Monday Driver

We had spent the whole morning traveling in the heat and dust. We drove down long, bumpy crater filled roads. These roads haven’t seen a paving in years and the earthquake only made worse, Worst. There were areas where literally the hole in the road was so big, traffic had to drive all the way around almost on the “sidewalk” to get through. These obstacles make what should be a short trip in any metropolitan area a long and arduous journey. You really have to ask yourself…do I NEED to go to this place??? Before setting out. A 30 mile ride for example took us nearly 2 hours to complete. From the inside of the vehicle you could see that it was not a long distance. I can close my eyes and plot out all the landmarks to retrace my steps. But the traffic and the roads make it so difficult. On the way to our work site we saw many things. “Street kids” begging in the street. Marlene told us that even if she took them in; they would not stay. They have the street in them and they only know the ways of the streets. She says they are also very promiscuous. This was all explained at a stoplight. As we drove off, my eyes stayed on the children we had left behind. They could not be more than 10 years old. We were keeping track of the other two vehicles with us. One loaded with our valuable supplies the other with our precious cargo, our team mates. We stopped often to let a vehicle catch up with us or vice versa. There was a stop where our driver was getting antsy. He said, this is a bad area, I don’t want to be waiting here too long. We could get attacked. We need to get out of here. I looked around and honestly I couldn’t see the difference from one place to the other. We were up and down streets lined with market plaSome of the merchandise looked really familiar. Are they selling donated clothes? They weren’t new. Are those donated shoes? Food? All I could see was huge mounds of various categories of things lying on a bag or a sheet on the ground. Shirts, jeans, sneakers, you name it. None of if was new. There was an area selling just auto parts. Another area where you could get your engine power washed with filthy water and the service wasn’t for free. There was an overpass for what used to be a river going through a town. It was now dry and filled with garbage. On one side, they were burning the garbage. Paper or plastic? Both! Not a lovely smell at all. We come to what I like to call a beach road. It’s where you have land on one side and you can see the ocean in the distance behind houses and streets. The road goes in and out of towns but there is always the ocean winking at you on one side. I thought oh we must be getting close. The roads here were not as bad. We picked up some speed and were moving nicely through,taking in the sites. This didn’t last very long. There was a huge truck in the middle of the road, just sitting there. Typical Haiti. We go around the truck and there in the middle of the road is a dead man, face down under a sheet. Only his feet and part of his head were sticking out. We drove a little further and there was a large crowd at a bus stop all huddled together. A little farther and there was a tap tap bus in the middle of the road. Empty. No passengers. The top was almost completely dismantled and turned alllllllll the way left. We put two and two together and figured that the truck must have hit the tap tap and flung the poor man out to his death. And there was no ambulance in site. There would be none coming either.
WELCOME TO HAITI!
I thought to myself; this is worse than a black cat crossing in front of your car! This is a bad thing to witness on the day we arrive to Haiti. I couldn’t get the image out of my mind. But like many resilient Haitians we all had to move on because soon we would arrive at our final destination for the week. Like it or not this would be home for the next 5 days. We had a lot of work to do. First on the list was unloading those bags. By the time we arrived we were already spent. It was like an episode of survivor. Do we rest or set up camp? With only 5 days on our lease we had no time to spare. We met our Ohio Partners and we got to work setting up 4 tents.
From that moment all of our bodies were about to embark on a 5 day assault. I can honestly say I have never worked so hard in all my life. The “work” began the moment the gate closed behind us and didn’t stop until we got on that plane and arrived back home. The work, the loving, and the serving the helping the aiding…we did all of it. This trip trumped all others because we were among the people. We didnt show up, set up shop and leave on a daily basis to other towns. Though this type of aid brings much needed supplies, medical help and relief. We set up shop and we stayed. We stayed with the people, we ate amongst the people, we saw what they were going through up close. For some maybe too close. For others we can’t seem to get it out of our systems. The vast disparity between where we lived in Haiti for a week and no matter where we live in the United States is difficult to comprehend. It wakes up a part of your being that rarely gets stirred and leaves you stuck between two worlds.