While we were with the kids in Carrefour (suburb of Port au Prince) we spent most of the time at the hotel. We would spend about 4 hours a day in the pool and the rest of the day reading books, playing etc... After a few days we all needed to get out so we had my Haitian friend Jean Sonel take us for a walk to see another family that I had meet on a previous trip. The wife "works" selling old Salvation Army clothes like hundreds of other women along the side of the road. The husband is absent, the wife's name is Jeanette. We went to her abode a 15x15 concrete encloser connected to dozens and dozens just like it. They have one opening, the doorway without a door only a sheet hangs over it, no back door or windows just concrete on all four walls and a concrete ceiling and floor. Ventilation is nil and the heat is stifling. They share a "bathroom" with their neighbors,which is a hole in the ground, with a sheet propped up around it. Six people live their lives in this "house" that is about the size of my kitchen. After talking for a few minutes catching up on family reports Jeanette told us how embarrassed she was that she did not have anything to offer us, we were embarrassed that she even felt that she needed to. Her life is not unlike millions of other Haitians.
The following is a video from her door back all th way out onto the street. You can kind of get a sense of the maze of humanity and level of poverty that lives in the Port au Prince area.
2 comments:
Wow, pretty crazy. I had my kids watch this and I asked them questions like, "So do you think the kids there can just get in the air conditioned car and get an ice cream or McDonald's?" It kind of puts things in perspective.
Wow, it took over three minutes to get back to the street. Having been in Haiti several times, I can smell it just by watching the video. Everything from the BO, diesel, coal fires, and waste to the citrus and awesome food smells. Thanks for sharing.
Amy
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