Silver Linings Social Aid and Pleasure Club

Dear Readers:  I came home last Tuesday full of the promise of silver linings in Haiti.  A month after Hurricane Matthew chewed up Haiti and spat it out, this natural disaster is giving birth to a new spirit of independence in the first black republic of the New World.  There is a growing generation of Haitians helping Haitians - not patronizing mega-NGOS or world powers manipulating puppet governments.  Examples include:

--Local fishermen banding together to carry their mammoth boats out of harm's way before the high tides struck

--Our community leaders distributing hygiene kits to 200 families, working daily against the threat of cholera

--Our staff keeping our clinic well protected and open as a service center during and after the storm, providing hundreds of neighbors with primary care

Belle Anse clinic

Peritoneal tap in our Marjofre clinic 

--The medical personnel of the Ministry of Health clinic in hard-hit Belle Anse working without pay to care for the rush of cholera patients.

--Our network of doctors, some of whom are from the worst hit Les Cayes region, organizing mobile clinics back home

Les Cayes

--A group of Haitian graduate students in the DR sending money to students who need uniforms, shoes and backpacks lost in the storm so they can go back to school

Hispañola Health Partners is doing what its mission directs - strengthening existing structures from the bottom up.  In the wake of Hurricane Matthew we have invested more than $5000 in Haitian-designed relief efforts.

More silver linings: The rains have also left our less devastated side of the country flush with green, happy corn and bean crops growing out of the usually dispirited rocky terrain.  And the vibrance of the people is very much alive and well. Take these kids playing a beat up drum kit at a Sunday service in Marjofre, or this lady selling chickens in a Port-au-Prince market.

A budding Tony Williams

Stop and Shop

Behold this brand new entrance of a local Catholic church with its simple honesty.

Haitian metal work of Grand Gosier Catholic Church

Charcoal powered ironing

Hope on wheels; we traveled 6 hours with this steel belted radial

Social aid and pleasure clubs are a New Orleans tradition mixing philanthropy with festivity, having roots in the island of Hispañola. So welcome to our Silver Linings Social Aid and Pleasure Club and thanks for the generosity you have extended to HHP.   Please visit us at hispañolahealthpartners.org.  Our hurricane relief effort is ongoing.  We are responding carefully to ongoing requests from partners on the ground in Haiti to make sure we are using your funds to their utmost potential.  We are also making improvements at our community health center in Majofre so that we will soon have lab facilities and a solar power system to help serve our population better.  But it is not all hard work and dire straights. The pleasure part of the Silver Linings wraps us in the joy of the Haitian experience.  A la bon ou bon!  "Wow, you are good!"

Keep the faith, Louise

Louise Lindenmeyr APRN, FNP-BC
Executive Director
Hispañola Health Partners

PS: Every time you buy something at Amazon, go to smile.amazon.com (no need to reregister your information) and sign up  Hispañola Health Partners as your designated charity.  We will receive .5% of the purchase price. Thanks!

Michele Marie, 35, feels the love