Exhausted, but alive and well in Port-au-Prince

Where to begin… So much has happened in the past 24 hours and I’m still hovering in a world of disbelief. It has yet to sink in that I am here relatively permanently. I am not going home in a week. I am not going to see my kitten boy or snuggle with him at night, and I am not going to see my best friend everyday. My mom’s care and my grandparents just across the street are no longer my reality. Now, I will be calling Port-au-Prince (PaP) my home and HELP is my new family. Although overwhelmed by just about everything, there are two things that stood out the most to me: a) the state of the country and b) the incredible hospitality with which I was greeted.

Flying in to PaP in itself was an experience. As you descend into the airport you can see all the decomposing ships that had gotten stuck on the reef or a sandbar with little white triangle sails zipping all around. The closer we got to the tarmac, the more I could see the destruction from the earthquake. Tent camps and shantytowns are scattered everywhere. As you may imagine or remember from the pictures just after the earthquake, there is rubble everywhere. The camps take up all the space where there isn’t rubble, and just up the street from my apartment there are still tents in the street. Everybody just goes around them, but what else can you do? They aren’t going anywhere soon. These tents and makeshift shelters will be the Haitian way of life for many years. Nobody is cleaning up the rubble, and few are rebuilding. I passed by a couple of construction sights on my walk to the HELP Center from my apartment, and I wonder if they are rebuilding with plans and materials that can withstand a 7.0 earthquake. I hope so, but somehow I don’t think they are.

I had the opportunity to go into one of the camps with Michael because Conor (the executive director) had arranged a meeting with this NGO called SOIL and I thought I’d go along. SOIL installs and maintains toilets and they compost the waste. It’s pretty cool and reminds me of the Living Machine at Oberlin. They’re even trying to come up with ways to bribe more people to use them. Anyway, the camp was pretty dismal. Life is hard there, but like I mentioned these camps are fully expected to be permanent, so they’ve strung up electrical wires and have giant water reservoirs where they can get water for cooking, bathing, and washing clothes. This particular camp had been built on what once was a park with a soccer field (of dirt) and a basketball court. Building the camps in these open spaces makes sense, but the people, particularly the children, of PaP have nowhere to play. It’s sad. They just sit around the camps all day, since most don’t attend school.

But, this brings me to b): The Haitian People and their hospitality. It is no exaggeration what they say about the kindness and tenacity of Haitians. Everyone in the camps greeted us with smiles and a “bonjou!” The same goes for pretty much everyone I saw or met from my flight to PaP to all the others throughout my day at HELP.

Itelier (a LOVELY student) and Roman (the driver) came to get me at the airport around 8 AM. They brought me right to my room in one of the dorm houses. There I met Michael (my boss) and Linedy (sometimes the d’s in Creole are pronounced like “dz”, so her name is the equivalent of Lindsey) who showed me around the house, introduced me to some of the students and helped me get a little settled. But I didn’t get to rest. At this point, my adrenaline must have been pumping because I took a quick sponge bath and walked with Michael and Linedy to the HELP center. The welcomes never stopped and neither did the happy faces. I met so many people who kept showering me with “Glad to meet you’s” and “We are so happy to have you’s.” What I don’t think they quite understand is how happy I am to be here. And how excited I am to learn their names and their stories. I can tell already that they will make a wonderful second family for me. How could I not already love them? Some of them who don’t speak much English at all were still eager to talk to me and welcome me to their country. It just feels so right. Now if I could just remember everyone’s name! (I have about 160 names to learn, ahhh!)

I think that’s a long enough first post from Haiti. There is plenty more to come… Look forward to descriptions of my living quarters, the food, the classes, etc.

I love you all and miss you dearly. Mom, pet Oscar for me and tell him I love him.