May 4St. Mary, Jamaica.
There are palaces next to shanties with exposed rebar here. I’m struck by how poor many Jamaicans are. Staying in dorms on bunkbeds, and it’s hot as hell. My soap leaked all over my toiletries, so I may be shampooless. I like the group and am excited but I miss home and my bed and everything. I feel like I’ll sleep for a week when I get home. It’s gorgeous here and I do catch the breeze, which is scented by Bobo’s cigar smoke (he claims it helps keep away mosquitos). It’s pleasant except for how hot the bed is. So, yeah. I’m here. Orientation starts at 9.
May 5Ali let me borrow her macbook so I emailed Mom, Dad, Dustin, and Dan to let them know I’m here and safe. Orientation is about to start. It was almost impossible to sleep last night which makes me wonder if chloroquine can contribute to sleeplessness. I found myself reading outside on the cool concrete steps, trying to catch the breeze and forgetting how hot my mattress would be.
The parish hall, where we eat and are meeting, is large and has a stage and many sets of doors, kept open on both sides to allow air flow. There are fans but they drown out voices, so we have to speak loudly or be hot. I asked Mike, who is a construction veteran from DC, about the exposed rebar and he said it is a way to leave open the option of expansion, towards, since the lots are so small, at least around here.
This is a lively group, mostly young Canadians. We’re all so driven and so ready to be there and rather idealistic, I guess, but not in the way that many Emory students I knew would be. I am so impressed with every story I hear from everyone, even if I was really cranky with many of the volunteers last night, due to how sound echoes like crazy here and the heat. We talked about the compound today, how outsiders stay outside, how we’re on the edge of the tent cities in Jacmel, and all I could think of were zombies, of how David and I used to jokingly plan for a zombie apocalypse and what a compound for us would look like, and there’s a lot of overlap here, except obviously Haitians don’t want your brains; they want money, water, food, clothing, whatever you can give. They generally are friendly, Larry tells us. Larry is our operations and security training guy, and will be getting us through customs and to the compounds. He’s got a background as a psychologist, a martial artist, a jazz musician, a teacher, and in HIV/AIDS education procrams, and now he partners with Nadine. Nadine worked for the UN for many years in disaster and emergency logisitics, and ended her tenure there in Indonesia, where there was always a disaster to respond to. Her involvement in this began while she was in Indonesia, January 12th, and she flew over here to Jamaica, researching and juggling emails all the way from Jakarta to Kingston. She’s Jamaican by birth, but has lived all over. Oh, and she’s a yogini! Amazing! So those are our fearless leaders for orientation.
I don’t miss home as much in the daytime; there is always someone to talk to, even if there isn’t much to do. Larry tells me there is an organization specializing in safe and natural childbirth in Jacmel who I can interview for Dr. Foster. He says there’s no prenatal care to speak of, though, otherwise. I’m curious about maternal and infant mortality, birthweight, delivery methods.
Just found out- I’m going to Jacmel, on an 18 seater charter plane, on Saturday morning. Waiting to start a yoga class with Lisa.
May 6Unsurprisingly I slept so much better last night. The combination of sleep deprivation, rum, and now familiarity with my location really helped. Got a few more mosquito bites. It’s so odd to think that our group is splitting up on Saturday! It’s not like we’ve all known each other for long, but these are the only people I know here so I claim them as mine, to some extent, in my head. We’re told to hang out with our compound groups more, which did happen last night at Glenn’s. Cathryn, Julia, Bobo, oddle, Gill, and I were the last people at the bar and comprise six of the nine Jacmel crwe. The other three are Stephanie, Michael, and Ali. The group is a good one, I hope, and we’re building the dynamic.
Some notes from orientation:“Y’all look like you slept way too well. That is NOT part of the training.”- Larry.
A taptap is a light truck with benches in the bed; garishly painted; hop on, hop off.
Don’t no-show for meals, or church. Preval is still head of gv’t, but there’s no infrastructure. Other NGOs we will see: UN, MSF, but we’ll wait and see. The disaster relief people have already left. UN is moving Pinchinat camp to a safer place for rainy season- about 7000 people. We’re in the pipeline to help with paperwork. Both camps have four people each from previous rotations.
Getting through cusoms and immigration. Do not move as an individual- stay together as a group.
“I’ll say, ‘Nous sommes un organization humanitaire. Il y a dix personnes.’ And then you’re all standing there with your ID badges around your necks and smiling so it looks legit.”
“What if they try to tax our luggage at customs?” “You tell them to go to hell!”
Obviously we had more orientation today, about the compounds, landing in Haiti, culture, and the current situation. Larry’s method of conveying information is story telling, which I prefer. We end up hearing a lot of anecdotes, including this one:
The first time we were in Haiti, there was a woman on the plane from Ireland, a sister, like a lot of volunteers back then. Sister Anna. She was going to Port-au-Prince, to a clinic, and I could tell she was feeling really nervous and trepidatious. I told her, “Sister, this private plane is your last privilege; all privileges end here, Sister.” When we landed, I tried to carry her suitcase, but she wouldn’t let me, so we walked to the first gate together, me with my backpack and her pulling her little rolling suitcase. Back then, you could just walk in, no immigration. I gave her my number, and said, “Sister, call me if you need anything.” Later, I got back here and she’d called twice- it was Nadine’s phone, actually- always with the same thing. “I’m alone, I am abandoned, this clinic is just some cots, there’s only one old woman here.” We tried and we tried to get ahold of her, but I never heard anything back.After a brief silence, Ali cut in, “Wait, that’s it? That’s the whole story?!”
“Not every story in Haiti ends happily! We can make up an ending: And then she went back to Ireland and was safe and sound.”
Larry talks a lot about “back then”, which sounds like more time than it is- he means right after the earthquake in January. Completely insane how things have changed since then. The compound is pretty nice, all things considered: two bathrooms, a roof over our tents, power outlets. I’m kind of irritated with how GVN made the conditions sound. I bought these water treatment tablets I don’t need, I could have brought my laptop, more books, tank tops. I hate feeling like the situation was so misrepresented to me and being so damned overheated.
May 7People started their malarone within the last few days. Chelsea woke us all up, hollering about a spider, nearly hyperventilating. A lot of people in this group are easily squicked by rats, spiders, roaches, all of which we have an abundance of here at Madge Saunders in Jamaica. This morning, I was putting in contacts while Ali and Chelsea were brushing their teeth, and Chelsea asked, “Is that rat poop in the sink?” Sure enough, it was. While I’m not afraid of rats, it’s still pretty gross. There was also a kerfluffle while I was in the shower. “Did the rat come back again?”
“No, it’s a roach the size of a rat!”
Not scary, but still pretty gross. Hopefully we as a group won’t have too many nightmares, malaria-drug-related or otherwise.
(later) Went to Dunn’s River Falls today, where we climbed the falls twice and were thoroughly soaked. I ended up removing my shirt and wore just my bra and shorts- I didn’t bring my bathing suit because I thought I’d be working all the time and not have time to do fun stuff. I had a lot of fun, took some pictures, fell on my ass a few times. I feel really good! Strong, capable, really “on”.
That said, right now I am feeling a bit cynical, maybe as a cover for my fear that we will accomplish nothing by being there, just babysitting or providing busywork. If we teach French or English, what happens when we leave? Will the next group pick up our lesson plans? Are we going to have access to rotations 1 and 2’s lessons? God, I hope so. I worry, too, that I cannot balance compassion and sense, that I will want to adopt every child and give out a bunch of handouts. The video we watched of one of the camps in late January had a phrase that rang true, rang hard, rang familiar: “the dignity of work”, instead of “the indignity of handouts”. Providing marketable skills and a niche in which to use them is, in my mind, radically important. I prayed- well, I guess it was more like meditation- a lot today- to have compassion and love for everyone I come into contact with, whether in or out of the compound; for safety; for my health; for an alert mind to see both dangers and opportunities. I hope I can have all these things and harness them to do as much as I can, as hard as I can, in my time in Haiti. The next time I write, I will be in transit. Here comes that cliff-jumping feeling again.
