Isolated Poets

It’s a useful reminder for those of us “NGOers” that are based in the capital that there is much more to Haiti than Port au Prince. My trip last week took me to the far-flung provincial capital of Jérémie in Grande Anse. Founded back in 1756 under French rule, it became known as the “City of Poets” in honour of its artistic community. Its people suffered oppression by the Duvalier regime in the 1960s for daring to mount a political opposition, isolating it even further.

Even with vastly improved roads that cut through the mountains towards the southern highway, it still takes almost 10 hours to get to the capital by car. Thankfully, a roughly cut landing strip and a dodgy airline make this journey possible in 45 minutes by air. As we circled over what appeared to be a large leafy fishing village, I wondered what it would be like to be in a town that had for once benefited from being so far away from Port au Prince. After all, there was no earthquake damage here which means no rubble, no dramatic reduction of schools or clinics, and most of all, no camps.

The plane seemed to skim the tops of the palms on our rapid decent to the landing strip – clearly the rocky track was short enough to make it important to not waste any of it. We thumped down and bounced along with the props roaring in reverse. After a minute or so, the pilot stopped the plane (no need to taxi or “park”), slid out his sunken cockpit door and opened the cabin door for us. We had arrived.

The reason for my trip was to observe a human resources work shop that my colleague was running with the departmental government. Strategic plans are few and far between in the public sector if Haiti, and this is particularly noticeable with the lack of HR planning – nobody can really tell you what they need, why and where they should hire from. But this exercise is fraught with structural shortcomings, such as lack of funds and over-centralization. The government in the capital has very little money to hire workers in the departments. Its obsession of control (and concern of multiple levels of corruption) means that the minister needs to sign every letter of nomination for new hires – be they doctors or janitors. In short, Port au Prince – as far away as it is – controls the fate of the local institutions in Jérémie. So, the planning workshop will not have immediate results, but it will provide the local government with the data and reports to lobby their distant ministry counterparts for targeted and specific HR needs.

It was most definitely a wonderful reprieve from Port au Prince. A seaside town of about 150,000 inhabitants, Jérémie gives you the sense that it’s in no rush. People saunter down the streets and cars move uncharacteristically slow and steady. The main street sidewalks are covered by arcades that shelter merchants from the sun. Green bushy trees seem to sweeten the salty air. The garbage is less abundant, or perhaps just better hidden. The difference couldn’t have been more stark from the dilapidated capital which struggles amongst the rubble, litter and now the dust of the dry season. But make no mistake, Jérémie is no haven of development. Decades of isolation have slowed the building of schools and clinics and the agriculture industry limps along in the shackles of farming practices from a bygone era.

Yet it was important to see Jérémie to get a better sense of what Haiti is like once you strip away the complexities of urban congestion and earthquake damage. In fact, the relative simplicity of working in “les provinces” is in a strange way comforting and enviable. But this also might be just a reflection of a cute little town that captured my imagination and gave me a break from the big city. Next time I intend to find the poets.