Making new friends

We had a great time at the orphanage across the street this afternoon making friends, playing jump rope and visiting.

Charlinette, our housekeeper, lives there with her sister's family, they are house parents for 28 children. Charlinette's daughter, Loudsondyà (Lude for short) is here visiting. Normally Lude lives with her Grand-mére in Jean Robel which is a few hours away. She's two and a half and she'll move back with her mother when she's ready to start school. Right now they don't get to see each other often. Haitian culture is an enigma to me. They either live crowded, all together, extended family and all. Or they live one spouse/parent in America or Bahamas, or in this case, child away from parent and it seems ok. Charlinette seems sad that she doesn't get to see her baby very often so I'm not sure the reason. We're just glad we will get to spend a few days getting to know her so that when she does move here, maybe we can be a good influence for her.

When we first arrived, Lude was afraid and didn't want to have anything to do with us(she probably hadn't seen white people up close). Alaina and Anessa had a couple friends from school with them so they all got involved jumping rope and climbing on the jungle gym/slide. Lude could see us from up above and started waving so Charlinette brought her down to let us see her up close. What really made her warm up was Mr Scott with his camera!