So yesterday was the longest yet most productive day ever! Danette, Nadia and I set off for PP with Pastor Pierre at 6. After a 4 hours of the bumpy and eventful ride, that involved passing the occasional markets in towns by National Highway -swaped with people, chickens, dogs, products and almost everything you can think of, we arrived at PP. I have to admit, that it did make us a bit nervous to slow down the Range Rover when we'd transit through the open markets in PP. There are no words that could do justice to the dynamics of the streets of PP.
The objective was to touch base with as many contacts as we could till about 3 PM and then head back. Thanks to Danette and her spiderweb of contact network in NY. The first one of the list was Yves, a Haitian architect who grew up in NY and has now been in Haiti for 5 yrs, started his own architecture and construction company. Here's some more info on him- http://archrecord.construction.com/news/haiti/100526yves_francois-1.asp. He is currently partnering with Technologists INC, a design build construction company operating in Afghanistan with USAID and Army Core of Engineers. The company provided jobs to 5000 local labours and 1000 local professionals and is making great investments in the local economy. Since, their Executive Director was visiting town, we had to oppertunity to meet with him. The meeting involved discussions about our project and the logistics of building with containers. Yves mentioned getting a shipping container from an NGO, like UN (where they just use them as fences) might be a good idea. After discussing a few details, some of which included equipment availability/ insulation, Yves took us out for a delicious Haitian lunch. He was also gracious enough to take us to the AFH headquarters thereafter. We met with a few graduate students from Univ of Cincinati and WashU. A few other practicing professional from Ireland. They were all working on school projects. (There's more info of all that on the AFH website if you're interested.) Next was Florentino Latortue, a former state secretary and relative of Gerard Tourtue that came to power as the PM after Arstide. We met him at his office and he told us about his reflied efforts for the people fleeting from Haiti and setting up emergency tents in the mountains. He initially provided them with food and water but when the numbers kept increasing from 5000 to what it is now, they had to stop. Later he we took a drive through tent cities in the mountaines that were put up by refugees. (However PP, post earthquake has more people than ever, from all over Haiti, in the hopes of recieving aid.) These tents were put up by the UN and OXFAM with public toilets and water on the left side of the road. This locally is refered to as Heavan. The refugees that kept flooding in and did not recieve any accomodation build tents out of burlap, corrogated metal and other materials, are living in whats referred by the locals as hell. There are over 150, 000 tents on the mountains. The shocking news is that the tents are around and some are in a dried river bed which is soon to flood since the rainy season is also here. Some efforts were being made to make some canals to reduce the flow of water but I doubt that will really solve the problem..
The ride on our way back was mostly silent. We were just taking it all in.. There is much to be done. But at the very least, we have a start.
-- Jasmine
No comments:
Post a Comment