On Day One

I arrived in Port-au-Prince in the morning and spent the next hour and a half in a hanger, trying to get at my luggage through the massive crowd.  At one point, the man next to me decided to deal with the lack of space around the luggage conveyor by pretending the people around him didn’t exist and swinging his luggage off the conveyor into his neighbors.  I was saved from being crushed by a pair of very fashionable young Haitian-Americans who literally held their arms in a protective circle around me until Crazy Man had finished his rampage and then offered to pull my bag off the belt for me. Thank you, Fabulous Green Top Lady and Elegant Sideburns Man!

The PSI driver was waiting for me on the street. A taxi driver grabbed my suitcase from me and carried it to the vehicle, then frowned when I gave him $1 tip.  He wanted $10.  This is the first sign that cost of living isn’t going to be cheap. 

Germain, the driver, spoke a little English and we quickly seized upon a topic of mutual interest: the World Cup.  It became apparent when every single car we passed was festooned in multiple Brazilian flags that Haitians are Brazil fans.  Germain explained, compensating for his limited English vocabulary by repeating phrases for emphasis (a technique I plan to borrow):

Germain: “All of Haiti is bresilien.”

Me: “Really?!”

Germain: “Bresil all the way!  All the way!  All, all, all the way! ALL the way!  ALL THE WAY!  All, all, all the way.”

Me: “Wow.”

Germain: “Many bresiliens!  Many, many, many, many, many!  Bresil is VERY big!  Very, very, very, very very big! VERY!”

And so on.  Germain is an Argentina fan.  I feel a little bad for him given the total canvassing of Brazilian flags across town.  Seeing all those flags made me giggle.  It also made me nervous.  What if Brazil disappoints?  Will the whole nation mourn?  Don’t they have enough to be sad about already?  Why not put your eggs in a few baskets, eh, Haiti? [A few days later, Brasil beat Cote d'Ivoire 3-1.  I had a delay on my TV but knew we were about to score from the roar of excitement from the city]

We passed piles of concrete rubble all over the sidewalks.  Many of the buildings are untouched.  One or two are completely flattened, including what Germain told me was a hotel in which many people, including his friend, died.  Looking at what’s left, it’s hard to imagine a hotel there.  The PSI office is around the corner – it’s a small compound of buildings on a hill about 45 minutes from Port-au-Prince and the epicenter of the quake.

I was in travel clothes and suffering from lack of sleep when I met the tiny, American country director, Alison.  We chatted until lunch, which we had at a charming little café nearby.  I was dumbfounded that such a place existed and that it was operating normally.  Alison said that a couple of months ago, the main supermarkets were stocking out of food because UN food aid ships were clogging the defunct harbor.  Other boats couldn’t get in.  It sent Haitians with money into a panic – it wasn’t appropriate for them to get food rations when they could pay for food, but at the same time, the supermarkets couldn’t get at their stocks which were anchored outside the harbour. 

[note: if during the course of this blog I start ranting about the UN, please call me out – that soapbox is already overcrowded]

In the afternoon, I met with the Director of Programs and the heads of the social marketing, HIV, maternal and child health, and research teams.  One of the first questions I was asked was what my expectations were of what I would be doing here are.  Uhm….that’s a tough one. I didn’t even know what their programs were yet.  Also, I hadn’t slept in a while.  They seemed to be expressing a desire for support while also demanding to know in exactly what way I could do that.  It was a bit much for me to deal with, but I would rather to be working with people eager to start addressing weaknesses than with people who refuse to see that there are areas in which they can do better.