Haiti hope all in the family
Haiti hope all in the family
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January 21, 2010 6:09 AM
By JILL MOON
The Telegraph
ROXANA - When the Runyons adopted Haitian orphans approximately four years ago, Haiti became part of the fabric of their lives, along with their children's birth families.
Michael and Natalie Runyon's oldest daughter, Eliana, 14, usually talks to her Haitian parents, Lamar Mathurin and Alcine Duverna, every week, but after the catastrophic earthquake on Jan. 12, Eliana heard nothing from them for several days.
"We're doing well now, since we heard from Eliana's birth family," Natalie said. "Her dad called Sunday at 6:45 a.m. and said that he and her mom had survived but the home was completely destroyed, and that they had no food or water and were living in the street."
The Runyons tried to shield their adopted children from news coverage of the quake until they heard from Mathruin.
"We didn't have it on the television too much at first, because we didn't want our kids to be upset," said Natalie, whose birth mother, Kim Harmon, is president of For His Glory in Texas, the nonprofit fund-raising arm for the Port-au-Prince orphanage Maison des Enfants de Dieu, which translates to "House of the Children of God." The orphanage is 2 kilometers away from the Port-au-Prince Airport and the U.S. Embassy.
"I have a brother living in that orphanage," Natalie said about Maison des Enfants de Dieu, where she and her parents' children are from.
Natalie's parents completed five adoptions from Maison des Enfants de Dieu and are in the process of adopting their sixth Haitian child, Jhonsley, 11, who still lives there. The Harmons and their other children live in Kingsland, Texas, about an hour west of Austin. Their children are Eli, 14, Jeff, 14, Dayana, 10, Josette, 8, and Fenduelle, 8. Natalie's birth brother, Nathan, 30, lives in Louisville, Ky.
Natalie, 30, and Michael, 37, home school their children at their house in Roxana. Eliana is followed in age by Isabella, 6, Jude, 5, and their children by birth, Madeline, 9, Meghan, 7, Eva, 2, and 4-week-old Joyanna.
All 135 of Maison des Enfants de Dieu's orphans not only survived the unprecedented disaster but came out uninjured. The orphanage had 80 staff members before the 7.0 magnitude quake. Two nannies died - one with her two children. Some staff members still are unaccounted for. The manager of the orphanage, Pierre Alexis, is on the board of directors of For His Glory and works closely with Kim Harmon.
"Our children are all safe," Harmon said Wednesday, the day of a 6.1 magnitude aftershock, in a telephone interview with The Telegraph from her Texas home. "Of course, they felt it."
Alexis and Harmon visited the River Bend in November on a fund-raising mission at Westminster Presbyterian Church in Godfrey and at New Song Fellowship in Glen Carbon. They also attended a private fund-raising event in St. Louis.
Of the orphans at Maison des Enfants de Dieu, most were in the adoption process with their adoptive families. U.S. temporary humanitarian parole cleared the way to expedite adoption of 107 of the children, although much documentation has been lost. For His Glory's Dr. Tawnya Constantino and Vice President Pat Flowers arrived at the orphanage Tuesday from the Dominican Republic to try to get the children on their way to the families.
"In Haiti, unlike most foreign countries where people adopt, you know your child. You meet them several times, you receive pictures; they come running to you when 'Mommy' comes to visit," Harmon explained. "A bond and a connection are made throughout this adoption process, but because of the process and length of time, these files are just stuck for some time, and your child doesn't get to go home."
Despite expedited approval and an outpouring of help from Texas legislators, U.S. congressmen and the Department of Homeland Security, For His Glory's 107 children still sit at the Port-au-Prince orphanage, where they are living under a tent and in a cargo van, but otherwise doing OK.
"The big problem has been the State Department. That's kind of where we're at and hope it gets straightened out shortly. We hear nothing from the State Department," Harmon said. "I hope (Jhonsley) comes home soon."
People offered For His Glory the use of private planes to fly to Haiti to pick up the 107 children. But the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services told For His Glory that if anyone takes the children out of Haiti, the children would be taken into protective custody, Harmon said.
"Apparently, the State Department said that the mission to rescue orphans with the Pennsylvania governor violated international law. That is an unconfirmed rumor that I've been told," Harmon said. She said she heard the rumor from sources at Texas Gov. Rick Perry's office.
Many more children will be arriving at Maison des Enfants de Dieu in the near future as a result of the quake. For His Glory needs help for those children, Harmon said.
"The best donation is money," she said. "Our first thing to do is to secure some property, so we can begin to take children in again, because there are going to be many, many children who need care and love."
For His Glory now has its U.S. support staff on the ground to help Alexis at Maison des Enfants de Dieu. Communication is limited, sporadic and difficult. Some methods that work sometimes are e-mail, texting and telephoning. For a short period of time, the orphanage will receive humanitarian aid, but For His Glory will need a new facility, which likely will have to be built.
"When this is all over, I'll have a zillion people to thank," Harmon said.
Donations can be made at www.forhisgloryoutreach.org with a credit card, through Pay Pal or by mailing a check to For His Glory, P.O. Box 674, Kingsland, TX 78639.
jill_moon@thetelegraph.com