How wonderful would it be to have all my friends from different walks of life to come together and share moments of life together? This desire became stronger when I experienced the beauty, the challenges, and the different emotions of cross-cultural learning in Hispaniola. I started planning and praying for the event during the silent retreat in the DR. When I returned to Boston, I was so determined to share with my friends in person about what I experienced, and more importantly, to share God's work in Haiti and the DR!
That was how this event came about:
a desire to share God's goodness that I experienced from Hispaniola to my friends of different backgrounds in Boston.
Before I go on to explain into details of how everything came together, I just want to give thanks to Mako who advised me on the seasoning part of the Haitian chicken, to my mother for her generous help in food preparation, and to my little bro Jin for his superb chicken tasting skills ;)
Spiritual Preparation:
Prayers, prayers, prayers! The excitement and peace that I got when I was praying for this event really helped me plan this event. God used the party we had in the DR to encourage me the joy of sharing meals and sharing life. Besides sharing my experience, I want to invite my friends to care for our neighbors in Haiti and the DR, countries we might not paid too much attention to in the past. I also want my sharing to bring people who are passionate for social justice and faith in Jesus to witness what God is doing in Haiti and the DR through organizations like Haiti Partners and Food for the Hungry. This is just the beginning of a very exciting journey that I want to embark on with my friends who are interested!
Food Preparation:
It was my first time cooking Haitian Chicken! I was reminded of baking ginger bread men with Jie for the Father's Day Event a few years ago. I found confidence partnering with God: where there is a will, there is a way! Everything will turn out just fine...as it has always been! God will take care of me! =)
The most enjoyable part of food preparation was putting all the mixed seasoning on top of the chicken, and the most challenging part was getting all the spices from four different supermarkets (three Chinese ones and Shaw's)!!! In the end, the Haitian Chicken was proven to be worthy of my time, money, and the efforts! :)
Song and Sharing Powerpoint Preparation:
Since I wanted the event to be cross-cultural, I decided to pick songs in Creole, Spanish, English. :) As for the powerpoint, it was a bit stressful to dig up photos from my ocean of 3,000+ photos. I was really thankful that I organized my photos into different albums so I had an easier time picking photos!
***
SATURDAY, JULY 5, 2014
On the Day of the Event:
Oh man, I don't know if I should be shock or be thankful that most of my friends were so on time! (Thankful ^^) I just made it to the church at 5:30pm, thanks to my lovely lady Mandy and Big T (I still find it difficult to spell your real name! haha) for transporting the food to the car and driving my lil bro and me to church!
Ice-breaker: Sharing!
I really love this part where I invited my friends to share their name, how we met, and why they accepted the invitation to come. God really showed me that He is a faithful God and He has and continues to bless the relationships that I have with each person. Even for Tykhia, whom I just met through Mandy on the day of the event, we were able to share those life moments because we both knew Mandy and we are both daughters of God! I don't know how she felt about the sharing, but I am sure that God would use that event to help her grow in creative and mysterious ways.
(Mandy sharing, Tykhia and I were listening attentively!)
Music Connects the World Together: Worship Songs!
I had an Haitian friend who was going to help me sing the Creole song but she was unable to come on the day of the event. But my God certainly provides! One of my Hispaniola teammates Isabel came and helped! Being the musically talented girl that she is, she helped me taught my friends Loue Loue and Sean a Ti. It was so much fun! I just spontaneously used Loue Loue as the gateway to share how I felt during the trip when I did not know either Creole or Spanish for the entire month! Although I did not feel very uncomfortable, but there was a point where I was yearning for English conversations to process my thoughts. I also missed speaking in Chinese and hearing Chinese sounds so much! I decided to journal in Chinese and listen to Chinese worship songs whenever I can. It helped me to feel refreshed! Anyway, I had fun learning Creole and Spanish. Learning Creole from the children in the school humbled me the most. My team and I did not just go there to give, we also received so much!
(I looked so intense in this photo...for a worthy reason: I was explaining one of the schools that Haiti Partners sponsored. It was the school with restavec students shown in the background of this slide. Restavec children are children given away by their family to live with another family. However, some of these children often get mistreated and even sexually abused. I chose this specific photo because it gives me HOPE. Despite their backgrounds, these children are receiving an education. Even if the progress may be slow and they've already started school late, I truly believe that education is empowerment, at any time at any place. When these Haitians find their voice and combine it with the tools they learned from school, they are going to be the future of Haiti. We must not give up on people, regardless of their age or background.)
I thought it was a humble way to engage everyone through music. When we have a group of strangers coming together and learn something new together, there is solidarity in embracing the unknowns. That was how I felt when I went with the American team and the ADEE Dominican Team to Haiti. When we got to Haiti, I felt so much closer to the ADEE team despite the fact that we can't communicate that well. We all have to abandon the comfort zone of Knowing and embrace the Unknown: Haitian culture and Haitian Creole. Songs are always a very good bridge for cross-cultural interactions.
I really enjoyed the part where Isabel explained the lyrics to my friends. It added so much meaning to what we were singing. I personally love good lyrics more than good music. So to know what I was singing encouraged me to sing with more of my soul than just my voice.
Sharing Trip Itinerary through Powerpoint: I was too excited to share so I started to get into details on my first slide of introduction. My bad! hahahaha. Anyway, I was really glad to walk my friends through Santo Domingo, DR -> Leogane, Haiti -> Port-Au-Prince, Haiti -> Elias Pina, DR & Haiti Border -> Retreat Center, DR -> Santo Doming, DR. (More details and photos to come in future posts)
My favorite part of sharing was sharing about the U.S. Farm Bill and how it affects third world countries like Haiti. (Wikipedia) I am personally still new to the topic, but I was glad that my friends asked many good questions.
Here is a summary: The U.S. Farm Bill provides billions of dollars in subsidies for US farmers for their crop. This was originally intended to allocate excess crops and to control food supply during the Great Depression. In recent years, US rice has been exported to Haiti, a country with low tariff for imported goods (an agreement between the UN and back-then Haitian President in 1994). Haiti was self-sufficient in its rice production until the 1980s, when the US flooded Haiti with cheap rice imports. When the local Haitians farmers are unable to compete with cheap US subsidized rice, they eventually have to abandon their farm land and move to the capital, Port-Au-Prince, to seek for jobs. As many people might already know, there are not many jobs available in the capital and it is already over-population with migration, many Haitians are forced to move to the DR to seek for job. (Discussions from the Trip)
Below is a photo of our night reflection in Leogane, Haiti. Our director Mako pulled out a bag of US Premium rice from the kitchen of the place where we were staying. The discussion that night felt intense, as was my mind. It was a huge "OH WOW" moment for me as someone who lives in the US and visiting Haiti. (I will dedicate a whole new post to address this topic!)
***
Time flies by when we have a good time ya? or is it just because someone talks too much? Haha. Either way, after I went over the trip outline, I quickly shared how God's story in the bible called us to bring justice to the world. I also shared my personal story of encountering social injustice and joining God's mission of restoring social justice. My point was very simple: God is still in control. I was very privilege to learn and to be part of His mission of sharing His love and justice in this world. I invited my friends to think about their personal stories, whether that story includes their first time encountering God, or a story of their encounters with social injustice... there is a bigger Story outside of our personal experience that we all shall explore and invest.
***
After the sharing, we quickly transitioned to dinner! I was so hungry!!! Besides the Haitian Chicken being a bit/too spicy for some people, I guess everyone enjoyed their food. :) It was so rewarding to be able to cook for my friends! I loved it when I saw the food disappears from the dishes!!! Towards the end, I was also able to share Mako's poem "SWEAT" with my friends. It provided a very unique perspective into our trip and linked it back to Jesus' Sweat of Love for us! I am sure my friends all appreciated it, especially the poetic ones (ahem AJ*). To close the evening, we sang "Sean a Ti" and "God will make a way", to lift up to God all His goodness and to remember that He will always make a way for us!
At the end, I was very thankful for the hands who helped setting tables, playing powerpoint, serving food, taking photos (Mei Hua ;)), taking down the tables, cleaning dishes and everything that I did not even notice! You all were so good to me :')
*To my friends, love you all so much! When I was preparing for this event, I experienced the joy of preparation. What an honor it was to serve you all! The fact that you guys so voluntarily helped me made me felt so loved. I was served by you all and it felt sooooooo good! Thank you for reciprocating the service and love! #GoodFellowship*
Tykhia, Lizzie, Big T, Jin, Ruo, David, Tony, AJ
Fly, Joe, Jodi, Sara, Christie, Isabel, Me, Mandy, Meihua
honorary Wendee and Gina ;)
Thank you all for coming, my dear friends!
