My day started off with a walk in the neighbourhood to get breakfast. A group of us whities were accompanied by one of the Haitian guards, and we strolled the streets looking for something appealing. We finally landed on a street vendor making omelette sandwiches. I had a great chat there with someone who was just hanging around the stall, and he told me what a great problem Haiti has with unemployment. It seems crazy, that so much work needs to occur in Haiti (reconstruction, still lots of rubble clearing), but people don’t seem to be being hired for those jobs. Lots of reconstruction is going to foreign bidders, and I read somewhere recently that once some big American companies are ‘in’, certain jobs aren’t even open for bid. So, the stroll was great (although it was sweltering outside!). I bumped into Annio while we were there, and with a big beaming grin, we embraced our hello in the middle of the street.
Regine, a Haitian architect, came to Grassroots to meet with us, see the building, and give some input on details. She spent 10 years in the U.S., and her English is excellent- she’e really cool, thoughtful, and I’m guessing quite good at her job.
Soon after that meeting, Alex met us to take us to Arkéide, where we were to meet with Father Benite Jeune to discuss some possible future straw bale projects. It was great to get out of the city, and head northwest towards the mountains. As we approached one mountain range, Alex told us that they had buried many corpses just at the base of the mountain in a mass grave after the earthquake. Nameless, in body bags, and tossed into big holes. That mountain is now dotted with hundreds of tents of people who have been displaced after the earthquake. Actually, there are tented ‘cities’ and areas almost everywhere- in the city proper, in towns, in between towns. It has almost been a year, and conditions haven’t changed for so many people!
It was interesting to see different types of homes in the countryside. There is the traditional Haitian ‘Ti Kay’ (small house), but there were also a few 3 storey mansions. It really does seem like there are mostly quite poor people in Haiti, and then a few really wealthy people.
We made it out to Arkéide just as the church service was ending. People were dressed in their finery, and the kids were particularly cute. Martin took photos inside during and after the service, but somehow I resisted; it didn’t feel ‘right’. The kids came swarming up to us, and really wanted to touch my pale skin. It might be that some of them have never seen a white person before, I’m not sure, but they really wanted to be close. It was so touching.
Our meeting with Benite wasn’t all that fruitful, as the school they are building has been donated to them- a steel pre-fab building with rolled insulation that goes in the panels. I think Martin had hoped it could be straw bale. In any case, he does have other buildings he’d like to build, but no funding. I can’t even imagine what it would have cost to ship this building over, but the building itself apparently something like $270 million USD.
When we finished walking around the future building sites with Benite, we asked if we could go walking in the village and talk to people about how their houses were constructed and plastered, and got permission. Alex came with us to translate creole, which was awesome. Alex is really a gem to have with us- he is really friendly, and has a way of easing into conversations with people that is admirable. He also has a lot of knowledge about Haiti, and shares lots of tidbits with us.
At the first building we visited, there was an older woman (a character, not unlike what my own ‘Eddie’ might aspire to be like in later years!) who said she had built the wattle & daub building herself and plastered it. (Wattle & daub is an old style of building, where branches are woven together to form the structure, and then the walls are plastered). Martin wanted Alex to ask about additives and special secret ingredients they used, and she pointed to the ground- la boue! (just mud!). There was a bit of cotton stuffed in between some of the woven branches, so I asked about that. She came up to me, and took the cotton out, put her hand on her hip and got up to the building and peeked in. In quite a boisterous voice and demonstration of a peeping tom, she repeatedly showed me why the cotton was in there- to prevent peeping toms from looking in. We laughed our heads off, and I hit her (lovingly!) on the back in a big guffaw.
From there we went to visit several other families who were living in small houses, of either wattle & daub buildings, brick, or simply, homes with plant screens for walls. The wattle and daub buildings had experienced some damage from the earthquake in some of them are no longer standing straight, but are slanted…but none of them fell down. Brick & masonry homes did have destroyed wall sections. One fellow in particular was tickled that I asked to photograph his house that he had built. He had built the roof out of sugar cane (similar to thatching), and as you can see in the photo, the underside is neatly lashed to the roof framing. He said because of the roof, the house stays a lot cooler than his neighbours who have steel roofs (makes sense).
From there, one of the villagers told us that there were cock fights going on down the pathway (no roads, as there are no cars in this part of their ‘village’). When in Rome…??? So of course we headed off down the path to the cock fights, where the villagers were sitting around the cordoned off fighting square, and two cocks were already hard at it. It was, of course, hard to watch, but it was fascinating to watch men, women and children alike cheering on their favourite rooster. Martin was preparing to take photos, and a fellow there told him if he took photos, he’d have to pay him (which I thought was well said!). (I think he still managed to take some). At the end, when one rooster lay down, the crowd cheered, and money was exchanged.
I was trying to be careful about taking photos, always asking first, so as not to offend anyone. I really wanted to take a photo of almost everyone I met, as there was such beauty in them. I’m SO thankful for my French, as it makes me feel slightly less like a foreigner (but of course, I’m entirely a foreigner with my white skin, funny clothes, and camera).
We spent over an hour wandering around talking with people, and it was so wonderful. The kids were (mostly) really enthused with us, following us around, but there was one little tyke who was afraid to say hi to me (can’t say that I blame him, actually!). We passed a couple of 100++ year old trees along the way, whose root systems were really incredible!
En route back to Port-au-Prince, once again driving on the pot-hole ridden streets, I am just amazed at the number of people who ride on the top of school buses, dump trucks, and other vehicles. And the way traffic works- people passing others any old way, relying heavily on their horn to let people know when they are in the way.
We topped off the night by a trip to downtown Port-au-Prince to see the gingerbread houses. We stopped on one street, and I was out taking photos, when Martin bumped into someone he knew, Paul, who lives in one of the gingerbread houses. He invited us inside to see the house, where we met his lovely wife as well. The ceilings are 12 or 14 feet high- I couldn't tell which, with extremely wide fancy mouldings. I tried to take a photo of the trim work, but it was too blurry. Their house didn't really get very damaged in the earthquake, which is good. Afterwards, we went to dinner at another gingerbread house, the Oloffson House, where I was regaled by the outdoor Christmas medley graduation ceremony that was going on. Apart from the music, the hotel is quite an amazing building, with really good food (maybe about $10 US a plate, which is expensive for Haiti standards). The setting at the hotel was quite a contrast from all of the homes, tent cities, and villages we had seen earlier in the day. It's hard sometimes not to feel guilty for being so privileged.
Lots of unfinished buildings in Haiti with rebar poking up out of the rooftops.
On our breakfast walk, I spotted these three sleeping dogs- dog days of winter!
A tap-tap (street taxi)- as in Colombia, with the Chiva bus, they are all decorative, and each tap-tap seems to have a name painted on it.
Here's the tiny inside of the bus. They squish in 10 or 12 people, easy!
Can you imagine riding on top of those tires?!!
Here's the lovely women we met who built her own house (behind her), who told me the animated story about keeping peeping toms out of her house. Note the slant of the building...post earthquake. She was so gosh darned adorable!
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