2011 Global Seva Challenge: Together in Service

2011 Global Seva Challenge Participant Kim Bauman

Today is Day 4 of the 2011 Global Seva Challenge immersion trip, and it feels like we are home. Not home as we know it, but we’ve arrived into the space, culture, and beauty of Haiti. What we continue to witness in each moment are powerful and true feelings about what it means to take your yoga off your mat.

Each day, we are watching a country put itself back together, which is not easy. For them to do. Or for us to witness. But the love that this Global Seva group has embodied to support each other moving through these difficult spaces and to step forward to serve the Haitian community takes my breath away. The greatest gift we can take away from bearing witness to the various reconstruction efforts going on around us is our ability as individuals to look inward and touch the essence of why we are here. We need to ask ourselves questions such as: What do I fear most?; When do I partake in hypocrisy?; How do I see myself in the people around me that I’m serving?

We are working directly with a Haitian relief organization, which was established by a small group of individuals from California, immediately following the earthquake in January 2010. At that time, 60,000 people were housed in the tent camps established by this organization. Today there are exactly 18,221 people. It’s remarkable that almost 42,000 Haitians in this camp alone have been moved from tents to permanent housing by the assistance of this group in just two years. The organization is committed to working themselves out of a job, so to speak, by rebuilding Haiti in so that continued relief is sustained 100% by local Haitians. In line with this vision, 90% of the organization’s 300 employees are Haitians.

What was unforgettable about today were the children. We spent the day bagging garbage from a dump site in the tent community we visited and relocating it to a new garbage site about 200 yards away. The amount of garbage is unbelievable. Several feet deep and everywhere, it literally looks like Port-au-Prince was built on a landfill. We started with rubber gloves, garbage bags, and face masks. The dust was thick, and the smells were intense.

And then came the children. About eight children began to join our community of service and help us load the trash and carry it to the new site. As we served them, they began to serve us, helping us shovel and fill bags. They brought an amazing work ethic, huge smiles, a sense of playfulness, and pride for their home. We spent the rest of the day singing, dancing, and collecting trash. We were working to help them. And they definitely helped us.

To find out more info on Off the Mat, Into the World’s 2012 Global Seva Challenge to battle sex trafficking in India, click here.

By Kim Bauman