February 29, 2004

This morning, I awoke planning to get ready and go down the mountain with my family, then up another to a friend’s house where we were to have a church service with a small group of “the holy remnants.”  It was to consist of five families who have chosen to remain in Haiti while most of their friends have left or were still preparing to leave the country.  I turned the TV on and was surprised to find the cable functioning.  CNN was running the script along the bottom of their screen that Aristide, the president of Haiti, had left the country and was probably going to the Dominican Republic and was to ask for asylum in Morocco, Taiwan,  or Panama.

I told Jodie about the situation then called my friends to see if they had the news already.  They were just hearing the same news.  We decided that the church service would have to be cancelled due to our ignorance about what the day was bring and due to the gunfire and firecrackers we heard going off the distance.  It would probably be dangerous to be out in public at such a time when there was so much emotion in the air.

We did communicate via the internet with friends and also heard from a number of them concerning the new situation in which we found ourselves.  We then had a church service of our own and listened to a taped sermon.

What we are noticing is that there is much more traffic on the road in front of our house than in recent days.  There are the occasional bursts of gunfire and even small gangs of men on the road.  One just passed and there were fairly heated arguments going on among them.  I would not be surprised to see some very dangerous situations going on the next couple days with groups such as these.  Although the international news gave the idea that almost all the population had lost their loyalty to  Aristide it seems he still has some very loyal followers who could make some very serious problems for those that they believe were against their cause.

I tell you this to let you know that all is not right even with the leaving of the president.  I think the next couple days will probably be very dangerous and ones that we will have to be “on our toes.”  I was just called by Edin, my nurse, asking me if we could go to the clinic tomorrow.  She was afraid that I wouldn’t understand the situation and would want to get back out as soon as we could.  She feels better now that she knows that we won’t be going until things in the streets calm down.

For these reasons we sincerely ask your prayers for our safety and wisdom to act in a reasonable manner.  We also ask your prayers for the country of Haiti in general and the people who will be suffering even more due to the change in government.  We also ask for your prayers for the quick and orderly  implementation of the new government.  These next few days will be so very important! -----John Ackerman

Click here for  an audio update from John, February 24th.