Feb 24, 7:00 pm Hi Folks: A full and productive day today: changing money, grocery shopping, dropping of medications at FFTP and checking on Jean D's FFTP house to be built, making lunch reservations for the upcoming Mission team, visit to the MSPP office, stop at LCJ to finalize mission team work and back to HH for paper and finance work and OF COURSE correspondence!

Each day I go out I see signs of progress being made with the relief efforts.....another camp of ramshackle lodgings has been switched to proper tents (the one by the airport), land is being cleared at Santo 17 for another camp or parc communautaire as they are being called here. There is a private boys school with a large piece of property that has been turned into a parc comm. Joseph was telling me that the Minister of Ed'n is planning to put 160 large tents on the grounds and it will be used as a central school to send kids to. The only problem now is that according to what Joseph has heard all of the people who have settled on those grounds refuse to leave unless the city hall folks find them a piece of property that is just as nice as this one for their lodgings.....and the fun begins!

The team that was just here brought one tent with them and I think I mentioned already that it was given to Joseph since he was driving them around and I knew for sure he was living on the streets with little protection. He was telling me today that the neighbours in his area are giving him a hard time because he has a tent and they don't. They felt that whoever gave him a tent must have more and that he should have fought harder to get more for to give to them. With the nice tarp he got as well..they really were at him. He said some people were even refusing to talk to him! ....can you imagine? Here you are thinking you are doing something nice for someone and sadly at the same time it turns out to cause them grief! He did appease several folks as he made them a gift of the large piece of plastic sheeting that he had first recieved. Sadly it ust goes to show once again how careful one has to be when handing out gifts of any kind.

That is pretty much it for today...wishing you all a pleasant evening.
Debbie