This past Saturday I was lucky enough—thanks to my roommate James and our pull as Fonkoze employees—to get a private tour of the hospital in Cange where the whole story takes place. They specifically don’t give tours to the public because of their goal to operate a hospital rather than a tourist destination. But we graciously accepted our invitation and headed out from Port-au-Prince for the drive through the mountains to the small village.
After about a two hour drive in a rented SUV on Friday, we stopped for the night in the town of Mirebalais before it got dark. Similar to Jakmel, it’s always nice to get out of P-au-P and experience the tranquility of more isolated places. With James and his girlfriend Noel wanting to stay at a slightly nicer hotel, I found a cheaper place and spent the night by myself exploring the town a bit and making friends with the Haitians working as security at my complex. It was such a great night sitting on the town plaza, drinking a Prestige, watching people meander by, and trying my best to share some conversation in Kreyol. Clearly, however, the conversation was not quite as clear as I thought though after the guys went and found a Haitian prostitute for me as the night was ending. Confused for a minute, I quickly realized what was happening and I sent her away much to my relief. Nothing like being lost in translation for a minute! I laughed to myself for a good long time about that one.
The next morning we packed up early and hit the dusty trail toward Cange (literally, it was quite dusty and rocky). In Haiti, there aren’t too many roads so if you generally know which direction the town is, you can take the path headed that way and get at least somewhere close. Without any maps, we constantly rolled down our window and kept asking people on the streets if we were going in the right direction. As we got closer, we knew we were headed the right way as we came upon a massive dam and reservoir—a subject that was mentioned throughout the book as a foreign aid electricity project which had flooded many people out of their homes in the valley and forced them up in the rocky cliffs. (A good example of foreign aid gone totally bad!). As we drove along the narrow dirt roads, the houses seemed to teeter on the edge of the mountains—surely susceptible to falling rocks and mudslides. Finally pulling into Cange, we asked one last person where Partners in Health (Zanmi Lasante in Kreyol) was located and found the complex nestled on the side of a hill.
I’m not sure what I expected it to look like, but it wasn’t quite what I had in mind. The complex was huge with numerous different buildings serving a variety purposes from an education center to community meeting spots. As we walked up the hill, we got into the heart of the medical complex which really didn’t resemble an American hospital at all. Our guide first took us to the pediatric in-patient ward where numerous children and babies were being treated for everything from premature birth to malnutrition. We then visited the operating rooms which were surprisingly and awkwardly accessible as we viewed two live surgeries taking place. Apparently, health privacy laws have not made their way to Haiti yet. We then saw the recovery room and the isolation ward for those patients who are co-infected with HIV and tuberculosis. Throughout the hallways connecting these different locations, there were people everywhere. Some waiting for loved ones, some carrying relatives into the hospitals, others sick themselves and sleeping on the floor while they waited for open hospital beds. From there we moved into the female health ward as well as visited a group therapy building. Overall it was great to see one of my favorite books come to life, but like many parts of the country, it was still depressing.
Zanmi Lasante is one of the best funded organizations in Haiti with millions of dollars from charitable foundations and private donors alike. Yet, still there was so much need. They had some state of the art equipment, but not enough. They had devoted doctors, but not enough. They had medicine, but supplies can run low. They can treat most diseases, but not all. Again with the mentality of “Do whatever it takes”, some kids even get flown to hospitals in Boston and around the US to treat more serious problems. When you think about how cost-prohibitive that policy is, it makes some people in the development realm question the organization’s priorities. Why spend so much money to save one child, when you that same amount could be spent to impact more people? But Paul Farmer and Zanmi Lasante don’t think that way. If a child comes needing help, they find a way to get it. It’s pretty impressive. Overall, they have clearly overcome some obstacles in the fight for healthcare in rural Haiti, but there are so many more obstacles ahead.
After the tour, we headed back to Mirebalais before continuing on to the village of Sodo. There, we expected to see a huge waterfall that’s steeped in voodoo tradition for its healing powers—and we weren’t disappointed. We eventually made it to the site and discovered it full of Haitians who had come to purify themselves. When life gets bad and your troubles become too much, many in the area come to the waterfall, light a candle, wash themselves, and then throw their clothes into the river, letting them wash away downstream. Along with their clothes, their intention is to allow their troubles to wash away as well. While I’ve had my fair share of modest difficulties in Haiti, I decided not to strip down and throw my clothes into the river—opting instead to enjoy the beauty of the waterfall from the sidelines, but maybe regretting it later on.
After one more night in Mirebalais, we headed back to Port-au-Prince on Sunday. Since we had a car for the first time in Haiti, we swung by the one Americanized supermarket which is about 30 minutes from our house. Along with the fact that we were visiting the store for the first time, we were also excited as our refrigerator had been broken for the past 4 weeks and was just fixed two days earlier. We stocked up on groceries and returned home only to find that our fridge had decided two days was enough. It was broken again! So thus, we ended up throwing out tons of spoiled food. In the next 24 hours, our backup power generator would break, our oven decided to no longer work, and my computer decided it no longer likes to operate certain programs. I’m not sure if this was the waterfall telling me I should have believed in its healing powers, but if I had to do it again, I think I’d be the naked white guy making a scene in the river!
Alas, though, when I finally stopped tonight to process the last 24 hours and its misfortunes, I think I gained some good perspective. I’m complaining about the power going out, but most people here don’t even have electricity to begin with. I whine because I had to throw away milk and cheese; some people survive by mixing cooking oil with flour and dirt to make small fried cakes. My connection to the world (my computer) stops for a few days, but many Haitians voices will never be heard.
Both of my two best Haitians friends here in Port-au-Prince have no formalized jobs. They try to sell cell phone minutes or get paid to play the drum. They hang out with us just like they were Americans and they dress remarkably nice, as do most Haitians. But then they sometimes ask me for small change and I scoff thinking about how I’m not getting paid to live here. How do they expect me to spot them $2.00 once a week? Does every Haitian literally think I am the source of cash? At the end of the day, however, I am the one who returns to a safe clean house (electricity or not). I am the one who never worries about eating dinner. I am the one who has bed. They, on the other hand, return to their shacks. They scrounge to send their brothers and sisters to school with the money they make. They sleep on floors with 8 people in a room. Just like Paul Farmer’s organization fights each day to aid Haitians, so too do Haitians struggle each day to simply live. They wake up. They work hard. They might succeed, but few ever fully escape the grasps of poverty. When my problems get too big, it just takes a moment of reflection to realize my problems are anthills compared to theirs.
“Dye mon, gen mon” … “Beyond the mountain, there are more mountains”
Such is the ancient proverb here; such is Haiti.
Those last two paragraphs are powerful. Thanks for continuing to keep me in check. The things I complain about on the grand scheme of life are so trivial compared to the rest of the needs of the world. Thanks for putting it into perspective!
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