When I was in 7th grade I had a teacher, Mrs. Poorman. She taught English, or maybe History. I honestly don't remember. I do remember the impact she had on me though. I was a troublemaker back then. I loved to toe the line and see how much I could get away with. If teachers got frustrated and gave me a detention, I'd retaliate by acting up as much as possible without actually doing anything justifying a trip to the principles office. I found this caused way more frustration.   ​

    Mrs. Poorman didn't get frustrated like my other teachers. Instead of giving me detention she pulled me aside and talked to me like an adult. And in doing so she gave me permission to act like an adult. Mrs. Poorman was an incredible teacher but not because she taught me how to use semicolons correctly or what year the Pilgrims gave the Indians smallpox. But because she cared and invested in me as a human being. I can name each teacher in my 17 years of school I feel this way about, and they fit on one hand. It isn't that I had bad teachers. I was extremely blessed to come up through a fantastic school system and attend a respected University. The kind of effort Mrs. Poorman put into her job was that rare. 

    Years ago, I looked up what a tenured teacher like her made in our district. It was well over $100,000 and she deserved every penny of it, if not more. The teachers here at Agape expect to make $1200 for the entire year. They often end up seeing less than that. Hank and I sat with them today and asked what they needed to do their jobs better. No one mentioned more money. They mentioned things like toys for the kindergarten classes, and smaller chairs and tables because the kids aren't tall enough to reach the tops of the desks they have now to write on. One teacher suggested a school nurse with basic medical care and the others laughed because it seemed so far outside what they could realistically expect. 

    I have the opportunities I have available to me today because of teachers like Mrs. Poorman. And sitting with the teachers here in Haiti, I saw the same rare characteristics that she had in each of them. They care incredibly in investing in their students. They have to. If they didn't, they wouldn't be doing it. They have no other incentive, as they often can go months without pay. We are working with Jean in putting a strategy and business plan in place that ensures they receive pay each month and on time, from revenue the farm brings in. It won't and can't happen over night though. 

    If you helped us by donating to fund these teachers for a few months, thank you. Thank you for providing them with a salary and a way to provide for their family. But more importantly, thank you for the encouragement it gives them in knowing that people see what they're doing and want to support them in their efforts. Any change we hope to see in Haiti starts with education. If we don't invest differently in the educators, we can't expect to see different results. Each dollar you've given helps us move closer towards our goal of self-sustainability and removing ourselves from the equation. 

    If you haven't donated and would like to please visit our website, www.missionkitestring.org/donate. We'll also begin collecting toys and other supplies to bring down in the spring, so if you or someone you know has school supplies, specifically for younger ages, you'd like to donate, send me an email at jbloss@missionkitestring.org. 

​-John

Many people ask about what is happening in Haiti, but then check out of the conversation by the time I finish my third sentence. I don’t blame them; it doesn’t really affect us Americans at all. So, I usually have a short-version answer, but the problem in Haiti really is too pressing to be dumbed down. So, today I give you what I want to tell people when they ask what it is we do, the answer that I think Haiti deserves.
 
All of the factors that led to Haiti being the poorest country in the western hemisphere can be, and are, debated at length. Agricultural experts claim the problem is erosion and deforestation. Politicians attribute every problem to government corruption. Spiritualists blame a voodoo-rich culture. Economists say it is due to low productivity levels and limited job markets. Educators point to a failing school system, based on schools teaching by memorization. Historians look at the country’s past of slavery and point out all the steps from there leading to the current culture. Not to mention the horrible earthquakes and hurricanes they’ve had to face. The sad truth is that all of these experts are correct, these are all factors, and they all need to be addressed simultaneously.
 
Because of this great need for help, foreign aid has flooded the country for decades, which has been great… for the most part. People are starving and living in mud, so of course we need to help them, but in some areas we actually see mission groups and foreign aid making things WORSE. A latent function of meeting this immediate need is that we have created a generation of Haitians that are dependent on handouts. In areas like Pignon, many start to feel entitled and it keeps them from going out and earning anything on their own. Many people we come across today are products of this system and don’t really know how to work, so they beg Americans. It’s most evident in the 25-40 age group.
 
Mission Kite String is designed to help reverse this begging and dependency. Instead of Americans coming in and implementing American organizations, we are training and working alongside Haitians to be the change they want to see in their communities. The first of these leaders is John Robert, the developer of Agape International Ministries.
 
John Robert is a break in the mold. He decided early on that he wanted to get educated so that he can stay in Haiti and help his hometown. After agronomy school he moved home and started investing in land. He did odd jobs like photographing weddings and thatching roofs to acquire enough money to buy chunks of land until he had what is now the Agape property. When I met John 4 years ago, there was nothing on the property but an open-walled stick structure that he was using as a one-room-school and a community church. He said he wanted God to do something big on his land, and we prayed.
 
A series of events unfolded leading Agape to where it is at today with a school building, farm, guest house, and a church that meets in the same stick structure as four years ago. But John believes God has a lot more to do, and we want to see it done. So, what we are here to do is connect John with the resources he needs to make it happen. We work for John, doing tasks like marketing his guest house, writing out a business plan, imagining different ways to generate revenue to fund the organization, and setting goals to reach self-sustainability. And in a few years, when it does reach self-sustainability, we can step back and watch God bring the community to life.
 
You see, we typically want to look at work like this in results. We want to count the number of floors poured, houses build, and people fed. I agree that those are necessary, and there are lots of organizations and money handed out to people that need it. But, I think there aren’t nearly enough efforts that focus on sustainability and the long-term results. What ever happened to ‘give a man a fish and feed him for a day; teach a man to fish and feed him for a lifetime’?
 
Agape is this beautiful kite, destined to do great things for God’s kingdom. We are just a string to connect it to the resources it needs.

​-Hank

With the wake of the Saturday sun comes the wildest cultural experience I think one can absorb in the Central Plateau. Each day, hundreds of people flock from town to town in pursuit of the daily market. It’s on a rotation, each town having its market on a different day of the week, and Saturday is Pignon’s day. From sunrise to sundown, thousands of Haitians pack in the middle of town in an American farmer’s market fashion. That is, if the farmer’s market was a department store, goodwill, hardware, as well as grocery and they were all only available one day of the week.
 
Shoulder to shoulder we shuffle our way from the butchers, around the bakers, through the appliances, and past the fresh fruit. This all takes place within a couple square blocks under the cloudless sky, where temperatures touch the triple digits. John and I had a small list of things to gather, but it’s never a simple task to get anything. Before long, we ran into a cluster of my friends and they helped lead us around to the different vendors to help us barter and translate our transactions.
 
One of the boys that was with us, Jimmy, I have known since I first came to Haiti and have gotten to know his family well. We bought his family a small gift then went to see his mom, two sisters, and three brothers that all live within a small, one room, stick hut. Despite their cramped accommodations and skinny bodies, they all share Jimmy’s bright smile. There we sat and shared some laughs for an hour or so. Jimmy’s sister, dismayed at my shaved head, insisted on braiding John’s hair.
 
Many have come before us to Haiti, and many will come after, but there has always been discussion as to how to do ministry well in this country. A question I know I don’t hold a simple answer to, but John and I have been studying much of how Jesus and his disciples walked. Anywhere Jesus went, there were crowds of people in need, and he did whatever he could to help them. Many times this was extremely frustrating for his followers, they would surely remind him they had places to get to, things to do, but Jesus knew the crowds were important. I couldn’t stop thinking about those crowds, 2000 years ago, as we made our way through an equally needy crowd this morning.
 
But I’m not an almighty healer, I can’t heal the sick or feed all the hungry, and that carries a weight. But it also reminds me of how great Jesus truly was and keeps me grounded as to how much I need him, how much we all need him. One day of the week, we gather as many neighbors as possible into the yard and listen to a Haitian pastor give a message then sing praises to God.
 
To Haitians and Americans both, this one day of the week is where Christianity is practiced and where God resides. But today is Saturday, and I saw God in a little stick hut on the edge of town where two white kids sat and shared life with a family from a different part of the world. And I saw God on Friday when we walked from house to house with Jean Robert and talked about how the hurricane was for their family. I felt God in a tobacco farming witch doctor’s hut, with whom we discussed his beliefs and showed him what love was like. We see God every day in the most unexpected places. Ministry is letting those moments unfold, bringing them to life, and sharing them with those around us.  And in that way we can do ministry just like Jesus did, because even when he healed crowds, he did it one person at a time. 

​-Hank

We were walking home from church on Sunday when John and I first caught wind about the hurricane headed towards Haiti. Maybe it was because we had just sat through a three-and-a-half-hour service in a language we didn’t understand, or maybe because we are from the Midwest and have never experienced a tropical storm, but both John and my ears perked at the exciting news. Not necessarily exciting in a good way, but we were far from afraid. We live in a fully concrete structure, so we weren’t too concerned about ourselves. Immediately, we started sharing ideas about going out to capture pictures and stories of the storm’s destruction while being able to be first responders to people that needed help.
 
The rest of Sunday was spent making preparations around the yard and house, but that didn’t mean much for John and me, and before long everyone was just sitting around waiting for the storm to hit. John and I were on the roof when we felt the first trickle of rain.
           
“No…” I hear John say then laugh, “This can’t be how it starts. This is way too anticlimactic.”
 
I’d love to tell you that over the next day we chased and endured a near-fatal storm like Bill Paxton in Twister. I’d love to say we led a safety boat that floated down the road and saved everyone from the tops of their houses. I’d love to say that my childhood dreams of becoming a rescue diver came true. In fact, hurricane Matthew ended up being, for us at least, no more than a long, slow rain and mild winds. Haiti is a fairly small island, but we are in the central plateau, which is the middle portion of the country surrounded by mountains, and the peaks helped to dull the storm. John and I ended up spending a little over two days sitting on the porch reading, writing, and watching the rain come down.
 
Tuesday afternoon we felt the onset of cabin fever and had to go on a walk. We journeyed out to the front of the property where the main road meets our path. My immediate thought was epic slip and slide. Much of the neighborhood was meandering about too. Little kids were splashing in playing in the mud puddles, and for a while we joined them. The brave souls that dared to drive on the slick mud laughed at us gleefully witnessing barefoot white men playing in the mud. We walked up and down the street a little bit, but it was still raining, so we eventually went back inside to dry off.
 
So, that’s how our hurricane experience was, for all of you who were worried. It was mostly just a little boring and slightly disappointing. But, When the rain finally stopped, we walked around to check on our neighbors, especially the ones who we had met with before and had printed out family portraits to give them. We sat and talked with them and listened to their stories. Then discovered that the storm hit hard for a few towns in the south, and they haven’t even been able to count the dead. But, you probably know more than we do, because news is very limited here, but we feel all of your prayers and concerns helped protect Pignon and the northern part of Haiti. And we thank you for that, and we thank God for that.

​-Hank

​As the sun rose over the mountains of Pignon, two groggy young adults awoke in comfortable beds they didn’t buy, in a room that was bigger than some houses, in a house they didn’t deserve. These two men were from America, meaning that their host felt the need to make them comfortable and secure, like most Americans are.

It is difficult to be wealthy in a place that has nothing. But that is precisely why we are here. There is a tension in this country amongst the leaders and foreign-aid about the best way to serve its needs. Recent news headlines have highlighted young Haitian men sailing off to Chile or Brazil in pursuit of something, anything better than the situation they have endured for all their lives. Those poor young men are finding it extremely difficult to survive with no identification or money, and so they are being forced to live in the jungles where many of them starve or are attacked by animals.

But we’ve all heard that, the desperate cry of a country in need, and it is human nature to want to help. So, we go on short-term work trips and send money, which is great, there definitely is an immediate need. However, in most areas of Haiti the immediate relief is rapidly coming in. Cement floors are being poured, houses are being built, and children are being sponsored for school. As I said, all of these are necessary steps towards ending poverty, but there must also be an approach taken with long-term sustainability in mind. There must be groups working to reduce the need for short-term trips because Haitians will be able to do it themselves.

That seems to be the case in Pignon, Haiti. For more than a decade, relief workers and mission groups have traveled all the way to this city in the middle of Haiti to help in the best ways they know how. Because they have done a great job, the quality of life here is starting to rise, but the whole system is relying upon those groups maintaining their service. Most of these programs are run and operated by foreigners, and when they leave the whole program will fall, many already have. Students that are sponsored through school and end up being successful often end up moving to the states, which is great for them and their family, but we need successful Haitians who want to help their country. Jean Robert is just that, a Haitian who sees the big picture. He realizes that we need more leaders who are willing to stay in the country and bring their community up with them. 

That is why Mission Kite String is all about finding strong Haitian leaders and partnering with them to create a self-sustaining business, organization, or mission that can be fully led by Haitians for Haitians. John and I are here in the business of sustainability. We don’t tell the Haitian leaders what will work, we work alongside them to catalyze their vision and make it self-sustainable.  

We arrived at our home in Lapilla, Haiti late Tuesday night. After landing in Port-au-Prince we were picked up by a taxi and immediately began the 4 hour drive into the center of the country. It was dark and storming, and it didn't appear the driver could see on account of the condensation he was constantly wiping off the front window with his hand. And the road, if it were in America, could only have served as a jeep trail that required "Danger - Drive at Own Risk" signs. We were safe though, our driver assured us, picking up the pistol sitting in his lap and waiving it in the air as if that proved it. 

We spent the last several days getting settled into the mission house that will be our home for the next several months. We came to Haiti to begin a partnership with Jean Robert, a local, who we've gotten to know quite well over the years after repeated trips to the country. We've learned to never assume anything here, and we tempered our expectations coming in accordingly, but that didn't stop me from being surprised by a realization I made early our first day.  

Jean Robert and his organization, Agape International Ministries, don't need me. And they don't need Hank or Mission Kite String or any other American or American organization. 

One of Jean's visions for his compound is self-sustainability. On his own he'll get there - he's that type of person that just makes things happen. It could take a while though. He makes US $1,000 a month at his insurance job. Each month he uses that money to take care of his family, a wife and two little boys, then puts the rest into the compound he's built from the ground up. Which now includes a 5-room schoolhouse, a church, a mission dorm, and acres of farmland. His goal is to quit his insurance job and work here full-time. 

I started working for this Non-Profit because I wanted to feel good. Yeah I wanted to help the people of Haiti and make an impact on their lives, but only if I got to see something tangible. A number I could point to and say, "look at what I did, look how many people I helped." It's selfish but also very human I think, and American. I sat through four years of business courses at Drake University, and I left feeling certain of few things, but the make-up of a successful business was one. A successful business has a vision, and a strategy to get there. It implements a plan, ensures everyone is on the same page, and creates tangible goals that are measurable. If the numbers look good - you have success. That's an obvious oversimplification, but the general idea holds true. 

So how do you measure the impact you have on a child? I can provide them shoes to get to school, a meal, or even a house so they have somewhere safe and dry to sleep at night. That's something tangible I can point to and feel good about - but it won't end the circle of poverty. If at any point you take the American (foreign aid) out of the equation, things soon return to the way they are. These kind of missions need foreigners and that's why they continue to fail. They aren't sustainable. They can make a huge impact on an individual's current situation and I'm not saying that isn't wonderful, but it will not break the cycle. 

This is the reason we partnered with Jean Robert. He doesn't need us. He knows that and we know that. But through connecting him with American resources we can greatly expedite the process and allow him to reach his goal of self-sustainability. We can allow him to quit his job and run Agape International Ministries full-time. We can allow him time to build relationships and spread the gospel further than we ever could as foreigners. We can allow him more time with his family and more time pouring into the youth that work for him and attend his school. Every time he walks down the road, or into a room, there's someone following. Watching and learning, eager to soak up a little of Jeans wisdom. 

Haiti will never grow out of its poverty as a result some great American idea. But if more young people like Jean Robert start deciding they've had enough and they're going to start positively influencing their own community, a movement will start. I've come to realize that I may never see the impact of the work we're doing. I may never get one of the feel good moments I set out looking for, but I'm okay with that now. Mission Kite String is going to invest in people. We're investing in Haitians. We're investing in Jean Robert. We're trusting that God has the plan, and I don't think he measures success by numbers. 

​-John Bloss