Home Sweet Orphanage

I thought I'd post some pictures of the place where the kids are living. I only have a few good shots because, quite frankly, we're more focused on getting pics of the kids while we're there than of the facility.

Nadia and her staff try very hard to keep things very clean. And you can see in some of the pictures that she'd had cartoon characters painted on the walls to make it more visually stimulating for the children.

Kids still get sick for a variety of reasons. After watching Jessica lick the walls and the bottom of her shoe, I'm not at all surprised when we find out someone's sick at the O. Kids will be kids and kids put things in their mouths. When those things have been touched by filthy rain water and all that goes with it then you end up with an orphanage full of kids with giardia or some other gift that keeps on giving.

The O is basically a house with 3-4 bedrooms in it. It has a living room/dining room area, but not a lot of furniture. There's a big kitchen space and oh - how I desperately wish I could carry enough food to stock their shelves!

The kids play and spend most of their day in this area - it's basically the carport. It's covered so it's a bit cooler. We want to get ceiling fans installed for them to keep the bugs down. They eat their meals around these tables. They play around these tables. I'm assuming when the school teacher is there, he's teaching them around these tables.

The kids sleep in these bunk beds - multiple kids to a bed. There aren't blankets because it's Haiti and it's hot all the time. They don't have air conditioning and, given that electricity is often unavailable in the evening, a ceiling fan isn't even an option. Every inch of wall that a bunk bed will fit on is used for that purpose.
50 kids - 3 bedrooms and a carport. But they make it work and they're doing the best they can for our kids.