many continued playing the typing game.  A few students switched over to chat, but a few others explored the depths of Wikipedia.  Seeing the kids independently choose to practice typing, or read articles is a wonderfully reassuring feeling.  It shows that they really are thirsty to learn, and it’s an honor to provide them with tools that can quench that thirst.

I wanted to go out of Grand Goave with a bang, I wanted to give the kids something that they would remember.  I definitely did so at Delmas 28 when I did my rocket lesson, and I wanted to give Mission of Hopes students a similar experience. Thursday I explained the basics of rocketry.  I lead with gravity, talked about the vinegar and baking soda fuel, and then went into aerodynamics.  I had the kids draw up some designs on paint so they could get a better idea of what we would be building Friday.  Many struggled to work to overcome the touchy paint software, but I went around and helped get everything in working order.  In the end we had some wonderful designs. A couple of students finished very quickly and agreed to design a new one even better.  I let them be and came back 10 minutes later to discover that they had copied a picture of the Columbia Spaceshuttle from their offline digital library, and pasted it into paint.  I appreciated the resourcefulness and congratulated them on their designs.  They even added their own artistic touches.  

Friday came and it was time to turn these students into rocket stars.  All the supplies were in order and I distributed them to the two teams.  The kids opened their XO’s and used their schematics as reference.  The older kids worked especially well together and were efficient with all their resources, the younger kids not so much.  The teams wrapped up and added their finishing touches.  We went into the graveled area next to where we held class and I prepared the fuel.  The teams formed a circle around and eagerly awaited their flights.  We shot off one rocket after the other and the kids cheered with delight at their successes. 

The day came to an end and I said my goodbyes to the class.  Friday was my last day teaching in Grand Goave and I truly will miss the students of MOH. These 3 weeks have meant a lot to me and not just because of the lessons I have taught.  Grand Goave gave me the chance to really get to know a group of kids, some on a very deep level.  Last week I introduced you to my friend Johnsley.  He is a 14 year old boy who aspires to be both a pastor and a doctor.  He has decent English skills, and he and I talked a lot and became very close.  He stopped by the beach house on Saturday so that we could say our final goodbyes. Tuesday I gave him an English bible and an English to Creole dictionary.  He left me with a letter that he wrote thanking me for being his teacher and his friend.  It’s something that I will cherish forever. Below is Johnsley with his rocket design. I wish him and all of his classmates the best of luck.

Tomorrow I head back to Port-au-Prince to do some teaching and server repair at Cazeau.  It has been an absolute pleasure to teach here in Grand Goave, but there is still plenty more work to be done at plenty of other schools.  I look forward to teaching and making more friends along the way.

Hang on,

Sean   

    

Grand Goave: Week Two

So week 2 ended up being a shortened school week due to a Haitian holiday.  October 17^th is a national holiday to commemorate the death of Haiti’s founding father Jean-Jaques Dessalines.  This definitely seemed to be a strange thing to celebrate, but it makes sense when you come to understand the Haitian affinity for the afterlife and the role that spirits play in their culture. 

After approaching Renee about my translator issues I was bounced back to Lex to work something out.  He assured me that if he and I talked to Mistro he would be there to help me throughout the week.  We did just that but yet again I only had a translator for one of my classes.  In Haiti there doesn’t seem to be the same sense of urgency that I am accustomed to.  This especially holds true in the laid back beach town of Grand Goave.  A lot of the people here have some serious stresses on their mind, so it’s understandable that they don’t let the day to day work load overwhelm them.  The task will eventually get done, and it’s more important to try and enjoy the ride.  This low-pressure work ethic is a widely accepted cultural norm.  As an outsider who hops around from place to place, I find this to be an incredibly difficult practice to work with.  My time here is limited, and I feel a strong sense of urgency to accomplish all I can in my stay.   My enthusiasm seems to rarely be shared, and it’s a cultural hurdle that I still struggle to overcome.  I will spend the last week again working with Mistro when he shows up. 

This past week at school did not go as I had planned, but I definitely think I made progress.  Mistro showed up for Tuesday’s class with the older kids, and we worked primarily with Wikipedia.  I spent Monday preparing a series of questions pertaining to different articles that are featured on the preloaded software.  The articles have been translated into French.  Although very few kids speak French, the languages are similar enough to where they can read and comprehend the material.  The questions were basic, but difficult enough to where the students would not know the answer off of the top of their heads.  “What is the distance from the earth to the sun?” “What year was the philosopher Socrates born?” “What is the boiling point of water?”  Mistro and I would pose one question at a time to the class, the first team to answer correctly earned a point.  The school currently does not have Wi-Fi, but with the preloaded software the kids are still able to access a good amount of information.  The purpose of the game was to get them accustomed to this method of research, and to give them an idea of how much information they can find on there.  I truly believe in the power of information.  Their minds are not just exposed to facts, they are exposed to ideas.  These ideas can definitely excite, but more importantly ideas can inspire.  I love the power of ideas, and it was a wonderful feeling to open these kids up to a whole new world of information.  Team 4 dominated when it came to finding the answer first, but I made sure not to advance until every kid had found the answer.  It was great to see the kids excited to find the answer, and excited to show their classmates how they could do the same. 

The next few days I was again without any translating help.  I’ve acquired a decent vocabulary in Creole, but not nearly enough to lead my own classes.  I let the kids work with their laptops independently and provided insight when I could.  Monday’s lesson plan seemed to stick, and I found that many of the students used their freedom to continue exploring Wikipedia.  I walked around and gladly helped out trying to explain some of the more complex articles that kids stumbled upon.  One student on Tuesday ended up on the Wikipedia page for Earth’s Magnetic Field.  The pictures were failing to load so I drew my own diagram and used my English and Creole knowledge to lead them through the French text.  Having my phone came in handy as I was able to look up French and Creole words that I was unsure of. 

Thursday one of the older girls in my class was reading about Switzerland for whatever reason, she then hoped over to the page of Geneva, CERN, and then the Large Hadron Collider (LHC).  For those who don’t know CERN is an international science community based in Geneva, Switzerland.  Their major project is the Large Hadron Collider, which is a particle accelerator.  The LHC shoots particles around their 17 mile loop at near the speed of light and crashes them together in order to study subatomic particles.  I definitely did not expect to be explaining particle physics on my trip to Haiti, but you can never predict where a kid’s curiosity will take them. 

I was also able to share my passion for philosophy with one of my students named Johnsley.  Johnsely is an undersized soft spoken 14 year old boy with a sharp mind and a decent command of the English language.  He approached me during class and asked if I would join him on the Chat app so that he could speak with me and practice his English.  I pulled out my XO and we began talking.  It started out as small talk, but then I decided to ask him what his plans were for after high school.   He proceeded to tell me about how he wants to become a pastor so that he can go all over the world and preach the good news.  He also wants to become a doctor to take care of the sick.  He’s an ambitious kid, and you can tell he wants to help people in every way he can.  We went on to talk about some basic philosophy over the course of two days, and I introduced him to the Euthyphro Dilemma and then we talked about Divine Command Theory.  I plan to leave Johnsley with an English to Creole dictionary along with a bible so that he can pursue his passions.  I wish him all the best. 

Friday as I said earlier was a Haitian holiday so no school was in session.  I still had some students hanging around wanting to use the laptops though so I was happy to pull them out.  This caught the attention of some of the construction workers who were taking a break.  They asked if they could try one out and I let them have a go.  The two were fascinated by Wikipedia and got to reading about engineering, appropriate given their profession.  The kids worked with each other showing off all the cool things they have learned how to do on their XO’s. Here Stanley, the little boy, is being shown how to play the piano by an older classmate. 

None of the students lack curiosity and that is something that excites me when it comes to teaching them.  It’s frustrating that I am not receiving as much help as I would like, but I don’t intend to let that discourage me from teaching in any way I can.  Not having a translator has forced me to pick up a lot of creole and has led to me interacting with the students one on one.  Through this I’ve formed some great relationships that I will cherish for a long time.  This week I look forward to strengthening those friendships and sharing as much knowledge as I am able to. 

Hang on,

Sean     

Grand Goave: Week One

I arrived in Grand Goave Sunday October 4^th at around 5pm via bus.  The driver dropped me off at the main intersection just over the bridge that separates the farmland from the town.  I unloaded my stuff and hopped onto a motorcycle to take me to the school.  Now I’m not a big fan of motorcycles, but if you want to get somewhere and you don’t want to wait, they are the way to go.  After some arguably illegal maneuvers by my driver, we arrived at the school/church grounds of Mission of Hope (MOH). 

MOH is an organization run by Pastor Lexidon Edme, and his wife Renee.  They’ve been working in Haiti for a long time and have some amazing support from both inside and outside of the country.  The school teaches several hundred kids ranging from toddlers to young adults, some older than myself.  Majority of the funding comes from sister parishes back in the states, and there is no lack of support.  The school has 25 XO laptops, 40 Kindle tablets, and is currently constructing a computer lab and a dance studio.  It’s definitely a drastic change from the schools I worked at in Port-au-Prince. 

Upon my arrival I was greeted by Renee who was the person coordinating my accommodations for the week.  We said our pleasantries and then she introduced me to her husband pastor Lex.  Lex is a formidable figure in his community and he receives tons of respect.  It’s hard to go anywhere with him and not get stopped every five seconds by people wishing to say hello or ask questions.  Lex gave me a brief tour and along the way we bumped into another Blan (Haitian word for white person).  His name is Laramie and he was accompanied by his twin daughters of about 10 years.  Laramie and his family are traveling missionaries who recently moved to Haiti.  He and his wife Amy have 4 kids ages 10-15.  They are currently working at the orphanage up the road and wanted to check out the school that some of their kids attend. 

The tour was over and it was time for “Sunday night worship”.  Laramie overenthusiastically invited me to sit with him and I obliged.  Now I’m not religious, but at the same time I’m not anti-religion.  I was raised catholic and have no problem attending mass.  But Haitian mass is not quite like American catholic mass.  Scriptures are read, Eucharist is shared, and praise is given, but with a different sense of urgency.  Pastor Lex stepped up to the mic and delivered a sermon that conjured up more excitement than I ever remember from Father Mike back at St. William. Arms were raised towards the sky, hands were clapping, and hips were swaying as the spirit of his words fell over the room.  It was slightly uncomfortable being the only one not overwhelmed by the holy spirit, but nevertheless it was a sight I’m glad I saw.

Mass came to an end and as a group we headed back to the house where I’d be staying.  After a 15 minute ride down a street that reminded me much of Green Lake Road, we arrived.  The gate rolled open and we pulled in.  I stepped out and took in the incredible view.  Grand Goave is an ocean town, and MOH is arguably the best place to take in the beauty of it all.  Mountains to the west, mountains to the east, and an island sits on the horizon to the north.  I dipped my feet in the water, grabbed some dinner, and then went back to my room to prepare for the week I had ahead of me.             

Grand Goave has been a much more regimented schedule.  Wake up at 6:30, get ready, eat breakfast, make lunch, and then go to school.  From 10-11:30 I’ve been teaching a group of high school kids. Then I wrap that class up, charge the laptops, and teach a younger group from 1-2:30.  The translator the schools provided me with has been far from reliable so it’s been hard to teach drawn out lessons.  So far out of the 10 classes I’ve taught he showed up to 1.  In that one class period I did an activity where as a class we took some measurements with a homemade apparatus and estimated the size of the sun. The math was troubling for some, but we managed to work through it and by the end everyone had their own estimate. http://cse.ssl.berkeley.edu/AtHomeAstronomy/activity_03.html . The younger kids have been a much bigger challenge.  A lot of the kids just see the laptops as gaming devices.  Although they do have some educational games programmed on, they are much more than that.  With only 25 laptops it’s been a struggle every day to have one laptop per child, and to maintain order.  I fear that the lack of a translator has really been limiting the potential of my teaching abilities.  Lex has other things to worry about and doesn’t seem to take interest, his wife Renee is the more approachable of the two and I plan on working with her this weekend to come up with a better solution. 

Despite the challenges I’ve managed to form some great relationships with the students and the staff members.  Nurse Leah was a huge help getting me acquainted with everything, and she was kind enough to let me use her Natcom 3G internet stick to upload my last blog post.  Rennot is another person who has been a huge help.  He’s the go to guy for whatever needs to be done.  Need a whiteboard? Ask Rennot. Need to turn on the electricity? Ask Rennot. Need to buy your own 3G stick so you don’t have to continue to work in the clinic in order to get Leah to let you borrow hers? Ask Rennot.  His help has been huge, and even though we can’t always work out what the other person is saying, I am always happy to see him.   

Some of the kids have definitely been a big inspiration too.  With the class of younger kids most of them just want to play math games and take pictures.  But one kid in particular is too fascinated by the world around him to be caught up in that sort of mindless entertainment.  Dionson (pronounced Jenson) is a 13 year old boy whose bright mind and thirst for knowledge has truly amazed me.  All class he sits and reads the French Wikipedia pages.  He’s on a new topic every day and never stops asking questions.  Together we’ve explored sounds, light, the stars, the planets, force, and a few other aspects of the natural world.  After the second day of class he begged me to let him keep the laptop out a little longer.  I of course said yes and he went with me to the room where I charge the laptops.  A few minutes later one of his friends appeared and asked if he could use a laptop.  I told him he could only use one if he used it to read.  He agreed to my terms and booted up his own machine.  After about 30 minutes I had a group of 5 all laying on the carpet eagerly exploring Wikipedia.  Dionson is a brilliant young mind and I hope the other kids continue to follow in his footsteps. 

Aside from teaching I’ve spent my time at the beach house.  Every day a group of kids will come by looking to play a game of soccer, swim, or partake in a new fan favorite which I showed them, throwing around the Frisbee.  Most the kids are pretty talented with a soccer ball, but they still have a long way to go with a disc.  I will surely be leaving some of the Frisbees that I brought with me behind for the kids to enjoy.    

Overall Grand Goave has been a bit of a challenge.  It’s not easy to find helpful people, and it makes me appreciate the help I had in Port-au-Prince a lot more.  I will work things out with Renee this weekend and next week I have a bunch of lessons that I’m really excited about.  I’ll be exploring the concepts of gravity, pi, and I may even have another rocket lesson.  Should make for an eventful week

Hang on,

Sean

Final Week in Port-au-Prince

My last week in Port-au-Prince was definitely and eventful one.  On Tuesday I worked at Croix des Bouquets with Jeanide and Junior.  They helped me run through my music lesson again but with a new group of children.  The first class had 28 kids and only 7 XOs to share.  We made the best of it and the children seemed to have a great time breaking away from their normal lesson plans.  In Haiti much of the curriculum is built around learning by memorization.  The students’ knowledge is assessed using tests put forth by the schools.  Hands on learning is a strange concept for most teachers, but seeing the kids engaged and excited about learning is a wonderful way to change their minds.  After the music ended I gathered some data in order to reprogram the laptops later that week.

Thursday I was at Cazeau, which is an orphanage/church/school.  The orphanage is home to over 40 kids, I spent the afternoon with 25 of the school age kids.  I arrived at Cazeau via Taptap around 1:45.  I walked to the school and was greeted by shy smiles and curios eyes.  I sat down waiting for Dyna, and pulled out a toy I knew the kids would enjoy, a Rubik’s Cube.  The vibrant colors quickly drew a crowd of about 15 as a spun the rows and columns to show them how it works.  I passed it to my left and reached back into my bag of tricks.  I pulled out 3 juggling balls and showed off my circus training.  More kids crowded and I started giving free juggling lessons.  Most were baffled by the concept, but a few weren’t half bad.  Dyna arrived and it was time to start class, but the fun was far from over.  

The lesson plan for the day was a science experiment.  I wanted to introduce the scientific method to the kids in the form of a very basic experiment, so that they could understand the procedures involved.  I lined up four glass bottles at the front of the classroom.  Each bottle was filled with a different amount of water.  Bottle one was empty, bottle two was ¼ of the way filled, three was ½ filled, and four was ¾ of the way full.  The question I wanted them to investigate was, “which bottle will make the lowest pitch when I strike it with a pen?” In order to find this out, I walked the class through the 6 steps of the scientific method.  1) Ask a question 2) do research 3) form a hypothesis 4) do an experiment 5) record results 6) draw a conclusion.  For the research portion I explained sound is a wave, and I explained the correlation between wavelength and pitch. The kids then guessed which bottle they thought would have the lowest pitch.  The class was divided between 1 and 4.  We then did our experiment and got our answer.  Bottle 4 had the lowest pitch.  The children then were able to draw a conclusion, no matter how many bottles, the one with the lowest pitch will be the one with the most water.  The students wrote up their work on an app called Fototoon, their work is down below. 

Friday I spent planning for my second seminar at Delmas 28.  I promised the kids I’d be back a week later to talk about space and I couldn’t have been more excited.  I decided to do a rocket science lesson.  Definitely an ambitious idea, but one that I knew the kids would be excited about.  I went to the market the day before and picked up the necessary supplies. The most essential being: baking soda, vinegar, tape and cardboard.  The rockets were to be designed at the end of class after I went over a few basic things.  Mike, a friend from Communitere, was kind enough to help me build a launch pad and I was all set.

Saturday arrived and I was up early making sure everything was in order.  I set up the launch sight in the driveway at Communitere and launched some practice rockets.  After a few successful launches Jeanide arrived and we were off to Delmas 28. 

We got to the classroom and I recognized most of the faces from the week before.  A few new students piled in and we had a total of 27 eager minds.  I began the seminar by talking about gravity.  The juggling came in handy again as a way to capture attention, and also to model the effects of this invisible force.  After they grasped that concept, I went on to explain that if you have a great enough force applied to an object, you can escape the earth’s gravity.  I then showed some pictures from the Apollo missions to support my utterly unbelievable claims.  I explained to the kids that in order to make a good rocket, you need three things.  1) A strong force 2) An aerodynamic body 3) Balance.  I had them draw out the best designs they could on paint.  The kids do not have all that much experience with a touchpad mouse so some of the designs seemed not so structurally sound, but one kid in particular did a wonderful job.  His name is Matariro and I have no doubt he’s going places.

After the computer designs were complete, I split the kids up into two teams.  Each was given one water bottle and an equal amount of both cardboard and tape.  They had 45 minutes to construct their rockets and they immediately got working.  Each rocket seemed to have 5 or 6 hands on it at all times.  Some helping to secure wings, others working on the nozzle.  What at first seemed like chaos, ended up being a fairly efficient way of working, and with 15 minutes to spare both teams were done and eager to fire them off.  We lined up and climbed the stairs up to our launch site.

I set up the launch pad and explained to the kids that I would put an equal amount of vinegar and baking soda in each rocket.  I wrapped the baking soda in toilet paper to delay the reaction enough so that could attach the cork and build pressure.  First up was team one.  None of the kids really knew what to expect, but they were filled with anticipation as they saw me measuring out the rocket fuel.  I slid the wrapped baking soda into the vinegar mixture and secured the cork to the mouth of the bottle. All systems were a go.  As I stepped back to a safe distance I could feel that the pressure was on.  I had promised the kids that we would transform these household objects into a rocket and although I knew it was possible, I was still worried about the experiment not living up to the hype.  The pressure continued to build and so did the anticipation.  The rocket shot off into the air and flew a good 25-30 feet before touching down slightly off center from the landing sight.  Jeanide was kind enough to take a video which I have linked here.  The kids roared with excitement and I let out a hardy laugh followed by a big smile. Bringing that amount of joy to a group of kids through to power of science was one of the most rewarding and wonderful feelings I’ve ever had.  Their reaction says it all.  http://youtu.be/iZ7zWsX6mi0 

Group 2 was up and they were confident they could do better.  I loaded their rocket with fuel and secured it to the launch pad.  This video shows them arguing over who had the better of the two flights, I’ll let you the viewer decide.  http://youtu.be/ttQCFzPpxF0    

Class came to an end as we rounded up the scraps.  The kids continued their bickering down the steps and into the classroom.  We never did pick a winner but everyone enjoyed themselves and that was more than enough.  I said my goodbyes and handed out as many high fives as I could before Jeanide pulled me out of there.  We were off to our next school at Croix des Bouquets to reprogram the software on the XOs.

We arrived at the school to realize they had no power.  Jeanide and I met up with Junior and we took the laptops back to Jeanide’s house so we could have electricity.  We sat around talking as I updated the software two at a time.  Junior filled me in on the current political struggle and Jeanide cleaned up for the dinner we had planned.  Haiti’s former president Jean-Bertrand Aristide was back in town, and rumor has it Martelly’s people (the current president) were trying to arrest Aristide and charge him for crimes of corruption.  Whether the charges are legitimate or not is unclear but Aristide is no guiltier than Martelly or any of his predecessors.  Aristide was one of Haiti’s most beloved presidents, but ideologically he and Martelly couldn’t disagree more.  Hearing all of this gave me a much better idea of why so many helicopters had been flying over Communitere keeping me up at night.  I said goodbye to Junior and thanked him for the good talk. 

Jeanide and I met up with Fefe and Dyna at one of the fancier bars in Port-au-Prince (it had air conditioning). We had a lovely last meal together and I thanked them for all the help they’d given me in my 10 days with them.  They made the adjustment a lot easier and I can’t thank them enough. 

As of right now I’m writing from my second work destination.  It’s a school/church in Grand Goave called Mission of Hope.  I’ve been living with Pastor Lex and his wife Renee.  I’ve already taught a few days’ worth of classes but that will have to wait until the next post.  A big thanks for all of those who are supporting me through this.  I love the feedback you all have given me, and I’m always happy to talk.  Feel free to leave a comment, or send me and email, or reach out to me via social media.

     

Hang on,

Sean