OLMC sends supplies to Ti Riviere

Every year since our Haiti mission began, we have collected supplies to send down to Ti Riviere on one of the  Sea Containers, arranged by the Parish Twinning Program, out of Nashville, Tennessee.  This year there were 16 boxes of books that Connie and Chuck Grimm had collected;  donated printed t-shirts & handle tote bags, soccer uniforms,shoes and balls.  Over 1,000 toothbrushes had to be counted and unpackaged along with sorting a great deal of school supplies and backpacks.  At the end we had 61 boxes of supplies that we U-hauled to Nashville, to be combined with supplies coming from all over the country...destined for all parts of Haiti.  Normally the program gathers enough for 2 or 3 Sea Containers.  This year the warehouse was loaded with enough stuff to fill 7 containtainers.  Thanks to all the dedicated OLMC volunteers who gathered, delivered, sorted, counted, boxed, taped, labeled, and loaded and delivered our 61 boxes to Nashville!  Lori Gallagher was in charge of organizing the entire effort and was assisted by Gayle Fedele, Laura Moehling , Dianne Barnett, Rob O'Dell ,Connie and Chuck Grimm, and Tom McHaffie.  Thanks to everyone for helping to make this happen.  As you can see from the pictures, there is an impressive amount of help heading out of that warehouse, including our 61 boxes headed for Ti Riviere! 

Thanks to Pat and Mary Rehovsky (pictured above) for pulling the whole thing together in Nashville.

Water Purifiers Constructed!

Gift of Water, Inc - Purifiers Constructed!

For several years the OLMC Haitian committee has been supporting clean water purifiers for individual use in Haitian households. About 50 Haitian communities were using Gift of Water purifier in their communities. As of December 2008, the Gift of Water purification system that OLMC (and numerous other organizations) used in Haiti seemed destined to go out of business.

Through God’s grace; a wonderful parishioner at OLMC by the name of Pete Murphy has chosen to continue the efforts. As a result, he has created a non-profit organization here in Indiana, which will make and distribute water purifiers in Haiti.
As of April 30th, almost 1,200 household water purifiers have been assembled at our facility in Westfield. Tasks that were accomplished included: Using a drill press to drill holes in buckets, drilling holes in PVC, light hammering, using pliers, recharging carbon filters.
For more information or to help with this project in the future, contact: Bruce Elkins, 317-506-9533 or belkins@indyzoo.com.

OLMC to Rebuild Ti Riviere Quake Damaged Chapels

OLMC is in the process of obtaining estimates to rebuild two and possibly three of the small chapels damaged in the recent earthquake, in our sister parish of Ti Riviere.  Although the main church, school, hospital, and guest house were not damaged in the quake, these chapels are located away from the main town, higher up in the mountains, and because of their poor condition to start with, sustained in some cases the "finishing blow" with the earthquake.  Most if not all of the system of small chapels serve multiple purposes as Church/School/Meeting place, etc.  The teachers at these chapel schools are also supported by OLMC.


This is the location for a the new chapel (and the makeshift temporary quarters) to replace the damaged chapel at "Silegue" 

 

Damaged chapel at "Cholette"...which has now become an outdoor Church.

This is the damaged chapel at "Bezin".  You can see why the people are afraid to go inside.

Ti Riviere and the Quake

Amid the chaos in Haiti, there is good and bad news from our twin parish in Ti Riviere.  The following is from an email from Father Rebecca received about a week ago:  In the town of Ti Riviere 7 houses were completely flattened.  In the overall parish, there was one death, and two of the "mountain" chapels and one mountain school destroyed ( the Cholette and Sillegue areas for those of you that have been there).  In the mountain areas there are over 800 home damaged and about 50 that were destroyed.

The good news is that the main Church and Rectory, and the new hospital are all o.k.  The school and staff house built by the good people at OLMC are fine as well!  Praise God!

Our Haitian builder/engineer/friend Abdou Fall visited Ti Riviere last week and sent the following pictures of some of these buildings.  The people had noticed some cracks in plaster and some of the block-work, and were apparently sleeping outdoors for fear of the buildings falling.  Abdou has assured us that the cracks are normal settling and probably not as a result of the earthquake, and in any case are not structural, or cause for concern.  We are thankful to have formed a successful partnership with Abdou, and for passing the earthquake test with these buildings!

The first picture is of the completed Staff House for the Visitation Hospital (pre-quake photo), and then the other pictures were taken last week after the quake, of the Hospital, Staff House, School, and Church/Rectory: