This week I had the privilege to finally get to go to what is commonly called, "Doug's Village". This is where Doug, the founder, created a heaven for street boys in Cap Haitien, Haiti. The facility sits on about ten acres of land just outside a small village where children are always running around, bathing themselves, or washing clothes in the river as you drive by. Once you go through the doors of The Village there's a very calming feel in their atmosphere. Almost like getting a sense of relief once you're inside and the doors close. A lot of work has been done since Doug opened The Village years ago.
Many suffer from learning disabilities which harshly affected them when sent out to schools around Cap Haitien. In Haitian education systems, physical punishments are commonly practiced during the learning process. However, the prevalence of his boys being punished for their inability to give undivided attention or a quick answer was an unfair result for many of Doug's boys due to their learning disabilities. Since the start of The Village, Doug soon realized the immediate change that he needed to provide his boys. Once he better understood what was going on in school he decided to no longer send his boys out of The Village for classes. Instead he built a primary school on campus so that his boys would no longer be unfairly targeted for abuse day after day. The school has expanded and now includes grades up through sixth, an art and music class. In addition to the school there is a dinning area, dormitories, showers, gardens, trees, rabbit farming, a basketball court and a soccer field. A few cattle, chickens and large exotic lizards are running all around.
A lot of the boys coming into The Village have very serious psychological problems due to their past, it takes many years for them to recover from or work through in order to live healthily functioning lives. Once the boys get older and are starting high school they have several options which Doug makes available to them. He has rented out several houses in Cap Haitien in order to accommodate their indivisual needs. For those who are still dealing with psychological damage live in a home with several other boys from The Village and with a "Haitian Mom" and a "Haitian Dad". This is to continue giving structure and limits that they did not have when they were young since most grew up on the streets and with that support continue working through issues from their past. This enables them to enter their adult lives gaining strength from their past and building toward a successful and healthy future. Other boys who are more stable and capable of caring for themselves will go into a home without "Haitian Parents" and just other boys from The Village. This has already been very successful where the boys take full responsibility for themselves, doing all their own laundry(which means by hand), cooking, cleaning, etc.
I have been able to hear about where some of these boys came from and went through and they were extremely touching to me. I honestly could not believe that at such young ages they had experienced so much pain, struggle, starvation, aloneness. One boy, who is doing incredibly well now, was taken by thieves who had him crawl in through people's windows, through their homes, and then to open the front door so the thieves could get in. They held a gun to his head over and over again, telling him that if he told anyone what they were making him do they were going to shoot him. He was only nine years old when this was being done to him. He had no Father, no Mother, no family at all. He was living on the streets completely alone at that young age of just nine years old.
Another boy, Antwoin, who I instantly cared for dearly, was a drug addict before having come to Doug's Village. I asked Doug about him because he seemed to be in an especially harsh mood. Doug then told me his story before coming to The Village and my heart truly went entirely out to him. He's about 12 years old now even though his birth certificate says he's only about 9 or 10, we think it's wrong. He was a drug addict and lived on the streets. His older brother is an absolute drug addict; every time Doug has seen him he had been high and doesn't have any parents that can care for him. He came to Doug's Village just a small while ago and over the break when they all went back out to their homes for a few weeks, he started using again and had a very difficult relapse. No one knew where he was or what happened to him. In a panic to find out what happened to him, Doug had all the older boys from The Village start looking for him on the streets. Finally after about two weeks they found him, and, Doug came to him in his car. He said that he wasn't going to make him come with him but that the door was open and that he really wanted him to. Antwoin jumped immediately into the car, but was so high and was needing another fix so badly that he went to the back of the Doug's car and stuck his nose in the exhaust. Antwoin was so hungry and so thirsty that he would get high in order to subside the pain from being so hungry and so thirsty. When I first saw Antwoin he had only been back in The Village for about two weeks after that night. Doug said that when he came back he was a complete terror, that one second he would be fine and calm but then one thing could go wrong for him and he would jump back into a very violet state of mind. For example if someone stuck their fork in his beans he'd react with, I'll kill you! I'm going to slit your throat! It was gut wrenching to hear all this happened to such a young and beautiful boy, and all I wanted to do was hug him, hold his hand, smile at him, and try to do something to make him happier and feel love because all I felt was love for him.
I sat down near where the boys were playing for just about a minute until Gabby and I were invited to learn how to play their card game. It was wonderful being able to sit down and talk to them and get to know them. Even though I'm just learning the language I still felt like I was able to pick up on how dynamic and fun each of their personalities are. To me, I felt like it was very important for me to get to know the boys, spend quality time with them, and also have them get to know and feel comfortable with me. Since so many of them have incredibly painful pasts, traumatizing experiences, withstood the threat of death, and commonly drug addiction, I felt whatever I could do to uplift their spirits I would try to do it. They taught us how to play their card game through lots of translation and the use of at least four languages. I ended up playing cards with all of them for hours, we ate lunch together, and by the end I felt like a large group of them began to feel comfortable around me. By the time I was about to leave one of the youngest boys grabbed a hold my hands and started dancing with me as I was sitting on the stairs practically falling asleep at the end of the day. It was really cute I loved seeing him laughing and dancing. The youngest was sewing a shoe back together while I sat next to him as he was singing Rosemond's song when he held my hand. When I got up to leave and said my goodbyes, I already wanted to get back to The Village to hang out with my new little friends (Ti zanmi mwen).
Here are some pictures I took over the past couple visits I?ve had at The Village:
I took this right outside of Doug's office where you can commonly find boys hanging out, talking, and getting started for the day.
Doug was able to build a second well that pumps up drinkable water that was finished just the day before. Here are some of the boys testing out the well and pumping water up for fun.
Cattle resting on the outside of their newly made soccer field
One of our Maison's who is laying the cement bricks one-by-one on the basketball court, getting ready for when we were starting to build two dry toilets for them.
Laying down and singing in front of the school
The walkway to the dormitories
The dormitories
Everyone working together to build the cages and start their education and experimentation with rabbit farming. Miriam, a woman from Northern California, is out here right now teaching everyone everything she knows about rabbit farming, which is a ton. Our goal is to teach and educate so that they can take use this knowledge to support themselves and their families.
My favorite boys 
Learning how to play cards, I'm losing.
The youngest one is on the right, sewing some shoes back together, so cute 
We're currently building two dry toilets for The Village and I'll be updating regularly on our progress
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