{"id":4234,"date":"2013-12-29T03:47:00","date_gmt":"2013-12-29T03:47:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/?p=4234"},"modified":"2026-10-02T01:35:30","modified_gmt":"2026-10-02T01:35:30","slug":"thank-you-wemo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/?p=4234","title":{"rendered":"THANK YOU, WEMO"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">For the uninitiated, WEMO is short for West Morris Street Free Methodist Church, a\u00a0congregation where we were privileged to serve in the early 2000s and still one of the dearest churches we know.Last summer our family had the opportunity to speak to WEMO&#8217;s VBS about Haiti and the kids there took our\u00a0four as their mission focus for the week.\u00a0 They raised enough money to get our kids each a bike.\u00a0 Melissa managed to pick one up for Caleb a few weeks ago on an excursion into Cap Haitien, but we were having trouble finding a time to take the whole family to pick out bikes and then get them transported back home.\u00a0 Christmas break seemed a perfect time to get this happy chore done!Melissa&#8217;s teacher&#8217;s aide, Rose, went with us to translate (we still have a long way to go in learning the language!) and to haggle.\u00a0 Mostly to haggle. Rose LOVES to haggle.\u00a0 She is a no-nonsense, master negotiator.\u00a0 And there is no way she is going to allow us to be charged the &#8220;foreigner price&#8221; for something in the market.\u00a0 She has been known to take a vendor to task over high prices: &#8220;Are you trying to charge me more because I am with her?&#8221; she once asked while helping Melissa find a new lunch box for one of the kids. She pointed at Melissa and continued, &#8220;She doesn&#8217;t have a lot of money.\u00a0 If she did, we wouldn&#8217;t be shopping HERE!&#8221;\u00a0 Priceless.So when Rose is leading, we can feel confident that we&#8217;re getting a good deal.\u00a0 We stepped into the middle of this particular\u00a0corner\u00a0 in downtown Cap where several men sell bicycles and, I tell you what, those guys saw four kids browsing\u00a0and their eyes lit up.\u00a0 Within two minutes we were surrounded by these fellows and their bikes.\u00a0 At one point Melissa had to ask them all to back up and give us some space.<\/p>\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/12\/20131228_114924-2.jpg\" alt=\"\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/12\/20131228_114942-2.jpg\" alt=\"\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This was the first time we have braved the markets with the entire family in tow.\u00a0 Sarah was none too excited about being out in the heat and crowds until &#8230;<\/p>\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/12\/20131228_121544-2.jpg\" alt=\"\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&#8230; we found HER bike.\u00a0 Now we&#8217;ll just have to teach her how to ride without training wheels.\u00a0 I have no doubt she will pick it up quickly.<\/p>\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/12\/20131228_142225-2.jpg\" alt=\"\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In the end, we\u00a0came home with\u00a0three new bicycles and managed to stay within budget.\u00a0 (Thanks, Rose!)\u00a0 This was a wonderful extension of Christmas for our kids.\u00a0 They will get a lot of use out of these bikes.\u00a0 Thanks again, WEMO, for your thoughtfulness and generosity.\u00a0 God bless you all!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>For the uninitiated, WEMO is short for West Morris Street Free Methodist Church, a\u00a0congregation where we were privileged to serve in the early 2000s and still one of the dearest churches we know.Last summer our family had the opportunity to speak to WEMO&#8217;s VBS about Haiti and the kids there took our\u00a0four as their mission [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":4235,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4234","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4234","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4234"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4234\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4239,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4234\/revisions\/4239"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/4235"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4234"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4234"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4234"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}