Well it has been a long hiatus from blogworld as I begin to sort out the complex world of Haitian politics, culture and the people who arrive to work in its milieu. But even while I spend time reading the news, take a break in the Dominican Republic meet people from other NGOs (non governmental organisations - read charities) with larger experience here than mine, Haiti never stops evolving, never stops marking its place, its bookmark in our conscience and heart. As the world put away its Christmas decorations and vacuumed the confetti from the office carpets, Haiti marked a day of solemn remembrance for the dead and survivors of the January 12th, 2010 Earthquake that claimed 300,00 people and altered the lives of so many more forever. And while its politics have remained up in the air; elections held and contested with everyone from Hillary Clinton to the man on the street voicing an opinion: life still has to go on, families fed, kitchens cleaned, schools reopened; farms tended, roads travelled, livelihoods earned.
The Day of Remembrance was eerily quiet as it was announced that it would be a day of business and school closings. The streets almost empty but for the market vendors who's only living is made selling their fruits and vegetables, small household toiletries, soaps, lotions, candles, hot fried pastries, raw sugar cane, chiclets. A day off is a day without pay, and surely in a nation where few can afford to stockpile food, someone will need some eggs, a few tomatoes, beans, some laundry detergent, a new belt for Mass.
Their instincts are born out to be correct. There were Mass and Services held throughout the day and many people walking the streets in their sunday best. Gone are the usual smiles of greeting; each engaged in thier own private ritual of mourning for a lost life, lost home, lost livelihood. Little traffic, no groups of friends chatting noisily on, few school children, except those dressed for church held in tow by a well dressed parent. Poverty is not something ever allowed to be shown publicly. You will never see soiled clothing, old shoes or tears in Port Au Prince except among the very destitute, or foreigners. Only crisp starched shirts and pleated trousers, shined patent leather and billowing cotton pattern dresses. Shoe shiners cluster in groups on street corners, usually at least one is engaged with a customer while he chats with his fellow buffers.
I feel removed from thier grief. I was not here when a poorly built supermarket roof collapsed killing three hundred in minutes. I cant know the horror of 200 tourists and foreign aid workers at the Hotel Montana, perched high on a hill giving sumptuous views of the Harbor collapses on them like a sand castle at the beach. Or the thousands of unknown people newly arrived in the Capital from outlaying provinces to make their way in the big city. Their story will never be told. These are the casualties that now make up the collective consciousness of the Haitian people. I am an onlooker like the gawkers at a fire, the car that slows down to watch the gruesome aftermath of a car accident on the road, the witness to a police arrest of questionable validity. I feel like an intruder: the sun still shines, a light breeze cools me off as I climb to the Basilica of St Pierre which was untouched even as the Catherdral in the Center of the city fell to ruins. This day is still a sunny day in the tropics of leisure and reflection for a middle class, middle aged man from New England.
As if in biblical foreshadowing, the money changers hold sway on the front steps, and a lively group of persistant beggars from dirty children to women who could easily be sixty and yet have infants at their breast harrass all who enter and exit. An older man makes the rounds inside the church, shaking hands, and waiting to greet his new firends outside in case they have some change still in thier pocket. There are clearly tears in the eyes of people assembling and some support from shoulders, many proffered hugs and shared glances. The scene is played out throughout the Nation only the more intense in the hardest hit sections, Port Au Prince, Leogane, While much of the island was untouched, the largest and most densely populated areas were hardest hit and the mortality shows the results.
It is a year later and there are still many houses and businesses in ruins. The cracked dishevelled piles of all the great buildings of the Capital are still in place, like ancient Rome after the collapse of empire. No money has been spent removing them and they stand a mute reminder of Haiti's psychic,economic and physical collapse. A year later there are still people living by the tens of thousands in tarp covered wood frames on dirt floors. Still aid workers scrambling to prevent outbreaks of disease in crowded settlements, sanitation teams wrestle with minimum amenities like showers, sinks, and toilets, and their effluent in spaces thrown together in days. Cuban Doctors arrive in well organised teams dispensing free medical care to all who show up at the hospitals and clinics. It has been many years since the white United Nations trucks, jeeps and tanks with armed soldiers arrived to patrol steets to prevent uprisings or violence. A year later and the country still waits the influx of promised aid, held up as much by the mistrust in the coming government, as by the clearly unsavory group that is leaving office in disgrace.
A year later plans are barely drawn up for what is rumored to be a complete revamping of the capital into a place of Parks, Collonades, Government Offices, A New Cathedral, Public Gardens, in the classical tradition of Esplanades, Grandes Allees, Public Markets and Commerce mixed with Housing and Pedestrian Traffic. Neatly detailed, precisely drawn, labelled, measured. The diagrams and hand colored sketches reimagining what Port Au Prince would be like in a parallel universe of functioning governm and normalcy. Leaders who give to the people instead of to their friends. Politics which work together to tackle the challenges of the Western Hemisphere's poorest nation. The Carribbean Sea's poorest island. The worlds broken promise of aid and assistance on a day of sorrow, grief and sunshine. PAP January 12 2010.
The Palace Perdu
It had been such a beautiful Beaux Art Neoclassical building
