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 :)

A blind date with the Citadelle

We did not know much about Cap Haitien, Haiti’s second largest city, when we booked our tickets. We also didn’t think much about which hotel to stay at, or the quality of the nearby beach. The point of the trip was to see the Citadelle, a Unesco World Heritage site located about 40 minutes from downtown Cap.

Graham was excited to see the fortress, draw-bridges, the more than 150 cannons (and the 50,000 cannon balls that are stacked nearby!). I was looking forward to a quiet walk up the hill among trees and beautiful views. A few of our friends had visited a couple of weeks earlier, and they described it as a sweet escape from dusty and crowded Port-au-Prince. “Go early so you can have it all to yourself” they said.

Our visit was of course not what we expected it. We visited on Easter Saturday which happens to be the day every single Haitian in the vicinity goes to visit the Citadelle. And they not only visit, they bring along pots of food to share with their many friends (some of them also brought their alcoholic drinks, and their loud stereos). And once they get to the Citadelle they sit there and hang out for hours.

Needless to say, it was not the quiet visit to a historic site to a historic site we had in mind! There were people all over the place, and by everywhere we mean every single spot you can think of. People were sitting on the cannons (and the cannon balls), in the windows, on the handrails, in every passage, and every corner. It was loud, and people were pushing us, and there were beer bottles everywhere.

Despite it all, it was very impressive with fantastic views in all directions. The fortress took the Haitians 15 years to be completed (1805-1820), and it was supposed to hold over 5,000 troops. The walls are 4 meter thick and 40 meters high, and the location was chosen to be able to defend the whole area from invading European troops (who never ended up coming).

Even though it wasn’t what we expected, we are glad we went, and will be recommending it to all our friends here, just don’t go over Easter weekend!

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!!!

A picture is worth...

many many blog entries?


We have so much to tell...I changed jobs, we moved apartments, we had VISITORS!!, Arcade Fire came to Port-au-Prince, Haiti has a new president....

But in the meantime I thought I'd post a few pictures taken by our friends last month. They captured so many images that we see every day but somehow have failed to photograph.

These images here include the view from our old rooftop, a market, the ubiquitous tents, a typical lunch stop, and a tap-tap, or the most colourful bus you've ever seen!

Enjoy!

Crazy Cat Lady

If you and I have ever talked about pets, you know I’m not a cat person. I love dogs, and I have had a few other pets (duck, monkey, parrot among others) but I do not like cats. They are temperamental and selfish, they don’t cuddle, they disappear for days, and they don’t play with you. Well, I never thought this would happen but recently I have become a crazy cat lady! Welcome to the soap opera-like story that took place outside our door for a couple of weeks... 

A black cat and a white cat became friends and started hanging out a lot. They would always be at our doorstep in the mornings, and liked to sleep on our patio chairs. I asked our landlord if they were a couple and she said yes, “they are both female and one of them is gay”, which she was very thankful for because there would be no baby kittens running around her house.... 

You know where this story is going. Black cat was neither a female nor gay. One day we noticed the white cat was a little bit rounder than usual... A neighbourhood scandal, pregnant out of wedlock! Unsurprisingly, the black cat disappeared as soon as he heard the news. Days went by, and we came home one day to find she had given birth to 5 awful wet-mouse-looking kittens. Our neighbour gave her some milk and some love (we didn’t because a- I don’t like cats and b-Graham is allergic). 

But the babies kept getting cuter. They would come from under their mum, walk over each other, and slowly started resembling sweet baby cats. Then one day we came home and the cats were gone. We thought they had been given away but the landlord told us the mom had moved to a more secure location.

We forgot about the single mother and her 5 babies for a few days until we saw the white cat limping along on our parking space. It seemed she had been poisoned (or eaten a poisoned rat) and she was now unable to walk, feed the cats or even get up to where she had put them. To our surprise “the secure location” was the flower bed right outside our door. All 5 of them had been there all along and we hadn’t seen them for days (the 5^th one was given away).

Our neighbour explained that at 3 weeks old they were not able to lick milk for themselves so he fed all 4 of them with a dropper. When he wasn’t around, we started to do the same. I don’t like cats but these 4 were the cutest baby animals I have seen in a while. They would hide all they long in the flower plant, and come out to play as soon as we came back from work. Soon they started looking for us in the mornings too, and we would give them some milk and let them in for a few minutes before we went to work each morning. They were all eating by themselves now (and we were so proud!), could jump back up into the flower bed by themselves, and seemed to have developed more instincts.

One evening we came back and there were only 3 kittens. The 4^th one had been found dead. He was the smallest one, didn’t eat very much, and hardly moved all day. We kept feeding the other three but noticed that one was not growing as much as the others. Our neighbour was also very concerned and talked to friends who might be interested in adopting the kittens. 

Then one day we came home and they were all gone. He had taken them to the embassy where he works, and the two bigger cats, Ginger and Spots were quickly adopted (and now probably live in a house way nicer than ours!). Baby died soon after he left and now rests in cat heaven with his mum (poisoned), dad (ran over by a car), and siblings.

We miss their sweet tiny paws climbing over our legs, and seeing their cute little faces every morning before we went to work and every evening as we returned...

 by Tania

The End of the Elections and the Carnival President

Michel "Sweet Mickey" Martelly - (from: Reuters)

For those who have been reading this blog from the beginning, you may remember this post where I jokingly profiled the long-shot candidate Michel Martelly, the “other singer” (after Wyclef Jean) who was running for president. Well, on Wednesday he will be officially announced the winner of the elections and the next head of the Haitian state with over two-thirds of the popular vote (the preliminary results were reported on April 5).

Over seven long months the elections have faced many startling challenges. With cholera raging in the background, Haitians watched as the process was almost hijacked by fraud, delayed by international involvement and shocked by unexpected visitors. As Haitians celebrate the end of this grueling necessity of democracy, we thought the process was worth a little recap. Don’t be surprised if a movie script comes out on this one day.

The first round of elections was held on November 28th and was marred by irregularities and wrapped up in thick webs of domestic and international politics, causing the original vote count to limp along without denouncement or endorsement. However, when the preliminary results excluded Martelly from the run-off, street protests quickly erupted. The two days of rock throwing and tire burning (see pictures on our blog)

Baby Doc on his way back from the airport. -AFP
(from theage.com.au)

could only be ended by an international OAS investigation that recommended that Martelly be included in the final ballot after all. By this time, of course, it was impossible to keep the originally scheduled second round of voting in late January. As confusion over the postponement reigned, Haiti received the highly-unexpected return of its ex-dictotaor Jean-Claude Duvalier. For days, his spokesmen offered varying accounts of why he had returned, and the world held it’s breath that he would not endorse a candidate – or worse – proclaim his own candidacy. He eventually faded into his mountain chateau and has set his efforts to quietly defend against his health ailments and human rights charges, both of which seem to be gaining ground.

Meanwhile, outgoing President Rene Preval was taking advantage of a two month election postponement to extend his mandate to May, angering many. But by this point, election fatigue was setting in – most just wanted the second round vote to be over with. Yet there would be one more surprise. Forty-eight hours before the vote, exiled former President Jean Bertrand Aristide announced his pending arrival back from South Africa. Despite the passive-aggressive efforts of Barack Obama and Nicolas Sarkozy to block his return (at least until after the elections), Aristide calmly boarded a private jet and flew back to his island to be welcomed by thousands at the airport. He calmly addressed the crowd and the media in five languages and called for transparency and unity. To the relief of many, he stopped short of any inflammatory remarks that would have sent the elections into a tailspin. In fact, he did not call on an election boycott and has mostly remained silent since his arrival. (Below- News clip from AlJazeera)

In the end, the second round elections did finally take place on March 20th and were considered to be the most peaceful in Haitian history. The vote tally then reflected the expectations of the population and for only the fourth time in history since Haiti’s independence in 1804, people were able to chose their leader. The celebrations have been loud and joyous – surly a good sign for the beginning of a presidency. But don’t get your hopes up, my Haitian friends have warned, these same people may be calling for his resignation in six months. After all, he is a carnival signer with no political experience and a fair share of shadowy connections to the past dictatorship. But for now, let’s just all enjoy the fact that the election circus is over.

We filmed this from our rooftop

Another weekend discovery

Last weekend we once again successfully escaped Port-au-Prince to enjoy another new excursion – camping on Cocoye beach.

It’s hard to imagine that during our first two months here in June and July, we hardly knew what do to with ourselves on the weekends. Haiti seemed to be void of weekend options for foreigners. Our choices seemed limited to the hotel pools or the few beach resorts two hours north of the city. Now, of course, we realize it’s because we just didn’t know where to go. Haiti does a good job of hiding its treasures – but it will eventually reveal them to you once you’ve taken the time realize that it’s got a lot more to offer than just problems and despair. It is, after all, a mountainous island in the Caribbean.

Our latest adventure involved a relatively painless car journey to Petit Goave, about one hour west of the capital, which would then be followed by a 1 hour boat trip to the beach. We met our boat - a 15ft sturdy open dingy pushed by a wildly underpowered outboard engine – on a pebble landing spot. We loaded it up with equipment and bodies, and set out putt-putting along the coast past cliffs, over coral and finally arriving at a golden beach with a turquoise coloured sea that I thought only PhotoShop could create.

For the next 24 hours we were treated to four meals, accompanied by wine, beer, rum and whatever else emerged from the bottomless cooler that had been provided to us by our Haitian host (an enterprising restaurant owner who had travelled with us from Petit Goave). We met a wonderful group of people from all over Europe, Canada and the US. By now, it’s easy to label those that are “fresh off the plane” and the “veterans” that have been here for a while. It’s crazy to think that we are now considered to be part of this latter group, as if nine months had made us experts on this secretive and complex half-island.

By now, the conversation takes predictable turns. You surf through the usual topics – employer, nationality, and last country you worked in. Then you move to find common ground by complaining about the non-workings of Haitian law, society and politics. From there, one of you tries to sound thoughtful with an anecdote of a positive story that, if extrapolated, could one day bring the country to either prosperity (“fresh off the plane” people) or at least dignified poverty (“the veterans”). Numbers and emails are exchanged. A couple of cold beers appear while somebody offers up a bottle of sunscreen – two essential elements to battle the beaming midday sun.

I awoke that night to a friend asking me if we should be afraid of the local men making the strange noises. I immediately heard the sounds of a ra-ra band drifting over from the far side of the beach. I stumbled out of the tent into the cool sand and we walked a little ways towards a bonfire surrounded by a dozen men dancing to the sounds of bugles and drums. My friend was convinced it was vodou and unwilling to approach further. It just looked to me like a late night party. As we turned away and walked back to the tents, I couldn’t help being struck with what pathetic “veterans” we were, and how little we all still know (or are willing to find out?) about this country.

The next afternoon we piled onto the same boat. The motor whined as it pushed a load well beyond anything the manufacturer would have recommended. Sleepy from sun, food and drink, we barely talked as we slid past the shore, back to our air-conditioned cars and the city that awaited us before our evening curfews.