Land of the Free

81 American kids went home. Can you believe that? Its incredible to think that within two days 118 Forever Families got to hold their new son or daughter. What a awesome thing to be a part of.
The aftershocks havent stopped. I felt another one up on the balcony and this one made the whole building start to shudder. My heart instantly started pounding even though it probably only lasted 5 seconds. Good thing I wasnt really awake for the 6.1 cause this 4.9 was good enough for me. Let me tell you that it is a whole different experience when you arent half asleep in bed. There is a website that volunteers have been checking out to see how strong the earthquakes are and it said that since the big 7.0 earthquake the country has felt 52 aftershocks. No wonder people are scared to go back into their homes. Sure enough after the shock the Nannies were trying to push the kids back outside. Their fear is still very present.
I am still amazed at the destruction. Driving through Port Au Prince and down Delmas Street the damage really is overwhelming. Forget the talk about riots and looting...people are suffering. There is a bit of light at the end of the tunnel as this time there were a few more street vendors that were selling food and the paintings were slowly starting to line the fences again. It is a wierd thing to witness, the normal against the backdrop of devastation.
Today things were planned a little bit better in that we didnt head for the airport quite as early. We did what we could in preparation of sending home over 80 kids. Because this was going to be a chartered flight with only GLA kids on it we didnt have to label them quite to the extent that we did with the Dutch. With them we had their names and birthdays written on their clothing, a piece of yellow construction paper taped to their clothes (this helped identify that they were from GLA) and their first and last name written in permanant marker on their arms. We were determined to make sure these kids were properly identified. Thankfully with the US kids we didnt have to go to the same extremes.
A couple of the girls put together bundles of clothes for the kids. Each child had two outfits, a pair of socks and a pair of shoes. The ladies were clever and taped each bundle together and wrote the kids names on each. A couple of others made over 100 sandwiches for the trip and then the nurses made sure that all necessary medicines were packed and ready to go.
Instead of a huge bus like we took for the dutch kids we piled into probably 5 microbuses (the size of a large mini vans) and began our trip down to the airport. You would think that transporting that many children we would have a real challenge on our hands but I can say with pride, our kids were amazing. They all behaved so well. When we arrived, the US base didnt provide us with the same luxuries as the Dutch. We didnt have a tent only an area of grass where we could sit with all the kids. Let me tell you it is quite the sight to see 80 plus Haitian children just hanging out in front of the US Air Force camps (I am very specific at recognizing that these were airman as a girl here made the mistake of calling them army members, we were quickly and sternly corrected). It wasnt long before we drew a crowd and we had just as many airman holding kids as we did volunteers and staff. That was really cool to see. The kids loved being that close to the helicopters that kept taking off and landing not to mention the HUGE US and Canada military cargo planes.
We were there for a couple hours before we loaded back on the bus to head over to the tarmac. At this point it was becoming emotional again. So many volunteers and staff were heading out on this flight that it was hard for the few of us that were left behind. We watched as child after child was hauled up the stairs and onto the flight that would take them home.
The most encouraging thing I had heard since arriving in Haiti came from one of our volunteers, Mary Jo who said, "Everytime I come down here I pray to God that he would let me take one of these beautiful children home with me. Today God is answering that prayer. Not in the way I expected but on a much larger scale, only the way God can".
Its blows me away to think how many people God has used to make this all come together. So many prayers have been answered!