PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti – On January 12, I was in Jerusalem getting ready to fly to London that night and then on to Niger, West Africa.

I was due to spend a week working with the Niger team on various projects including an exciting new project using micro projector technology. The plan is to begin using videos to train people in remote areas in proper health and hygiene methods. This new battery powered projector that hooks up to an iPod has just opened the door to make that possible.

I had my tiny projector, my iPod and the portable sound system all packed and ready to go and then I received the message—earthquake in Haiti! I flew to London as planned, but then to Miami, Atlanta, Santo Domingo and (48 hours later) Port-au-Prince. The next weeks were spent running flat out on emergency relief projects; I didn’t have time to even spare a thought to my cancelled Niger trip.

At the height of the relief efforts in Haiti we planned to do a distribution in a remote village. On the day of the distribution I just happened to notice the portable PA system in my bag and put it in the truck just in case. It turned out to be a huge winner.

The local pastor doing crowd control was able to make announcements to the 2,000 people scrambling for the distribution. He was able to call each family by name to step forward for their relief kit. The PA system has been very useful in that same scenario several times during the relief efforts here.

Fast forward a few more weeks and Operation Blessing erected a huge tent in a camp of 3,000 people in Port-au-Prince. The tent is now a school building for hundreds of children who are back in class thanks to teachers that OBI is helping to support. OBI also coordinated with the US Navy SeaBees to build desks and benches for the kids.

We are even serving peanut butter sandwiches to around 450 students each day. The woman coordinating the school is a Haitian-American named Jounie. She has become good friends with the OBI staff, and we are constantly offering additional ways to support the camp. I knew this was the perfect opportunity to test drive the micro projector system, so I offered to set up a movie night for the kids in the camp. Jounie loved the idea, so we set about coordinating the best day and time to do it.

The weather forecast for last night looked good—no rain—so Jounie and I decided that it was time for movie night. She started sending the message out around the camp, and I realized I had better find a movie to show the kids!

My options were limited. I sifted through Eric’s (our national director) DVD collection and found a classic animation that the kids would love, and it even had a French language track. A little while later I had the movie formatted to my iPod.

Once it grew dark, a few from the OBI team headed over to the camp. When we arrived, we were greeted by an almighty roar and ear piercing screams, the kids were super excited. I set up the projector, plugged in my iPod and hooked up the sound system. The children filed into the tent and sat cross legged on tarps, boys on the right and girls on the left.

There was so much atmosphere, the kids were buzzing with anticipation and there was me, nervous to see if my system would last throughout the whole movie. I hoped the batteries were fully charged. I pressed play and the movie started and lit up the end of the tent. Immediately, there was silence; the kids were transfixed. Then, all of a sudden, one of the characters did something amusing and the whole tent erupted in laughter. And that was how it went for the next 90 minutes—silence then laughter, side-splitting laughter.

I stood outside the tent looking in. There were around 200 children packed in like sardines. It was hot in there, but they didn’t care. The children forgot about their tough circumstances and were having a blast. It was incredible for me to stand back and watch this huge tent bellow with joy thanks to a tiny LED projector and my iPod.

Jounie took movie night to the next level and handed out cups of popcorn to the kids. When the movie ended, the children applauded and cheered. The batteries lasted and probably could have kept going for another film. My first trial of the projector kit was a success. Jounie got on the microphone and asked the children if they wanted to do movie night again next week, no prizes for guessing what they said…

I have requested some CBN animations in French and a technician is already in the process of uploading a few films already formatted for my iPod. The kids will love it.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, March 10th, 2010 at 10:43 am and is filed under Caribbean, David Darg, Disaster Relief, Earthquake, Haiti. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.