pandemonium

What a great day it’s been so far! It is my first non-work weekend here, so we woke up (relatively) late, ate some breakfast, did some cleaning around the house, and then headed into town. If I could describe Haitian shopping in one word, it would be “chaos”. For sure.

Our first stop was a place called The Lookout. The name makes sense. It’s a place with a decent amount of shopping and an incredible balcony area that looks out over Port-au-Prince. The view is breathtaking, and we could even see the beautiful Caribbean waters!

This was my first encounter with shopping in Haiti, so I made my fair share of rookie mistakes. My first purchase was an overpriced shirt that I found especially cute, and in my defense I did lower the price by about half! In retrospect, I still spent too much and failed to pay attention to the size of the shirt. Let’s just say it will make an adorable maternity shirt one day! Some of the girls say it will look really cute with a belt around it. I think they are being kind. I somehow also got suckered into buying a less than attractive bracelet thing, and that’s when I grabbed Alecia and Becca to walk with me. Strength in numbers.

I like to think I improved quickly in my bartering tactics. The Haitians are hilarious though and persistent to say the least. For those of you who know me well, I struggle with being blunt…but I think today’s experience brought me a long way. There were several times that I couldn’t control myself and busted out laughing because they shove these ridiculous goods and trinkets in your face to buy, and even when you blatantly refuse they go on about their paintings, how you need to come look, how they need money, how they will give you “special price”…it’s hysterical. I think I made some of them mad by offering ridiculously low prices, but it's all part of the game...and usually when you start to walk away they give in anyways! We didn’t linger at the Lookout for too long, but I found some neat paintings and a couple other small things. The artists really are incredibly talented, and they had so many to choose from that it was extremely difficult to pick out what I wanted! My indecisiveness got the best of me at several points.

Our next stop was the Baptist Mission. It’s a really neat place that I’m glad I got to visit, and we sat down to buy some lunch and refuel. I had the first turkey sandwich I’ve had in awhile, and it tasted wonderful! I was glad to have a lunch without rice. After eating, we headed back out to brave the streets once more. I knew this would be my only day of shopping in Haiti, so I tried to have a game plan, but it gets pretty easy to loose focus out there! They had a larger selection at the mission, so we found some fun gifts and souvenirs. The funniest part of the day was at the end of our shopping excursion when somehow Becca and I were the only two Americans together. We were looking at vases or something, and I kid you not…there were about 10 or so different salesmen basically circling us and trying to lure us to their stands. The plus side was we got some really great bargains out of it! But by the end of it all when we had a pile of an embarrassing amount of goods in our hands, we looked at each other and said, “what just happened??” It was rather amusing. Joyce, our driver for the day, literally pulled up next to us in her car and had to help us escape the pandemonium. I like to think that we boosted the Haitian economy a little bit today. What a hysterical experience.

On the way home we stopped briefly at a farmers’ market type place. There were tons of fresh vegetables and different kinds of meat (smelled a little awful). We didn’t buy anything, but it was a cool thing to see.

We’re now relaxing at the house. It’s really warm here today…so it feels good to just lay down and nap or read. We have dinner in a couple of hours, and we’ll probably enjoy a movie or do something low-key tonight. It was such a fun day overall. I came back from shopping with only $3 in my pocket, but don’t worry mom…I thought ahead and left a safe amount of cash back at home so I couldn’t spend my whole stash of spending money!

Tomorrow we have church, and I’m excited to see what that is like here. I can’t believe I only have one week left with my kids. I know I will miss them and this place a lot. I’m praying that next week I will not only soak up every opportunity here but also pour out every chance I get. Pray that He’ll equip me to serve and love in a way that brings Him glory. I hope I’ll continue to learn and grow through this next week as well!

Love you guys, and hope you're all enjoying the weekend!

"One thing God has spoken, two things I have heard: that you, O God, are strong, and that you, O Lord are loving."

-Psalm 62:11