I made it to PAP. I rode in the back of the bus, which I was warned not to since every time I would hit a bump I'd go flying. This didn't turn out to be the case, luckily. I paid my 25 gourdes, which I was willing to double since I was essentially taking two people's space with my baggage. A man came back and sat next to me. He said he's a Haitian doctor, who recently lost his job doing mobile clinics with Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF).

MSF had two of their people kidnapped (and returned within days) in Port-au-Prince and now this Haitian doctor doesn't have a job. He told me he was in a meeting on January 12th at the Montana and left at 4:20. Had he left half an hour later, he would've been dead.

Finding any Haitian doctor unemployed seems criminal to me, especially now. Many Haitians responded with free care immediately after the earthquake, but now, months later, are facing massive bills. With billions of dollars donated, who is going to help Haitian institutions pay their bills? If Haiti is supposed to become self sufficient, international NGO's cannot allow these few and small institutions fall apart. Josiane Hudicourt-Barnes was responding early on, even photographing the dead, if I recall correctly from the Corbett List early on post-earthquake. Now, she's facing a big financial problem. The Washington Post is reporting that other clinics are having the same problem as a steady supply of international doctors come in to give necessary care.

The question is: How can Haiti rebuild destroyed institutions and maintain current ones while still accepting international aid, essentially free competition?

Switching back to my day, I arrived in Martissant and hopped on a moto for more than I should've paid, but I just wanted to get out. I'm not too comfortable on the tail end of a motorbike, especially with a huge rucksack between me and the driver. We drove through Chan Mas, which smelled like sewage. With Queens of the Stone Age's "Everybody Knows That You're Insane" stuck in my head, we zig zagged through streets and almost hit a woman who wasn't looking. I swore at her in English, my driver swore at her in Kreyol (all I picked up was "kaka"). I'm glad I went to the bathroom before I left Leogane.

I arrived at Delmas 33 and dropped my stuff. I saw a few people I recognized, but no SOIL folks. I picked up Leslie Desmangles' Faces of the Gods for a few minutes before the heat lulled me into a nap on the tile floor. I awoke a couple hours later to find a certain SOIL person had just pissed on the bathroom floor, trying to use a toilet bag being piloted at the moment. Always a unique experience with a little toilet humor.

Monday devastated me. I spent the day working at the clinic again. Early in the morning a baby came in. An interpreter pointed the mother out since they didn't have a standard sheet, but a handwritten referral as we sometimes see from other clinics. I pushed her to the front of the line after looking at her infant.

Her head was clearly too large and her eyes were dialated and fixed. She was 40 days old. The doctor stood up and walked two steps toward me, clearly shaken, and said, "I just want to cry." That shook me coming from a doctor. She paused, then continued saying that this was the second baby like this that morning. Since I was the clinic runner she gave me instructions: "Go to the white house and talk to the coordinators about arranging a ride to Project Medishare in Port-au-Prince. We can't do anything here for her. If they can't arrange a ride, then we're basically done here."

I stayed through my 2 hour break to help out after that. This week's crew is short-staffed and losing all of the runners at once wasn't going to help. People in lines outside were getting angry, standing in the heat for hours, many in pain. I took a short break later in the day. The woman sat for a couple of hours with her daughter and only once we had a ride arranged was she notified just how serious her daughter's condition was. I went back to Belval Plaza exhausted and slept for almost two hours before dinner.

Tuesday morning I came in and got a radio call for a runner. I came to find the woman and her baby. She missed the shuttle to Port-au-Prince. She had been there since 4am, but somehow missed the shuttle.

Besides that Tuesday was less stressful and less busy, but I clearly needed a break. Today I signed up for house cleaning, which is a disgusting task (we throw our used toilet paper into waste baskets, which get cleaned everyday). I took the afternoon off and packed to go. After 30 days we're required to take a break. I'm a little early, but it's necessary.

I'm heading to Port-au-Prince tomorrow and I have two options. I could take the "shuttle" we have for $80, splitting it with other occupants (but there won't be any) or I can take public transport, which is about 25 gourdes (65 American cents). Guess which route I'm going.

I'm crashing in Delmas 33 Thurs. night, getting picked up by my friend Andy on Friday morning, and heading to Santo Domingo for the weekend. I'll crash in Delmas again Sunday and head up the mountain Monday morning to visit Vivian. I'm excited for the weekend because I'll be with great people, visiting new places, and relaxing. I will not be bringing my laptop so you will likely not hear from me for about a week.

Peace!

I spent three days this week at the Rousseau site with a really good crew. People worked hard in the heat, were sensitive to all of the kids and people in the area, and there were good conversations. By Friday I had run out of tshirts to wear, since they've either been stolen or were in the wash (probably waiting to be stolen). It's kind of astounding to me that an organization can fly into a disaster area, set up a decent sized operation, yet thinks it an insurmountable task to keep people's laundry in their own possession...oh well.

On Friday I did an orientation at the Nursing school next door where Notre Dame and the Worldwide Village and the Filariasis study are running daily clinics and a field hospital. I shadowed Eleanor in the afternoon, who had been working as an interpreter (fluent in French, picking up some Kreyol).

Yesterday I went back to help out. My Wilderness First Responder training is helpful, but language skills would be more helpful. I started in triage taking people's blood pressure, pulse, and temperature. Within a couple minutes Gabe came in and sat down to do the same work, but faster and with more experience. I helped interpret.

I had worked on a lot of vocab before coming in Saturday and went from there. When I clearly couldn't understand something I could pull another interpreter from a few feet away. Lots of fever, diahrrea, loss of appetite, etc. We saw cases of scabies, women unsure of pregnancy or unwanting, a man with a large swollen stomach, and a case of measles.

Early in the morning a woman brought her two year old son in. He was unresponsive. We checked to see if he was breathing, which he was, but decided to run him over to the field hospital. There he woke up and started crying. His stomach clearly looked problematic, but whether it was malnutrition or something else, I don't know.

We returned to our spot in the clinic where a chicken decided to lay an egg in our corner, about four feet away. It was annoying to say the least.

I took a short break for lunch and returned to find a turkey wandering into the tent, which I then had to chase out. I don't think I've actually seen a turkey in Haiti before, but there were three of them hanging around our door.

I left the clinic/hospital/nursing school feeling good about the day, but it's definitely heavier work than smashing rubble. Rubble work has its moments, especially when you find personal effects, or family members tell their story, but you mostly focus on the work. The work at the clinic is work that shouldn't be there in a lot of cases. These people come in with easily treatable diseases that have festered for years due to a lack of health care.

Switching gears a bit, I've received all of my offers from grad schools and I'm weighing them. It's hard to do until I know about a few financial applications which won't come for a few weeks, but I'm leaning toward U of London SOAS due to cost, length of program, and quality. Nothing's set of course.

My friend Andy and his wife are coming out to visit today. Next week I have to take at least 3 days away from the base for mental health. Andy invited me to Santo Domingo so if that offer still stands I should be spending my first time in the D.R. I haven't had a huge desire to go, but why pass it up? Time to grab an egg sandwich e bannan ak pikliz. orevwa.

I haven't had time to really write much, but I thought I'd post some things that I either sent to one or two of you or began writing, but was interrupted. You won't find anything uplifting in this post so don't read if that's what you're looking for. That said, these are very small portions of my day, the little or big disappointments that you live with, ignore, avoid, etc.


Making Friends - March 18th
I was in a tap tap heading to a site yesterday when this guy started talking about Vodou. He said that people get to choose their own devils, whatever devil they wanted to talk to. Someone asked if he wanted to go to a ceremony and he said "No, I don't want to talk to any devils." at which point I said "There is no devil." He said, "yeah, you get to choose whichever one you want to talk to." I elaborated, saying there is no such thing in Haitian Vodou. He said, "There is, this guy on the street told me." I told him he was talking to a Christian, in which case there is a devil, but not in Vodou. He said "Well, I guess we'll agree to disagree." I said, "I'm not agreeing to anything because you're wrong."

I don't think we'll be friends.

Mental Health Breaks - March 16th

A Haitian-American woman here in Leogane just returned from a 4 day mental health break. We're required to take them after being here 30 days (we work 6/week, have Sundays off). She went up to see her family in the mountains. Beforehand they went to Petionville where she witnessed a body being pulled from the rubble. She thought it was a dog because it was so small and shriveled, but it was a man. A short while later a woman was shot in the back of the head, her body laid on the ground twitching as her killer robbed her. My friend sat in her car in traffic next to this scene.

She told me this at a rubble site in Leogane today as we were working to remove large sections of rebar, smashing through the strong ceiling of a collapsed home. So much for mental health breaks.

Mapous - March 12th

I asked one of the HODR interpreters if there were any mapous around Leogane. He said "no" and added: "Everywhere there is a mapou there is a devil."

Here's a video with pictures that I shot, recorded, and edited over the past week or so.