Visit to the Campbell Orphanage

I typically don't share my Haiti stories on the blog, but I had the privilege of spending almost two weeks in Pignon, first few days at the Board meeting and then a week with my team, The Fargo Medical team. I have shared the story below with my family and coworkers and now with you. 

Love and Music breaks all Language Barriers

Personal experience of Fargo Team member

Lorrie Beauchamp Berg

On Thursday afternoon we finished surgery early so a few of us decided to walk to

the  Campbell Orphanage.  We walked down the paved street until we came to a dirt road at the edge town, we continued down the dirt road for a short time until we came to the path that lead to the orphanage. The path was shaded by trees and had a cactus fence. At the end of the path was a guarded gate. The guard recognized some of the team members who had visited earlier in the week and opened the gate for us.

We continued down a path to a house.  Beside the house were a few

trees that gave shade to a group of children as they played on a

slab of cement, others children were sitting on a picnic table playing cards.

After spending a few moments watching the games that were being played.

A couple of the team members sat down to play cards with one group while other team

 members joined other groups of children and still others went off to tour the orphanage.

I walked over to Jenifer, the mom of these many children and introduced myself to 

her, saying I didn't expect you to remember me because it had been a few years since 

I had been to the orphanage but I explained to her that I was friends with her on Facebook,

that I had been reading about the two small blind brothers whom

they had found almost naked sitting outside a thatch house. I explained to

Jennifer that one of my wishes on for t his trip was to meet those two

little boys and have them sing. 

Jennifer smiled and went and got a little boy sitting in a wheel chair, 
Ellinez and brought him over to where I was standing. She graciously 
asked if I would like to hold him. I said yes while my heart screamed 
YES PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE . She picked him gently up out of his 
wheel chair and placed him into my arms as I sat

on the picnic table.  As she placed him in my arms, she smiled and 
said I do remember you.  Jennifer then went and got the other brother
Leemonez, and brought him over to us.  He sat on the lap of one of my 
team members then she asked the boys to sing.  They gently reached out for each other

to make sure the other was there then they started singing.  After they

were done singing the little one that was in my lap snuggled  his body

into my arms resting his head against my chest and as my chin rested on

top of his head I slowly started rocking him and humming Amazing Grace

to him. I knew that even though there is a language barrier,

music breaks those barriers. Amazing Grace was a song that was very special

to me , I had heard it, sang it and experienced its power on an other trips to Haiti.  

The more I hummed quietly to him the tighter he snuggled into me until I thought

he was sleeping ( I now believe he was either pretending to sleep so I

wouldn't put him down) There was a small girl that would come over every so often and look at

the two of us rocking on the picnic table. She was a mothering soul and 

would reach up to my cheek and push the strands of my hair that had blown into 

my eyes or face in the breeze, back behind my ear, she would smile at me as she 

did this and then she would go play for a moments, few steps away from us, 

then she would come back and check on us. If a strand of hair had again decided 

to fall into my eyes she would push it again behind my ear.  After humming a few 

songs to him I started humming Hallelujah. The little girl came back to check 

on us, she looked at the small boy in my arms and I could see a look of concern, 

panic and anxiety on her face and I could tell she had no idea what to do as she 
kept looking at the little boy arms and then at me and the little boy again.

 She said something to him in Creole and all he replied

was a ahhaaa.  I looked down at the small boy in my arms he who was

snuggling so close to me I had a lean over him even further to see his

face  and to see if I could tell what was she seeing and what was causing

her to be upset.  When I looked at the small face nestled close to me

I saw that he had tears running down him face.  Which only cause my eyes to

fill with tears for this small boy who’s thoughts I did not know but 

who I had surrounded in as much love as could as I held him. I gentle took his
 hands and placed them on my face so he too could feel a tear that was now on my cheek.

 After exploring my face with his small hands for a moment he snuggled once again
 into me.  We took out one of the team members IPhones, he had the song I had been

humming on his phone. We placed it to his ear, the expression

on his small face was priceless. Before long it was time to start our

journey back to the dorm and I had to place the small body back into

his wheel chair.  In those few short moments our two souls spoke and shared more
than many people speak to each other in a lifetime