Category: Mission life

Holy spaces

I returned the other day from a trip to El Salvador. I’m still struggling on what day it is, or was, or when such-and-such happened. It was early days and late nights and sound sleep and awakening with no alarm.

October 2014

The journey was two-fold: to attend the inauguration of Central America Migrant Mission Network with folks from Presbyterian World Mission, and also to visit our Presbyterian Hunger Program partners in and around San Salvador.

I have so much to tell you that I cannot right now. I’m still reflecting, filling in the blanks, poring over hundreds of photographs. I remember as a reporter being able to write the first five paragraphs of a story on the way back to the newsroom. Another gift long gone.

The moments of seeing the clothing Archbishop Oscar Romero wore when he was gunned down 44 years before mingle with the pride of a farmer beside the huge jackfruit in the community mountain garden.

Likewise the deep sadness of a mother hearing her son’s story of chronic kidney disease knowing his father and three brothers, fellow sugarcane workers, has succumbed to CKD compared to the joy of a young child pushing her baby sister on a swing.

Life is like that. Rollercoaster.

The holy holding space for joy.

Stories are to come. I promise. But I will leave you with this one.

In 2014, I visited a home in San Isidro for lunch while there at a mission gathering. I took a photo of a child grinning at me through a window. On Sunday, I was there again. I showed the photograph to those who live there.

A few hours later, I was stopped on the street. The young girl, her family said, is now 15.

A lot has changed in El Salvador in 11 years, but this girl’s grin hasn’t.

March 2024

Walking each other home

My friend Ryan walking me to his house. Where the treats are.

First, let me thank everyone who wandered through the maze of buttons and instructions to join me in this blog. I do appreciate you all.

I promised I would connect more often. This is a good season for such a promise. I am near to overwhelmed with tasks. Preparing to move to another country has its built-in complications. Learning a new language while doing so just makes it that much more fun.

Eleven years ago about this time of year I prepared to move to Haiti. It seems a blur now. But I recognize the excitement of it. So many feelings! I am so happy to embark on adventure. At the same time, I’m already mourning time I won’t spend here in the Valley. Add that to the existing grief of being far from my friends in Haiti.

It’s best to stay busy, I know, but also to spend time reflecting.

In the four-plus years I’ve been back in the Valley, I’ve readjusted to life here. My work other than a few trips is remote, but I spent good times with many of you. I have lived with family and with friends who have become like family.

I’ve enjoyed being about to walk along the South River, driving in the Blue Ridge Mountains, meet so many of you for lunch or coffee.

Many of you have allowed me to stay with your four-legged friends while you were away. That has been a gift. I have a few more of these occasions coming up. Memories spent with Ryan in the photo here are precious. He left us too soon.

I’m learning Spanish, researching land and food issues around the world, imagining what I will pack for the Dominican Republic and what I will do with the rest of the stuff I’ve gathered. (Too much stuff!)

I’m remembering Ram Dass’s quote: We all are just walking each other home.

In all the ways. To all our homes.

Be well, friends.

Ke-nee deep in kenep season

Even as their lives are filled with often heartbreaking challenges, the people of Haiti seek out the sweetness of life. Often that sweetness grows on tress.

They just dangled there, tantalizing us with juicy sweet tartness. For weeks, so many weeks, we waited.

“Kenep pre?” I’d ask hopefully. Are they ready?

“Yo poko pare,” Garry would respond. They aren’t ripe yet.

A few times, I tried one, breaking the still supple green rind, pop the pulpy fruit on my tongue, and promptly spit it out.

The kenep is a tropical delight. It grows on a tall tree that provides lovely shade year-round. But by early August, its sweet fruit gets all our attention.

When ripe, the rind tightens so it is cracks open. The pulpy fruit covers a large round seed about the size of an ordinary marble. The flavor lasts a few minutes – something like the taste of SweetTarts candy.

To be fair, it’s not even our tree. It generously leans over the wall from the neighbors house. The low-hanging fruit goes first. Even the man who collects our trash lifts a hand up to pull down a bundle of kenep on his way out the gate.

In about a week after the kenep ripened, Nadia began using a long pole rigged with a Y-shaped branch to isolate and twist small branches and retrieve the bunches.

Small boys, and some not so small, gather at the gate asking if we can give them kenep. A glance up the street shows that another neighbor’s kenep tree has lured other boys onto the adjacent alow wall where they pick the fruit and collect them in plastic bags.

On a good day, the street is littered with the green rinds and crowded with happy-faced kids.

Even Bobby the half-grown pup gets into the action. He doesn’t stop to toss the rind. He just eats the whole thing.

As for the rest of us, we enjoy them one or two at a time, or gather a bunch to eat later.

Like the other best things in life, we know the season will draw to a close, leaving us waiting another 11 months.

Searching for home in Haiti

cindy first sunday
Pretty much how I spent my first year in Haiti, clutching a Creole Bible, camera bag, water bottle — and my heart. Here with Russell Cook and Tracey Herrera, who along with their group from Florida, invited me to church with them my first Sunday in Port-au-Prince. (Photo by Connie Cook)

This recovering journalist turned mission co-worker moved to Haiti to live and serve on May 25, 2013. To mark this extraordinary five year anniversary, here are some stories of the highlights and lowlights. To be sure, I am grateful beyond measure to all those who have made this journey possible. I only hope that Haiti, the people of Haiti and the rich joining of hands of sisters and brothers from both my lands make your lives a bit richer as well.

(This is an occasional series)

Home is a charged word to me since I came to live in Haiti. That was almost five years ago. Still hard to believe. So much has changed. I have changed so much. As the anniversary approaches, I find myself examining this journey, understanding the commonality of all our lives and lifestyles. We are sent as mission co-workers into poor lands, but it is not the poverty that connects us, but the spirit of generosity. 

I owe the joy and lessons of my life to tremendous generosity of many people in my life, both Haitian and North American.

My story in Haiti begins the afternoon of May 25, 2013.

So before making the trip here, loaded down with two bulging suitcases, a backpack and a carry-on, I listened to every word of “Home” by Phillip Phillips:

 Settle down, it’ll all be clear

Don’t pay no mind to the demons

They fill you with fear

The trouble — it might drag you down

If you get lost, you can always be found

Just know you’re not alone 

‘Cause I’m gonna make this place your home.

 With due apologies to the songwriter Phillips, to me, it was if God himself was talking me through what would be this huge change in my life. And whether to the credit of Phillips or God or both, it worked.

Five years ago on May 25, I arrived in Port-au-Prince, found my taxi driver and settled into Trinity Lodge, a guesthouse that, too, has become one of my homes here.

By next morning, I was stepping up into a huge truck to go to church with a group also staying at Trinity Lodge.

And by early Monday morning, I was making the first of many (many!) mistakes. Like many foreigners I was unclear on the difference between the U.S. do dollar and the “Haitian dollar.” The “Haitian dollar” doesn’t exist. It’s a term used to mean 5 times five gourdes. Or 25 gourdes. Which at that time was about .50 cents, U.S. So when I approached the woman selling ice cold water by the bottle, I asked her how much. She said in Creole, “senk dola.” Five dollars. (I blame this next part on being tired and hot and obnoxiously overconfident) “Five dollars?” I exclaimed, outraged but thirsty. She nodded. “U.S.?” Again, she nodded. (I mean, what would you do, with a red-faced, obnoxiously overconfident foreigner standing in front of you?) I pulled out a five-dollar bill, took the water, shook my head in disgust and walked up the dusty street slurping cold water.

(This story still embarrasses me, but it is a good reminder of what I would quickly realize would be my new life: I am often wrong.)

 (Next up: Cindy goes to Cherident!)