Bonjour from JEN Haiti office

JEN Haiti office is located in Leogane, a town one hour away from the capital city of Haiti, Port-au-Prince. The office is surrounded by greenery. The town is nice and quiet, and we can see sugar cane fields on the side of the road to the capital. Leogane was the epicenter of the Haitian earthquake in 2010, where people suffered from huge damage and destruction. While many other NGOs set up their offices in the capital, JEN is based in Leogane, as our motto is “working closer to people in need”.

 
[Our office]                         


[View from the office]


For the moment, there are around 15 staff and one watch dog (her name is Lorka) in the office; head of office, Ludovic from France (who has already written some blog articles), construction team and hygiene promoters (led by the local staff, Berlande), and admin staff (including Japanese staff from HQ).

[Staffs]


　　　　　　　       
[Lorka]


In the morning, JEN Haiti office wakes up with roosters cry and lowing of cows living around the office. All staff comes to the office at 8 am, and the construction team goes to construction site, and hygiene promoters go to the field to do their activities respectively. Head of office also goes to the field, sometimes to the capital city for meetings, and also works from the office as well.

　　
[Construction team]               


[Hygiene promoters]


Admin team literally does the back-office admin work, but here in Haiti, they have another important work. That is to keep the electricity running! Since the supply of electricity in the country is irregular, we have to charge our inverters while it’s on, and when the charge runs out, we have to operate a generator. If we live in Japan, it would not be easy to imagine this situation, but keeping electricity running is a very important mission for us! (It’s because, needless to say, we cannot use internet, charge cell phones, and even use fans without electricity).

Although our working environment is not so easy, our staff is tough and we continue to fight all the difficulties that we face to get the job done!

【JEN is now accepting donations. Your help would be very much appreciated.
DONATE here】

【Click here to know more about JEN 20th Anniversary innitiative】