When you embark on a trip of this nature, you don't expect an easy ride and we had prepared ourselves for many things. Cholera has been rife in the city and the usual suspects, malaria, tummy upsets, heatstroke, emotional overload were all possible contenders to make the journey a challenging one. However, we were to face our biggest test to date in the form of some furry friends who, as it happened had squatters rights when it came to the sleeping arrangements within our tarpaulin home. We had been informed with a casual "Watch out for the rats", but we were certainly not schooled in the night time partying habits of rats who have taken residence in Port Au Prince. Tonight was going to be our chance for fast track education.
Inside the tarpaulin structure were several smaller tents and we were being spoilt with mattresses and even a fan to help us through the night. This was the Ritz Carlton of the tenting world in Port Au Prince terms, so we bedded down for the night extremely thankfully and with a hope of some decent rest.
As it transpired, our tent was situated right next to the main road, so there was a nice roar of traffic hurtling past for the first several hours. Not too much of an issue, I thought ...We'll get used to it. Around 2 am the traffic seemed to be dying down and I was making headway towards that wonderful dreamlike state when suddenly Flor sat bolt upright with a shriek! A rat!!! Thankfully not inside the tent, but she had felt it brushing past her body from the outside. We froze and listened for more rat evidence. There it was..a definite squeaking and rustling in the corner. In panic we furtively felt all around the tent- were there any holes? Were they coming in? ( And by now we knew for sure we were dealing with "they" and not "it" because the rustling was coming from several places).
What to do? Time to look at it rationally. They weren't in the tent at least and at the present time there was nothing we could do to make them go away save for banging the tent, shouting and waking everyone else up. So there was nothing for it, but to show some good old fashioned stiff upper lip, lie back down and try to get to sleep. Flor, being slightly more dramatic in nature, took a while to take this idea on board. But in the end she conceded that it wasn't possible to get back on the plane and go home right now and that would hardly be in keeping with us achieving our objectives... so instead we would embrace Port Au Prince, rats and all!
Fortunately, we had not actually seen the rats at this point, or our story most likely might have had a completely different outcome. It was only a couple of days later during a sessions when the boys were being given a talking to about an incident that had occurred, did we spy one brazenly making its way across the floor. Like the cat who had got the cream - or at least, the rat who had finished up any remainder of last night's dinner! This was no common old garden rodent as I had experienced on the odd occasion back home. This was no "all the gear, no idea" kind of rat. This was one hardcore, steroid taking, muscle pumping rat who looked like he had been working out down the gym 23 hours a day. Think rat/large rabbit/black curly haired spaniel (why they have curly hair is anyone's guess?)
"Leave them alone, they're family!" Quipped a guy from the Dominican Republic, who was quite enjoying our daily tales of night time rat antics. On reflection, this was actually good advice, as well as being strangely comforting. So leave them alone we did...and I might be delusional, but we even started to think just a little bit fondly of them by the time we left!
Fact:
Pests are a serious problem for the nearly one million people who are living in the tent cities. Overcrowding, poor sanitation and piles of garbage are the perfect conditions for all kinds of flies and rodents which spread disease like wildfire. More work needs to be done to ascertain how to keep major epidemics at bay and offer easy to maintain solutions, such as storing food aid off the ground and improving rubbish collection (MPNA)
Monday, 28 February 2011
Sunday, 27 February 2011
Meeting the Boys
After the settling in process, which consisted of throwing our suitcases down in the tent and standing under a fan for a few minutes, it was time to meet the boys that Bright Tomorrows has been supporting for the last few months. There are 13 in total and many of them live in the tent cities nearby, in a variety of different circumstances. Some have some family members, but not in the traditional set up as we might understand it, as many are fending for themselves. Most don't know who their dads are and some even have abusive mothers who have harmed them. Others still have no parents; having lost them in the earthquake.
We were full of questions and a feeling of excitement and nervous anticipation all rolled into one. Would they understand us? Would they be able to answer our questions, or even want to? Was it Ok for us to ask them about the earthquake and how it had affected them? We sat in a circle and one by one the boys stood up to introduce themselves. At first it was a little stilted and formal...Do you like school? Yes, they replied. Do you have a brother/sister and so on. Time to dust off the very rusty A level French...Parlez en Creole they said, but that was a little beyond us at this point! It was getting late and we were all tired. A couple of the boys started to get restless and muck about a bit. This was a good sign..they were beginning to feel at ease with us and as every teacher has experienced, there is nothing more unnerving than a class of children who are too quiet!
As we talked, it also became apparent that these children were very much individuals. It was amazing to be able to already see their characters; some earnest, some cheeky, shy, confident. All unique...all real people, with real lives, worries and hopes. No longer just names that we had read and pictures that we had seen.... It was going to be fantastic getting to know them over the next few days!
We were full of questions and a feeling of excitement and nervous anticipation all rolled into one. Would they understand us? Would they be able to answer our questions, or even want to? Was it Ok for us to ask them about the earthquake and how it had affected them? We sat in a circle and one by one the boys stood up to introduce themselves. At first it was a little stilted and formal...Do you like school? Yes, they replied. Do you have a brother/sister and so on. Time to dust off the very rusty A level French...Parlez en Creole they said, but that was a little beyond us at this point! It was getting late and we were all tired. A couple of the boys started to get restless and muck about a bit. This was a good sign..they were beginning to feel at ease with us and as every teacher has experienced, there is nothing more unnerving than a class of children who are too quiet!
As we talked, it also became apparent that these children were very much individuals. It was amazing to be able to already see their characters; some earnest, some cheeky, shy, confident. All unique...all real people, with real lives, worries and hopes. No longer just names that we had read and pictures that we had seen.... It was going to be fantastic getting to know them over the next few days!
Saturday, 26 February 2011
Trip to Haiti February 11
Generally the idea is to write a blog as you go I know, but as we hadn't planned on doing so, or had the ability to do it out there, this is a retrospective blog on our trip to Port Au Prince!
(The names of the children have been changed to protect them)
Day 1
A long, long journey with an overnight stop at JFK and finally we were nearly touching down at Port Au Prince. I admit to having butterflies in my stomach as I contemplated what lay ahead and as I looked out of the window, I could already see the burgeoning tent cities that decorated the bird's eye view of the city. They rather reminded me of children's homemade art work - colourful, due to the tarpaulin sheets, but random and a bit mismatched. I couldn't let on to Flor how nervous I was feeling, after all she had been a trouper leading the way directly after the earthquake a year ago, so there was nothing for it but to take a deep breath and jump in!
As it happened, there wasn't much time to reflect any more as we were soon grappling with our luggage that had all been piled into mountains at the "arrivals hall". Like an Indiana Jones movie, remarked an American lady and it was comical to see everyone plunging into the fray like action heroes intent on defeating the enemy! Then, more grappling, as some extremely helpful guys practically forced their way into our lives by deciding that we needed their services to get our bags to the car park. No. we really could manage, we said, but to no avail. A fight then nearly broke out as to who was going to take us to our destination, despite no-one, including us, knowing exactly where that was to be!
Suffice it to say, after some very tense moments when the taxi driver decided we were giving him trouble (as he was wanted for kidnapping and couldn't possibly drop us off at the police station car park), we finally made it to our home for the next few days. Slightly shell- shocked but relieved...
(The names of the children have been changed to protect them)
Day 1
A long, long journey with an overnight stop at JFK and finally we were nearly touching down at Port Au Prince. I admit to having butterflies in my stomach as I contemplated what lay ahead and as I looked out of the window, I could already see the burgeoning tent cities that decorated the bird's eye view of the city. They rather reminded me of children's homemade art work - colourful, due to the tarpaulin sheets, but random and a bit mismatched. I couldn't let on to Flor how nervous I was feeling, after all she had been a trouper leading the way directly after the earthquake a year ago, so there was nothing for it but to take a deep breath and jump in!
As it happened, there wasn't much time to reflect any more as we were soon grappling with our luggage that had all been piled into mountains at the "arrivals hall". Like an Indiana Jones movie, remarked an American lady and it was comical to see everyone plunging into the fray like action heroes intent on defeating the enemy! Then, more grappling, as some extremely helpful guys practically forced their way into our lives by deciding that we needed their services to get our bags to the car park. No. we really could manage, we said, but to no avail. A fight then nearly broke out as to who was going to take us to our destination, despite no-one, including us, knowing exactly where that was to be!
Suffice it to say, after some very tense moments when the taxi driver decided we were giving him trouble (as he was wanted for kidnapping and couldn't possibly drop us off at the police station car park), we finally made it to our home for the next few days. Slightly shell- shocked but relieved...
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