The Social Landscape

If you were in Port-au-Prince on a Saturday night with us, these are the people you might end up hanging out with:

Los Diplomaticos: From Argentina, Colombia, Brazil, Chile, Guatemala, Mexico. They have usually just graduated from school and are on their first post as Diplomats. The “hardship” of this post will guarantee that their next job will be in a place with working traffic lights…like Paris or New York. We speak Portu-nol together, or mostly the Brazilians integrate into the dominating Spanish conversation. Incredibly welcoming, nothing is ever planned in advance, the food is always good, the music is always loud.

The Irish: From one island to another. There are several NGOs, one telecommunications company, a security company - if you’re in Haiti you just can’t escape the Irish. And thank goodness for that. But unbelievably, there’s still no Irish Pub in town (though one is planned!) They are always up for a good time, I do not always understand what they say, but the little I understand is very funny! Can’t keep up with their beer drinking, but have learned to appreciate a hot cup of tea in +35C weather…

UN police: Some of the best parties we have been lucky enough to attend, were organized by groups of men in tight shorts (because they are usually held at gigantic compounds, and the party is always near the pool—and men from developing countries love their tight shorts). The man-woman ratio is about 10-1, the directions to the location are always terrible but you can find where you’re going by the dozens of white UN cars parked outside blocking the main road. Special mention for a party thrown by the Spanish SWAT team…ahhhh, lobster BBQ, and sangria buckets J

Library-goers: The Colony Club deserves its own separate entry. It is thanks to this library though that we have met a group of wonderful Haitian-Canadian/American couples that have been in Haiti for a long time. As in for the past 30 years. Oh, the things they have seen and lived! We see them almost every Friday, or every second Friday when there’s wine at the library J

Las Colombianas: During most of the winter we would end up as the same parties as a group of Colombian girls working for different organizations. Some of them had arrived right after the earthquake and had had to live in camps with up to 300 soldiers (and only 1 shower!). Beautiful, smart, multilingual…and a disappointment to the young men around them as most of them are here with their boyfriends.

Canadians: in times of Hockey play offs, crazy Canadian elections, maple syrup scarcity, or just plain homesickness, how lucky we are to be able to work, go to the library, search for a new restaurant, or just hang out and watch hockey with other Canadians. We love the familiar slang, similar complaints, trouble finding cheap tickets to Vancouver… and the niceness of them all.

Quebeckers: If Montreal seems a bit emptier these days it’s because half of their highly educated, well-travelled, perfectly bilingual youth have moved to Port-au-Prince! They are, seriously, everywhere. NGOs, UN, International Organizations, Consultant firms, private sector, government jobs…everywhere you turn there’s a Quebecois running a meeting (here a separate category from the Canadians, just as my previous co-worker would have it… Mr. V- I miss working with you!)

Free-lance journalists: A South African friend once told me that in real life, aid workers don’t live adventure-filled lives and move around on the back of pick-up trucks, but reporters do. Only journalists live like aid workers are portrayed in the movies. And it is true. While we move around in SUVs, and live in nice places, these guys are on their own. Nobody picks them up at the airport, they don’t receive security warnings. When there is a crisis and you can see fire from your rooftop, the NGO workers stay in their compounds, and lock our doors as instructed. The journalists see the fire, smile, grab their cameras, put on a helmet (or a bandana) and off they go. On foot, a moto-taxi, on the back of a pick-up truck, looking for a story, hoping for a good picture.

Jaded “citizens of the world”: Last but not least, the most interesting and less interested group. They are veterans, been on the road for so long they can’t remember if they were in Afghanistan or Sudan before coming here. Big titles, big money. They speak that heavy accented-English that you just can’t place, wear khaki trousers, haven’t shaved in a while, always tell crazy stories. It doesn’t matter where they were born, they don’t identify with any nationality, they could pack and move to another crisis right then and there. Nothing faces them anymore…And they make you fall in love in development work and wish you never end up like them all at the same time.

Unfortunately some of these people have already left Haiti, gone home, off to their next mission, learning new acronyms, meeting new friends in a new place…. It was an honour and a pleasure to have met you! Hope to spend another weekend night with you again someday :)

Visitors!!!- Part III

Apologies for the loooong recess... I changed jobs, and then we moved apartments. And then we moved again. Then we were very busy for some weeks, and lazy for some more. Then Graham left Haiti (as expected) - but that's another blog entry.

I would like to dedicate this post to a wonderful and beautiful friend who came to visit us in April. Much like with our previous visitors, her visit coincided with election results announcements. She also happened to be traveling through the US at the time when tornadoes closed dozens of airports. Her flight was canceled, her time in Haiti was cut in half. And then I decided to change jobs the week she arrived. In any other setting, that would have translated into more free time or less time restrictions. In Haiti, it meant we did not have access to cars when Graham was not around. So we were restricted to walking, visiting, eating and shopping within a two block radius from our apartment. Eventually we escaped Port-au-Prince for a couple of nights though and went to visit Cap Haitien in the north of the country.

She did not complain about the dodgy car that picked her up from her airport, the lack of AC at our place, the fact that her very expensive vacation was cut in half, or the countless mosquito bites. Then again, she didn't complain about visiting me in Montreal in -38C degree weather to help me celebrate my birthday a few years ago...

Thank you for being such a great friend, for calling from every corner of the world you've made it to in the last 10 years, and for always always being there.

With all my love,
Tania

Visitors!!! Part II

Former President Aristide returns....

In case you need a recap, 4 friends were coming to visit us. Their visit was nicely timed with elections, and the return of an ousted President.

During all of March there had been rumours about former President Jean Bertrand Aristide returning to Haiti. Then, days before our friends’ arrival, the exiled former president said he would be returning to Haiti before the elections. And the day before our friends were scheduled to arrive, the news confirmed that he would fly in on exactly the same morning as them. The country immediately started hyperventilating – now it would have both former right-wing dictator Baby Doc Duvalier and former leftist populist president Aristide in the same country, moments before the tightest election in Haiti’s history.

Our NGOs went on high security alert. We were instructed to come home early, avoid meetings near the airport, and stay inside for the next few days. Nobody knew what Aristide’s return would bring, or how people would react. Our friends had signed up with my organization to volunteer during part of their visit and I was asked to tell them to cancel their flight. We wouldn’t be able to pick them up as the road to the airport would be off-limits that day.

We talked to our Security advisors, thought about worst-case scenarios, and based on the previous elections weekend concluded that the risk was low. The decision was of course on their hands but we would provide them with as much information as possible so that they could make an informed decision.

We then proceeded to try to reach our friends. For once, internet was working at home, and they were both often online. Except it was St Patrick’s Day and they were out celebrating... “Please call us back tonight” emails and voice mails ensued, and then we finally got in touch with them. We told them they might have to wait for a long time at the hot, uncomfortable hangar that is Haiti’s International Airport. We would do our best to pick them up as soon as the crowds cleared. It was of course understandable if they would prefer to cancel their trip. But of course they didn’t!

They are studying International Relations and Development, this is the stuff they debate in classes for hours, and write essays on! The Aristide story made them quiet popular during the rest of the St Paddy’s festivities, and a few hours later they were on their way.

Luckily the airport road cleared very quickly after Aristide’s speech and they were shortly on their way to Tania’s NGO building. The sleeping bags and “Emergency Food” that had been packed in preparation for possibly having to be at the airport for a long time, were quickly unpacked at our place. We then settled for a couple of quiet evenings in our house until the elections passed with very few incidents, and then were able to enjoy just a few but incredible days with them in Ayiti Cherie. These are some of the pictures they took:

Visitors!!! – Part I

Timing is everything....

Among preparing for elections protests and subsequent lock-down, weekend escapades, going to an Arcade Fire concert, preparing for hurricane season, etc, by far the happiest part of the last few weeks was having visitors! Yes, you read that right. Friends came to visit us in Haiti.

Our friends here didn’t believe us (nobody here gets visitors!). The answer was always “No, really, who do they work for?” But it’s true. We were fortunate enough to have 4 of our closest friends come and visit us during their spring break, not because they were on “short-term missions” or doing “a week consultancy work”. They came just to visit us and see the many faces of Haiti.

And of course this being Haiti, their trip was not drama-free. So much happened that I will break this entry into three posts so you don’t get bored with me!

The drama mostly resulted from the timing of the visit. In January, when our friends asked if it would be a good idea to spend their spring break here, we said “YES! Come and visit us in March!” – How about these dates? -“That’s great!” We both said. Back then, the election process was a complete mess: The OAS was writing a report on who really won the first round, the announcement dates were being debated and rescheduled, and nobody really knew what would end up happening.

We knew the second election round would be around March. However, not wanting to let uncertainty dissuade our visitors’ visit, we turned a blind eye to the disorder and told them to go ahead and book their tickets – what was the worst that could happen?

Well, the worst that could happen was that the government scheduled elections for the weekend they were going to be here. Even worse, we were being told that we had to prepare for lock-down. That meant that our weekend plans quickly went down the drain. Instead of enjoying the wonderful two-day hike and beach trip, our friends would have to be housebound.

“That’s ok!” our friends said. “We’ll do some work, and get to watch the elections from your rooftop.” They were excited to come to a third world country during elections! Their families were not pleased but their colleagues from their Masters were jealous. Thank goodness for their International Relations/poor country-loving, inquisitive minds!

And so March arrived, and they got the necessary vaccines, bought mosquito repellent in all its forms, printed and packed “light” reading on the history and the politics of Haiti, and got ready to come to Port-au-Prince.

One of them was getting in two days early. After some juggling I was able to go to the airport to meet him. Except I couldn’t find him at the airport. The driver was there, had his name, and had arrived early enough but our friend was nowhere to be seen. Frantic calling ensued. Graham hadn’t heard anything, we couldn’t get through to his US phone, and there was nothing else to do but wait until every passenger from that flight had gone through customs. But I had to get back to work so I told the driver to bring him to the warehouse where I’d be working, hoping that he had made it onto the plane and was just delayed somewhere in the airport.

Everything was fine -it turned out the flight was late. However, the next day we had another “missing friend” moment when Graham and I met at home the next day thinking that the other person was in communication with our friend. He had stayed at our house to do some work, had texted us in the afternoon and had left us a note saying he was going to a hotel nearby to check his email. By now it was 8:00pm, dark, and just two days away from the elections. He didn’t have a phone and neither of us had access to a car to go look for him very far. The panic didn’t last very long. He came home and explained that he wanted to give us some time alone given that we were hosting people for the next few days.

The next day the 3 of us were shocked by the news. Former President Aristide was coming back to Haiti. He was flying back that same week, and the same day that our other two friends were scheduled to fly in. What’s worse and for reasons that only Murphy can explain, he was scheduled to land at the same time as our friends....

Haitian mothers

There was surprisingly little publicity around Mother’s Day in Haiti. Perhaps they don’t celebrate it in May, or maybe we just missed it all. And yet... there are mothers everywhere! Every second girl that we see is pregnant, or holding a young baby, or taking a little one to school. In any conversation about family all you always hear is my mother is this, she sacrificed this much for me, I would do anything for my mother. Sometimes the phrase morphs into my sister raised me, or my grandmother takes care of my babies, my aunt let me moved in after the earthquake...mum, sister, grandmother, aunt... Elle...toujours elle.

It is a very sexist society, and yet has your country had a female presidential candidate? Contrast, irony, the inexplicable. That's Haiti.

Happy mother's Day! To all the mother's out there. The ones with the baskets in their heads, and the days-old baby on their knees at the market, holding them tightly in what passes as public transportation, grabbing the tiny hands in the dark while crossing the street at night.

To all mothers, our mothers, and grandmothers, our friends who have started a family and to the mothers to be that we are dying to see.... Valerie, this is to you as well, Happy mother's day my friend!!!

Where in the world is SAIS?

A few months ago, you might have seen a random dancing video that my friend Ian and I performed in front of a waterfall. That clip was combined with those of our classmates from the School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) all over the world. The video was dedicated to our dear friend Julia who we all lost to a terrible accident in the fall.

The video went viral amongst our university community, so we're doing a second round. Niraj (who I also went to school in Bologna with) and I took advantage of our time in Colombia together over Christmas to file this equally random video.

Pink is for girls...

Conversations with my male co-workers

Stuck in traffic- talking to the driver

-In Colombia do girls wear pants?

Me: Yes, why?

-Because under the good governments in Haiti women had to dress well

Me: You mean they had to wear skirts? By law?

-Yes, there was a type of police that would make sure women didn’t wear pants

Me: That’s crazy. What’s wrong with wearing pants?

-Well, it must get really hot when they wear such clothes ~as he points to a girl on the street wearing tight jeans-

At the bakery buying birthday sweets for a male co-worker

Me: Let’s get chocolate cake!

-Tania, chocolate cakes are for girls

Me: Really? What do men like?

-They like square cakes, and they have to be simple

On cooking

Me: Is it true that Haitians eat cats?

-Yes, some people do.

Me: Have you eaten cats?

-Yes, sometimes when I drink with my friends. It’s really good

Me: How do you cook them?

-Cooking them? I don’t know. I don’t know how to cook anything. But once last year I made coffee.

You're in our thoughts...

Today we learned that four of Graham's Bologna classmates were involved in a car accident in DC. An intoxicated driver crashed her car into the two girls as they were waiting to cross the street at an intersection. Both of them sustained very serious injuries, and one is still in critical condition. Luckily the two guys were not injured.

Our thoughts are with Melissa, Julia, Teddy and Moran in this difficult moment. May family and friends bring you strength, comfort, and support to fully recover and get well soon.

With much love, all the way from the Caribbean,

G&T

Profile: Charles the bodyguard

Tania and I hope to begin profiling some of the very different people we are meeting. We hope to bring you a glimpse of their unique stories through these posts.

Charles and his DVD player

We'll start with Charles the bodyguard, one of the favourites of my NGO. He joined us last weekend on a hike up into the mountains. Not knowing that he was getting himself into a 3 hour adventure, he brought his backpack full of heavy items, including a small DVD player. At our lunch stop, he proudly took it out (determined to justify its trip) and played us some choice Dominican salsa hits from the 90s. He can be full of surprises. He can also be very serious when talking about the problems of his country. But rarely much time goes by without his trademark smile.

 

Name: Charles

Age: 39

Immediate Family: Father, Mother, Wife and Daughter (7 months). All have lived in New York off and on since 1986. Charles has stayed mostly in Port-au-Prince to watch over the family’s three clothing stores.

Languages: Creole, French, some English and Spanish

Job: Bodyguard with a major foreign-owned security company. Finding few job options after graduation from law and agronomy school, Charles went to the Dominican Republic in 2003 to attend a escort training program. He came back to Port-au-Price and has worked ever since as a bodyguard during the week (earning ~$25/day), and helping the family business on the weekend.

Worst part about job: 1) The stress of escorting a client during protests and demonstrations 2) Waiting around at gas stations.

Best part about job: Chatting to clients during drives.

Dream in life: Become a doctor. Charles already studied one year of medicine before switching into a law program to appease his mother. But despite having the degree, Charles has never practiced law. In fact, he then took another program in Agronomy which eventually led to a job with the Ministry of Environment for two years. Unhappy with the salary and the few career opportunities, he decided to become a bodyguard to save money to re-enroll in medicine. Now 39 years old with a new baby, he’s not sure it will ever happen.

Earthquake story: His wife and daughter were visiting in Port-au-Prince. Eleven family members were on the 3^rd floor in their house when the earthquake struck. Only minor damage occurred, and all of them were left uninjured.