Zakat & Zanfan Lakay...Port au Prince

The editing for all the Haiti photos is coming to a close. I still have more photos and stories to share, but was reminded this morning of a moment I've told folks about but didn't realize I got a photo of.

One of our final days in Port au Prince we took food to some people who live in the street next to the iconic Cathedral that was all but destroyed in the earthquake that hit Port au Prince in January 2010. I was able to look inside one of the "homes" people have made and saw a tarp for shelter, broken down boxes for beds, and two jugs for water.

This is all they had.

I'm thankful to have a photo of it..I didn't even realize I had taken one from afar. I'm thankful to have a reminder that God's grace has been given in ways I don't even think about from day to day but not because of anything I've done. I need this grace just as much as those living in tents and just as this grace was undeservedly given to me, it's possible for them as well. It's good on this Friday to remember that the boys and girls we came to love in Port au Prince at Zanfan Lakay, the home for children of the street, no longer live with just a tent, cot, and the clothes on their back. They now, by the grace of God and the gifts of people in the states, have a home, new family, shoes, clothes, some of them even education, and all of them the chance to hear of this grace on a regular basis.

I’ve mentioned a few times already the boys home we worked with which was our main connection to working in Port au Prince.  The home is named “Zanfan Lakay” which means “children at home” or “home for children.” Before I show you images of these boys, and girls, I’d like to tell you and show you a little from where some of them came.

You've already heard Naika's story and the ways God is using Zanfan to provide for her in tangible ways. Each of these children have a different story…but all are orphans. How they came to Zanfan Lakay or were taken there is an array of backgrounds and stories. The first members of Zanfan Lakay lived on the street. Some of them for 3 years in a place called Zakat. This area is close to a sewer where many folks live.

(the sewers flow through the streets of Port au Prince along with endless trash)

We had the privilege of visiting Zakat and seeing where these boys lived for months and years before God provided a home, food, shelter, shoes, and clothing for them. The following images are of Zakat & the room the boys lived in, some of the boys who lived there the longest, and our team feeding some of the people who are still living in the area & on the street.

The boys came from living  at Zakat, to being  taken in by Jimmy, who they refer to as Papa. With the help and support of local folks, teams that regularly come into Port au Prince, and families in the states, these children have food, clothing, shelter, and more than half of them are able to go to school. The older boys help teach and care for the younger boys & we even got to see them encourage each other with the bible and share the verses that encourage them the most. This is Zanfan Lakay:

How you can be praying for Zanfan Lakay:

Jimmy's wife, and Zanfan Lakay's house mother died unexpectedly this year. They are currently in a major transition and grieving a huge loss of their loved one and for the home.

After having to find a new house because of a spike in rent, the children have recently moved to a new area of town which means new schools and new adjustments. The hope is that Grangou will be able to eventually purchase the home the boys just moved into.

There are still children in the home who aren't able to go to school. Pray they would receive sponsorship and the funds to be able to attend and the possibility of your own family sponsoring a child to go to school. For more information on how to sponsor children please visit Grangou's site here or comment/email me (hello@claireelysephotography.com)

Please pray God's work through Grangou and Zanfan Lakay as well as the teams that regularly visit would expand to other needs in Port au Prince and continually bring good news to each of them.

Check out a photo of Zanfan Lakay's new house here!!

Thanks for reading and stopping by,

Claire

The Darres...Port au Prince, Haiti

The story of why and how we went to Haiti can be found on these previous posts here and here.

I had the privilege of getting to serve in Haiti alongside Kate, my dear friend and roommate, and thought it only appropriate that you should hear her perspective and see some of the things we experienced through her eyes.  This is what she had to say about our time at the Darres':

On our first full day in Port au Prince, we had the opportunity to visit a local pastor and his family who had recently decided to take in and care for 6 special needs children.

This family, the Darres, lived in the heart of the city, and had very few resources to care for their own family, let alone for 6 new children who required extra attention. Yet, they had a heart for serving these children, and the faith to trust that God would provide what they needed.

My aunt, Kandis- the physical therapist from Texas, had held a clinic for 40 special needs children at the home of this family before and had warned us that when we got to their home, we might see some things that made us feel uncomfortable, so I tried to be prepared for what we were about to experience.

(or as prepared as it is possible to be when in Haiti… )

When we arrived at the Darres' home, my first sight, ironically, was a blind man sitting outside the door where the special needs children were. He was tenderly holding a baby, and he very much seemed to be a kind of gate keeper for these children. Even though he couldn’t see them, you could tell from the way he held them and talked to them that

he loved them very much.

After speaking to the man, we peered into the dark, window-less room where the children were liying on the concrete floor on tattered mats. Kandis told us our only job was to go inside and love on them, hold them, laugh with them, play with them. And we were happy to do whatever we could.

The temperature in the concrete room was well over 100 degrees and several children had very high fevers. As I sat down on the floor and began to fan flies off the face of a two year old boy with cerebral palsy, I was overwhelmed with anger and frustration. He was crying out and obviously in severe pain and discomfort, but there was very little I could do to make him feel better. In that moment, I was so mad at the brokenness and fragility of this tent of a body that we carry around with us, disgusted with the lack of medical care available to people in these circumstances, angry at the ugly mark that sin has left on this earth.

At the same time, I thought about every time I obsessed about my body or appearance, every time I griped about a “first world pain”, every time I neglected to show patience and mercy in a situation where someone was desperately crying out for help. As I continued to hold this sweet boy, doing anything I could to communicate that someone was right there with him, God hit me over the head with a complete feeling of helplessness. As someone who (most days) feels like “if I just work harder, maybe tomorrow I’ll have it all together” or “I-can-take-care-of-myself-thank-you-very-much” , I have a hard time grasping the extent of God’s provision for me. But through this experience at the Darres' home, I envisioned myself and my circumstances through the eyes of this child- unable to do anything for himself, completely dependent on the mercy of someone else to provide for his every need.  Without someone-his nanny, his caretakers, a volunteer-coming in to stoop down, pick him up, and take him outside to experience the sunshine, he would always lie on the floor alone.

But God always provides exactly what we need. And for this boy, and every other child at the Darres home that day, God provided wheelchairs. These wheelchairs, which are worth close to $10,000, were donated by people in the United States who knew that my aunt takes them to people in Haiti. She doesn’t bring the wheelchairs with any specific person in mind, but inevitably, they always fit someone who needs them. That day at the Darres, my new friend was picked up off the floor and put in his very own wheelchair. This provided almost immediate relief from a lot of the pain he was experiencing, opening up his lungs and allowing him to breathe more easily than he could on the floor. Even though he will never run or walk, he also will never spend every moment of his life lying on the floor. God lavished His grace on these children through the gift of a new, better way of living and experiencing the world.

Praise God that He graciously gives that same gift to all His children.

(The following images are of the 6 children who received medication and wheelchairs from donors in the states and the men, women, and  children who care for them.)

If I'm honest, this was one of the hardest things to photograph while we were there. Sorrow and joy were both very real at the same time. I would say these photos accurately portray the many ups and downs of the week and encouragement that came in the midst of grieving. It's hard for me even to post these photographs as we saw these children living in what I can only describe as the worst of circumstances I had seen at that point...but oddly enough...they're better off at this home on this hot floor than in the tent cities where they came from...more on that soon.

If you or someone you know has access to wheelchairs or medication to be taken to Haiti on future trips please email me (hello@claireelysephotography.com) or comment below.

Check out our connection to Haiti and the group of boys we went to serve here.

Thanks for stopping by,

Claire

Naika Walks...Port au Prince, Haiti

While in Haiti we did several different things throughout the week and got to servein multiple ways. Today, I’d like to talk about one of the many things we got to be a part of and our  original connection to the opportunity to go.

So, Kate, my dearest friend and roommate, who is now a continuous help on wedding days and practically partner in this business, has a lot of family that have loved me as well as she has over the years. One part of this family that feels like my own is her aunt in Texas. Kandis is a physical therapist who works with special needs children in a school district right outside of Houston. She originally found out about Grangou’s work in Haiti through her own church.(more on  Grangou and what they specifically do through the boys’ home we partnered with in Haiti is coming). For the past few years, Kandis has been taking wheelchairs to Port au Prince and providing assistance for special needs kids.

I’m going to pause my story here in order to give a shout out to American Airlines. A couple of days before we left, Kandis’s husband, Steve, went to talk to American Airlines about our flight. At this point Kandis had collected 7 wheelchairs and a gait trainer from current clients who didn’t use these particular chairs anymore as donations for her to take to those who need them in Haiti. We also wanted to take 6 checked bags full of clothes and medical supplies which was a priority since shipping these items is pretty much impossible (they will likely be stolen before getting to the right folks). So Steve went to talk to American Airlines about all these bags and wheel chairs. The guys at the counter remembered Kandis and her many trips with wheelchairs and Steve showed them pictures of some of the kids she goes to visit. American Airlines decided to let us check all the wheelchairs, gait trainer, and 6 bags..for free!!! Since starting a business, I tend to get super excited when I see people run their businesses well. I know many people have issues with just about every airline out there as traveling has sometimes become a nightmare for folks so really I couldn’t believe they let us do this. That’s kind of a big deal these days. It was a very redeeming and hopeful report in my mind and so I think American Airlines could use a shout out.

So…Monday morning we trekked to the airport, trailer in tow, with 7 wheelchairs, a gait trainer, and 6 huge bags full of belongings of our church members and medical supplies our friends had donated to people they didn’t know. It was a pretty awesome sight and the first of many humbling moments on our trip. When we arrived in Port au Prince after a very long day of travel, getting initiated right off the bat into the very different culture of Haiti simply by arriving at the airport, waiting…and waiting…and waiting some more…we met our team and had dinner at the hotel. While visiting with team members we were told in passing about Naika, a little girl who had recently been taken in at  Zanfan Lakay, the street boys’ home we would be working with. Naika couldn’t walk. She had to be carried to get anywhere and held sometimes by multiple people in order to do any basic tasks you and I take for granted every day. With Naika’s condition, most children in the US would have the resources and therapy to be walking by her age. Naika is originally from the cemetery where many men and women live within the walls and amongst the graves.

I had heard of people living in the cemetery all throughout the trip but it wasn’t until we got back that I found out what these women live in. There is a cemetery in Port au Prince that has 24/7 guard service within its gates. There are women within the gates of the cemetery who have been allowed to live there and given “protection” by the guards in exchange for prostitution and “servicing” the guards on a regular basis. These women live in the cemetery, are abused and used by the guards, and often become pregnant without a way to care for their child. Naika became a part of Zanfan Lakay, the boys' home, because, Jimmy, the house dad at the home regularly takes food and clothing to the women within the gates. Naika was likely born with cerebral palsy and there was no one to accurately care for her within the gates, so Jimmy took her in.

I mentioned a gait trainer was donated to Kandis before we left. The thing about these wheelchairs and supplies Kandis gets is she takes whatever folks can give and doesn’t really know who in Haiti will need them, what size these folks are or what size their chair would need to be. She just takes what people give and sees how she can use them when she arrives. This trip was the first time she was given a gait trainer to take to Haiti. A gait trainer is basically a walker which is used for children who have cerebral palsy or other issues walking or using their legs.  In the U.S., if  a child with cerebral palsy is given the care they need from a physical therapist, the child can learn to walk with a trainer and even get to the point where they are able to walk on their own. Again, Kandis hadn’t heard of anyone in Haiti that she knew would need a gait trainer, but brought it anyway knowing we would likely find a use for it. God provided the trainer for Naika long before Kandis or our team knew about Naika’s need for it.

The following photographs are of the first time Naika walked. This happened our first day in Haiti. With all of the boys and girls from the home and our entire teamwatching, Kandis stretched Naika’s legs, stood her up, and then put her in the gait trainer. At first Kandis helped her get acquainted with the device and helped hertake her first few steps…and then the smile that came was full of more joy than I think I’ve ever seen in a smile as Naika began to do it on her own. Her face had suchan expression of redemption and hope. It was the first of many reminders that God is at work amongst these people, that he saves the lost, that he came for the poor and broken, and that he literally causes the lame to walk.

The next day, Naika walked the length of the front patio area by herself. She even got to watch a video of herself walking on her own.

With the gait trainer and the help of the older boys at Zanfan Lakay walking Naika each day, she will now have the opportunity to be stimulated each day with activity, go outside on a regular basis, play with other children, and we pray eventually be allowed to go to school and get an education

(something she can’t do now as the schools in Haiti do not take special needs children and much of the culture views those with special needs as unwanted and cursed.)

Throughout the remainder of the trip, Kandis was able to give all 7 wheelchairs to those who needed them and purchase an additional chair for a man who lives in a tent city where we delivered food throughout the week. More on those who received the other chairs and how God used our time there will be in later posts and stories.

If you know of a way to donate wheelchairs or funds to purchase supplies and medication needed to treat children like Naika or if you want to learn more about how you can sponsor one of the boys or girls at Zanfan Lakay, please comment or email me (hello@claireelysephotography.com) or visit Grangou’s website here.

"And he answered them, “Go and tell John what you have seen and heard: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are raised

up, the poor have good news preached to them." Luke 7:22

Thanks for stopping by friends,

Claire

Haiti...an introduction.

I’m going to start with a little back story. I explained in my last post some of why I went to Haiti. But it hasn’t been until I returned that I am beginning to understand more why I went.

I think just about every time I first meet someone, inevitably in the conversation, the question comes:

“so what’s your favorite thing to photograph?” or “so why are you a photographer?” or at the very least “so what kind of photography do you do?”

The answers to these questions are answered swiftly, without much forethought, and then followed by other conversation. I think after Haiti, the answers to these questions can’t really stay the same. And I’m thankful for that.

 Yet, in the back of my head as I answer these questions, there’s always this one nagging question that I usually keep to myself:

 Why did I pick up the camera in the first place?

 I don’t ask this question in a way that assumes I never should have picked up a camera, or that I regret my career choice.  It’s more of a little reminder to consider why. And God giving me the opportunity to go to Haiti was that little reminder played out in real life.

 You see, I picked up a camera years ago as I struggled to know what I wanted to do with my life. Back then I thought I wanted to maybe be a “counselor.” This idea revealed that what I value most is having real conversations with people and serving others. That was the desire in a nutshell. As I’ve gotten older, studied photography in college, shot 3 years of weddings, started life on my own as a single woman out in the world, and had to make a decision of what I will follow, what I’ll live for, and ultimately what my mission will be…the desire to serve others hasn’t changed- it’s just become more focused.

The thing is, I originally picked up a camera because I saw that, for whatever reason, God had provided a gift, and a desire to use it and other gifts in order to help. I just haven’t been able to put to words what that “help” actually looks like or means. I've only part known what it means and why I picked up a camera to go, to serve, to use photography and this device that somehow by the grace of God stops His time in its very tracks in order to connect people, to bring awareness, and to bring money, aid, and help from people who, without these photographs, would not know about the need.

 Until Haiti.

 Since our return, I first of all got sick, which laid me out for a week. But honestly I can see the sickness was a very good thing for me in a lot of ways because it helped me process and settle back in. It also granted me a whole lot of time to read, research, and look deeper into this thing tha,t for lack of a better term, is titled “humanitarian photography.” For those who know and love me well, I’ve been throwing this term around for quite a few years in hopes it’ll stick and be something I could pursue. There is no definition in the dictionary for a humanitarian photographer, but a humanitarian is one who

1.

has concern for or helping to improve the welfare and happiness of people.

2.

of or pertaining to ethical or theological humanitarianism.

3.

pertaining to the saving of human lives or to the alleviation of suffering: a humanitarian crisis.

 I’ve thought a lot about this term, this idea and desire I’ve always had, and the comments and ideas of other people who strive to be “humanitarian photographers.” I don’t have it all figured out by any means and I never will, as I’m not the one to know what God has for me now or in the future or why He does what He does…but I’ve been able to realize that long ago God put in me a desire to do something for reasons I may not have been able to put into words, and now He’s given me a little bit deeper understanding than before. I’ve realized that this thing I’m wanting to do with the camera, this aid I’m wanting to bring, this “alleviation of suffering” and desire to “improve the welfare and happiness of people” cannot and will not be separated from the ultimate need and goal of the gospel being that which saves them. I’ve read a lot about bringing dignity to others through photographs. Something I’ve always thought about is somehow using photographs to bring an awareness of people’s conditions and for people to open up their wallets and their time in order to give back after seeing what some people are living in. These are all still missions of mine and ideas I plan to pursue…but the point is..now, more than ever, it’s clear to me that all of these things can’t be separate from a desire to speak the gospel, to make the love of Christ, our need for it, our brokenness, and the grace that came from a man, who wept most of his time here because of the brokenness he saw, that humbled himself in order to go. I can go to other countries and take pictures of people in order to bring dignity to them in the midst of their circumstances, and I can photograph them with a smile instead of a frown in order to show that God made them in his image, and I can stop time in its tracks with this tool that God will likely use to bring money and time and concern from others….but if I do it without bringing the message of the saving grace of the gospel. If I reduce it to “happiness” and “welfare” or even “food” and “clothing” but do not bring the only “alleviation of suffering” there truly is…then what am I doing?

Some of the things we saw and experienced in Haiti are still difficult for me to know how to talk about. Some of my response has been fear to look at the images because I get overwhelmed. How am I supposed to put words to these images and reduce these people, these situations, these circumstances to a bullet point beneath a photograph? The truth is I still haven’t gotten to the answer of those questions. But I know I am to try. You hear people saying “I need to give a voice to these people” and I do. “ I need to bring dignity to these people and show others that they have hope, life, joy, and even faith..sometimes more than we do in here in this culture”..and I do. “ I need to do my share and give up my time and energy and money for these people who can’t speak loud enough on their own.”…and I do. But if I separate it from the love of Christ or from the saving knowledge that I am just as broken, just as helpless, and that it’s only by the grace of God that I have the opportunity to show a beggar where to find food…then I’m just another humanitarian, just another helper, and it’s just another 7 day pin-point on the blip of the radar of my life. God has called us to more. And I don’t know what it looks like in the day- to- day, or if I’ll have a chance to do another trip like this one or photograph those who are hurting and starving and naked and in danger…I hope I do…if it were up to me I would. All I know is I got to go to Haiti, God provided a way to photograph and speak His name while there, and now it’s my job to try in my limited understanding and ability to tell these people’s stories and thereby bring an understanding of the brokenness of all of us…not just them. So the next few weeks will be a very flawed and pathetic attempt to show all of us our need of the very thing that played itself out as we watched hurting, starving, naked, dying people…

...a Savior.

 

This is just an introduction and start of many, many photos I have and plan to show. Please bear with me as I process, in every sense of the word, the photos I was able to take and stick around to see more and hear some of these peoples' stories if you can. Thanks so much for reading, friends.

And thanks for stopping by,

*Claire

p.s. I'll be telling more soon about the group we partnered with but check out their website to learn more:  http://grangou.org/