raging storms

Some dark clouds show in the horizon, roll up over steep mountains and proceed to sweep southwest. The air is heavy full of potential. Sometimes, dark clouds gather only to drift swiftly away and dissipate out at sea. Sometimes, the storm lets lose its fury of rain and wind and lightning. One never really knows when or whether the storm will strike until it does. Last night the sky blazed – it was a beautiful little tempest.
An uprising here must, in some ways, be like a rainstorm here. The social mood, like the weather, is never quite settled. Sometimes tension mounts only to ebb quickly thereafter. As history testifies, this is not always the case in Haiti. Dark moods intensify, like the thunderheads in the horizon, and release their fury without much warning. Just the other week in Madame Comb, the town next to Castel-Pere, two cousins got into a fight. The fight, fueled by a hot workday and some moonshine, resulted in one cousin shooting the other. On-lookers swiftly avenged the death and stoned the murderer to death. By the time UN police arrived at the scene, the spontaneous crematorium was already raging. The storm had passed, leaving destruction in its wake.