Camping on the beach

I have been averaging a weekend away (or at least a day at the beach outside of PAP) since getting back from Ottawa, and it's been a really good way to get away and disengage from work. So, two weeks after Ile a Vache, I went on a camping trip to a beach called Kokoye (coconut beach). Ian didn't make this trip, but I went with 5 of my colleagues. It was Chiara-the-intern-and-only-other-expat-girl's last weekend in Haiti, so I guess you could say it was a special occasion...

Kokoye beach

This whole idea started when we got an email invite to a group trip to Kokoye planned in October that one of my colleagues mistook for the upcoming weekend. From the photos in the email, he was hooked (see photos in this blog), and we realized there was absolutely nothing preventing us from going that weekend anyways. Never ones to plan something until the last minute, we should have realized that our lack or organization could have prevented us from going, but this was not the case. We tossed the idea out there, didn't make any concrete plans, and on Saturday at noon I got a call saying "Yeah, I think we're going to go forward with this Kokoye thing. Are you still interested in going? We're going out to get some food now and we'll probably leave around 2:30." 2:30 became 4pm as some of the beach goers (myself included) went souvenir shopping, but at 4pm one our our big Nissan Pilots picked me up with 5 people + driver and a load of luggage in the back. Since we were only staying overnight I just had a small backpack with my swimsuit, towel and a change of clothes so I wasn't sure why there were two suitcases in the back, but I was told not to worry.

It took us about 45 mins to get out of the city, then we drove to Leogane where we met up with someone who was supposed to show us the way, since the trip actually involved a hour-long hike down to the beach. He wasn't actually much use - we probably waited 20 mind for him to show up and all he did was give our driver directions, but on we went after that. The only problem was that the drop off point was a little farther out of PAP than expected, and the PAP traffic and waiting for the directions guy took longer than expected. So, at 7pm when the driver dropped us off, the sun had already set. We were almost prepared for this - 3 out of 6 of us had headlamp flashlights, and others could use their cellphones. Only Chiara and I had running shoes/hiking boots however, the others had to make it down the hike in flip flops. I also soon understood why there were two suitcases in the car - one was carrying our tent, extra bedding and water, and the other had our food! Not the most effective packing but I guess there were no "travelers" backpacks around. So, off we trudged down the mountain with our headlamps, small backpacks, assorted pots/charcoal/water carried in our arms and Ben carrying this giant suitcase on his head like we often see Haitians do.

I'm not going to lie - it was a rough trek down, but we made it in one piece. Despite my running shoes I fell several times, but I seemed to be the only one (I can't believe that Ben in flip flops with a suitcase on his head didn't fall!). {Janine, I was thinking about that night on our Machu Picchu trek the whole time} Two guys broke their flip flops and had to go barefoot, but fortunately our headlamps worked, we didn't get lost and some nice villagers met us when we were about 20mins away and led the way to the beach. Chiara and I set up the tent while the boys got to cooking, and we were able to take a late-night dip in the ocean, which was (a) really refreshing but (b) really cool - there were phosphorescent plankton that just lit up the area around you! We spent the rest of the night chilling on the beach, and everyone but me fell asleep under the stars...

Beach camping site

I woke up the next day just before sunrise, and was able to see what a beautiful beach we landed on. There were big palm trees swaying over the white sand, absolutely no one around, crystal blue water that went on for like a 800m and two islands close by that were just asking to be explored. I put on my bathing suit and hopped in the water and watched the sun rise from about 500m away from shore as some local fisherman were bringing in some lobster traps. I mean how great is that? Everyone else started to get up and we spent the rest of the day swimming, exploring the little islands, tanning, playing frisbee, and just having an all-around awesome beach day. We were able to take a boat ride back, so fortunately the guys with broken flip flops were spared, and came back to the city feeling totally relaxed. We agreed to go back again for the organized trip - knowing of course we would be a bit better organized the next time!

Fisherman paddling in this boat..

Cow Island

I'm going to try and get this post out before Ian and I have our long overdue housewarming BBQ, with hopefully another post tomorrow. The first trip I'm going to tell you about happened about three weeks ago, when we decided to explore the southern coast. We originally thought to go to Jacmel, a cute little artsy town on the beach, but it was the weekend after Tropical Storm Isaac passed and a whole bunch of garbage has washed down the mountain and into the water, so we squashed that plan. Instead we went further west along the southern coast, to an island called Ile a Vache.

Our hotel on Ile a Vache

Ile a Vache is a beautiful little island with a small population and a couple hotels that cater to expats looking for a weekend away or even travelers looking to take a week or so. The place where we stayed had a bit of the "resort hotel" feel, you payed an all inclusive price for the boat ride to and from the island, accommodation and food but are still required to buy your drinks. The trip there took about 4 hours, and we were only staying one night, so we tried to make the most of our time there.

Lover's Island

The first thing we did came recommended by guests we met getting off the boat - it was a getaway to "lover's island". Lovers island is this amazing sandbar in the middle of the ocean, far enough away from ile a vache and the mainland that you have complete privacy but still amazing views. The sandbar is maybe the size of a tennis court, and they drop you off with an umbrella and a cooler of drinks and come back whenever you want to be picked up. Ian and I brought our snorkel gear so we took and underwater tour around the island, and just enjoyed staying out in the sun.

The rest of our time was spent eating great food, looking at great views and snorkeling around the hotel. There were some interesting coral and fish to see around the hotel, and apparently there are even spots to go diving, which I'd like to check out when we get back. One night definitely isn't enough, so we'll need to make the most of a long weekend our next trip there.

The other interesting part about the weekend was the drive to and from. I had never been this far along the south of the horseshoe, and it had some beautiful scenery - rolling hills, lots of palm trees and jungle-y forest stuff, and the southern coast that faces the Caribbean sea is just beautiful. I might almost have enjoyed the drive as much as the trip! Fortunately there are a few more towns to check out along that coast, so I'll get to pass through again....

Cap Haitien

>>> this post was written at the beginning of August but I think I forgot to publish it. Sorry!

I hope all you Canadians are enjoying your long weekend. We actually Monday AND Tuesday off last weekend, so Ian and I decided to take advantage and do some in-country travel to Cap Haitien, a major town on Haiti's northern shoreline. We started off in PAP on Saturday morning, and drove on the "northern route", following the coastline to about the mid-way point in the big bay that makes Haiti look like a horseshoe. That was a beautiful drive along the shimmering blue ocean. We then darted inland to get to the northern coast, going through valleys then mountains then jungle, quite a different landscape than what I've seen around PAP. During the evening after we had gotten there, we went for a stroll along the major plazas, saw some lovely gingerbread houses and had dinner at a seaside restaurant.

Palais Sans Souci

The next day we went to Palais Sans Souci and the Citadelle, a UNESCO World Heritage site. The Sans Souci palace was built in the early 1800s, meant to the be "Versailles of Haiti". In the 200 years since it's been sacked and looted, but you can still see a lot of the old structure and it's quite nice. There is a catedral at the bottom of the hill, and a grand staircase leading up the palace, with a large garden area off to the side. UNESCO World Heritage sites in Haiti are not like those in Europe, there are no barriers that prevent you from going upstairs (or ones that prevent you from falling over, for that matter), so we had a good time walking through and exploring.

We drove up the hill, parked the car, and walked up to the Citadelle, a fort built on top of a very high hill which overlooks the valley clear through to the water. The Citadelle was built with 4m thick walls and has a very steep slope to access it. It also has about 1,500 cannons and something like 15,000 cannonballs. For all of this protection, no one ever tried to attack the fort and the cannons were never fired at a hostile enemy. The Citadelle itself is very well preserved compared to the Palace, and it was really cool to wander around. The whole thing is open and you can wander wherever, from the rooms with the cannons to the medieval-esque courtyard inside, to the top of the structure to give you stunning views into the valley below. Again, there are no barriers to keep you from falling over and tumbling down the valley, but fortunately the 4m thick walls make it easy to walk across the top without fear of falling over...

View from the Citadelle

The day after we explored the Citadelle we had our beach day. We first went to Labadee, the beach that Royal Caribbean has "leased" from the Haitian Government for something like 50 years, and has cruises stop at twice a week. Since there were no cruises that day, the place wasn't open and they didn't let us in, but you can drive around the perimeter and see into it from the other side of the beach. This place has everything from a zip line to a waterslide to a roller coaster! I couldn't get over it, a roller coaster in Haiti. This must be how the cruises make their money... there is also a beautiful stretch of sandy beach, clear water and a water trampoline! Fun. We asked and you can't even get into the area when there is a cruise, probably because Royal Caribbean is scared you'll tell people they're actually in Haiti - apparently Royal Caribbean calls it "Hispaniola", which is the name of the island that has Haiti and the Dominican Republic.

Add caption

After our visual tour of Labadee we headed to Cormier Plage, the beach where we were staying at that night. It was just as gorgeous and way less crowded than Labadee would have been, and we spent the day reading, snorkeling, swimming and tanning. It was a really relaxing way to end an already chilled vacation, we actually wound up staying till 3pm the next day before heading back to PAP. This time we drove back through the central plateau, which had a very different landscape form the northern beach route. We went through the jungle, through plains with lots of agriculture, rolling hills that looked like English countryside and then past a series of connecting lakes that reminded me of Quebec. I really can't get over what a diverse countryside Haiti has, and how different the cities outside of Port-au-Prince can be. I'm really glad we could take the chance to see Haiti outside of Port-au-Prince... 

Calm before the storm

So this post (like almost all my posts) is way overdue. This was going to be my "I survived hurricane Isaac" post, but of course you all know that because it happened two weeks ago. What I want to start telling you about was actually three weeks ago, when I finally discovered where the yoga happens in Haiti.

Yoga in Port-au-Prince

There were twice-weekly yoga classes in Kabul that I attended pretty regularly - it is super relaxing and was a really good excuse to get out of the house. I know that there are yogis among any expat community, so I was searching and searching for a similar yoga class in PAP. I finally learned about one three weeks ago, the instructor gives a free class on Wednesdays on the roof of her apartment. It felt really really good to get back into yoga - it had been almost 8 months since my last class - and it could not have been in a more picturesque location. The classes are on the instructor's apartment rooftop with a great view over PAP and the bay. They start at 7pm so we're doing our sun salutations watching the sunset, it's absolutely amazing. I'm really excited about finding this class and have been attending weekly every since.  I also realized that yoga is another way you get 'spoiled' as an expat - I haven't paid to attend a class in two years and the concept just seems foreign to me now!

So that was Wednesday. By Thursday, everyone was buzzing about Isaac, the tropical storm that was slowly making its way to Haiti. We actually had Friday off work in case it hit, which turned out to be THE most anti-climatic day. It was a bit cloudy and kind of windy, and then everything quieted down (the proverbial calm before the storm, I suppose). By dinner time we were going stir crazy in our apartment and headed over to our friends house down the road for dinner and drinks. The winds picked up around 7 or 8, and the rain around 9 or 10, but the storm wasn't even in PAP by the time we went to bed. It hit us around 2am, and I awoke to some howling wind, but was able to get back to sleep so we really slept through the entire thing.

Isaac was tropical storm strength (one strength less than a hurricane), and caused less visible damage than a freak 20-min hurricane we had had a month earlier. There wasn't too much rain, so the amount of damage caused by flooding was minimal, things were quite normal in PAP. The storm came through the south and they were hit worse off then us. Overall it was a very anti-climatic experience, firstly because the storm hit late and we slept through it and secondly because it didn't leave much of a trail. I'm not complaining, and we still have three more months of "hurricane season" so there may still be a storm or two coming, but at the moment I'm back to enjoying my sunny days on my tropical island!

The apartment blog!

For all of you avid blog followers, the blog you have been waiting for is here! It's the apartment blog! It's only about two weeks after I originally wanted to post this, so thanks for your patience... 

After Ian spent two weeks looking at 20+ apartments, from dingy studios to pimpin' penthouses, we settled on a nice 2-bed 1-bath that wasn't even referred to us from Ian's vast networking of local real estate agents, the landlord is the best friend of one of my colleagues. Fortunately Ian doesn't see it as time wasted, because he got a good idea of the market and knew to snap this one up when he saw it. I'm glad he did because it's perfect for us. 

The location is only five minutes away from where I was in the Build Change apartments, so it's a good distance in between work and Petionville, the part of town where we normally go out for dinner, drinks or to parties. The landlord is very nice and putting in a BBQ pit, so we'll soon be able to have cook outs! We're surrounded by Haitian neighbours, which is nice because it makes me feel a lot more connected with my surroundings than I did living in a poppy palace in Kabul. Plus there aren't any helicopters flying 100m above my bed. 

Here is what I know you’re really looking for thought, the photos:

View from the front door

The living room

Our balcony! We eat here almost every meal... 

The master bedroom. The cleaning lady was washing our sheets.. 

Our landlord said that when the earthquake hit, they were renting these apartments unfurnished to Haitian families. Many moved out because they were afraid to sleep under a concrete slab roof (it took some people up to a year to be able to sleep inside again, so don't take this as a shot against the structural integrity of our building), and the landlord decided to furnish the apartments and rent to expats. Our landlord is actually a young guy and so he took extra furniture from his parents house and put it into our apartment and showed it off to potential clients like a model home! We still have our "model home" furniture, but actually it make the place feel quite homey and has a Haitian flavour, I really really like it. 

In other fun news, Ian got a job! He’s going to be working as a Finance Delegate with the British Red Cross. He’s very happy with his choice and I’m proud of him – Red Cross jobs are hard to land! He actually flies to the UK on Saturday for a week of orientation (during the Olympics!) and then will start in earnest Aug 13th. Inshallah he will continue to be able to live with me, pending the outcome of a security assessment, but the Red Cross don't seem to bothered about it and I think it will all work out. I'm actually going to miss his first few in-country days, as I'll be back in Ottawa for a VERY short R&R trip, I fly in at midnight on Friday the 10th and fly out mid-day on Weds the 15th.... 

Last weekend was a holiday in Haiti as well as the Canada, for a just-as-random holiday, le Carnival des Fleurs. Since Monday and Tuesday were off, we took advantage of the possibility for some in-country travel and went up north to Cap Haitien. That blog to follow...  

Voodoo at the Waterfall

Hello all,

I'm sure you all expected my next post to be about our new apartment, but you'll need to wait at least another post for that one. As much as I love our new place, I had a great experience last weekend I think you'll be more interested in hearing about.

Last weekend we went to Saut d'Eau, which literally translates from French to waterfall (in Creole it's just Sodo, because, as my colleague put it, the French just add in too many extra letters when they try and spell stuff). Saut d'Eau a town plus the waterfalls themselves about an hour inland north-east from Port-au-Prince, and last weekend happened to be the anniversary of a supposed sighting of the Virgin Mary of Mount Carmel. The story is kind of fishy, but apparently a priest saw the virgin appear on a palm tree a couple of hundred years ago, and not wanting it to turn into a superstitious thing, he cut the tree down. Nevertheless, it turned superstitious and both Catholics and Voodoo-practitioners have associated something religious with the place. There is a pilgrimage to the waterfalls every year in July to bathe in the waterfalls using herbs swirled around and blessed in a calabash (or you can just use plain soap).

Ian making his way up the waterfalls

We drove up on a Saturday and went straight to the waterfalls, where the festival atmosphere had started a bit. We passed lots of stalls selling soap, herbs, alcohol and more, and President Martelly had been at the waterfalls only a few minutes before we arrived. The waterfalls are quite big, you can either get into them from the bottom or the top, but it's possible to climb up or down through the waterfalls. They are also a lot of places to just sit down and have the water run down all around you. It was a really relaxing afternoon, and it's somewhere easy enough to drive to, spend a few hours, and go back to the city on a weekend or with visitors (ahem).

We stayed overnight at a friend of a friend's, a Haitian that lived in Montreal driving a taxi for 16 years and has come back to enjoy retirement in his home country. He was very welcoming and had a lot of people around for the festival anyways, so a few more were no big deal. At night he had a lot of friends over, and got this "troubadou" band to come and play while everyone ate. Troubadou is one of the local music styles here, quite African and super cool. There was a guy on a banjo, a maracas guy, a drummer, and a guy with a bass that was actually a big box he sat on with a hole in the middle, and different lengths of knives over the hole that he would pluck for the sound. These aren't the same guys, but this gives you an idea of what I'm talking about: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wmcvQ8-Aoq0.

One of my fav photos - scrub scrub scrub!

The next day we went back to the waterfalls, and it was a LOT busier than the day before, I bet there were at least a thousand people in the waterfall at any given time. We stayed up at the top of the falls where we were the day before, and spent a couple hours just watching the real festival-goers do their thing. There were a lot of people going through the bathing ritual - in fact I saw so much flesh that it felt weird going back to Port-au-Prince and seeing people in clothes! No one was running around naked, but everyone was in their underwear, and given the force of the waterfalls, there was little to be left to the imagination. If I ever had any doubt about how a man washes himself, it was put to rest last Sunday, I can tell you that. We also saw some voodoo priests with a gathering of followers, normally women, and he would swirl around the herbs in their calabash and wash them all up and down. There were rah-rah bands around, lots of chanting and a bit of singing and you can tell it was generally just enjoyed by all.

Better to be upstream than down

When we were leaving the city we encountered one of the major problems with holding a festival with only two roads in and out - traffic. Our driver had done the smart thing and parked on the outskirts of the city, but the traffic to get there was horrendous. There were about 10 of us in one truck (between the seats inside and the flatbed), slowly crawling along to try to get to the other car. Finally we decided it would be easier for those of us going to the other car to hop on a moto taxi, so that's just what we did. We had a mini-convoy of three motos with 6 people plus drivers that easily weaved through the traffic and got out to the car in 5 minutes. Ian and my driver had the speaker system set up to his phone and was blasting the tunes while the moto in front of us was beeping along to the beat. It was just one of those situations where you had to laugh... 

Jellyfish to the Face

Hello all, 

I hope that you're doing well and are enjoying the full swing of summer. It's been summer since I got here, but hurricane season just officially started, so I expect a rain or two in the coming months. 

The most exciting news of this week is that we found an apartment! It's quite close to where I'm currently living, so it's a good distance between work and the after-work places we like to go. It's "homely" as Ian calls it, because not only is it furnished but there are paintings on the wall and it is a very comfortable place. The best part is that is has a big balcony, I imagine we're going to be eating a lot of meals and playing a lot of scrabble out on it. We should be moving in next week, so I'll send pics once we're settled. What most important for you perhaps is that it's a two-bedroom, so there is a bed for visitors :) Yes, that means you. 

I also got to get out of the city for work this week, which was nice. I went to Leogane, south and west along the peninsula from Port-au-Prince. I had only driven through it once before, and didn't see that much this time around, but it was nice to get out and see the rural areas of the country. There are lots of banana trees and agriculture around, and life is just as colourful but seems a bit less crowded - it's nice. Leogane was actually the epicentre of the earthquake, and I was surprised that there were still a lot of people living in tents - proportionally as much as PAP maybe. There were also a lot of transitional shelters - buildings meant to last 3-5 years as people save money to rebuild their own homes. It will be interesting to see how it develops in the next five years as many shelter projects draw down in Leogane, but health and education programming goes up. 

I got out to that side of the country again this weekend, as we spent today at the beach. There aren't any beaches (or at least ones you want to go to) directly in PAP, it takes about an hour outside of the city either north or south to get somewhere that you have a chance to relax. There are basically three types of beaches in Haiti:

1. Public beaches that we call "MINUSTAH beaches" (MINUSTAH is the peacekeeping force here), because inevitably a couple truckloads of soldiers show up, have the tunes blasting, have lots of beer to go around and are generally making a commotion. Depending on the nationality of these guys, they may also be staring at me. Not so ideal when one wants to relax. 

2. Beach resorts. These are very nice classy places, Club Med standard. But they charge an entrance fee to get in, and $20 entry or $40 with a buffet is standard. Pricy!

3. Smaller hotels that don't charge an entrance fee, you just buy lunch or drinks or whatever. This has been my preferred option since being back, I've been going to this great little place called Villa Taina near Grand Goave. 

Yes, those are bits of tomato on my neck. I guess my freckles mask the swelling but it's there!

So we went to the beach today, which was really nice and relaxing. There were definitely people there but it wasn't overcrowded, the water was warm and the sun was out. Everything was very idyllic, down to the Haitian man in a canoe (aka hollowed out tree) paddling to get the lobster in the traps for lunch. Ian had a couple pairs of goggles and we were able to check out some of the coral and fish below, although it was only a small reef. You can imagine after a morning of swimming, a lunch of lobster and then a last swim where I was alongside the fishes in the reef, I was pretty relaxed. I was! And then a jellyfish stung me in the face! I'm serious, it got my whole face and part of my neck! I'm still not sure how it happened, as I was wearing the goggles and should have seen it, but I guess jellyfishes are clear. 

I immediately got out of the water as the stinging was starting, then I splashed cold water on my face then the owner of the place took me into the kitchen where he gave me his home remedy: first he soaked a rag in vinegar and ran it all over my face and then cut a tomato in two and ran both sides over it. It didn't smell the loveliest and it attracted a lot of flies, but it worked! The stinging subsided and I was just left with a swollen face. It took about three hours for the swelling to fade, but that's gone now too. I don't think that episode took all of the relaxation out of me, so the trip to the beach was still worth it... 

Celebrities in Haiti

Haiti seems to still be one of the top spots for celebrities that have a charitable inclination and want to do some good in the world. It's close to the States, so it's an easy flight down, it's a tropical island so it's much more pleasant to visit than say Pakistan, and there are lots of cute kids to take photos with. Everyone from Oprah to Pamela Anderson has been for a visit. Some celebrities have taken it further and have charitable foundations that work here, most notably Sean Penn, who started an NGO after the January 2010 earthquake. His NGO runs a camp for displaced people in a hard-hit area of town and also provides services to eventually get everyone moved back in to the communities where they came from. I find it funny that everyone seems to have "Sean" story (he is not Sean Penn to these people). The people who work for his NGO seem him often enough and it's fair they're on a first name basis. Others people will tell you about how they handed Sean a beer at a party or how they took the same flight into Port-au-Prince as Sean.

I had my first celebrity encounter last week, though it wasn't with Sean. My organization is part of the Clinton Global Initiative, which basically means we've made a commitment to some global good (in our case, training block makers to make stronger blocks). The Haiti meetings are held every 6-8 weeks, and Bill Clinton himself happened to be in town to open this meeting up. I didn't get a chance to speak with him (nor did anyone else), as he was ushered into the room when we were all seated and left after giving opening remarks, but it was cool nonetheless. What I found particularly funny was that people had dressed up for the occasion, there were lots of nice blouses and dresses and even a few suits, but Bill himself had dressed quite casually - he was wearing pink pants and a lemon-lime coloured button down shirt! More appropriate on the golf course than at the meeting table, but he had just flown in at 2am so I guess I couldn't fault him. He spoke well and looks much slimmer than he did in his presidential days. I have to admit that I didn't see him crystal clear, as I was about 20 feet away and my eyes can only see clearly to about 10 feet [ :( ] but I'm sure I entertained his secret service dudes with all my squinting.

Ian has been here a week and is settling in well - he's already got a couple leads on potential interviews and apartments, which arguably may have been more productive than my week! There's definitely something to be said for showing up somewhere and networking - he's gotten a few good leads that way. He's also had the Euro cup games to keep him busy, and is still fully appreciating the 101 ways why PAP is better than Kabul. We watched the final at a bar this afternoon, which had a pretty awesome sign at the door - no firearms allowed, no prostitutes allowed. I mean it is not so awesome that there are Haitian prostitutes around (this bar turns into a club at night and there is definitely a market for 'lady of the night' services here, unfortunately), but kind of awesome that that's the kind of bar signage we're getting.

And speaking of signage, I leave you with snapshots from some of my favorite advertisements. Almost all advertisements here are hand-painted, which is pretty cool, and the office for a local security company (Ange Gardien S.A.) is very well done. It's double funny because all security companies do here is provide a guard posted at the gate of an office or house (with or without shotgun), but Ange Gardien S.A. showcases that they can do so much more...

For the "Tru" Professional

Yes, that does say "Trusted by U.S. Marines"

 

Ian is here!

Most exciting news of the past week! After telling me he booked a ticket on Tuesday, Ian got here on Friday night! I am so very excited! Exclamation marks all around. The plan is for him to continue his job search here, and in the meantime start on an apartment search for us. He also has a stack of books, gym clothes, intentions to learn Creole and ideas about downloading a cooking app, so I think he'll be okay.

On Friday I took him to the Montana, a hotel that's still being rebuilt but with salsa music on Friday nights and great views. We spent most of the weekend touring around the city a bit (so he could get a feel for the apartment market!) and watching Euro cup games. Since he's been walking around and getting to know the city, looking at apartments, and going to the gym, so he's quite happy for the time being. And I'm quite happy too! All of the 101 reasons why Haiti is better than Kabul that I experienced, Ian is experiencing too, and it's reminding me how lucky I am to be here.

Other than that things have been quite normal here... I've been busy at work but it's a lot of meeting people and time away from my desk, so it's all a good balance. My roommate Juan has moved out but was replaced by a new intern, a girl who is very nice. As much as I will miss Juan (I mean, the guy left me Brownies as a parting gift!) it is nice to live with a girl and even nicer not to be the newbie but to instead be the one showing people around. I guess I'm doing that twice with Ian and Chiara (the intern), but it suits me just fine.

Anyways this is more of a personal post that a Haiti interest piece, so I'll cut it short.. but I hope you're all doing well and feel free to drop me a line whenever! xoxox

Rainy Sunday Post

Hello all,

I'm writing on what is the first rainy day in the 6 weeks I've been here... Rainy Sundays can be quite nice though, and so far today I've had a big English breakfast with my colleagues, Skyped with Shabari in Spain, gone to the market and had tea on a balcony watching the rain... and there is a scrabble game to come - yay. Altogether it's been a low key weekend, yesterday I went to a rooftop BBQ at night and spent most of the afternoon before that chatting with some friends... not a bad weekend all in all!

View from Tisous - taken on my Blackberry so it's low res

Friday was a lot more eventful though. I was plugging along at work when one of my colleagues announced "well, I'm off to Tisous (one of the neighbourhoods where we work), Kate, do you want to come?" I hadn't been to Tisous yet and my boss encouraged me to go, so I went along with Gordon, our lead structural engineer, to check on some of the houses we are overseeing, both new construction and retrofitting. Gordon walks around the neighbourhood in flip flops, so I thought I'd be okay in my work sandals and work skirt, and surprisingly I was! I'm sure the residents were wondering why I was so dressed up though, seeing as though our engineers are generally (rightly) in jeans, a t-shirt and baseball cap, but mostly they just smiled at me the way they do any other foreigner, and one lady smiled at me a arranged the neck on my shirt. One thing I'll say about Haitians is that looks matter, and they're happy to straighten your tie if it's out of place. Tisous is in a 'suburb' of Port-au-Prince called Carrefour and is quite different from the other big neighbourhood we work in. For one thing, there's more space in Carrefour, and even if the houses are still small, they have amazing views. It was great to get out and see some of our work in action, I'm slowly learning how to pick out what's right or wrong with the houses we're overseeing... It was nice to meet some of the beneficiaries as well, even though they're Creole-speaking, we could quasi-communicate with my French, and it was great to hear them so empowered about rebuilding their homes. And the lady who straightened out my shirt was very very nice.

Sacre Coeur parade from our second-floor balcony

I got back to the office and worked all afternoon, and just as I was getting ready to leave the office, I hear  what sounds like a gospel-choir outside my office. I look out, and literally hundreds of people were coming down our street - one of Haiti's many spontaneous parades. Apparently it was Sacré Coeur - why this merited a parade I'm still unclear but there were priests, a congregation, and a mobile keyboard/guitar coming down my street singing! It was pretty cool hearing all of those hundreds of voices singing and "amen"-ing though. There are some large shady parts on our street, so they stayed outside a good 30 mins, but this means I overheard part of a mass in Creole as well! It was Friday night and I was keen to leave the office, but if my comings and goings need to be disrupted, I'm glad its with parades and not the demonstration's I was used to in Kabul...

I'm not sure that there was too much more that was interesting about my week, so instead I leave you with an interesting Haiti fact: the Haitian currency is called a gourde, it's about 40 gourdes to a dollar. Some time ago however, they had "Haitian dollars", and five gourdes = one Haitian dollar. The interesting part of this all - it's not uncommon for people to price things in Haitian dollars, although you need to pay in gourdes. I've been to grocery stores where every price tag is in Haitian dollars, to restaurants where the bill comes out in Haitian dollars. Even more hilarious is the fact that when you ask "what's that in gourdes ?" (because of course you can only pay in gourdes), you generally get grumbled at and inevitably a calculator or phone comes out to figure out the conversion. If I buy mangoes off the street for five Haitian dollars, and this mango seller does the same transaction every day and knows she gets 25 gourdes, why doesn't she just tell me that off the bat?? Why are there grocery stores and restaurants that price things in a currency that doesn't exist?? It blows my mind. Happy Sunday everyone!

Hashing in Haiti

I think my last post was Wednesday, right before I went to Chicken Fiesta? In between those wings and now, I've had a good couple of days... Chicken Fiesta was delicious, as expected, but I found myself in an unexpected place afterwards. I had met a girl named Sarah through work last Tuesday that told me about "Wednesdays at the Petionville Club", which she kindly invited me to, so I headed over after Chicken Fiesta. 

The Petionville Club is a country club that's been operating in Haiti for years. When I was here three years ago, it had tennis courts, a pool and a golf course! Two years ago the golf course was claimed by a displaced persons camp (Sean Penn's, actually!) and the tennis courts by their staff. Fast forward to now, and it has reclaimed its salt-water pool and tennis courts, though the camp is expected to stay another year.... The Petionville Club is very much a country club, membership required, but on Wednesdays they open their doors up to the public and generally have Haitian music as entertainment. In and of itself, that was great, but Sarah happens to be very good friends at the owner, so I had a place at their "VIP" table with lots of wine being poured. Thankfully Thursday was a holiday, thus a day off of work! I wound up spending an hour talking with the owner, having an interesting conversation about what it's like to run a country club in an impoverished country, among other things. It definitely wasn't what I expected going in, but a good night nonetheless. I think it may become a regular Wednesday spot for me.... 

I laid low on our holiday Thursday, doing a bit of work and working on my tan. Friday night I went for burgers with my colleagues to a place called Hang - it was blasting dance party music but was a burger joint, certainly different from my waitressing stint at the Works! I kind of enjoyed shaking my shoulders to the tunes while chomping down on my burger though..... Saturday I spent some time by the pool and met up with a friend from Kabul at night, and I even managed to take in the hockey game! Hopefully I can catch game 6 when I go out later tonight... 

Hashers trying to make it down a very steep hill

Sunday was another interesting day - I participated the hash! For those of you who don't know the hash, they describe themselves as a drinking club with a running problem... They have either a walking or running group that goes out on a trail, and then there is a whole bunch of drinking afterwards. I did one hash in Kabul but, as you can imagine, this was quite different. Aside from the fact that I could wear shorts and a t-shirt (yay!), the trail was quite different. Since Port-au-Prince is full of hills, we went up a hill, down the hill and across a ravine, up the informal settlement, through a bit of a forest (going up and down hills all the time), back across a ravine and then back to the starting place. It was interesting seeing houses being built (since that's my new gig), but also just seeing life happening in the settlements. It's nice to see things as they happen instead of through the window of a car... And nice to relax this way after seeing it all! 

Cheers! 

The reality of working on a tropical island..

#1 - You can still catch a cold. Which I did a few weeks ago, slowing down my extracurricular activities and also my blogging. Sorry!

#2 - You still have to work. And I do - long hours! Fortunately a weekend is a weekend here, two full days to sleep in a suntan and just veg out. But I often find myself working a long day, coming home to change clothes and go back out again for a dinner or networking thing, otherwise I am too tired to sit down and write anything meaningful anymore. So sorry about that too!

I have been doing a couple interesting things that merit mentioning though, like lunch last Sunday. We went up the mountain to a restaurant called Trois Decks, which had a jazz band play all afternoon. We had a very civilized meal accompanied by a few drinks and a great atmosphere, we were on one of the decks overlooking the tree canopy. I did have the foresight to take a photo but I must have had one too many rum sours because I only took photos of the foliage. I attach for your amusement anyways.

I'm starting to keep a running tab of why Haiti is better than Kabul - I think I mentioned in the first few blogs about being able to go to the beach on the weekend and show my elbows at all times? These things still excited me. As does the latest: the parties. Not the parties themselves, because a Kabul party was pretty kicking, but the fact that there isn't a guest list to get in! Kabul was insane for that! I hadn't had to 'fake' getting into somewhere since I was a teenager! But there is none of that in Haiti, yay. And if you're going to put on a party, the costs of getting alcohol are much more reasonable...

My last tidbit for the day is the language, not French but Creole. The words/phrases I learned before have come back to me, but I've been slow to learn some more - I'm still getting comfortable communicating in French. However, I'm not anticipating a problem because I (unlike a lot of Europeans here) understand Quebecois, and if you can learn Quebecois you can learn Creole. They are both a phonetic version of french, but one's fast (Quebecois) and the other at a slower pace (Creole). Some of my favorite examples so far: dlo (d'leau = water), machine (pronounces mah-shine = car), pwojé (projet = project). It should be a piece of cake.

I'm off to discover all that PAP restaurants have to offer, this time to a place called Chicken Fiesta that specializes in wings! Who would have thought... ?

Field Trip!

A lot of random things have happened in the past few days, but I'm not sure how interested you all are to hear that I had my first encounter with a spider the size of my hand (in my shower, I trapped him and set him free), or the fact that I found out I have a colleague who is named Prince Harry. Prince Harry as first names Rosignol as his last. He's no ginger, although apparently he did start an email last week with "let it be known...."!

A building site in Duval. What a view! 

I did get up to something quite interesting yesterday though, I went out to the field to see our programs in action. I had been out to an area called Villa Rosa last week, so this wasn't my first visit. On the map in my office, Villa Rosa is described as a 'shantytown', because it has a lot of haphazard settlements built closely together on a very steep slope. Duval, where I went yesterday, couldn't be more different. It's up in the mountains, it takes over an hour to get there. There is miles of space between the houses, although to be fair many of them are still built on very steep slopes. It was a very picturesque drive up though, reminding me at times of Peru or Sri Lanka, and being up in the mountains has the added benefit of being at least 10 degrees cooler than the city.

I was quite interested to go because we saw houses in various stages of construction, so it was easy for me to visualize the building process, and easy for me to see how the technologies we teach help buildings become disaster-resistant. I will probably delve into work stuff more in later posts, so I won't bore you "non-engineers" with it now. (Yes, I am also a non-engineer, and have been referred to as one in a somewhat-endearing way by one of my colleagues).

It was also really neat because they do a lot of agriculture up there, we passed tons of cabbage, lettuce, beets and other veggies. Actually, my colleague brought us some of the Duval lettuce last week, which I had been eating in salads and sandwiches. It was really neat to compare their agriculture to what I've seen in other hilly places though, because they are able to grow things on VERY steep slopes. They do terracing like I saw in Peru, but it's way less formal, they'll just pile a bunch of rocks along the plots, which tumble down now and again and get piled back up when the do. The other funny thing that reminded me of other places I've been was unexpected, because I was reminded of Afghanistan! It seems like a couple of the households have been siphoning off electricity from the main power lines (not that uncommon), but they're not using electrical wiring, they were using barbed wire as their conductor! I love how strong the entrepreneurial spirit is in places like this...

I leave you with another proof of entrepreneurship, an entire furniture showroom fitting into one tap-tap for transport.... enjoy :)

Flag Day

Happy long weekend to most of you readers! Haiti also has a long weekend, though we had Friday off instead of Monday. Yesterday was Flag Day! Not independence day, flag day. I went out sightseeing with my colleagues, inadvertently learning about flag day and coming upon a parade. I'll start at the beginning:

I went out with Juan and Ben with the goal of taking photos of some gingerbread houses. Haiti has these really cool houses built during the 20s-40s that look very tropical villa-esque, brightly painted with a neat old time feel. We went down into the old district and found a few that we could take photos of from the outside, and one where the caretaker let us in to wander around. The rooms were empty but even their atmosphere is enough to take you back to the time they were built, you could picture the southern ladies and gentleman having cocktails in the salon. They had wraparound porches and patios off bedroom/offices on the upper floors, providing a great view of Port-au-Prince and the bay. Sadly, many were damaged in the earthquake, but they can be retrofitted, and it would be SO neat to retrofit and restore then and open a hotel/bar/restaurant.

While we were downtown we also happened by the Haitian Cultural Museum, and it being flag day we decided to go in. The museum itself it quite small but they have a few artifacts, including the anchor from the Santa Maria (Christopher Colombus' boat), some swords/spears/personal effects of the Haitian "rebel" (aka native) army that got independence for Haiti from France in 1804, etc. They had just opened an exhibition on Haiti's flag, which has quite the long and colourful past. There have been about a dozen versions since the Haitian "rebels" fought France for independence in the late 18th century, and it seems like every new dictator in the 20thC was happy to declare Haiti a new flag. The current one was Haiti's flag from 1820-1843 when the north and the south parts of the country unified, then was tossed out by a dictator, changed again by another dictator in the 1960s, and brought back in 1986 after the Duvalier regime fell. Good times.

We went uptown for lunch, and then embarked upon a search to find Ben a backpack. The Jansport backpack is ubiquitous here, but there are tons of knockoffs (called Joysports!). It was fun getting out and walking through the markets though, it was like a bazaar in Afghanistan where there are just piles of stuff on display, suitcases and cell phones and clothes and bed frames, you name it and I probably saw it. I did however thoroughly enjoy this souvenir (see photo) obviously targeted at MINUSTAH, the peacekeeping for here. They have the Brazilian, Argentine and Chilean soldiers all lined up in fatigues with guns, and there is the Canadian in his policeman's uniform and nothing but a sidearm. How very typically Canadian!

We got a last dose of culture on the drive back, when we came across a flag day parade! I have learned that everyone gets flag day off but school kids, who are forced to march in celebration of their flag. This parade had it all: marching bands, coordinated dance routines, songs, outfits, flag waving, and vocal onlookers. In Kabul we would have had to avoid such a demonstration, but here we were able to pull over and enjoy it. There's nothing like a good parade to cap off your flag day! Well, actually I capped off my day with a quadri-lingual scrabble game (English, French, Spanish, Creole), and those of you who know my love for scrabble can imagine how much I enjoyed that!

Back to Haiti

Hello all, 


As most of you know, I'm back in Haiti. I'm with a new organization, called Build Change, who designs earthquake-resistant houses and then train and supervises homeowners, builders, and government officials to build them. I've been back almost two weeks but have been too busy/tired to start the blog, so this first post will be a copy/paste of an email some of you received, and the second will be new. Here goes! 

Well, I'm back to being Katie in Haiti and I am really, really enjoying it! It is so very different from Afghanistan, but also quite different from the last time I was here. It seems like I bring a unique perspective having been here before the earthquake, and then again shortly afterwards. So much has changed - there are way more restaurant/bars (to cater to expats but also Haitians), the price of food has gone up (expats and well-to-do Haitians are willing to pay, so they can charge), and a lot of the tent cities have been cleared out since I was here after the earthquake. Apparently many have been cleared as recently as a few weeks ago, but what a difference it makes. 

The job:

Is really good, I'm enjoying myself a lot so far. Build Change designs earthquake-resistant houses and then trains homeowners, builders, and government officials how to build them. We either do designs for new construction, or retrofits of houses that were deemed unsafe. We don't provide financing for homeowners to build, nor do we do the actual building, but we train people how to do it and provide onsite, on-the-job supervision so that the builders learn a skill they can carry away. I am doing fund development and grant writing, which is a combination of networking on the ground and writing proposals. For example, an NGO may win a contract to retrofit/build 300 new houses in Port-au-Prince. I'll write a proposal offering to sub-contract to them, having Build Change provide housing designs, train their builders how to build the designs, and provide onsite supervision throughout the process so it's done correctly. I've wrote three last week and there are another couple in the pipeline, so you can imagine how busy we are! I like it though, it's a good mix of getting out meeting people and the geeky, proposal writing stuff I like to do. I report to the Director of Programs, who is great and has been helping me a lot this past week. 

My coworkers:

Are all really nice. There are about 80 Haitians, the majority of who are engineers/trainers and are on building sites every day to make sure things run smoothly. The rest are admin/operations people, comms people, or architect/engineers who create house designs. There are 9 expats including me, two Haitian-Americans (one heads admin and the other comms), then the director of programs and 5 engineers/architects. All are men except the comms director, but it's not a problem at all. All are really, really nice and have been great at getting me up to speed and making me feel included in their after-work activities.

My apartment:

Is also quite nice, and a lot like the ones I stayed in with PDT. There are two bedrooms, a kitchen, living room, and a shared bathroom, and all are big and spacious. I am sharing an apartment with Juan, a Honduran architect. He's fluent in English and French, but I'm practicing my Spanish with him as well. He's been great about making me feel welcome and it isn't weird sharing the living space. The apartment is about halfway in between the office and Petionville, the kind of hub of activity for extra-curricular stuff, it has lots of restaurants, gyms, bars, etc. Traffic is terrible here, so it's in a nice midway location. 

Haiti itself:

Is awesome! It is SUCH a change from Afghanistan, I can't get over it. We don't have any curfews or security restrictions except that we're supposed to take Build Change drivers. This means that if we want to go to the beach, we can go we just need to take one of our drivers. We're actually going to a beach about an hour outside of PAP today! My coworkers have taken day/weekend trips all around the country, so I'm getting excited to do the same. I feel completely safe in the city as well, there really aren't any security concerns. It would be totally possible to come down for a Haitian vacation, spend your days at nice cafes/restaurants and going to the beach. SUCH an upgrade from Kabul! I am really excited for my new lifestyle. 

For all of you that want to keep in touch in another way, we can BBM! Work gave me a Blackberry and I am slowly learning how to use it, so if you have one you can pass along your pin. That's it for now, post #2 coming up!