Kikote ou te pwe ale? My first trip to Haiti
Trip Start
Apr 21, 2011
1
Trip End
Apr 28, 2011
Where I stayed
Junior's uncle Akson's house, on the floor
La Motagne, Sud-Est, Haiti
Thursday, April 21, 2011
Thousands of people were going in, out and around Miami International airport, and I was feeling tiny in a world of almost 7 billion.
With so many busy and important people going so many busy and important places, how could anything I did that day matter to anyone? Eh, but it mattered to me, and to me that's all that mattered. I was finally going to Haiti for the first time, as I had wanted to for years. What's better, I had two great travel buddies (one of which has been working in Haiti for the past 6 years) to go with me... travelling with others was kinda new to me... I think I could get used to it.
As we're in the security line in Miami we hear the airport security guard bellow across the shuffling masses in his best crowd control voice, "Excuse me, excuse me... does anyone in line NOT have a laptop? Please raise your hand if you do NOT have a laptop...(dramatic pause) Alright y'all, yeah, they got those on sale down at Best Buy today, you should go check it out if you get the chance." It was a good morning. The 6'2" ~280lb guard that pushed my bag through the Xray complemented me on my biceps (musta been a tight T-shirt?) made some jokes and I was off on my way. Sitting on the plane I wondered what to expect. Probably should prepare myself for a depressing trip, I decided. You're probably expecting to read a somewhat depressing blog about it, too...
You all know the sobering numbers -- the dead, the displaced, the cholera, the tents, the hunger... and if you don't where have you been? Sorry to disappoint, but I'm not here to rehash that in your face. You can Google it or watch Anthony Bourdain's episode in Haiti or something. Despite all that, ours was really a rather beneficial trip. Let me qualify this by saying that we spent almost no time in Port au Prince. I got to see a side of Haiti that I don't think most people think about, and that I didn't expect to find.
Our destination was La Motagne... "Which one?", you ask, since La Motagne is just the Haitian Kreyole word for mountain, and there might be 50 "La Motagnes" across a country 1/4 the area of Ohio. This one was on the south coast, down by Jacqmel, so that's the first place we headed on a 5 seater plane -- us 3 Americans, Jr. (the man who gets things done for Yonn Ede Lot in Haiti), and our pilot Will. Maybe it was less depressing because we skipped the highway where Judy didn't want to risk us getting held up at gunpoint. Will wasn't a chatty guy, but he did a good job of getting us to our destination safely. That box of Twinkies Judy brought him was well earned.
In La Motagne we slept on the floor at Junior's uncle's recently finished house, and over the next 5 days I got to know Yonn Ede Lot's non-profit operations well. I also got to help consult on their microfinance operations and generally give some opinions and input on economic development in the area. Funny thing, I guess I realized that the MS degree I just slaved over might have taught me a thing or two after all! After this trip I had a new appreciation for my opportunity to go to grad school and my chosen path of studies in development economics.
But what I was most surprised about and what I gained the most appreciation for was the amount of homegrown Haitian human resources that seemed to be accumulating around the idea of rural community development. Maybe it's the stink and severity of Port au Prince that encourages such desire for rural development. I was able to work with over a handful of young, college educated Haitians who were dedicated to developing their home rural area so that people wouldn't have to move to Port au Prince to find opportunities. {One of these new friends has had his university studies interrupted by the crumbling of his university in the earthquake. Another climbed out from beneath the rubble.)
In fact a group was already building homes to incentivize college educated individuals back into the community. I got to meet the group responsible for this, and they were organized around a community development plan that they themselves, all natives of the area, had formed -- a plan that made sense and seemed to have all of the necessary parts... well, except of course the funding.
Furthermore I was struck by the difference in spirit that I thought I perceived, between the fixed self dignity of the descendants of the first black people in history to defeat their colonial masters in war to make Haiti the first black independent nation in the New World, and the quiet submission and even self doubt of the Guatemalan character I am so familiar with,... is it just beaten down by a legacy of colonial rule and the inequalities of racism that have persisted for almost two hundred years after the Spanish declared the Republic?
I felt while I was in Haiti a sort of latent potential humming softly below the daily disasters, tragedies and hunger. Since returning I have heard others comment on the same potential that seems to be there just waiting... Perhaps it wasn't just my imagination.
I'll keep this short, but you'll find more stories amongst the photos. ("Slideshow" doesn't print the notes, but just click on a photo and look to the right of it to see any notes)
OH! And if any of my wonderful donors who have helped so much in the past feel moved and think they can help the La Motagne community with reconstruction of one of their 3 crumbled schools (see photos), you be sure to let me know!!
Be well dear friends!
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Comments
Hi Katie, que bonitas fotografias estás actualmente en HAITI, que bien que sigas trabajando en Desarrollo, cuando vienes a Guatemala me cuentas.
Bye