The Road Less Traveled

"The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeing new landscapes, but in having new eyes." -Marcel Proust

In 2001 I traveled to Haiti and stayed there, in a town called Cayes, for one week. It was at the same time one of the most beautiful and scary places I've visited. My husband (then boyfriend), my dad, and 12 other adults (I was one of only two women) went there to help build a pastors house and visit churches in the nearby villages. It was a very memorable and life-changing trip for me. Here are some excerpts from my journal entries during that week:

May 16, 2001: We've arrived at the pastor's parent's house in the outskirts of Port-Au-Prince. We have been through the city on an hour drive and I've already taken almost 2 rolls of film. The people here live in amazing poverty and I cannot believe the sights I have just seen. We were taken here from the airport in 2 4x4 trucks and now we have a bus that we are supposed to take the remaining 100 or so miles to Cayes. The bus is broken. The brakes don't work and we've been waiting for quite a long time for them to fix it. Oh! Now they just drove the bus around to test the brakes... they seem to work alright. We think only one brake is working (the right front). But I suppose that's sufficient enough for us to be on our way. The city was unbelievable. Kids peeing out in public. The public water system running down gutters in the unpaved street.

At this point, I was a bit tired and shell-shocked from the sights of the city. I had no idea what was ahead, but if this was any sign, it certainly wouldn't be like a trip to the Palm Beach Breakers Hotel.

May 18, 2001: I can't believe it's Friday. It doesn't feel like it! The food here is excellent (or am I just starving from all of this physical labor?) and the people are nice. Last night I slept in the mission house with the guys because the cats in the main house were bothering my allergies. It was warmer, but much quieter and comfortable. Today is hotter than yesterday. Whew! Yesterday we got really worn out. We went to a late night church service and dad gave his testimony. I wish I had brought the camera. We had to drive THROUGH a river to get there. It was in a very rural village. These people are amazing when they worship. We only had one lit bulb in the front of the church and even that flickered on and off. In the pitch blackness the full church thundered with intricate rhythms and clapping and singing. I wish I could have sung along with them in Creole. The one thing I wish the most is that Haiti were not so hot. The breeze is good, but not out in the sun. It is beautiful out here.

Let me tell you... at night in Haiti, out in the rural areas, it is such a thick and heavy darkness with the humidity and not a single sound. That is unusual for an American to experience. We're used to hearing something all the time, we don't even realize it. The distant hum of traffic, the air conditioner kicking on, the TV in the background. Not in Haiti.

May 20, 2001: On the way home from church our bus got a flat tire. It was bad--the rubber had burnt and was smoking badly. It was dark and the bugs were out. We were pretty much abandoned there with 2 flat rear tires and only one spare. Omega, the bus driver, tried to fix it but it fared badly. Time passed with no relief. The jack was too small--the bus couldn't be lifted high enough to put the new tire on. Chanin had to dig with a metal rod into the clay-rock road to allow room to slip the new tire on. That was our first "huge" disaster. Last night though... WOW! We had a great service out in the middle of nowhere in a small little church. We sang praises to God. A bat got stuck in the church and was flying, circling above our heads for a good while. He dove and spun and flapped his long wings in the dimly lit church. Chanin tried to jump and swat him as he passed by. Only us "blanc" (white) people ducked as the bat flew over us. Supposedly, the village witch doctor was not happy to have us Christians visiting his territory. Meanwhile, as we would soon discover, the bus was stuck up to the rims in stinky mega-enriched soil and mud. It was a huge ordeal after the service in the pitch black as we walked along the water's edge balancing on a cement curb (Dad slipped into the mud 2 times). The men pushed the bus as the pastor's SUV pulled it from the rear with a chain. The bus--only having one brake and 2 wheel drive--squealed in protest when it was gunned into reverse, causing it to fishtail to the left toward a ditch. The entire village and church-goers watched on with anticipation. It was exciting but scary. On the way home (when we finally got the bus un-stuck) the battery acted up and at times we had no headlights at all--driving in the darkness with no sense of direction. Today I gave my t-shirt to this kid outside of the mission house who was wearing only a blue Wal-Mart "How Can I Help You?" vest. Tomorrow we leave to travel back to the airport in Port-Au-Prince.

I hope to go back to Haiti someday. What an adventure!