Thoughts on re-entry from Carla, and pictures from Kevin
Day Nine- Carla and Kevin are home.
Contradictions are even worse when we get home.
Kevin and I have returned from our travels. We stayed one day beyond the rest of the
group- in case anyone had trouble getting out of the airport. As it turns out, the airport in Port au
Prince has become surprisingly efficient (for Port au Prince) and the
departures went smoothly.
Immigration and
Customs in Miami were far worse! After
two hours, three passport inspections and three security lines, we RAN to our
connecting flight, backpacks bouncing. We arrived breathless, sweaty and just
in time to get on board. To top it off, the
big man in the seat next to me on the flight intruded into my space, snoring
loudly, and passing gas! I kid you
not-it was one bad flight!
We left Haiti and are back in the comfort of the first
world, with its first world comforts.
First world problems seem so pointless. A hot shower felt better than
ever this morning. In Haiti today, young
girls are walking miles to get water. I
bought tomatoes and fresh Romaine today from amidst an abundance of fresh
vegetables in the produce section. The Haitian
peasants’ tomato fields are dead of drought.
My cats are soft and well-fed, purring to have me home. The ribs are showing on the cats creeping
into the dining hall at La Kay. Extreme
contradictions. I let go of
contradictions and enjoy my shower, my tomatoes, and my cats. Re-entry is a
challenge.
Yesterday, still in my program-leader hat, I sent an email
to our group about the challenge of re-entry. This is a continual process of
integrating all the contradictions. We need
to be patient with ourselves, not to wallow in guilt. We need to continue to
enjoy our lives, and yet to live with a new awareness. Our experience in Haiti shatters our racial
and cultural assumptions, the divisions we saw in the world. We establish connection -we cross a boundary. Beyond the contradictions and the boundaries
we humans have created is a universal human experience and human connection. I believe this. I continue to struggle with the
contradictions, and to seek integration. This is why I return. I am so grateful to share the experience, and
the struggles, with others.
Laura speaking: I believe all of the Haiti Travelers (aside from Carla, Kevin, and Rob), are home now. Carla and Kevin should be home this evening. Rob will be staying at MPP for an additional two weeks. Today has been a challenge for me, as I begin this complicated process of re-entry. There is plenty to be written about on this process alone, for sure.
Thoughts from Liz, right before we began our long journey home yesterday morning:
Morning of our eighth and last day in Haiti. We head to the airport in Port au Prince after breakfast.
I had intended to post on this blog each day. This my first post.
Writer's block is a condition I have rarely experienced. Brilliant, pulsating, sunny Haiti was not the place where I would ever have expected it to show up as present. Yet there it was for the past seven days. I am grateful that Laura's posts have spoken so strongly and clearly and beautifully for me.
A simply glorious week here in this Caribbean country with all of its bounty and scarcity, beauty and pain, courage and fear.
Six week old Emanuel has been in the forefront of my mind and deep in my heart ever since I had the blessing of holding him in my arms two days ago. I can still feel the warmth of his little body and see his beautiful, brown face. His spirit will accompany me back home, I know, as will the spirit, love, and courage of so many I have come to know here.
The dedication and tenacity of the workers in Papaye's AG-ECO program and their fierce determination to develop nutritional crops in the face of drought and paucity of equipment inspires beyond words. The bright smiles of greeting on the faces of Haitians of all ages as we see each other in the streets brimming with poverty cause me to ask myself whether I ever dare to complain again.
The plan for Father Richard and me to get together at the hospital in Port au Prince today will not come to fruition because he will be working to retrieve a boy in very perilous health from an off shore island and treat him in whatever way possible to help save his precious life. Father Richard wrote in a message to me yesterday that we now need Zach's prayers for this boy. As I write these words I am back in Zach's room in the last weeks of his earthly life when Father Richard visited and prayed with Him, his parents and sister, and several other family members including me. Now here Zach is, showing up in Haiti.
I am crying today. I can't let these tears start or they may
never stop. Still, I cry. I am here to support others, to be the calm
reassuring presence, the program leader. Still, I cry. Perhaps I could model that it is ok to cry?
Sitting in the shade beside my husband and listening to one
man's story of loss, the tears began to swell. Another tragic story of struggle
and loss, a broken water system and hard work that bears no fruit.
Water is life.
In this case, tomatoes are the fruit that that the work doesn't
bear. Dry tilled fields lay sprinkled
with seeds, ready for greens and ripening reds. No water will come to these
fields, even so close to a lake. This
ideal location for growing has gone dry as the pump that brings water through
pipes from the lake to these fields has broken. No amount of hard work and even
the dollars the peasants scrounged together to hire a technician could fix
it. The plows that tilled this soil, the
men who walked behind them, the cows who pulled them, that seeds that lay in
the brown soil are equally powerless to help these fields now. There is no water.
Water is life.
The gray-haired man cracks a smiles as he tells us of the
day he carried 14 jugs and 10 bottles of water from lake to field. That desperate day when he still dreamed of
saving his fields. The next day he went
to plant beans but couldn't bend over.
The pain in his back was the pain of the futility of this, he laughed at
himself for being a silly old man. Even
the three young men, all the tattered, sad-eyed women, and thin but charming
children cannot carry enough buckets to water these fields.
Water is life.
"We are hungry," he says. He is done with his
story. We thank him ,"mesi anpil."
We climb into our air-conditioned vans, wave out the windows, drink from our
water bottles in hot, thirsty gulps. We laugh and talk and leave them
behind. Mostly.
Water is life.
How many water bottles would it take to save these
tomatoes? How many tears would it take
to water these fields? How many months can these people survive before the rain
comes?
I can't stand to listen to another story; another failed
well, failed fishpond, community in conflict, child who will never go to
school. Across every field is another
heart-breaking problem that has no end. there is always more hard work and misery, more
hope fading silently into hopelessness.
I cannot bear another tale of a broken dream. I do not want to see more
imaginary tomatoes and dreamed of beans.
I want to go
home. I need to go home! I want to stay
and to help. I need to stay and to help.
How could I ever help? I know no
raindances, and I don't fix broken pumps.
Water is life.
When I get home I'll turn the tap to wash my hands, my
dishes, my teeth. I will flush a toilet and take a hot shower. I may complain
of another grey rainy day. I take water completely for granted. As I do light bulbs, air-conditioning, tomatoes in the
supermarket, and cans of black beans. We are hungry, says this man; no water,
no crop, no money from the market, no food.
Water is cool, refreshing, beautiful. Water, we are privileged to forget, is
essential. Water is the Source of All Being.
I can only cry for these people- for all the people of
Haiti- for all the hungry people at home- for all of us. I can only cry.
Water is Life.
The bottom of the waterfall we visited
From the top of the waterfall
Our fearless leaders! Juliette, Carla, Robert, and Mayheeda
There is music in the
distance as I sit on the Big Thoughts front porch tonight. In the van today, Carla wondered whether it
might be more aptly named the Big Hearts front porch...and I think I agree with
her. When we have our evening reflection
circles here on the porch, the love and hope and compassion in this circle is
astounding. I have to imagine that the
energy of our collective Big Hearts is rippling out to the rest of MPP, to
Haiti, and to the world.
The Big Heart front porch
Photo credit: Kevin
I held a 6-week-old
beautiful baby today named Emmanuel -- "a gift from God," his mother
said. As the Sweet Honey in the Rock
song goes:
For each child that's born,
a morning star rises and sings
to the universe who we are.
Like all babies,
Emmanuel holds immense promise. Like all
mothers, Emmanuel's mother was so proud to share her son with the world. She
came and handed him to us -- the white strangers -- as comfortably as though we
were his aunts and uncles. Like all
babies, Emmanuel smelled sweet, and his tiny body snuggled against mine as his
eyes closed.
We are our grandmother's prayers
we are our grandfather's dreamings
we are the breath of our ancestors
we are the spirit of God.
After Liz held young
Emmanuel, she looked at me with tears in her eyes and said, "what wouldn't
you give to see that he grows up healthy and safe?" I could only nod. Yes.
We are mothers of courage
fathers of time,
daughters of dust
sons of great visions,
we are sisters of mercy
brothers of love
lovers of life and the builders of nations.
Like all babies,
Emmanuel knows nothing of the world he has been born into. He cries the same universal cries of hunger
and discomfort, and makes the same baby coos and noises that all babies make. He is loved, and tended to, and cared for by
his mother to the best of her ability.
He is known to be a gift from God, and one only need look into his eyes
to know this to be truth. At 6 weeks
old, Emmanuel's world is still coming into focus. What will he come to know as his vision
clears?
We are seekers of truth
and keepers of faith
makers of peace
and the wisdom of ages.
And Emmanuel is also
the youngest of 6 children in a Haitian family who survived the earthquake and
is starting over. If his family stays at
MPP, he will grow up in a house with 4 walls and a roof - and this is a
blessing. He may or may not have enough
food. He may or may not have clean
drinking water. He may or may not get an
education, and if he does, he may or may not go past the third grade. He does not currently have electricity in his
home or in his village. His family does
not currently have enough food. His
family does not currently have clean drinking water. By luck of the draw, Emmanuel was born here,
to Haitian peasants, 5 years after the earthquake. By that same stroke of luck, he was born to one
of the 500 applicants who managed to get a place in one of the MPP
villages. This is -- I believe -- a
blessing.
We are our grandmother's prayers
and we are our grandfather's dreamings
we are the breath of our ancestors
we are the spirit of God.
The school today was
full of beautiful children. In the
afternoons, we drive by children in uniforms walking home along the
pothole-ridden, unpaved, rut-filled roads.
I watched the clouds of dust from the passing cars and motorcycles
engulf them. I watched big brothers -
who couldn't have been more than 9 - walking with their arms around their
younger sisters. Who knows how long and
far they walk? I've seen children managing
donkeys and bulls with more gumption than I would have. I've seen them playing with metal hoops and
sticks: a universal toy. I've seen them
carrying jugs of dirty water in their hands and on their heads, bathing naked
in the river, tending to a fire, and playing soccer.
Haitian children are as
children are everywhere -- and this work that is being done -- all of this --
is for them. The work being done now
will not benefit this generation of Haitians.
Everything that is being done is to create a better life, a better
country, a better world for the children.
The families in the villages are pioneers setting out in a land plagued
by drought, and a harshness I could never understand. They are living in a land where only 2% of
its forests remain, and so they plant trees.
They learn sustainable farming methods.
They begin again, if only because they have to. Perhaps that's why there is hope here: where there
are children, there is hope.
We are mothers of courage
fathers of time
we are daughters of dust
and sons of great vision...
There was a mother with
her older, perhaps teenage, daughter at the village, too. Her mother had a far-away look in her eyes
that I am coming to see in so many Haitians.
Her daughter held her hand as they walked, and leaned against her
bashfully, as though they may be pulled apart forever if contact were to be
lost.
There was another mother
with two children -- perhaps 2 and 4 years old -- who appeared quite ill. The two-year-old, who wore only an Elmo shirt,
tugged on his mother and whined, attempting to get her to look at him. She sat with her head in her hands, unmoving.
...we are sisters of mercy
brothers of love
we're lovers of life and the builders of nations
we're seekers of truth and keepers of faith
makers of peace and the wisdom of ages.
At the school today,
the director said, "if you know doctors who can come and treat the
children's physical and emotional health, tell them to come." Tonight, I asked Chavanne what is being done
to address the children's mental health.
"We are concerned with the mental health of all people in the
villages," he told me. "The
children and the adults." Although
there was support immediately following the earthquake, and people were trained
in trauma and stress reduction techniques, there is no ongoing support.
We are our grandmother's prayers
and we are our grandfather's dreamings
we are the breath of our ancestors
we are the spirit of God.
Rob and baby Emmanuel
I do not know the life
Emmanuel will have, but I know he is the hope for the future. The light shines bright in his eyes that are
just beginning to see the world. Like
mothers everywhere, his mother loves him with all her heart. Her life is dedicated to the betterment of
the world for his future. Like mothers
everywhere, he brings her hope. Like
children everywhere, Emmanuel sleeps in the security and comfort of her arms,
unaware of the world he has been born into.
She breathes in his sweetness and blesses his head with kisses. He is innocence, and love, and hope embodied.
He is her gift from God.
Thoughts from Rachel on visiting the school this morning.
We visited the school today. I had mixed feelings. On the one hand, I loved seeing the children. I loved giving them new school supplies. I loved taking their pictures. But on the other hand, I think maybe we shouldn't have gone. We were there for our own benefit, mostly. How did it benefit them to have a bunch of strange white people interrupt their class to stare at them and take pictures of them? They are only in school 5 hours a day for 3 years. That was valuable time that we took away from them. I have these thoughts because I have been there, as a former preschool teacher. I did like that we tried to minimize our disruption by only going into one class each, staying for a short time, and giving the supplies to the director instead of directly to the children. But the phrase "well-meaning white people" is still in my head from the other night. This is my point of view.
Photo credit goes to Kevin:
School time!
Visiting the MPP goat farm, and speaking with their veterinarian
Meeting the residents of Village 5
The residents of Village 6
Meeting with Chavanne, the director and founder of MPP
Today, I discovered a dozen new ways my heart can break.
As a psychologist, I have met with children whose histories
leave my heart heavy. I have heard
stories and seen faces full of traumas that are named and unnamed. I have learned how to hold those stories, and
the pain and the hurt, to the best of my ability. I have met with families for whom trauma
seems to run through their veins - generations of abuse, pain, and neglect
leave them such that I can feel the weight of their stories before the stories
are told.
But in Haiti, trauma is in the air they breathe. There is environmental trauma, and the
collective psychological scars of an entire country of people. How is it that one country can bear so much? This trauma lives in its founding,
in every generation of its history, and is also ongoing and acute. One cannot be in Haiti and not sense the
weight of the trauma as it sinks into your pores. One cannot be in Haiti and not feel the
trauma as you inhale the dusty air. It
touches the very core of you. There is
no way it cannot. It sinks in, and it
breaks your heart.
I'm struggling again this evening with finding the
words. I can only say that I feel a
sense of hopelessness, and powerlessness, and feeling as though the pain and
need is so immense that no amount of anything will help heal it. The trauma is in the water. Even if complete peace were to arrive
tomorrow, it will take generations to unlearn the ways of being they have
developed by necessity.
This is not to say that there is anything wrong with the
work we are doing, or with MPP, or with the vision of MPP for the
peasants. MPP is an incredible organization.
UUSC is also an incredible
organization, and I had a moment today when talking with the peasants at
Village 1 when I was so proud to be Unitarian Universalist. I believe everyone involved in this
organization and its support is doing absolutely the very best they can do, and
there is nothing more that can be asked or expected. I simultaneously believe that this is not
enough, that it cannot be enough, and that even - perhaps - there is not an
"enough." In the face of this
much suffering, there is never an "enough."
The residents in Village 1 are all people who lost
everything in the earthquake 5 years ago.
They were living in Port-au-Prince and surrounding areas, and fled to
Papaye when the earthquake hit. They are
adjusting to a life they had never known, and perhaps never even imagined for
themselves. They are living in the
aftermath of a trauma in which they lost everything, and they are starting
over.
I don't know how one starts again after that. I don't know how one begins anew in a country
where trauma seems to come as predictably as waves crashing on the shore. I don't know how you have the courage to
begin, and begin, and begin again.
And yet, I am also witnessing the beginnings. In all beginnings, there is loss, and pain,
and dreams, and hope. There is anger,
frustration, resentment, and also courage, and bravery, and an ever-present
belief that things will get
better. In order to begin again, you
must have an inkling of that belief.
Otherwise, no one would be able to begin again. I don't know where that hope is, or where it
comes from, only that it must be there.
I feel it, too. I don't know how
or why, but it is here.
I am thinking about healing and where it comes from. I'm wondering whether it's possible. I'm feeling powerless in the role I can have
in this. We all know the story of the
boy throwing the starfish into the sea: there were too many to throw them all
in, but he knew it mattered to the ones he threw. In some ways, it feels that this country is
covered in starfish and, while I'd love to throw a few into the sea as I pass
by, the sea is nowhere to be found.
There is nowhere to throw them, and no water to bring them life: my job
is to witness. To write, perhaps. To tell the stories.
I'm thinking of a poem titled "A Fixer" by
Anonymous.
A fixer has the
illusion of being casual.
A server knows he/she
is being used in the service of something greater,
essentially unknown.
We fix something
specific.
We serve always the
something:
wholeness and the
mystery of life.
Fixing and helping are
the work of the ego..
Serving is the work of
the soul.
When you help, you see
life as weak.
When you fix, you see
life as broken.
When you serve, you
see life as whole.
Fixing and helping may
cure.
Service heals.
When I help, I feel
satisfaction.
When I serve, I feel
gratitude.
Fixing is a form of
judgment.
Serving is a form of
connection.
Perhaps this is my answer.
Perhaps this is where the healing starts: in connection. Perhaps it starts with witnessing, with
hearing, with seeing. Perhaps it
travels, then, from wire to wire, across the connections of space and time,
from my eye to my typing fingers. From
the screen to your heart. From your
heart to your hands.
"Serving is a
form of connection."
With my feet connected to the floor of the Big Thoughts
porch, sitting on the contradictions living inside the Haitian soil, I open my
heart in connection to the people of this country - and also to you, in the
hopes that you will feel moved to do the same.
In this way, may we connect, and serve, and create the ripples of an
ocean into which we may toss the starfish, giving hope and life.
