I have spent some time reflecting on where we are at today and wanted to share an update about all that has been accomplished in Haiti since the Earthquake.

APJ Secondary School

Of course the school is our pinnacle achievement with 35 teachers and staff and nearly 400 students. By now we are all familiar with the hurdles we jumped to open on time and what seemed impossible at times has become a reality. It is truly thrilling each day when I walk into the front gate and see the students laughing and learning at our APJ Secondary School.

Cholera Center

APJ has been proud to support the Cholera Center at St Damien’s Hospital. Nearly 500 patients have been treated in our center, which would not have been possible without APJ providing the structures for the offices and screening facilities as well providing the security fence. APJ was also able to get most of the other materials for the facilities donated including 20 large tents, 400 cots, showers, the entire water system including five industrial sinks and much of the IVs and medical supplies. The Cholera Center is unique in Haiti with the kid of feel only Father Rick and the St Luc team can provide. Welcome mats hang over the entrance and during the day Haitian musicians play music for the sick, at night colorful Christmas lights drape the tents, bringing a playfulness, joy and light to this new dark disaster.

St Luc Hospital

Our continued support of the new hospital has been instrumental in both the building of the facility and day-to-day operations. When it became clear to Father Rick and the St Luc team that they would have to expand St Damien’s to care for adults APJ stepped up to help in the challenge. In March Dr. Reza and I stood in an empty field with four shipping containers and never would have thought it would grow to such an amazing facility. Providing over 300 free operations, St Luc has seen thousands of patients providing life saving care ranging from simple hernias to gunshots wounds.

World Food Program (WFP)

It’s been a long road of paperwork including a 40 page report due every month but for the last 8 months APJ have been a partner of the WFP. Because of this partnership we feed 22,000 people everyday, including every child under the St Luc program and our Secondary School. We have so far received almost 400 tons of food. In the past two months I have hired two former Kenscoff orphans to take the project over, making it sustainable and with the capacity to carry on for as long as WFP stays in the country. Our strive for excellence and complete compliance with WFP standards rank our schools in the highest tier with the UN and are now used as their model. The St Luc schools are regularly visited by dignitaries and top UN staff when touring Haiti.

UNICEF

UNICEF has been a strong partner of APJ they have donated 40 large tents and numerous medical supplies to APJ, which in turn we gave to the St Luc program. Without the tents St Luc not have been able to open all of the street schools in such a short time. The head of the UNICEF education department in Haiti also visits our programs regularly and has called APJ the hardest working albeit annoyingly persistent NGO working in Haiti.

Other programs

APJ has partnered with TOMs shoes distributing thousands of shoes to children in need. With a focus on Father Rick’s programs most school children in St Luc schools have been given TOMs shoes.

Sun City Picture House was the first movie theatre built since the earthquake destroyed all remaining theaters in Port au Prince. APJ board member Maria Bello was on hand for the opening night where she introduced her movie “Mummy 3.” Built in one of the largest tent camps in Port au Prince, Sun City Picture House shows movies every weekend. The documentary about its construction and Father Rick has been submitted to 16 international film festivals and is a powerful tool for showing the spirit and importance of APJ.

Father Rick has come to count on APJ and me for our ability to get supplies and materials for free. After years of working with these group throughout Africa I’ve come to know the players well and most of the heads of the large NGOs are at the top of my speed dial.

Other Partners

Throughout the months I have become well versed in which organizations to bring into the hospital. I have carefully chosen groups that fit within Father Rick’s guidelines of who he will work with.

OPERATION BLESSING

I brought Operation Blessing to Father Rick and they have since become a great help, giving resources without asking anything in return. Through them many of the schools have been set up with bathrooms and water filters as well as wells. Operation Blessing is also building a state of the art surgery center for Father Rick as well as supplying it with equipment and visiting American teams of doctors from the Mayo Clinic.

MEDISHARE and GRASSROOTS

Have consistently provided us with medicine and supplies.

GIVE LOVE

Patricia Arquette and Rosetta Getty’s Haiti NGO Give Love has been another great partner APJ has introduced to the hospital. Give Love has donated to the hospital through APJ 15 shipping containers that now house and provide schooling for hundreds of children orphaned by the Earthquake.

US ARMY

The Army has donated to APJ generators and the entire water and shower system we use for the Cholera Center.

FLAMINGO INDUSTRIES

Local Haitian construction company run by a dear friend of mine has supplied all 40 of the prefab units to the hospital at close to cost, saving Father Rick thousands.

NPH

Over many bottles of wine with Toia we are now in the final stages of setting up the computer center at our Secondary School, freeing the funds we would have had to use for this project to go into the future support of our school. We are also working with NPH Germany to have them provide all the solar panels for our school.

JOHN SHADDUCK

We are waiting on a 40-foot container already in Haiti from John Shadduck that is designated to our school. Full of school supplies and books this container is a perfect starter kit for our school.

Partnerships

To get an idea of the size of these partnerships I have included a list of the dollar value of these materials.

• WFP – 380 tons of food worth over $500,000
• IOM – Cholera Supplies $40,000
• UNICEF – 40 tents $600,000
• Give Love – 15 containers and building supplies $90,000
• John Shadduck – container of supplies $100,000
• Operation Blessing – has spent close to $1,000,000 in various projects for the hospital
• Flamingo Builders – Supplies $70,000
• Grassroots – medicine and labor $15,000
• Feed the Poor – sanitation kits $10,000
• Medishare – medical supplies $60,000
• Bomberos United - ambulance -$100,000
• US army – various supplies $32,000
• NPH – computers $40,000

All in all over 2.5 million dollars worth of supplies.

When you add this to our own generous contribution it paints an awesome picture of the scope of APJ in Haiti, brining the grand total to nearly 6 million dollars of aid to Father Rick.

We have changed the face of St Damien’s for the better and at times I try to imagine what it would look like had we not been here. On my own side I am proud to represent us. I have helped unload nearly every one of the hundreds of shipping containers that have arrived here and spent endless days working through the night for the people of Haiti including rarely missing a chance to play my saxophone at the morgue every Thursday. We have worked hard to minimize our overhead and I am proud and a bit astonished that all these achievements have been done out of my tent, which also serves as my office and from on top of my trusty scooter. When you calculate what we have spent on overhead in Haiti in the last 10 months it is about the same as what most NGOs spend on one truck in their fleet.

We now have plans and designs for Phase Two of our School. The final plans will be ready next week with the addition of the music school and our design firm is ready to break ground.

I hope to see you all down here soon. Keep the people of Haiti in your thoughts as we face the Cholera Epidemic, which may turn out a bigger disaster then the Earthquake, and now with what looks like weeks of violence against the presidential elections. If I know have learned anything here its that through what ever hardships Father Rick and the Haitian people face it will be met with strength, love and light

Peace.

Bryn

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