One of the thoughts that kept hitting me in Haiti this year was that only a few years ago this was a tropical resort island – like jamaica or the dominican republic. The empty swimming pool drove this home. Nature hasn’t changed … instead, the whims of people, and our perception of security has changed.
Today, instead of bronzed travelers sipping drinks poolside, we have medical teams ministering to the poor. Same place, same island.
Pictures from Haiti are online here. Only six pages this time, for a total of 164 shots. I’m trying to organize my thoughts into a travelogue … but as usual there are just too many thoughts and not enough time.
Here’s a picture of a group of charcoal burners. These folks are at the very bottom of the Haitian social stack, and are therefore probably some of the most impoverished, downtrodden people on earth.
I found out from one of the young men who runs the guest house where we stayed in Port Au Prince that three members of Haiti’s most popular rap / hip-hop group, Barikad Crew, had just died in a horrible car accident. They were driving between gigs, and a high tension electrical wire touched their car (circumstances are murky), and three of them were burned beyond recognition. That happened on Saturday night, the night before we arrived in country.
The following Saturday my group was returning from the countryside in a big open truck. Fourteen Americans piled into an open truck. I was clinging to the top of the cab, taking pictures of the approach into town. As we came into the city, I saw a mob walking in the street ahead of us … perhaps a couple of thousand young Haitians all wearing red bandannas and matching white and red shirts.
My first thought was “oh crap.” I’ve got a thing about large groups of upset people. I had never really been on the receiving end of thousands of people visibly, obviously not the same race or nationality as me … staring at me. The fact that they were all wearing matching bandannas was the really freaky part to me. This wasn’t random … it was organized. I was very much reminded that we were in their country … and I started giving mental odds that we were about to become a story on CNN.
Then I remembered that the funeral for the rappers was supposed to be that day. I looked closer and saw things like “RIP” and pictures of three men on the t-shirts.
Some of them gave us the finger as we passed, others gave us the peace sign … just like you might get from any crowd of young people. We encountered similar groups throughout the city for the rest of the ride back to the guest house.
Posting from the Miami International Airport. I’ve been in Haiti for a week with many adventures, but no internet access whatsoever at any of the places that we stayed. All the locations usually have satellite links, but for one reason or another all of them were offline. I mention this for the benefit of those of you who think I’m insane for going to Haiti at all and may have been worried. All is well.
This was my third trip, and it was quite different and yet very much the same as the others. Haiti still has incredible poverty, and the conspicuous consumption and gluttony in the airport has me a bit dazzled.
I have perhaps 800 pictures to sort through, and another airplane ride before I get home. The OLPC doesn’t really support my camera, so I’ll have to wait until then to sort them.
–UPDATE–
My flight to Boston was supposed to leave at 4:15. The board now says “5:00”, but the man at the podium is predicting more like “9:00”.
They so can’t scare me with this crap right now. I am so totally comfortable just having this here patch of floor, and the air conditioning on. What, only a four hour wait? I’ve had worse today. I woke up at 5am in HAITI for god’s sake.
— UPDATE TWO MINUTES LATER —
Okay, fine. We’re boarding now.
Here’s a few vignettes from Haiti:
It’s going to take me a while to process any meaningful fraction of my thoughts about this year’s trip. Going to a subsistence farming community in a third world country is a much longer journey than just the travel … and once again I’ve experienced a massive mental reset.
Pending that, here are the pictures. If each of them is worth a thousand words, then this is a quarter million word opus.
Posting from the Hospice St. Joseph in Port Au Prince, Haiti. The trip has been a rousing success so far, and we head back to the calm, clean environs of the states tomorrow morning. Three flights, one shuttle between airports, and a drive later, we’ll be home.
Since I’m communicating over a shared satellite uplink, I will be brief.
Haiti is in better shape than last year, though Port Au Prince is still easily the worst city I’ve ever seen. There is noticeably less tension in the air, and our bargaining with the vendors had an almost playful feel, rather than the hard edge that I remember from last year.
All is well, redmed, Tara, and my dad are all doing great, and we’ll be home tomorrow.
Pictures from the trip to Haiti are online.
At some point, I’m planning to commit my narrative journal of the trip to an electronic medium, but it ain’t happened yet.
The cats are still very needy. They’re taking turns sitting between my arms as I type.
We’re safely home, after a somewhat hectic day of travel. To summarize: Miami international airport is not optimally configured.
Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have 787 emails.