Today was our first official day in Haiti. We stayed at hotel in Port Au Prince the hotel was very nice. It felt so good to actually have bed to sleep in. In the early afternoon we got picked up and had a two hour drive through the mountains. I love just sitting in the car and taking in all of the views that the country has to offer. One of the big differences here is they don't have traffic laws. So people drive all over the road and there is no speed limits which can make it interesting. On our way out of town we saw a guy riding on top of the van! Its like these people have no fear of anything. Words can't even describe the beauty that we saw today driving in the mountains. The roads were so curvy and at moments we were just hanging over the edge of the mountain. I was thankful that I was not driving. It is also interesting when you encounter a truck on these roads because they are very narrow.
Another thing that I noticed while driving is lots of women and children are carrying containers of water up the mountain. These people are walking many miles just to fill up a container of water and we have it where we can literally walk to a sink and fill up a glass of water. It really makes you realize how much we take for granted. I could not even imagine having to walk through the mountains to retrieve water. We saw one young lady balancing a FULL 5 gallon bucket of water on her. That takes some serious talent. I have no idea how they can do that.
We have had to do a lot of adjusting today. I forget how hard the first day can be to adjust to all of the differences a country has to offer. For instance in order for us to drink the water we have to filter it through little filters that attach to our bottles. Electricity is also a luxury out here. Randomly throughout out the day the lights will just all turn off for a short period of time before coming back on. They also do not have very much hot water out here so our showers are all with cold water. The cold water actually feels really good since it was around 90 degrees here today! Its just all these little things that we have become so accustomed to. It makes you so much more grateful for what you have.
Today we also got our first official Haitian meal. I love the food out here it is so good but they make huge proportions. For both meals today we had chicken and rice. If you ever travel to a country like this you need to try the chicken. It is so good!! We had to put our orders in for the chicken early because they had to go catch and kill the chicken before we could eat it. Thats a little different then back home. They also serve huge proportions out here. I have no idea how people can even finish there meals.
We are now sitting in our room finally getting a chance to relax and unwind from all the events. Its so relaxing I am sitting and bed listening to the ocean waves crash with fresh sea breeze blowing through our room.
With love,
Abby
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