How You Can Get Involved

Time, Talent, and Resources

If you feel called to get involved with bringing clean water to the people of Haiti, we hope you will do that through CitCwater. Through the years, we have had people get involved in various ways.

First, for those in our church, was to pray for wisdom and guidance for a successful mission.

We had people that we called our "Home Team". These people wanted to be involved, but knew that they would never be able to make the trip to Haiti. They helped with organizing education meetings, fundraising events, cooking and serving at fund raising dinner, helped to man information booths when we were advertising new trip opportunities.

Then we had the committed, or the curious, and the compassionate. Otherwise know as the Mission Team. These folks came from all sorts of backgrounds. They came from different denominations. They came from different states. On some of our trips, our first person-to-person contact was in Miami, while we waited during our layovers before heading on to Haiti. A week later, we had a common experience that will tie us together the rest of our lives.

Then we have the financial supporters. It may be a one time thing or an every trip thing. The guy that hand you a check for $500 for a pancake breakfast. Or the kid that hands you a dollar out of their Piggy Bank, to help someone his age have clean water.

Our organization and program is here to meet you where your heart is. If you believe that you see the benefit of our work, we want a find a way for you to get involved.

 

Rodney and Michael in 2012
Rodney, Jennie, Reid, and Mike 2018
Set-up in front of a villagers house, installing and training people to use their new filters.
People starting to line up to see what our team was doing in their village.
Rodney training a recipient on how to maintain her filter system.
Rodney, his mother, brother and sister joined the team for a Maundy Thursday dinner at our hotel.
Villagers lined up to get in this picture with their buckets, ready to receive a new clean water filter.
Jennie (on Spring Break from her Clean Water Management Program at Red Rocks Community College in Lakewood, CO) joined the team to be one of our trainers in 2018.
Rodney decided he needed a hat as well.
One of our favorite village centers, in Capotille. We spent two days there, on the terraced park walls, putting together around 200 systems.
The bucket assembly line on the retaining wall in Capotille.
A recipient follows the progress of their bucket as it moves down the wall to get a filter.
Working the line under some very welcome shade.
Roger, Shareen, Jennie, Rodney and Michael pose for Reid before starting work in Capotille.
Taking a break after a long afternoon of filter building. Michael has to keep track of his hat...you never know who wants to wear it next.
"Precious" (young girl in the center) is prayed for on her mother's request. She was not expected to survive very long after birth, yet here she is. We love when villagers ask us to pray with them.
Working inside at a village, close to Fort Liberty.
Marie-Claire (in blue, studied in the US and returned to be the mission team liaison for the school) and an assistant joined the team for a water distribution. Roger and Shareen share a moment with them as we prepare to set up in front of this USAID field office.
Rodney tries to shake Reid awake and tells him to get back to work. Somebody has to keep everyone going.
Michael with his two favorite art dealers. Five or six families would set up at the school and wait for us to return from the field so we can look over the art that they had to sell. Roselyn (yellow) was unable to speak well, so her daughter (or son some years) would come to help facilitate the negotiations. They always had at least one person in the group who could speak English very well. We loved catching up with them each year.
This was our first year to stay at a hotel instead of the school mission house. We asked the school if the cooks would rather cook for us to make more money, or have holy week off, to spend with their families. They asked for Holy week off, which of course we honored. A little bit of luxury, putting filter kits together in an air conditioned dining room.
Michael gets to meet Jennie's new nephew, at her mother's house. We also got to meet her mom and sisters. Her mother asked if we would like some coconut milk. Jennie said they had a coconut tree behind their house. She pulled out some small coconuts for a refrigerator, produced a small machete to lop off the ends and handed us each one...with a straw in it. Haitian hospitality at it's finest!
When the volleyball team (national champions in 2011) has a tournament to get to in the bus, we take a ride in anything available. Michael says his seat is all good!
The bus from the school served a number of years for our field work. We never knew who our Haitian staff would see that needed a ride back into Ouanaminthe. Hugues would always laugh and state, "There's always room for one more!"
One of our team members from Pagosa Springs, CO fulfills a donors request. She wrote a quick blessing on a bucket and the name of the donor. We love those personal touches.
Madam Colonyo was the first teacher at Institution Univers. One teacher, 30 kids in one room. By the time I started coming to the school, she was the Principal of the Kindergarten building. Kids ages 3-5 (300) were under her team of teachers. After building a friendship with her over a few years, I surprised her with a tablet. She was so excited, since their was WIFI at the school.
The school has a bakery. Hugues always said they had the best pizza in all of Haiti. We usually had it for lunch, one day each year.
It's easy to find a group of friends ready for a group picture, while Michael was waiting for breakfast.
Hugues had a farm where he was experimenting with what he could grow the best. Cashews grew great. We had several meals a week that had a cashew sauce on it.
The town center of Ouanaminthe. Around the park were houses, the Catholic Church, a number of businesses and the Univers Medical Center, which was founded by Institution Univers and it's donors in North America.
Some days we did what we called our "tail-gate ministry". Each day is a blessing, regardless of how we get to the villages.
Beautiful countryside, with the hills off in the distance. Small motorcycles are a common mode of transportation in Haiti. I have seen a father with six kids arrive at the school. "There's always room for one more."
The homeowner brought us out a table to work on, in front of his house. We had quite the audience on the porch as we built bucket systems.

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