katie loves haiti: We rescue all kinds of God's creatures!

Today, the anger and violence continued. In fact, I think it is worse. In the morning, we realized that we only had one more jug of clean drinking water left and no extra diesel fuel for the generator. We loaded up our fuel cans and plastic water jugs into the truck. Then, I ventured out to the gas station. Things appeared relatively normal in our neighborhood aside from the charred remains of tires and trash on the roads. When I got to the gas station, unfortunately I was told that they are closed and have no idea when they are going to reopen. So, today we began boiling water from the cistern for drinking. We have been calling our water truck to come refill the cistern, but there has been no sign of them. If we should run out of water in the cistern, we have no idea what we will do for water. Pray things do not get that bad. When our generator runs out of what fuel is left in it, I can't guarantee when we will have electricity again. So, should you not hear from me, please do not worry.

Mid-morning, one of our nannies called us and asked us to meet her halfway to the house for a ride. So, Dorothy and I ventured out. It was a scary sight. On a good day, Port-au-Prince looks terrible, I won't lie. But now, it is even worse. The streets are littered with trash, charred remains, and anything that can be drug out into the streets. I saw a toilet in the middle of one road, an overturned car in another, and a refrigerator on yet another. Although the streets were lined with people, we were one of the only vehicles out driving.

Haitian police trucks.

A refrigerator in the middle of the road along with other junk

An over-turned truck in our way...U-turn!

Trash, furniture, and the remains of burned tires

It doesn't look like it in the picture but this dumpster was moved into the road

A main road....no cars at all...So eerie and creepy looking to those of us who know what it is usually like. You can see burnt tires here

The road blocks did not stop the pigs from roaming freely as usual

One of the busiest roads in PAP totally empty of cars...except for the two crazy white ladies that is!

main Delmas is usually backed up with car after car

approaching a large road block that was being set up

They were waving us to come through, but we opted to do a U-turn instead, ha!

preparing a roadblock

typically this intersection is very busy

I know it is hard to see in this picture, but this boy is playing with a homemade toy car. It is made of a juice bottle with four plastic bottle caps as wheels!

a better look at the toy car. The kids here make toys out of all kids of trash

On our way home from picking up the nanny we had to drive through a tent city to get back to the house. For the past couple of weeks, we have seen a litter of tiny puppies playing along side the road and joked about taking one home with us. Today when we went by, Dorothy slowed so we could take a picture and watch them playing.

What we did not notice was that laying in the middle of the road (just outside of the photo above) was another puppy. As soon as we saw him curled up in the road with cars passing by, Dorothy said he must be dead. She was too afraid to get out and see for fear that he was dead. So, I went. As I got closer and touched him, he opened his eyes the tiniest bit. His ear was bloody and I could see that one of his front paws was scraped raw, swollen, and bleeding.

What else are two animal/child lovers supposed to do but to rescue him? So, I walked back to the truck and grabbed a cloth diaper to use as a blanket. As I scooped him off the road and wrapped him up, every Haitian on the street burst out in laughter, pointed, and jeered at the crazy white girl saving the dying puppy. Haitians hate dogs and are usually afraid of them. On more than one occasion, I have seen them throw rocks at them for no reason. All I could do was hold the puppy close as I climbed into the truck glaring at the men and woman laughing at us. How is it that the same people I love so much can make me so angry at times?

Leonne, the nanny that was in the truck with us, just laughed as I sat down in the front seat with out new very smelly puppy. Dorothy and I explained to her that he is a baby too and we are here to rescue babies. We love all God's creatures not just humans! When we got home, Leonne announced to the other nannies that we have a new baby. They all peered in my direction with curiosity at the bundle I was carrying. When they realized what I had, they shook their heads and laughed at us. Dorothy and I just further our "crazy white woman" status more and more each day, ha!

The kids were not as excited about the new puppy as you would think. Claudine kept saying, "Yuck! Yuck! I don't like it! Is it dead?" Rosa and Mich just watched me with curiosity. I explained to them that he is a sick hurt baby just like all the other babies we bring to our house. I told them that we need to love him and take care of him. I also kept telling them that I love him very much. After repeating that many times and modeling how to gently care for him, they started to catch on. After a little while, Claudine even joined in to help Dorothy and I bathe him. He was TEEMING with mites and fleas. I've never seen so many in my life. His skin looked like it was moving. He was so filthy that it took three through bathes and a rinse to get him somewhat clean. He will be getting at least one more tomorrow. We cleaned his wounds, fed him some softened dog food, gave him some antibiotics, and tucked him into a little cardboard box bed in my room. And in case you are wondering, I named him Jake.

Meet our newest addition to the family!