A Haitian wedding

It's been over a week since I posted last. The past few days I have thought every day that today I would have time to post an update and as you see it hasn't happened. One of Keith's brothers and his family is still here. Otherwise all the visitors have gone back to the U.S. or Canada. I think there were almost sixty white people here over the time of Trevor's wedding. Before the wedding most of Candace's family was up here and after the wedding Keith's family came up. The wedding took place close to where Mirlene lives in Fonds-Parisien which is a little over half way to Port-au-Prince. It is definitely warmer there than here but still not hot. Saturday night Keith had reserved a bunch of rooms in two hotels there. They were pretty nice places. A lot of the young people stayed in one hotel and the married folks stayed in the other. I didn't see a lot of the other hotel but it appeared to be even more American than where we stayed. In the hotel I stayed in every room had a bathroom with a shower. The water was not hot but that was fine as it was quite warm outside. Every room also had a fan. The building had a flat roof so we could go up there if we wanted to. The bathrooms didn't have doors like most of us are used to but they had mini blinds you could close if you wanted privacy. Sallie and I shared a room and we had no problems, when one of us was in the shower the other one would secretly guard the door. We even had a continental breakfast served to us. It consisted of Haitian spaghetti, (which is a common breakfast food here) boiled eggs, bread, juice and coffee. The spaghetti doesn't have a meat sauce but rather is cooked, seasoned noodles and it was good!
    The congregation at Fonds-Parisien has a large church with a balcony in the back. The benches were full clear to the back doors and there were a bunch of people in the balcony. If I heard right the head count at the wedding was over 500. Trevor's grandpa had the sermon and Mirlene's dad had the vows as they are both ministers. Anthony (Candace's brother) has also been a missionary here in Haiti and he knows the language very well so he translated the service into Creole. Most everyone who spoke at the wedding knew Creole but how awkward would it be to try and translate for yourself. We all had to laugh though when the brother who was having the opening said something in Creole and Anthony translated it into English. There was a large men's group for the choir and also a couple of songs sung by close friends of the bride and groom. Someone local who has a restaurant catered to-go plates of rice and beans etc for all but about 100 people who were close family and friends. We then went to a hotel and had a catered lunch there. This hotel was right by the ocean and we ate outside. There was a long row of tables covered with a grass roof and then a tarp over some of the other tables for shade. The water was so close a wave would periodically splash over the cement wall and give  someone a small shower. There were palm trees all around and it was beautiful.
   I'm sure I will think of more details but that is all for now. I will try to post again soon about clinic life.
  A couple of things I wanted to add: a wedding here is in one way an occasion to dress up and yet is very laid back. For instance, there were many, many suits worn by the men and boys yet  a lot of the ladies just had short sleeves. Also, people would walk in and out of the building as they desired and no one cared.