Ali’s reflections on visiting Port Au Prince

Hello everyone! My name is Ali Mandrell, I’m a sophomore at Southern

IL University Edwardsville. I’m helping to coordinate worship and

chores here in Haiti, and I have had the privilege to get to know

several of the Haitian students and build relationships with them. I’m

going to share a little bit of my journal entry now about what we saw

on Monday when we went into Port Au Prince.

“We went into the city today. On the way to Port Au Prince, there were

children and adults fishing in the ditch along the road that was

flooded by the storm last night. The water is very, very muddy, so

it’s hard to believe anything lives in there. Much of the camp and the

road is under water, and some of the road has even been washed away,

so travel was bumpier than normal in the bus. When we got into

downtown Port Au Prince, the traffic thickened immensely, and the

streets were very narrow. The drivers here are something else. I find

myself impressed with their mad skills at handling the busy streets. I

can’t imagine life in St. Louis without stoplights or interstate

signs.”

There were thousands of people wandering the streets. There were only

a few buildings out of the massive amount of them that were not

destroyed in

the earthquake. It was terrifying for me to imagine being inside those

cramped concrete buildings when they collapsed. The capital was

practically in ruins, but there were parts of it that displayed its

former beauty. They drove us by Port Au Prince’s largest catholic

church, which appeared to have been huge, that was also completely

wiped out by the earthquake. I sat with Jenne, a Haitian student and

friend, she kept saying things like “they were broken, everything was

broken by the earthquake, so many people were dead.” She told me the

parks were once beautiful, and a “must see” for american toursits. She

said she used to walk there from class before the earthquake; but now

the streets are littered with garbage, the water is even more sickly

than before, and the grass of the parks are covered by thousands of

tent cities. We drove by a university campus where all of the

buildings had collapsed. Jenne told me that many of her friends had

died there.

Coming out of the city was a relief, and seeing the compound again

felt like home. Even though there was so much devestation, our Haitian

friends still have Hope in Christ. It was overwhelmingly encouraging

to watch them smile and interact with us in the middle of all of this

chaos. Thank you for all who have been praying for our team! This

seems like a very somber note, but God has been and will continue to

do great things in this city. He has not given up on Haiti, and He has

been protecting and preparing His people all along for whats to come

in the future of this beautiful nation. Please pray for Haiti, and for

what God is doing through us in our time here, and more importantly,

pray for the Haitians who will be here leading what God, through

Pastor Pierre and many others, has already started once we have long

gone back home. Bondye Beni nou! God Bless all of you!

-Ali