Castiners in Haiti

By Portia Mills *
Rural Haiti may seem an unlikely place for a gathering of Castine “natives.” But on a Friday evening in mid-March, an unexpectedly large group of folks with deep ties to Castine—Danielle and Larry Mutty, their adult son Paul and his daughter Sarah, Joe Kilch, and I—all gathered around a large dinner table to enjoy the evening air and chat with Fr. Marc Boisvert at his orphanage. Fr. Marc is well known to many in Castine from his first diocesan assignment, as well as Pwoje Espwa, the orphanage he founded in 1998....

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the girls of Haiti

Still hope of a future...

Saved from starvation...

At serious risk of teenage pregnancy...

tropical waves bring drama to the skies

Orphans on Ile-a-Vache

fishing the empty waters

...the darndest things

Blan: Looked they burned out the tree!

Timoun: Ya.

Blan: Think there're evil spirits in that hole?

Timoun: Hmm...

Blan: I think there are. Would you sleep in there?

Timoun: (silence)

Blan: Evil spirits...

Timoun: There aren't any. (pause) I'm not afraid of the devil!

Blan: Oh no?

Timoun: Nope! (kicking the air) I'd fight'em.

Blan: (looks at kid)

Timoun: Ya! (still shadow boxing) And 'sides, they burned that tree out to kill the evil spirits. So there aren't any any more. They're gone now.

THE FANTBULOUS FOUR-O

We call ourselves the Fantastic Four. We experience many adventures together (yes that's me on the backhoe).
After a little evening out, we braved our flooded living quarters together. Our names are (left to right in the middle photograph) Portia, Paige, Blood and Erin. We are superheroes. We have incredible powers. We - are - taking - southern - Haiti - by - storm... at least as long as the storms don't take us first (last night was wild).

creepy-crawly things i'm forced to live with

A holy frog, known here as a CRAPO. It's as big as a meaty fist and it's residing in the quad's chapel.

Paige, also known as PAGINA to the Spanish-speaking world or PIDGE to the Creole-speaking world. "Pidge" is my favorite. Say it out loud a few times to yourself.

(guess which one's creepy and which crawly... or is it D, all of the above)

building hope and homes

Denise (AKA: Matante)

Rosmanie

*************************

Pwoje Espwa literally builds hope for over a hundred families in Haiti by facilitating the construction of homes. Cross International funds this work and we help vet the recipients and select the builders. These two homes were built in Camp Perrin, Haiti, the town where Espwa first set down its roots.

bitter-sweet waiting periods

Perhaps some are under the illusion that work in the developing world is fast-paced. I like to refer to my experience working here as "The Great Wait." To give you an idea:

The Cayes-office is dark, there is spotty, slow internet. Charcoal dust and the scents of pig entrails and tripe blow in the window from the neighboring kitchen. Two different sets of computer speakers blast music -- one kompa and the other Celine Dion. Working out at the farm is impossible since the guy who's supposed to set up the internet has said "tomorrow" since last week. A large satellite dish sits on the bottom floor of the quad, secure in its corrugated cardboard, taunting us.

We can't get the Haitian government to recognize our NGO status. An ongoing saga. Every day it's going to happen "tomorrow." This prevents us from participating in round-tables with other organizations in the area. This also prevents funding from major international organizations who would otherwise be able to provide immense help.

Organizing and requesting aid from peripherally located organizations means securing a ride into town, finding a printer that works, printing off the request, driving it half way up a mountain, waiting around, handing over the request, waiting, driving home. This can take up to a whole day, which means that not much else gets done.

EDH (Haiti's national electricity company) hooked up power to our farm. This is awesome except that EDH is highly unreliable... So there are surges and 12-48 hour periods with no electricity at all. Yesterday, since our batteries hadn't been recharged for days, we had no power... We waited and waited and finally were able to get something done on our computers by evening.

Now, the upside to all these "down periods" is that the kids are happy to see us around, hang out with us and harass us. If I let go of my neurotic, American expectations to be on the 'net every day, then I can be very happy out here playing with children and running a backhoe (yes, running a backhoe). Then, too, I recognize the ability to have other kinds of successes.

All these things taken into consideration, it'll be bitter-sweet leaving Haiti behind. Right now I am engaged in a transfer of "power." Paige is meeting my friends around town and learning about some of the projects that I have been working on. She'll pick up the mantel where I leave off in mid-August.

visitors and septic

The quad is exploding with visitors, this time mostly female. Actually, I am going into a bit of a shock because my Haiti experience has been, to date, amidst a bevy of boys. Now there's me, Paige, Dee, Jamie, Angie, Erin, and Kelly. What the HECK?! I know... it's weird. I don't think Fr. Charlie knows what to do.

Yesterday I went to the Uruguayan UN base and begged them to come pump the kids poops again. Lt. Colonel Talagorria agree happily. They are there today, pumping away in the heat.

Fr. Bal, our 83-year-old master carpenter, is leaving us now for good. He's finally retiring. We'll do a little goodbye for him today -- surprise, last minute.

More exciting stories about our adventures to come!

Led around for a string

Portia and Paige trembled with excitement. A trip to town! But despite their elation, they wondered nervously how they would travel from the farm where they lived to the shabby, bustling city. Would Jonny drive them? Fr. Marc? Would they (gulp) have to find a motorcycle? But they both knew, despite the transportation obstacle, getting to town was a must. They had a mission and that mission was………. to find some string.

At 10:00am a sweating Haitian youth rushed into the quad where Portia and Paige sat reading (A Heart Breaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers and My Friend Leonard by James Fry respectively), legs crossed, minds elsewhere.

“Vit. Pócia. Pe-a ap rele’w” (Translation: Hurry. Po-see-a. The father is calling you.)

“Li ale?” (Translation: He’s leaving?)

“Wi!” (Translation: Yes!)

“Di pe-a n’ap vini!!” (Translation: Tell the father we are coming!!)

The two girls ran to their rooms, threw their things into their bags and raced to the entrance of the farm. Weeee!! Everyone piled into the vehicle and the green and cream-colored SUV (built and outfitted especially for hot, third world countries) bumped down the rutted road toward town. First stop: an orphanage called FOCSED (just say it out loud).
Everyone, Fr. Marc, Directors Bertony and Eddie, Paige and Portia, one artisan named Sammy and two kids spilled out of the car like clowns. The amiable director of FOCSED, Junot DesRivaux, also a policeman, showed everyone around and introduced the 19 orphans, the youngest of which entertained everyone by bouncing off of cement walls, skidding across the floor next to the railing-less stairway (hearts in throats), and kicking Sammy the Artisan (much laughter).

Fr. Marc entered an office to “discuss things.” Portia tried awkwardly to make conversation with the mother/cook/babysitter/teacher figure. Paige played hide and seek with a child who, in the States, would most likely (and perhaps wrongly) be labeled ADHD. An hour later, they left. Next stop: La Madonne.At La Madonne, Paige and Portia patiently braved the excessively slow satellite Internet access, squeezed some money out of the financial office, grabbed Sammy the Artisan and departed the front gates West, in the direction of La Cayenne. Before even attempting to locate string, the girls need to fuel their bodies with papaille-au-lait (papaya milkshakes) and chicken BBQ sandwiches.

The unlikely trio trooped through the streets of Cayes together, Paige towering over Portia, Sammy trudging alongside the two “blan-yo,” (whities) complaining the whole time of the heat. Soon they arrived at La Cayenne and entered the dark, windy restaurant – dark because Haitian store-owners do not illuminate their establishments with rows of fluorescent lights, a-la-their American counterparts, and windy because La Cayenne has industrial-sized fans in the corners.

Without much ado, the odd threesome selected a table and ordered their meals. Before too long, the waitress set before them one of the greatest treats available in both the developed and undeveloped world: Papaya milkshakes – thick with crushed ice and fresh milk, colored a vibrant Easter-egg orange by the fresh, blended papaya.

Portia and Paige felt rejuvenated and Sammy beamed, sang to himself – delighted that two girls would buy him lunch and a lunch of papaille-au-lait and sandwich poulet at that. They paid and left La Cayenne behind, onto the next destination, the public market.

The three walked on the side of the street, dodging swirly, brown puddles, unrecognizable blobs, and parked cars, Sammy in front guiding them and Portia and Paige behind, looking this way and that, diverted by the colorful, bustling streets and terrified by erratic motorcyclists who turn left onto streets by driving onto the wrong side of the new road and then quickly crossing over to the right side without warning.

“Pistach! Gen pistach! ” (Translation: Peanuts, I have peanuts!”)

“Mab-yo! Mab-yo! Youn sak mab-yo pou 30 dollar!” (Translation: Marbles, marbles, one sack of marbles for ~$4.00US)

“Cheri, ou beswen youn bel chemis! Gade sa, sa bel pou’w! Ou vle?” (Translation: Deary, you need a beautiful shirt! Look at this, this is perfect for you. You want it?)

Paige and Portia were bombarded left and right by vendors. Sammy, on the other hand, passed unscathed, much akin to the way he and other Haitians cross over busy streets: perfectly, calmly. They looked at thick, nylon string, thin nylon string hanging on the walls of a very American-looking hardware store. They moved on, looking at shoestrings, boot and sneaker length, flat, rectangular and spherical, dark and light. They looked at electrical wire (promptly rejected). They inspected threads (too thin). Finally, a large sweating woman reached into her basket of toys and pulled out a roll of black yarn.

Sammy extracted a small wooden cross from his pocket and inspected the drilled hole at the top, looking to see if the yarn would, in fact, feed through that space. Paige nodded emphatically.

“Wi,” Said Portia.

They forked over a few hundred faded, ripped, greasy Haitian gourdes. Now Sammy and the other artisans had the string they needed to make little, crafty rosaries. Mission complete! The girls wiped their brows with handkerchiefs. Sammy complained of heat again. They began the trek back to La Madonne.

On the return journey, Portia and Paige, walking side by side, became diverted by an in-depth conversation on fashion and shopping. When Sammy asked Portia is she had 5 gourdes, she handed them over distractedly, not missing a beat in the dialogue. The next thing they knew, Sammy had fallen behind, was missing. Paige looked around. Portia called out, “Sammy?” Suddenly, from the right side of the street, a motorcycle took off, crossing in front of them, knocking Paige back on her heels a bit. The girls whipped their heads around.

There was Sammy, seated on the back of a motor-taxi, grinning and waving as the vehicle hastened away from the two shocked Americans. “Tooooo hoooootttttttttt!!!!” The young Haitian artisan cried out, as the taxi driver sped toward La Madonne and out of sight.

(to read another version of the story, go to Paige's page).

Feeble Celebrations

There were no beers on a lawn, no barbecues, no hoards of laughing friends and family, no vacation days, no fireworks. Still, Paige and I donned our red, white and blue in the hopes that there may be a few “Happy Independence Days” launched our way.

No such luck.

However, we were able to coerce Fr. Charlie into a rare photo op in honor of the day. For true musings on the celebration of America's 231 years, read the blog de mon frère. It's touching.

Floppy Hats

Paige (right) comes from Arizona. She studied education and will spend a year here with Espwa working on overhauling the English and art programs. It turns out she and I have other things in common aside from an interest in Haiti and Espwa kids.

bye-bye rasta man

Jonas was walking in Camp Perrin with 4-inch, coiling dreads bouncing rhythmically about his smaller-than-average cranium. As he rounds a corner, a policeman's eye is drawn by sudden movement in the periphery of his "watch." He strides over to Jonas and grips his arm roughly. Jonas -- who carries only a sad collection of innocuous items in his worn backpack and who was doing nothing particularly attention-getting at the time of the encounter -- looks startled.

The cop drags him to the next corner, mostly wordlessly but also faintly mumbling profanities and the word "rasta," to a barber shop. The policeman plunks a miffed Jonas down in the barberchair and orders and old, boney man in the corner to chop the crop of natty coils.

As the barber goes to work with his razor, the officer leans on the wall in the corner of the shop. He wears a smirk. When the barber finishes, Jonas looks clean-shaven but decidedly less cool... even with the earring. The cop plops a few coins in the barbers hand and walks off, greeting his friends outside with a laugh.

travel day tomorrow!

Tomorrow I am flying back to Haiti. I hear that our satellite internet link has been quirky lately, but I'll surely begin posting again from there as soon as I can.

I also noticed that some fellow bloggers have recently added me to their list of favorite blog sites. Thanks for that -- and I'll be adding you too!

bye bye bros... and stuff

Is it strange to have a "clique" of friends that consists primarily of family members? Faces and names in the periphery change slightly from year to year but the ever-constant, related core remains the same? Perhaps it's odd, un-American (I hear it's a more a Latin sort of thing), out of vogue or what have you. Cool or not, that's the way it is in my family...Though I feel I must return to Haiti - even WANT to return to Haiti (this shocks some people, I know) - I will desperately miss this trio. One brother will move to the Left Coast this August, another to Europe and, as I'm off to the Caribbean again, it's clear that we all must and will go our own ways. But still, it's too fun to pretend that if I stayed in the District, time would stand still and we'd continue our time together.
Thursday it's back to Haiti. No more salads, no more cool evenings, no more hanging with the brothers.

It's tragic, growing up.

a brief (if vapid) interlude

"Inside the Frame" intends to shed a spotlight on and provide the occasional snap-shot of life in the region of the world where I experience it. This Friday I'll be back in Haiti and posting and observing from there. For the moment, however, I am in the United States of America. Some of my behavior and choices may seem superficial to the less-than-dedicated reader, but they serve to lend a stark contrast to my everyday life in the Les Cayes area. Forgive me if I offend.

California sunset

So pardon my long absence from the blog-o-sphere. It's not like interesting or remarkable things stop happening the second I land on U.S. soil. On the contrary.

The New York City bars, several weeks ago, were quite a trip (skinny drunk girls in $500 dresses, long flat hair swinging as they rocked to the rap music) after a 7 hour lay-over in the Port-au-Prince airport. In fact, now having traveled a bit more (but no where near as much as this guy), I agree that "Airports themselves are unexceptionally unexacting, unhappy, unsanitary, unpleasant places of waiting." Toussaint Louverture International is no different.

Unfortunately, I spent my first week back in the States battling a mean little Haitian germ. I guess it stowed away somewhere in my GI track for a while and reared its ugly head only when my immune system was debilitated from travel and irregularly late nights. This episode over-lapped with my eldest little brother's (take a minute to figure it out) graduation from Cornell. So instead of romping around campus and reliving the glory days, I lay in a hospital bed clutching my stomach and moaning in agony. I didn't even get to see Soledad speak. :-(

After New York City and Ithaca, I got to hang out in the Washington-Baltimore area for a few days where I marveled at my friend's close relationship with her huge Bengali-Tiger cat named "Baby Cat" (below). Baby-Cat is 4 times the size of my sweet little Teelees and I think they're the same age.

Tilees

Their markings are strangely similar despite obvious physical and temperamental differences. They both like to stalk though.

Then came a California voyage. I landed in Oakland, rented the ritziest SUV in the Enterprise lot, and drove south to Santa Cruz. In retrospect, I should have noted the warning label on the sun visor: "high roll-over risk. Avoid fast maneuvers and high speeds" given that a majority of my drive down the peninsula was on winding mountain roads. The purpose of my voyage? A wedding. Yes, the first of my good friends took the dive. It was a "do-it-yourself" wedding. All those present for the entire weekend stayed in cabins nestled in the redwoods. This select, cabin-bunking crowd, who participated in the bachelor/bachelorette parties, rehearsal dinners and Capitola Beach lunches, chipped in by flower arranging, giving facials, running errands and cooking late-night batches of macaroni.

I returned late last Monday to the District of Columbia with bright pink, California-esque nail polish on my toes and fingers. The Washington, DC area is so boringly conservative at times. At my regular DC-area spa, a manicurist looked down at my vibrant nails with a disapproving frown and said "ve-dy Cal-ee-fo-rrrr-nia."

Sound superficial yet? I even exchanged Brothers Karamazov for The Debutante Divorcée during my stay on the Left Coast. It was a delightfully vapid read.

Since returning to the capital area, I have made it my business to do all the things that are so very Washington: Drinks on the Georgetown waterfront, Latin dancing at Citrón and Rhumba, over-priced dinners comprised of "tasters" and tapas, shopping in Friendship Heights, trips to the Baltimore waterfront, backyard barbecues, and downtown lunches with folks of stature.

On the 14th, I head back to Haiti. Not sure if I am ready yet, but here I go! There are some cool projects coming up and I'll be doing most of the photography for Espwa now that Nick has left, so keep reading for more pics and more on the happenings of this volunteer in le Departement du Sud.

I am looking forward to a hot, sweaty summer in the Caribbean and to you living it vicariously through me via the blog.

Shazam!

some changes

On Thursday I'm heading home for a few weeks. Gotta go to a graduation and a wedding and see some friends and family. I'll be back here by mid-June though!

A volunteer and good friend, Nico, took off for a new job this afternoon. A diocese in Connecticut runs a mission house in Port-au-Prince. Nick landed the position of running this house and overseeing the mission's various projects throughout the city.The kids put on a show in his honor. Some of them sang a song they composed about how they will miss him and see him again one day. The talent show (called a spektak here) was the finest I've see yet. There was a comedy skit -- teenagers dressed up and acting like loud, angry old men. And there was a "remix" of Michael Jackson's "Thriller." Not too shabby.Nick lived in Cayes for two and a half years. He's "moving on" now but he's not moving far. We hope to and expect to see him from time to time -- because the bonds created here last a life time and, well, we'll miss him.