Sunday afternoon catch up

December 7, 2008

Today has afforded us a surprise day off. Due to some car trouble requiring us to leave the Galloper at the car hospital for a while, our Sunday engagements had to be canceled, and suddenly we find ourselves with a little unexpected time.

The last few days have been a blur of activities and insights. Friday, we had planned to go to Jacmel, but the noisy breaks on the car inspired appropriate concern for our safety given the mountainous roads we would have to traverse. So we delayed our trip, and dropped the car off for repairs. Friday night, in response to an invitation by a Canadian group staying in the guesthouse, we attended a dialogue the group had with a Haitian guest speaker. We really didn’t know what to expect. We were told that there was an interesting man coming to visit who would certainly inspire us and make us think. We were not disappointed.

We were greeted by a man with long dark dread-locks woven with silver, a Confucius style beard jutting from his chin, and a warm, welcoming light in his eyes. We soon found out that Jan was an interfaith minister, an intellectual, and a Voodoo priest. He spoke of his identity being comprised of his ancestors who created who he is and inspires his work. His lineage is comprised of a unique assortment of peoples whose roots trace back to Africa on his fathers side, and France on his mother’s side. He wisely recognizes the dichotomy of his ancestry, and the unique perspective such mixings of two very different social and cultural classes affords him. And I think he represents his ancestors well.

The evening was filled with rich dialogue, about the history of his ancestors intertwined with the history of Haiti. He discussed the complexities of the Haitian culture and mindset. He touched upon Voodoo, some of the misconceptions and misrepresentations and clarified its coupling with Catholicism and the saints. We had one of those rare, enlightening conversations that made you want to talk the night away. He welcomed questions and thoughts, received our own observations with grace and interest. Jan exuded an open, welcoming, intelligent air and spirit seemed to pour out of every word as well as out of his physical presence. We felt privileged to have come across his path.

Early in the evening, Patrick and I had dragged our feet a little as we faced giving up our date night in exchange for another meeting. But as we walked back to our room, our minds swimming with thoughts, our hearts inspired, our curiosity perked, we recognized that the timeliness of this exchange and the discoveries it allowed couldn’t have been more perfect.

Yesterday I spent the day with an American medical volunteer group that came down for the weekend to hold a free clinic in the poorest part of Port-au-Prince--City Solei. Accompanied by a guide from the neighborhood, we felt safe venturing into the neighborhood notorious for harboring gangs and some of the most abject poverty in the city. It was my first venture into City Solei—into the heart of it all. I was anxious to see with my own eyes what has been described by so many first time visitors.

Although there was no city gate, no official entrance demarcating our arrival into the neighborhood, the change was obvious. People were everywhere, populating every nook, cranny and walk way. The density of bodies was the first change in the scenery. Although Port au Prince is densely populated and alive with human activities, City Solei takes crowded humanity to a whole new definition. The vast city of tin and stick structures spread out before us, representing some of the poorest conditions a human has to exist in. And poverty cloaked the people here. Children ran naked, dirty, with snotty noses alongside the truck. I watched an older child—an age where nakedness becomes less socially acceptable here—who was clearly mentally retarded, dance naked after a UN army vehicle full of men in full combat fatigues with guns at the ready. The contrast was jarring. I watched a man bathe in his underwear on the roof of one building, sudsing himself using a bowl of water and a bar of soap under the mid-morning sun. The difficulty of life in this part of the city clung to every person we passed colored by the ragged appearance of clothes, the dirt that covered everything, the reddish tinge to the hair of babies signaling malnutrition, the hunger in every eye. The maladies dripped from noses, coughed from mouths, were dirtily bandaged around limbs.

The clinic was set up in a building normally used as a school. I joined two other physicians, a paramedic, 2 nurses, a pharmacist, and several other willing helpers who organized and ran a day that allowed over 400 people to be seen. In a room with a gentle breeze and a bench where people lined up, I saw one face after another aided by a very competent translator. The symptoms ranged from head to toe, but always existed in the background of hunger. The group brought with them a formidable pharmaceutical supply, and we took advantage fully of the coveted resource. Children were given worm medicine, vitamins were dispensed to everyone, hypertension and fever and infection were attacked, pain was soothed. My translator was incredible. After having him translate several educational points several times in a row, he quickly picked up his new role. I would turn to him and say, "tell them about iron-rich food," and he would jump into the shpeal he had translated multiple times before, sometimes addressing everyone who sat in the room waiting their turn for evaluation. I could have hugged him. And he was one of those Haitians furious with the inequalities of his country, but also deeply in love with it. A young man, his energy was inspiring to me and filled me full of hope for Haiti's future.

I am not trained as an Emergency physician, and on some level I think it would suit me better for these brief intensive outreach days. I have to stop myself from saying, “… and come back next week so we can ensure that the medicine is working.” Although gratifying that so many people got to air their concerns and describe their illnesses today, that a lot of good was dispensed, I was still restless with the recognized need of a more permanent presence of health care here. It only fortifies my own will to prepare for a clinic that can modestly serve the community it sits within on a day to day basis.

The day was exhausting, challenging, but rewarding. I fought feelings of not being able to do enough with reassurance that at least we were doing something. And it was lovely to work amidst the energy of medical professionals fresh from the States, radiating the energy and passion for bringing care to people desperately in need.

Patrick returned recently from a jaunt through the neighborhood. He came bearing surprises. He had ventured to our neighborhood little mom-and-pop grocery (actually the whole--family-plus-pen-pals-grocery) in search of a mid-day snack. The grocery was running really low on supplies. He bought peanuts and milk to tide us over till dinner. One of the men hanging around the store saw his curious purchase, and told him about a restaurant upstairs. Clarification: restaurant and discotheque. Apparently the music was bumpin’, but only the workers of the empty restaurant were groovin'. So Patrick ordered from their reasonable menu, got the tour of the (empty) hotel, discotheque, restaurant and hair salon that nestled in the building up the stairs from our neighborhood grocery. We had no idea. Patrick said the establishment was nice, but empty; he quickly became extremely popular. They insisted he bring me back for a date soon.

Patrick surprised me with my favorite Haitian dish: rice and chicken in Creole sauce. Incredible. He added to the surprise with some Christmas decorations he found at the grocery: two little packets of tinsel streamers and a little packet of tiny ornaments (drums, candy canes and pine cones). I love Christmas. The holiday for me is steeped in tradition that my family nurtures with faithful vigilance and love each year. Although far-removed from the cold winds that have always prompted the changing seasons, from the Christmas tree farms and the smell of evergreen, I’ve been determined to celebrate my favorite holiday someway this year despite doing so a long-distance from my family. Using Patrick’s sweet surprises, I busied myself getting REALLY creative. I used some string from a sewing kit, and tied up the green tinsel in such a suspended way that it hangs in the shape of a Christmas tree, the ornaments hanging in the general area of its branches. It’s a modern interpretation, an abstract representation, but it is undeniably our first Haitian Christmas tree. Its one of those kinds of decorations that would never make it in my shopping basket at home... I'd settle only for lights, classic ornaments and evergreen. But you do the best that you can with what you have. And I'm pleased with my little suspended tree. It shakes its "needles" when the fan stirs up the air, almost like doing a little tree shimmy. Makes us laugh a little. True, it lacks that evergreen scent that fills the air with smells of the great outdoors, but in a country that feels like perpetual summer, our room now reminds us that its Christmas time. Maybe I’ll find one of those Pine-tree car fresheners to add to the ambiance. Or not. ☺

So as we all deck the halls using sentiments from the past, and tokens of the present, engaging in the traditions old and new of the special season upon us, we send our sleepy Sunday greetings to you. May the Christmas spirit weave itself into your days, and remind you of friends near and far who join you in the collective consciousness of the season.