Notes from Haiti: A Journal in Parts

This journal is not meant to be one of those linear confessionals in which breathtaking detail describes the minutia of all that I saw and did in Haiti. Details, while certainly important, can confuse and detract from the larger picture at hand. The problem is, I don’t know what the big picture is in Haiti. All I have is a mixed bag of feelings, images, and experiences. No story arch. No conclusions.

I hope in writing this summary of my experiences, that I’ll be able to come to something definitive. I hope you’ll follow my progress in this endeavor and perhaps gleam something for yourself from this tale.I left for Haiti on Tuesday February 2nd, and I lasted just nine days, returning to the U.S. on Thursday February 11th. Getting there, I flew to Santo Domingo, and took overland transport to Port au Prince. Leaving, I hitched a ride with an aid group to the States, and left directly from Port au Prince.

Part I: First Impressions (Feb. 3rd – 5th)

A week or more leading up to my trip to Haiti, I impose a media blackout on myself. I push Haiti out of my mind. I don’t want to see images or hear the reports. All the reports scare me. They are turning it into something garish and war like. The reports make me think that if I go to Haiti I’ll end up dead on the street, or somehow the local conditions will incapacitate me and some doctor from Médecins Sans Frontières will give me glucose and a large dose of Gallic attitude.
In the week proceeding my departure I bury myself in the most inane and unproductive activities. Will you be mad at me if I tell you that my online ranking increased from Private to Sergeant Major in Modern Warfare II during that last week?

The road that crosses the border into Haiti from the Dominican Republic runs along a large lake. The road itself is nothing more than a glorified dirt path cut into the limestone rich hills that abut the lake. The dust is intense and coats everything in a serene and odd white. Even the fisherman on the shore of the lake carry a light dusting on their heads. Visually, this sight offers a beautiful contrast between the white dust and the dark skin of the fisherman.
Through the dust, I glimpse a scene that reminds me of a Whistler painting. Three women sit on a rock in tattered clothing with the sun hitting them from the side. A shored-up sailboat resembling a dhow, sits behind them. The cobalt blue lake serves as the backdrop. They look like pirate women from a different time. In passing, we look at each other with hardly more time than a snapshot would offer. Anything more is impossible with Phillip’s driving. I’ve never been in a car so recklessly driven. This phenomenon is not restricted to Philip, but it seems everyone in Haiti aspires to near rally-racing standards of vehicular movement. This articulation is not restricted to motorcars, which are nimble and quick, but exists as a general standard also shared by buses, trucks, and motorcycles. For the next five days, I survive my general anxiety and near pornographic fixation on crash scenes in my head by trying to make the seat belts work. One day I succeed in making one seat belt work only to find it is not my own but Mike’s. In addition to crash anxiety, I also suffered from guilt for always getting the working seat belt seat, and leaving Mike to fend for himself.

My initial impression of Port au Prince was of third world safety. Third world safety is not first world safety, and especially not American safety. American safety revolves around law and the constant threat of punishment, which visits itself upon those who infract the law. Third world safety is more personal. It might be something like the way a fox feels when he is being hunted. Danger is present, yet the fox posses the stamina, wit, and experience to avoid conflict and destruction. It is akin to a kind of confidence and personal accountability that most first world urbanites lack. In the chaotic melee of crowds, markets, street sellers, and alleys in Port au Prince, I perceived nothing that I could not handle given my stamina, wit, and experience. I cannot deny that this feeling of safety presented a small yet persistent challenge to what I had came to accept as reality in Haiti. In a perverse and unsatisfying way, I was slightly disappointed by what I did see, or rather what I did not. Where were the mangled heaps of bodies laying in the street that looked like a monster from John Carpenter's movie, The Thing? Where were the dead with gaping mouths in the rubble piles? Where was the looting? Where were the convicts summarily executed in the streets?
The general lack of what I had assumed would be common occurrence on the streets of Haiti put me in the odd position of having to go and look for the morbid and terrible in my own attempts to photo document the aftermath of the earthquake. I found only disappointment in approaching photography in this manner. It was distasteful, and I gave it up after visiting a mass grave.

To be continued . . .