My sweater gets caught in the luggage. I try to fix it. My sweater then has a hole. This is just the beginning.
We arrive overnight in Fort Lauderdale. I think of Santiago as people check in for a midnight flight. I think of Karachi. I panic. Haiti is worse than Karachi. The last 24 hours disturbing thoughts ping pong in my head. What are we doing I ask myself each time.
The plane might be our first and last exposure to well off Haitians I tell myself. I’m going to Jacmel I had told the guy on the plane, will it really hit 110degrees? Yes. Okay, I respond. We read travel prayers together, we land. It starts. The first question I’m asked in Haiti is if I’m from here. I wish I said yes. We do not speak French. We do not speak Creole. We are taken to a warehouse makeshift airport. My travel buddy and I acclimate fast.
I have a high tolerance for culture shock. My adjustment seems to be natural. My travel buddy says she feels this is like home. I walk out, we see a sign with Fariha. I tell the driver I am Fariha he smiles and says wait and continues to hold up the sign. I just sit and wait for whoever else claims to be Fariha. We walk by to the parking lot with our other guide whose nephew will drive us. We pass by our one armed porter, I wonder if that is Jackson who we were supposed to find. Here it starts, as David P. said it would, “Sister, please give me a dollar” as we walk along. We jump into the shafty third world van.
We see dirty shifty streets. We see tents. We see street vendors. There is no culture shock. I thank our third world journeys. Haiti is like the ghettos of Pakistan. I wonder if Pakistan will turn into Haiti. I think of that during our van ride. We pass by USAID tents. They are labeled everywhere, like branding. I think of a slogan that should be printed on all their tents. “We’re back” is a good one. I do not mean that in a sincere solidarity spoken way. The city is hustling. Everyone is out and about. Street vendors flood the streets. We see much rubble, it doesn’t seem out of place. Rubble seems normal. We see some new buildings. We see some broken buildings. We see a beauty salon and two men in business clothing. We see people on cell phones with backpacks. We see ladies carrying live chickens in a bag with their head sticking out the bottom. At least it’s all organic here. I keep saying these are the rich areas. But there are patches of poverty interspersed everywhere.
The country is so beautiful, aesthetically; so lush. We make our way up through Port-au-Prince through the mountain roads. They are labeled, the roads. I wonder if this was done before the economy came crashing down many ages ago. I cannot stay awake as we climb to the mountaintops, I doze off. I did not sleep at all the night before, my back Is sore. One trickle of sweat trickles down my chest, I feel it. We arrive. The weather has changed progressively. We are in Fermathe at the Bungalow for a day and night. This is probably the only home to harbor disabled children in all of Haiti.
The dog greets us, he is pretty healthy. I wonder if the mountains are scattered bungalows of mainly rich people. We meet the directors. We nap. I call my mom. We gaze the balcony and see children dancing to the drum. The soccer match is over, and normal has resumed for the remainder of the day. We walk up the wheelchair ramps. Two of the disabled children hug us. There hugs last two minutes. The first one says something, I do not understand so naturally I kiss his cheek, then I lean my cheek against his lips incase that is what he desired. I have a rule about properly stopping and kissing someone’s cheek. I believe it holds a unique quality of intimacy. I do it kneejerk. He continues to hold on to me. I wait. Another child hugs us. Another one plays with my watch, then shows me his, he has dragged himself back onto his walker and has followed us. We shake hands, one girl screams in joy and shakes her hands as we walk into the dormitories. We go back and share stories with the directors. The weather remains phenomenal. We have one night here.
This is an ideal summer life I say, lets just stay here... I can read all day, write all night.
Sunday, June 27, 2010
“To understand the people you must live amongst them 40 days” Arab proverb - 2 days to Haiti
My stay in Haiti coincidently is 40 days. A little short under the 6 week time frame. The concept of 40 is both very fascinating and spiritual. 40 days makes a habit; 40 consecutive prayers in masjid Nabawi grants redemption from Hell, 40 is the age of Revelation for Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him); 40 days of spiritual retreat in cultural sufi tradition; 40 was age of Khadija, when she married Muhammad pre prophethood; 40 days and 40 nights of rain fall during Noah’s flood, 40 years of wandering Israelites, 40 is where Celsius and Fahrenheit scales correspond…the list continues
In my life, I never imagined I would come to Haiti. I thought my teaching days were over when I graduated from college. I never imagined I would teach ESL abroad again after I had done so in Damascus. I always had a dream, an item on the bucket list to do relief work abroad. And here we are, I am a teacher, I am in Haiti, I am teaching ESL, and I am crossing off an item off the bucket list. But in all reality, we came on a journey to understand something about our own lives while understanding what it is to live like these people, who have endured and persevered beyond imagination crisis through crisis.
In my life, I never imagined I would come to Haiti. I thought my teaching days were over when I graduated from college. I never imagined I would teach ESL abroad again after I had done so in Damascus. I always had a dream, an item on the bucket list to do relief work abroad. And here we are, I am a teacher, I am in Haiti, I am teaching ESL, and I am crossing off an item off the bucket list. But in all reality, we came on a journey to understand something about our own lives while understanding what it is to live like these people, who have endured and persevered beyond imagination crisis through crisis.