Travis' Story

Becky and I went thru a roller coaster of emotions starting Wed, Feb 10 when we learned our kids were on the last steps of the process to come to the states. There were a lot of people that were very gracious and helpful to us during this process. We could not have done this without them. For our own sake, we documented some of what we went thru below, and others have asked to know this as well, so we though we'd share it with you. I know it's long, I don't expect anyone to read it all, but wanted to include it for my own remembering.

Wed Feb 10:

Becky and I heard that our kids (Johnson - 3, Maranatha - 1) had appointments at the US Embassy in Port-Au-Prince.

We made last-minute travel arrangements to fly to Miami on Thursday.

Becky brought Zeke to the doctors- he complained of ear pain and he did have an ear infection. Then she brought Zeke and Chloe to her parents, the Bakkers.

Left for Cities to stay w/ Nick and Jamie. We past Brice and Sara driving on the road.

Thurs:

Jamie got up nice and early to bring us to the airport.

We flew to Miami.

In the evening, we heard that we cleared our background checks and that our kids got approval from the embassy. 2 pieces of GREAT news. All that was left was for kids to be signed out by Prime Minister, which we now expected to happen on Friday.

Friday:

We went shopping for some stuff for the kids.

We heard that Prime Minister decided he wasn't going to sign any more papers until the following Thursday. We were crushed. We debated whether or not to stay in Miami. We had a hotel thru Sat. night.

We called Grandma Marcy to find out if she new anyone in FL that might be willing to host us for a few days. She got a hold of Doug and Dorothy Bonnema (whom we never met), and they had a spare bedroom they would share with us. We made arrangements w/ them to be there Sat. night.

We heard that Sen. Amy Klobuchar was in Haiti and wanted to have a call w/ us on Saturday, along w/ a couple other couples. This gave us some hope.

Saturday:

We started our drive to the Bonnemas.

We stopped short of their house for our call w/ Sen. Klobuchar.

Apparently, when the senator was in Haiti the day before, she had an opportunity to meet w/ the Prime Minister and presented our case along w/ a couple other MN couples waiting for their kids. She said the PM assured her that there was no "moratorium" on signing off on kids and planned to continue working on Monday. He stopped short of promising anything on specific cases, but this gave us some hope again.

The senator took the time to talk to each of us on the phone and to hear our story.

We arrived at Bonnemas, they had some guests over, Ken and Myra. We had an opportunity to get to know both couples and learned that Ken and Myra lived in Venice and volunteered for Agape (the airline that delivers all the mail and supplies to COTP in Haiti).

Enjoyed some of Dorothy's pie.

Sunday:

Went to church w/ Bonnemas.

Monday:

This was the one "warm" day in FL.

Went to the community library to work remotely.

Becky went to the pool to lay out in the afternoon.

We got a call that the PM signed off on our kids. We were ecstatic.

We got a call asking if we would go to Haiti to assist in escorting our 2 kids and 2 more. Becky couldn't go, b/c her passport expired the week before.

We got a call that Travis could stay at the airport this night and flight (w/ Agape) would leave 7:00 the next morning. We shared this w/ Bonnemas and they suggeste we w/ Ken and Myra, who we just met on Saturday, since they live just minute from Agape and know where it's at.

Becky and I drove to Ken and Myra's that night, they were very open to having us stay w/ them.

Tuesday (the looong day):

Awake at 5:45.

Ken, Myra, and Becky drove Travis to Agape.

Flight w/ John and Tom (pilots) and John's wife Judy left at 7:00. The "Leap-frog" takeoff was interesting.

Landed in Bahamas for refueling.

Arrived in Cap-Haitien around 11:00.

I met our kids outside of the airport. Maranatha was sleeping. Johnson and I just looked each other over for a couple minutes, but he was willing to let me hold him and carry him from that point on.

We waited for our flight from Cap to Port-Au-Prince, which left around 1:30.

I flew in a very small plane w/ Maria, my 2 kids, and 3 other kids.

In Port we took a taxi to the US Embassy. The taxi ride was the most I got to see of the damage in PAP, it was very surreal.

The Embassy closed at 2:30, but they were told to expect us, as long as we'd get there by 3:30. We arrived at 3:30. The Haitian guards didn't want to let us in, but when we told them we were expected, they made a phone call and we got thru.

Minutes after we arrived, a woman came out asking for the passports for all the escorts. There were about 20 adoptees (including my 4) that stayed together from this point on.

The shuttle that took us from the Embassy to the PAP airport arrived at 6:30. This was the point where Maria left me on my own w/ the 4 kids. Fortunately, there were some Americans assigned to assist all adoptees, so I had some help.

At the airport we spent some time in a big military tent along w/ some military personnel. They loved taking turns holding the different kids and took tons of pictures of themselves w/ the kids (mostly the women military).

Our flight, which was supposed to leave at 8:00, finally left at 10:30. We flew out on a C-130 w/ the Texas Air National Guard.

3 Military women helped hold 3 of the kids I was responsible for, I was holding Johnson.

Right before takeoff, Johnson threw-up all over us. I had another shirt w/ me for him, but no pants, so after cleaning him up, he was wearing a t-shirt and diaper only. I did not have access to my bags (which had an extra shirt for myself) until 10 hours later. So I got to enjoy being "wrapped" in puke for quite a while.

We landed in Miami around 1:00 AM (so I guess were into Wed. now).

We took a shuttle to Customs, but the military weren't coming w/ us, so I asked some Haitians traveling w/ us to hold the 2 girls I was responsible for.

I had Johnson and Mickenson, who I had just learned, also threw-up at the end of the flight.

When we arrived at customs, some wonderful women from Red Cross were all-too willing to help w/ holding the kids. They also changed all their diapers and gave them juice and crackers and blankets.

We sat in Customs waiting for all the adoptees from the flight to get processed, this took until about 4:00 AM.

Then we took a bus to His House. His House had staff on the bus, so this was the point that I was no longer responsible for the welfare of the 3 kids.

At His House, I was able to cleanup Johnson, give him some nice jammies that they provided, and tuck him in bed (a little before 5 AM).

The director of His House was on the bus and was able to give me a place to shower and sleep for a few hours. She also gave me some new clothes to wear. It was a huge relief to get out of the puke clothes, which ended up getting thrown away.

I slept from 5:30 until about 9:30 that morning. I caught up w/ Becky who was already doing paperwork at the other side of the building I was sleeping in. She had woken up at 5:30 to drive 3 hours to get to His House.

After waiting for some paperwork to clear and the kids to get dressed and ready, she was finally able to meet them a little before noon.

After we got the kids cleared, I booked a flight for us to leave that day.

We drove to West Palm Beach airport w/ our new additions.

We got a 5:30 PM flight to Atlanta.

Arrived in Atl late, ran till we almost passed out, but fortunately, just made our connecting flight to MSP.

Arrived in MSP around 9:30, Jamie picked us up.

We drove home, and made it home at about 1:00 AM Thursday.

It was a bit of a crazy week, still not caught up on sleep... but in this case, the "end" definitely justifies the means.