Miriam "Doodle" Cinotti and Natalie Cross, from Jacksonville, Florida, are among the American missionaries who say they're stuck in Haiti after ongoing violence in the country closed off airports and other means of transportation.
Several American and Canadian missionaries who say they are stuck in Haiti after violence closed off airports and other means of transportation struggle to find a way back home says they're committed to eventually returning to the country to continue their work helping others.
Miriam "Doodle" Cinotti and Natalie Cross are from Jacksonville, Florida. Linotte Joseph is an American citizen of Haitian descent, and Barry Glinski hails from Alberta, Canada. They are in the Caribbean nation working with Mission of Grace Haiti.
“We arrived here Feb. 23 to help serve the orphanage. Mission of Grace, Ms. Lin here had to move 150 of her kids from Carries, Haiti, that was in the crossfire of gang violence. And so, we had to bring them to safety,” Cinotti says.
Glinski says he can hear the gang violence as it’s being carried out. “I've been there when the guns were going off, not in danger, but you can hear the gunfire,” he says. “So, when it's right outside your door. And they're well protected, they're in a surrounded area, but you try to sleep at night when the guns are going off as a little child.”
Linotte Joseph, co-founder of Mission of Grace Haiti, says the orphanage needed to move. “Our kids were traumatized because they've been in the crossfire for the longest because Haiti has been in that situation over two years,” Joseph says. “But our children really were affected by it because next to them the gang will start shooting. They will go under the bed, they will be screaming, ‘They're going to kill me. They're going to burn us.’"
The volunteers were supposed to leave Haiti on March 3, but Mission of Grace still currently has American and Canadian volunteers across the island nation, including in the center of Port-au-Prince.
“We are trapped. We feel trapped. There are people still trapped in Port-au-Prince that need to get out,” Cinotti tells Inside Edition Digital.
This group of missionaries is serving at an orphanage in Plaisance Sud, a mountainous area south of Port-au-Prince.
The remote location has seemingly protected them from the violence seen in the capital city, but it has affected their work. “Because of the violence, we can't get what we need where we are,” Joseph says. “So, all the trucks stop crossing because they can't cross the road from Port-au-Prince. Everything's hard to find, like gas, like food, everything.”
Cinotti says she has reached out to the U.S. Embassy. “The email that came back said, ‘Hunker down, stay safe.’ They gave us the thing that Haiti is a level four, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Well, we knew that when we came, but does this mean that you're not going to get us out? And as an American citizen, I feel frustrated,” Cinotti says. “I'm safe. I can't reiterate enough that we're safe, but we've been here long enough to where we can't get out if we wanted to. And I feel like our country is not doing everything it can to help us.”
A Level 4 - Do Not Travel warning for Haiti was issued by the U.S. Department of State on March 5, 2020.
Natalie Cross has been volunteering in the country for about 14 years. She believes the situation in Haiti needs more attention. “It's not about the country or the politics, it's about the people,” Cross says. In her time volunteering, Cross says the need has intensified. “When I first started coming in to Mission of Grace, there were only 24 orphans.” she says. “We have over 200 now.”
Though they want to get home to their families, all of these missionaries say they plan to return to Haiti. “I have been coming here since 2010 and I see the politics. I see the aftereffects of it. I've been here when the UN was here. I've been here when they haven't been here. I've slept in Port-au-Prince. I've done all these things. I've never felt afraid. I've never felt afraid or I would not come. OK? I'm called to come,” Cinotti says.
Glinski has bonded with the children in the orphanage. “I have a young lady here that I call my stepdaughter,” he says.“Her name is Linda and she's my family now. So, they tell you not to come back to Haiti, but I don't have biological family here, but I do have kind of family here. So, she draws me back. And the orphan kids, there's a few of them that really touch your heart and I don't know, it's like your family. It's hard to explain, I guess, but we have made a difference in their lives.”
Because of Linda and the others in need of help, Glinski says he is committed to returning.
This team from Mission of Grace Haiti does not know when they will be back on American or Canadian soil, but say time is of the essence. Joseph’s husband, who is also in Haiti at the moment, needs medical care in the United States. “We need to get out so he can get his medicine,” she said.
Glinski says his experiences in Haiti have made him a better person. “When you go home, you're a changed man or a changed woman,” he says. “You see the world a lot different. It opens up your eyes.”
