Vaboomer -- Baby Boomer Views & News

A View of Pre-Earthquake Haiti

I published a slightly different version of this article in the Montclair Times Jan. 28th, 2010 edition.

New Year's Eve, 2009, the eve of my 65th birthday. The moon is full and golden, filling the sky and low hanging over swaying palm trees. Birds call in the scented air. A sure recipe for romance; I, however, am in love with the sweet cheeked village children of Limonade, Haiti who greet me with little moist kisses. These children hold my hands guiding me through the cow pasture and beside the pig pens to reach the goat compounds. And there I am even more enamored with the fuzzy goat babies, the kids who butt their mamas’ milk filled bags.

 

This goat herd is only one of many family herds funded by

Sonjeayiti.com’s micro loan project. Sonjeayiti or
Remember Haiti, is a local community development organization, headquartered in Haiti’s northern city of Cap Haitian. It was founded in 2005 and since that time has developed children’s and adult literacy programs, a women’s coop producing fair trade Haitian hot coca (the best I have ever tasted!) and chevre cheese, the goat project, and a micro credit program.

 

Sonjeayiti.com, its founder Gabrielle Vincent and many of its participants are only a few of the many people I interviewed in pre-earthquake Haiti this past school break,

for a www.thimbleberrypress.com middle school reader, My Country: Haiti (where past and present meet) and Draw on Culture: Haiti, an art activity book. And their energy, creativity and warm-heartedness was typical of people I met all over the country.

 

The Haiti of Hollywood stereotypes and rumor; the Haiti presented in news reports as a country-wide slum rife with violent mobs; the Haiti of stereotyped suspicion and superstition, was not the Haiti I saw or experienced. Rather the Haiti I saw driving all over the country and talking with people as diverse as a market woman selling peanut candy at a night time bus stop, 1980’s international soccer star, Frantzie Mathieu or Mrs. Michelle Duvivier Pierre-Louis, former Prime Minister, were open and forthright about their country’s pluses and burning issues. Clean water, universal education, economic development rooted in communities and local people, reforestation of the mountains, and better sanitation were common concerns. There is no question that building codes were non-existent in most urban construction. Houses were built higgledy-piggledy of concrete blocks with little rebar, and faced with stucco. That practice was a function of house-building one room at a time over many years as the family accumulated funds and of no code. The earthquake showed the tragedy of that lack of policy. Yet despite economic hardships due in large part to global forces, by and large the feeling I got from random conversations on the street to formal interviews was of a warm-hearted and resilient people.

 

Pre-earthquake Haiti was full of energy. One day, I went to an out door Port au Prince market with Frantzie and his girlfriend, Patricia, shopping for lunch. We wound our way along jammed dirt paths, ducking under multi-colored beach umbrellas to choose the best fresh shelled beans, fat plantains, picking just the right variety of rice, mangos, and cassava bread flavored with coconut. Streets and roads all over the island were lined with small stalls selling food, cell phones, sandals, baskets. Motorcycle “taxis” zipped around carrying a few passengers on their rear saddles, tap taps (painted vans), retired American yellow school buses and large air conditioned buses were jammed with holiday makers preparing for Independence Day, Jan. 1.  

 

Haiti’s hard won independence in 1804 as the first free black nation in the
Western hemisphere was a common topic that I heard about again and again from people all over the country. Independence and tremendous pride are the poto mitan (backbone) of Haitians. Pre-civil war American southerners including President Thomas Jefferson were threatened by Haiti’s successful slave revolts.  But President Abraham Lincoln was inspired by Haiti’s slave free nation and appointed Frederick Douglass as US Ambassador after the American Civil War. Douglass himself accorded Haiti as inspiration for many slave revolts in America.

 

Leogane, a bustling town of about 20,000 east of Port au Prince and the unfortunate epicenter of the earthquake is the location of Father Gabriele Blot’s parish. Pere Gabie, holder of a double doctorate and a master’s degree, showed me a newly opened computer lab for his plantain and vetiver growing community.  Alternately giving me Haitian revolution history lessons and discussing the spiritual social structure of his parish, Pere Gabie spoke often of that national pride to the gaggle of adoring children tagging after us as he pointed out where the school would expand and new housing would go.   

 

One of my favorite visits was with Rosemond Joliessaint, 18 and winner at 16 of Haiti’s first “Idol”, Digicel’s “Rising Star” music competitions. Rosemond took me and research colleague Stevenson Mathieu to his 10x10 studio, jammed with guitars, a keyboard, drums and his Cds. If pride, creativity, energy, and compassion are characteristics of Haitian society, Rosemond embodies them. Love glows in his eyes and suffuses his compositions and singing and brought tears to my eyes.

 

I want to end this piece with some observations by my friend Stevenson sent from Haiti via Facebook. Amazingly, lessStevenson as well as everyone mentioned in this piece survived the earthquake. Steve stayed on afterward to help rather than airlift out with other American citizens.

 

“Every day I walk around town to see the actual damage.  You could never capture enough, the expression on the faces of the survivors.  I did not see or hear any violence.  Haitians are proud of the hospitality concept.  They will open their doors to total strangers and at this time this catastrophic moment, I was filled with wonder.  Never before in my entire life, have I heard of a store owner giving the green light to those less fortunate to take what they need to survive.  There are so many stories of loss and death… and at the same time there is such unity among the Haitians to give a helping hand.”

While the reports of death and destruction from the earthquake are devastating, I think it is important to honor the resilient spirit of Haiti. The true test in the months and years ahead will be less for Haiti and more for us—safe in our homes. Will we forget? Will we dismiss Haiti, as has been the pattern in the past? Will the world, will we have the same kind of unity to give the helping hand that will be needed?  

 

Fear of Haiti Hampers Distribution of Food and Supplies Says Dr. Sasha Kramer

I might have written this post myself and indeed will be writing something similar for an article in the Montclair Times to be published this coming week.

Subject: Live from PAP: Fear slows relief efforts

January 22, 2010

To our dear friends and supporters who have been so present through this difficult time. I feel like I have a wall of love and protection around me knowing that you are all holding Haiti in your thoughts and prayers. I apologize for not having written for the past few days, it is partly that life here is so hectic and fast paced and partly because I find that writing about the situation brings all my emotions to the surface and brings me to a vulnerable space that can be rather overwhelming. That said, I so want to be able to share with all of you what we are experiencing and the important difference we have been able to make as a result of your generosity.

When I first arrived in Port au Prince I spent a day at the UN compound by theairport where NGO’s, doctors and soldiers swarm around talking on satellite phones

and running from meeting to meeting. I learned about the massive amounts of food that arrived in the first week and was stockpiled at the airport. I learned of the aid trucks filled to the brim with supplies blocked at the border and sitting idle at the ports. Since that day I have not returned to the aid compound and chosen instead to go into the streets, into the camps where people hide from the sun, huddled together under tattered tarps waiting for the food that has yet to come, into the alleyways littered with the rubble of fallen dreams and the spirits of those we have lost.

I know that some of these stories of aid not reaching the victims are beginning to filter into the international media but I wanted to see if I can shed some light about why this is without casting blame. Everyone who has come here is devastated by this disaster, everyone wants to help but the slowness in distribution is not a question of intentions, it is a question of long standing fears and the security structures put in place in response to these fears.

A few days ago I got an email from Nicolas Kristof of the New York Times asking me to comment on the supposition made by many (not Nicolas himself) that Haitians have received large amounts of aid money over the years and have somehow squandered it. I responded to him by talking about fear, this same fear that is slowing the distribution of aid during this crisis. For centuries Haiti has been portrayed as a dangerous country filled with volatile and threatening people, unsafe for foreigners.

This supposition, this fear and misunderstanding, has very deep implications for foreign aid and cross cultural understanding.

I have been amazed to visit friends working with large NGO’s in Port au Prince only to learn that they are forced to operate under security restrictions that prevent any kind of real connections to Haitian communities. One friend showed me the map, used by all of the larger NGOs where Port au Prince is divided into security zones, yellow, orange, red. Red zones are restricted, in the orange zones all of the car windows must be rolled up and they cannot be visited past certain times of day, even in the yellow zones aid workers are often not permitted to walk through the streets and spend much of their time in Haiti riding through the city from one office to another in organizational vehicles. The creation of these security zones has been like the building of a wall, a wall reinforced by language barriers and fear rather than iron rods, a wall that, unlike many of the buildings in Port au Prince, did not crumble during the earthquake.Fear, much like violence, is self perpetuating. When aid workers enter communities radiating fear it is offensive, the perceived disinterest in communicating with the poor majority is offensive, driving through impoverished communities with windows
rolled up and armed security guards is offensive and, ironically, all of these extra

security measures actually increase the level of risk for aid workers.

More from Sasha Kramer on the ground in Haiti in another post.

The Light Inside or the Tap on Your Shoulder -- Pay Attention!

Haiti Bound

Can you feel it?   The light coming back after my favorite day of winter--the Solstice?

I can, I can already sense that the days are growing longer and the darkness is receding. Even more than the external darkness receding, I can feel my inner light flaring brighter. More energy, more creativity, more ideas flowing. More friends made.

I'm Writing a Book on Haiti

Tomorrow I leave for Haiti to begin researching a tri-lingual (Creole, French and English middle school book and its companion art activity book--the former, My Country: Haiti and the latter, Draw on Culture: Haiti.

These books will be part of the Culture series of Thimble Berry Press.

This trip parallels the earlier China trip I made, and the 2 books that resulted from that journey. The "Dragon's Daughters Return" was a chronicle of that heartfelt journey of 21 adoptee families.

Our "Draw on Culture: (China)" book is enjoying early success.  It is an activity book designed to introduce children to Chinese history, cultural ideas and images. It pairs ready-to-color artwork with explanatory text, a stroke guide for practice writing the simplified Chinese characters.  Order here:

And here is a video about that China trip:  Video

Serendipitous Events

Much of the future success of these two books for kids will come from the tremendous help I have already received from many people -- suggesting people to interview, places to visit, organizations to see. Folks networking with me via email and making contacts. It has been really wonderful. My vision for these books is that Thimble Berry Press will be able to raise enough money to give upwards of 25,000 copies of each book to school children across Haiti. And then afterward distribute them in the US, France and Canada.

In addition to all the help that has been already given, there are the happy unexpected Haiti connections --such as the chimney guy who came to clean mine out last week and ended up telling me about his friend whose dad is a close friend of former President Aristide. Another of those unexpected Haiti connections came from an press release about three books written by Frank McKinney http://www.frank-mckinney.com/--whose styles himself a real estate maverick. Frank is the author this year of  The Tap, Burst This! Frank McKinney's Bubble Proof Real Estate Strategies and Dead Fred: Flying Lunchboxes and the Good Luck Circle.

Sustainability in Haiti

And in addition to being a great dad, and husband, a wild real estate visionary, a cool guy to chat with... Frank is doing something really wonderful in Haiti. He is building self-sustaining villages--with clean water, nice houses, facilities for kids with no parents, health facilities, economic development and more. The organization that manages these projects is http://frank-mckinney.com/and as Frank says on the site--we are not in the charity business, we are in the self-sustainability business. In Haiti alone over that last 10 years 11 villages have been built. I'm visiting one this coming week and will report back. How enlightened is this? When I talked with Frank a few weeks ago, I said, well yeah, how many cars can you drive (he drives a purple Hundai ) and how many houses can you live in, and how many clothes can you wear. Exactly he said--this man who has made millions and builds exotic houses for the wealthiest. That's why I needed to reengergize my spirit by dovetailing my professional highest calling with my spiritual highest calling. Well, I think he's done a great job of it. 

And by the way, I have a copy each of Frank's new books to giveway. Get inspired by him.