A Week in Mombin Crochu (northeastern Haiti) -- Day 2

Beautiful countryside seen on our trip today.

Tuesday, July 16

In the morning Adelin asks me if I “don't have anything he can throw away for me.” He means the pee basin. Thankfully, I was able to tell him that I'd already emptied it.

I'll be riding with Adelin today, and Osse will drive Eric.  Did I say that the roads were bad between Cap Haitien and Mombin Crochu?  Well, it's true -- but the roads even further up the mountains are even worse. I've been around this area via both truck and motorcycle before. The driver has his feet down lots of the time for balance. Adelin's motorcycle doesn't have a working horn, which is unfortunate, since these are rocky, curvy, rutted, mountain roads and we drive all over the road to find the best path.

Just like in the US, when passing people in rural areas in Haiti you greet them. When we would pass by people that Osse or Adelin knew, they often say, “Woy, woy, woy” and the other driver responds, “Okay, okay, okay!” For people that are not known as well, it's a head nod and, “Gentlemen,” or “Ladies and Gentlemen.”

It's ridiculously beautiful here. I'm also getting a good workout – I posted the following on my Facebook:

I have come up with a new interval workout -- traveling by motorcycle through the mountains of northeastern Haiti. You start out with an arm workout (holding the back of the motorcycle to stay on). You switch to legs periodically: lifting them up high as you cross rivers and go through mud puddles, or jamming your feet into the footholds to keep from sliding into the driver on steep downhills, or getting off the bike and hiking up the mountain when it's too steep/rough for the moto to carry two.

It's steeper than it looks in the picture!  I've jumped off to walk up the hill.

I am humbled, for the millionth time, at the hard work that my brothers and sisters do to transform their communities. Adelin worked part time for a USAID/PLAN project doing HIV/AIDS prevention, which is how he got this motorcycle. It needs a new chain, which he hasn't been able to find, so he greased it before we started out this morning. Somehow because he also needs new “sprockets” the motorcycle can't haul us both up every mountain. He doesn't want to push it and risk breaking something. Once even he has to get off and push his motorcycle up the last stretch – I can't imagine how hard this is with a heavy bike.

Yet another hill too steep for this bike's current condition -- as I watch while walking up from below, Adelin has to get off and push his bike the rest of the way.

Today's trip is to the village of Bois de Laurence, where they've asked volunteers from the surrounding villages of Mapou, Lagwamit, Venbal, Birèl, Derrière Garde, and Sylvestre to come and share their stories. (Stay tuned, because I'll put their stories up next!)

After I'm done typing everyone's stories, Osse, Eric, and Adelin meet with the local trainers and answer questions.  Phone signals aren't always good out here and the bad roads (and lack of finances for travel) make it difficult for our master trainers to get out here as often as they would like.   Soon, however, they decide we should get going, since it looks like rain.  Thankfully we get back "home" to Mombin without any rain -- the clouds changed direction.

When I stay at someone's house I like to figure out something that I can do to contribute – here it looks like that is washing dishes. The first two days there is water in the reservoir at the house (it dried up after that and someone's job was to go to the pump closer to the village for water for us). I fill up two tubs for washing and rinsing and set the dishes in a laundry basket to drain. Washing dishes is one of my favorite household tasks. It's only slightly complicated here by the fact that there are stinging ants all around. So every few minutes I have to pause and jump around, scratching one foot with the other, stung again.

One of the guys sees me jumping around and asks if it's the ants. I tell him it's a shame they're the stinging kind, and he says that most ants he knows sting. He says they call non-stinging ones, “crazy ants.” I ask why and he says, “Well, because they don't sting!”

Throughout the night I realize that I'm using my basin several times a night. It's probably more than normal because I deliberately dehydrate a bit during the day so as not to have trouble while traveling. Then I drink a lot of water in the evening to make up for it. But again, the walls in the house do not go all the way up to the ceiling. Although the basin I've got is pretty shallow, it still seems extremely loud to me and, well, you know how time seems to be fluid? Sometimes lasting longer and other times passing by quickly? I swear it takes me five minutes to empty my bladder each time – enough time for every man in the house to wake up and think, “Is she peeing again? What is with her?” Sigh.

T-shirts seen around the village from a campaign we were a part of -- the phrase chosen for this HIV/AIDS prevention campaign is, "Control your pleasures to protect your life."

A week in Mombin Crochu (northeastern Haiti) -- Day 1

A girl and her goat in Mombin.

If you know much about Haiti, you've probably heard the unemployment statistic -- it varies somewhat depending on who's measuring it, but it's generally agreed to be around 80%.  (Meaning only 20% of people are formally employed.)  A friend of mine, Claudin, has been unable to find work -- not surprising, with those numbers. When he was my neighbor I would sometimes share my food with him, but he got married last year and moved farther away.  I really don't have the contacts to help him find a job.  I ask our wise director, Osse, if he can think of anything.  He tells me that some years ago Claudin taught a dance class for the kids in his hometown -- Mombin Crochu -- and they keep asking when he'll come back.  Osse says everyone loved the dance class -- and also that there isn't much entertainment for the kids in Mombin. (Mombin Crochu is several hours from Cap Haitien by bad roads. I've been there three times before, and we had significant vehicle troubles on two of the trips.) 

I need to go to Mombin anyway, since a lot of our CHE programs are in the surrounding villages and one of my tasks this summer is to gather stories from people who've been involved with CHE. Osse is more than willing to plan two trips in one:  I'll personally sponsor dance classes while traveling to surrounding villages with our volunteer trainers to gather stories for work.

Monday, July 15

We set out for Mombin on two motorcycles – I'm riding with Osse and Claudin and his wife Roselande are riding with Osse's son, Nono.  We stop in La Victoire, where Osse's sister lives.  

We sit on the front porch of Osse's sister's house.  Little kids pass by with empty jugs to collect water for their households.  They stop to smile at the strangers (that's us).

Osse tells us his sister has prepared “a little coffee” for us.   I am reminded of the Minnesotan phrase “a little lunch" as we enter the house:  in this picture you can see  spaghetti (breakfast food here in Haiti), bread, bananas, and -- oh, yes -- coffee!

From left to right:  Osse, his sister, Claudin, and Roselande.

Nono then leaves with Claudin and Roselande so they can start the dance class. Osse and I stay so that I can talk with some of the people in this town. They haven't started a full Community Health Evangelism (CHE) program but use a lot of the tools and want to tell me some stories of the positive changes they've seen.

It's only about a half an hour to Mombin from here. Unfortunately, just after we start out we see the dark clouds coming. The rain hits us when we're about 10 minutes away. We stop and I put on a poncho, Osse's covers his backpack with a sack. I'm praying quite a bit because these are dirt roads in the mountains, and I'm thinking this rain is making them slippery. I found out later that it is apparently not so bad while raining (except I suspect the driver can't see well). Osse says that it's really just after it stops raining that it becomes dangerously slippery. So I should be glad that it poured until we reached his house!

In the late afternoon I head down to see how Claudin's dance class is going. We are running a generator for the music, but there are no lights at all in the room. It's made even darker because most of the shutters are closed so the many bystanders can't see in so well– the kids will include this dance in a show they have in their community in August. In the evening the kids don't want to leave, they keep saying they're not tired!

Here's Claudin giving one of the kids some extra help.  The dots on the photo are due to dust -- out in the rural areas there is still dust everywhere despite lots of sweeping!

We walk back to Osse's house and I'm told “there's water in the shower,” meaning the bucket in the ceiling-less outdoor room is full. Thinking South Pacific– remember Mitzi Gaynor singing, “I'm gonna wash that man right outta my hair"?  Makes me smile every day I bathe here.

Osse and his family moved to Cap Haitien a few years ago and Adelin, one of our trainers, lives in their house to take care of it. But there are somehow about 10 young guys here! It turns out that only a few of them stay overnight, but during the day they come to fix motorcycles and hang out with Nono. Most are related, but a few are just friends. Osse and his son stay in one room, Adelin and Osse's wife's younger brother stay in another, and two guys sleep on the floor in the main room. I'm in the middle room. As in many houses around the world, the walls don't reach up to the ceiling. This means that you can hear the slightest movement in the room next to you – and all the rooms are next to me – as if it were in your room. I wonder what married couples do.

Here's the window and wooden shutter in my room -- I'm told to lock both it and the bedroom door at night.  Feeling very Jane Austen.

Sin City

On my way to Las Vegas for a medical course today I decided that since I almost always travel alone, it's a good thing I self-entertain.  Here are some of my traveling observations:

• I discovered today that there are women in Minnesota who wear glittery jeans! (I've been told not to there, although they have been THE THING when I've beenin Arizona, Haiti, Argentina, and the Dominican Republic.) Turns out that Minnesotan women definitely prefer jeans with bling when they're going to Las Vegas.
• I've never been on a plane with this many tipsy people! Must be the destination. It's okay, though, because this way when I laugh out loud at my book (Cold Comfort Farm) I don't feel nearly so conspicuous.
• The drunk mother-daughter duo behind me are finally quiet, having falling asleep (very sad).  Now I overhear portions of my seat companions' conversation, “She always wears the same clothes: those sweatpants, d—m windpants – Packers. Nothing about her ever changes.”  I really want to know more.
• As we land I see signs for Cirque du Soleil, reminding me of the only other time I was in Las Vegas – I went to a medical conference and our alumni association had an evening reception and discounted tickets for the show “Ka.” Turns out a picture of me from that night was the only good one I had when it came time to print my missionary prayer cards– cracked me up every time I saw it, thinking of how it sounded to say that the photo on my prayer cards was taken at a bar in Vegas!
• On the ride to the hotel I learn from a billboard that Oprah calls David Copperfield, “The greatest illusionist of our time.” Impossible to see the word “illusionist” without hearing it said by that guy in Arrested Development. Turns out there's some stiff competition for David C, since Criss Angel is actually “the greatest illusionist in the world.”  If you can believe a billboard, that is.
• I learn from the TV in the cab (yup, there's a TV in the cab) that Bon Jovi and the Pet Shop Boys are actually alive and well (and playing in Las Vegas).

It's kind of a bummer to be here on my own, especially since the last time I was with here I was with my good friend Jenny and her family. Of course, there was disappointment on that trip, too – this Ocean's 11 fan found out that the fountains at the Bellagio aren't actually timed to great music (in the movie it's Debussy) but rather to kitschy pop songs.

There are many, many more things to be sad about here -- a traveling billboard advertises that they will "deliver girls right to your door, call now!"  I am reminded of what I read this morning in Matthew 11:  Jesus tells us to come to him, all of us who are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and he will give us rest.  Even so, come, Lord Jesus, and be our shepherd.

On a much needed break during the school screening yesterday!

Hi!  I'm traveling in Petit Goave -- southern Haiti -- this week.  Our team is posting at http://haiti.rezmissions.org

Fish Bones (or, Things Are More Complicated Than You MIght Think)

During each of the years 2010, 2011, and 2012 I endured at least four weeks with very little sleep.  The heat was impossible here in the Caribbean, and what you can work with during the day is not the same as what you can sleep with at night.  I would pass the nights going from my bed – where the mattress and pillows seemed to be radiating heat – to the cooler floor, where my 40+-year-old bones couldn't take the pain.  I racked my brain, thinking of what I could do.  The fan (when the electricity worked, which thankfully was more often than not) cooled the parts of my body that were exposed.  But I couldn't sleep in my birthday suit since my bed is right next to a large window that other residents walk by.  I enlisted the help of friends, but we couldn't figure out a way to cover the windows adequately while still allowing air in.

I kept fantasizing about ice, but the refrigerator at my pension's lodgings was frequently on the fritz, and ice was, well, a hot commodity (heh-heh).  However, at the end of last year we bought a dorm-style refrigerator for our office.  It has a teeny freezer, and this summer my co-workers started freezing drinking water in bags to take home to their families.  I bought a small cooler and started taking a small block of ice to my room every night.

Passing the block of ice over me turned out to be a little wet – which is not as cooling in a humid climate as it would be in Arizona.  So I splurged on Amazon.com and ordered ice packs.  However, they wouldn't actually freeze in our dinky little freezer in just one day.  So since my pension had recently bought a new refrigerator I put them in its freezer. 

Ouch!  I wrapped the ice packs in a plastic bag (the freezer isn't so clean) and the first day I went to get them I grabbed the wrong bag – it had fish bones in it!  Bleeding only slightly, I found and retrieved the right bag.  But the cold packs were only barely cold, and definitely not frozen.  “Oh, yes,” said an employee of the pension, “The freezer doesn't really work anymore.”

So I'm back to a block of ice in a bag in my cooler.  But it actually works like a charm!  I put my burning feet on the block of ice every time I get too hot during the night.  Problem solved, with only a few hiccups (and three years) along the way.

Stories of change in Miniere

My last post was about some of the fun we had while traveling to Miniere.   Below you'll see just four of the amazing stories of transformation that we heard -- definitely worth a little mud on my shoes! 

Jaudner Altidor, community health evangelist since 2009

What I would like to say about CHE, about myself – well, I didn't start right away. The CHEs used to come to my house to talk with me about cleanliness and about spiritual things. They talked about cleanliness, and we saw that some of the things we were doing weren't right. We changed those things. We realized that if they came to give us advice about cleanliness – well, we could see that it was because they wanted to help us. It wasn't really that difficult to change.

The biggest change we made was with regard to latrines. Where we were living it wasn't all that easy to dig a hole because we have a lot of rock. And when it rained the hole got messed up. But we knew we had to dig a hole anyway, and so we did.

CHE has brought a lot of change to the community. When I was a child I used to see pigs running all over the street [Translator's note:  pigs excrete parasites which children then pick up through their bare feet.  CHE encourages people to keep their pigs penned away from where children are playing.] People didn't drink clean water. (I'm 20-years-old right now.)

The most important change for us was spiritually. You see, we weren't used to praying, we weren't used to going to church often. Prayer heals people. Prayer is communication with God. If you have a problem, God can help you. You communicate with God. When people pray they aren't worried.  When I go to church I find a lot of principles that are in the Bible and I learn a lot. This allows me to feel that I am growing closer to God so that when Jesus comes back I will be ready for his kingdom.

(c) copyright Jaudner Altidor. Used with author's permission.

 

Madame Onorise Deravine, community health evangelist

I went to the bank and a woman asked me to write my name. I didn't know how to and I was really embarrassed. But thanks to CHE I started going to school, even if I'm already an old woman. Now I can write my name. I'm 73-years-old.
 

I accepted Christ one year and one month ago, and I was baptized. I used to go to the vodou priest's house. I have six children that died. I went to the feet of the saints [paintings of saints in some Catholic churches] but my children were still sick. Then they invited a man to preach to us. He confessed what he used to do to people when he was a vodou priest – he confessed that he took their money and sometimes didn't do anything for them. I stopped following the vodou priests and accepted Christ.

Now when I have money I buy farm animals or I buy food. . . I've become younger, too – I used to be stressed, and any little bit of money I had I would save it to then take it to the vodou priest. I didn't have enough to eat. Now I have security.

There are also a lot of people who are clean – it's CHE that has made them clean.  Thank you.

(c) copyright Madame Onorise Deravine. Used with author's permission.

Philisma Joseph, secretary, CHE committee

What CHE has done is opened our eyes. There are so many things we now do. When other NGOs come they can tell. Our community, the environment – everywhere you look it is clean. This is due to the efforts of the groups that work in the community. We go to people's houses. When you have knowledge you don't get sick so easily.

When you boil water, if you look away for a little bit, dirt or trash can get in the water. SODIS [solar disinfection, a method of making water safe to drink] is the best water. It's the reason why we aren't sick anymore.

We have seen that the CHE movement has taught us so many things that we didn't know, but now we know.

We talk with people who don't yet know God. With the brochure, “Steps to Peace With God,” you see that that there is a separation between us and God. Sin makes it so that we cannot get close to God. We are rebellious, but God keeps telling us to come to him.

When things are clean, it's better for everyone. You don't have problems when you live in a clean environment.

(c) copyright Philisma Joseph. Used with author's permission.

Tertilia Alexis,community health evangelist

CHE has done a lot for me. Everyone used to be involved with CHE but I wasn't. And I had fevers now and then. My husband got fevers sometimes, too. Sometimes we went to the hospital. Once they gave my husband a medication that he had to take for six months. We had taken him to the hospital because his fever was so high that he cried out. Everyone thought he'd died. But right before you get saved is when there is the most darkness. At the hospital they told me to boil water and put it in clean containers.

I am Catholic, and I thought that CHE wasn't for Catholics. [Then I found out it was for everyone, and] I started with CHE in 2010.

When I started with CHE, they taught me what to do to prevent different diseases. Since I've been with CHE I haven't had a fever. My husband hasn't had a fever, and neither have I. Now we do SODIS [solar disinfection, a free process to make water safe to drink by using the sun's UV rays], we don't boil water anymore – for that you always needed [to buy] charcoal or wood.

(c) copyright Tertilia Alexis. Used with author's permission.

A special thanks to the organization World Challenge for sponsoring our travels to get these stories!

Traveling Mercies -- Trip to Miniere

One of my tasks this summer has been to collect stories from people.  Here's one of my own stories about our adventures in accomplishing this goal:

I really loved the colors of this rooster next to the grass -- keep reading to find out why I had a lot of time to look around me on this trip!

Saturday, June 30:
It rained two days ago and there are still several muddy patches on our drive to Miniere. A few times I have to get off the motorcycle and pick my way through as best I can. At one part, a girl walking by helps me put a small log down to cross a particularly tricky patch.  There are cactus hedges lining the road so it is impossible to try to sidestep a mud puddle by going through an adjacent field. At one point we arrive at a really large muddy section – a half-finished, poorly planned project by a big NGO has made the road situation far worse there by inhibiting water drainage. I get off the motorcycle. As Osse is preparing to try to cross the mud, he realizes that his back tire is flat. He tells me he used to have a kit with him to fix tires, but since he never ended up using it and it took up space, he's quit traveling with it.

A man comes by on his horse and tells us that we should leave our motorcycle at a certain house down the road. “That's what everyone does,” he says.  Another man in typical farmer attire -- rubber boots on his feet and a machete in his hand -- stops to agree. A motorcycle with three passengers also pauses to assess the situation. Osse calls Madame Philisma, our contact in Miniere. He asks her to find a mechanic to come out and fix the tire. He pushes the motorcycle back to the nearby house and we leave it there.

Now to cross the mud. This section is perhaps 30 feet long. Osse has boots on, but I am wearing dress flats (don't judge me:  this is typical shoe attire for a woman here, even in the rural areas). There's nothing for it but to plunge in. The flats stick to the mud, making it really hard to lift my feet up. I try to take large steps to avoid the worst of the mud but can't balance to unstick my feet that way. Osse comes back and gives me a hand, but I still have to take small steps and “un-suction” my feet each step.  I ask if I shouldn't just take my shoes off but he reminds me that there are cacti and pricker bushes all around and it would't be wise, since I would likely step on a thorn.  We make it across and then I try to walk in my super-muddy shoes. I had rinsed off a bit in the last puddle, but there was too much mud and not enough water in it.  My shoes keep wanting to fall off, widened by the moisture. We soon pass a stream and I wash off a bit better.

Madame Philisma and another trainer meet us on the road. She says she hasn't been able to get ahold of a mechanic yet, but she'll keep trying. We get to the school where we'll be meeting and she pumps water for me to wash off my shoes and feet and then insists that I put her sandals on, leaving my shoes to dry in the sun. She sends someone back to her house to get another pair of shoes for her.

The Community Health Evangelism (CHE) committee in this area is really active, and I hear some great stories of people's lives that have changed through the CHE work in this community. Several hours later we are done meeting, but no one has been found to fix our tire. One of the two mechanics isn't in town and the other doesn't have any tools. We go to Madame Philisma's house and she gives us some grilled corn, mmm. We then walk up to the road – she has planned for us to see the site where, until last year, the CHE group made “akasan” (a corn flour drink) and sold it to people on Sunday mornings before church.

Off to the right is where they made the akasan.  I thought the shadow of this palm tree was prettier.  ;-)

On our way back to her house, Madame Philisma made sure to show us the inside of the local church.  Osse sat on top of this percussion instrument and started to play.

We get back to Madame Philisma's house where her daughters are dressed for a funeral the whole family is planning to go to. No one has been found to work on our bike yet, though, so we all sit down for a bit. Madame Philisma brings out a sack of oranges and starts to peel them for us. The cicadas are buzzing and I'm mentally transported back to summers in the American Midwest – then three women pass by, riding their donkeys sidesaddle.  They greet us with a "Mesyèdam" (literally "gentleman and ladies," a common salutation for mixed company) and I'm back in the present. 

Madame Philisma was using the only small knife to peel oranges, so one of her daughters started using this ginormous thing so that she could help, too.  Haitian-style orange eating involves peeling off the very outer layer, leaving the white part.  The orange is then cut nearly in half and ready for the consumer to split the halves fully in two and suck out the juice.  These oranges were incredibly flavorful and the family gave Osse a bag of them to take home.

Osse asked the couple if they have been making any soap lately.  Turns out they are out of lye -- which is required to make soap.  They asked Osse if he can get some from the Dominican Republic.  Our team has never been able to find lye in Haiti -- but as of this writing, I'm sitting in the DR with four dozen bottles of lye next to me, ready to take back! Here Mr. Philisma is showing me the maskreti plant, from which they extract an oil for the soap.

Here are the seeds from the maskreti plant.  You cook them and then mash them to extract the oil. 

Madame Philisma's daughters head off to the funeral and she and her husband accompany us back to the motorcycle, even though we don't know anything yet about the mechanic. We stop at someone's house on the way to pick up a pump. Once this is in hand we call the tool-less mechanic and ask him to meet us at the bike.

It's a beautiful walk back to where we left the bike, perhaps only 30 minutes on foot now that some of the mud has dried. Yellow and orange butterflies flit by.

Here is Madame Philisma, with Osse, and Mr. Philisma in front.  You can see the flowering flamboyant tree ahead with its petals scattered on the ground. She's carrying my helmet for me and her husband is carrying Osse's.

  We get back to the bike. No tools, remember? So he fixes the hole by tying the innertube around it with string. I'm not kidding, here's the picture:

I ask Osse if the string will hold for our entire trip back. He says, “Oh, sure, if you are on good roads a repair like that can even last two or three days.” The tire is re-mounted, the innertube filled with air and checked for leaks. It is still leaking – the string is holding well but it turns out the mechanic perforated the innertube with the screwdriver he used to pry it off. Unfortunately, this second hole is near the valve, meaning that we cannot fix it in the same way. The mechanic stops a passing motorcyclist to send him to Miniere to pick up some wrenches, while he starts walking off in the other direction to try to find a patch.

It's been over an hour and the mechanic is still not back. We call our friend and fellow trainer Anias, who is originally from Miniere and has a motorcycle. He is a nearby city, Fort Liberte, so we ask him to buy an innertube for us and come out to meet us. It's a good thing we called him, because although the mechanic eventually returned he wasn't able to find a patch. Osse says, for perhaps the fifth time, “You know, I used to travel with a repair kit. . . “

As we're sitting around waiting, Madame Philisma spies a cashew tree.  She said that Osse had told her I loved cashews and she had meant to prepare some for me but she'd forgotten.  She asks a little boy to scale the tree so that she can show me the fruit.

It might be a sign that a repair isn't going well when baby chicks feel safe enough to start exploring your motorcycle.

Anias arrives with a new innertube as well as sodapop, water, and “pate,” a meat-filled pastry. Turns out that Madame Philisma, sorry that she hadn't given us lunch, had asked Anias to pick up some goodies for us! I had used up my water awhile earlier and was really grateful for the drinks.

The innertube gets changed and we follow Anias back out the dirt roads to the national highway.  He heads to the right, back to Fort Liberte, and we head left to Cap Haitien.  On the return trip I decide my job is to look out for the “donkey backs/sleeping policeman” (French/Kreyol). The many speed bumps can be difficult to see, especially as the sun is setting. We are able to go quite fast on this well-paved road, and it would be dangerous to hit one unaware at those speeds. What speed, you ask? Well, I have often wondered, but since I have yet to ride a motorcycle with a working speedometer, I don't yet know!

As we arrive at the last turnoff before getting into Cap Haitien, I sigh softly, “Mèsi, Bondye. nou rive Kalfou Lanmò.” Then I laugh to myself since this translates literally as, “Thank you, Lord, we got to the Crossroads of Death.” (There are various stories as to why this intersection has that name, but no one seems to know for sure.) A moment later Osse stops to adjust something on his motorcycle and says essentially the same thing. Traveling here is fraught with difficulty, and the nearly universal response is to be relieved at the end of a journey and to give thanks to God.