The Foreign Service Journal, January 2011

The school director who was supervis- ing the work came over to greet us. Dr. Barbara smiled, shook his hand through the car window; then off we went. It was he, she noted in her im- perfect English, who had killed the two thugs. First Impressions My first impression of Port-au- Prince a few days before had been con- fused: instantly recognizable in many respects, yet different in some. The traffic on the airport road was the jum- ble familiar to me from countless de- veloping countries I’d worked in or visited as a Foreign Agricultural Service officer. Once the piles of rubble began to appear, it seemed the entire area was a patchwork of blue-and-white tent cities, interspersed with the blocks of concrete buildings in pastel colors you’d see anywhere in the tropics. Despite the country’s reputation for abject poverty, before the earthquake it had more paved roads, electricity and other infrastructure than Chad or Liberia, countries I know well. As in Africa, there was plenty of life in the streets, with merchants selling all kinds of goods in their shops. But there was a more concentrated range of goods here: food, clothing, building materi- als, auto supplies, but fewer household goods. Many of the buildings looked fine — but how to tell which were still in- habited, which not? Which were sta- ble and which were in danger of collapse? Everywhere there were tents — in parks, sports grounds, yards and the streets themselves. There were no- tably few dogs, cats and small rumi- nants. Traffic was frenetic, augmented by sports utility vehicles from NGOs, the United Nations and diplomatic mis- sions. Lots of local cars and tap-taps, gaily painted little pick-up trucks whose cargo platforms were covered and lined with benches to haul pas- sengers. (In the Philippines they’re called jeepneys.) These are Port-au- Prince’s only public transport; a ride costs 10 gourdes, about a quarter. I was trying to help the schools run by the Salesian Fathers and Sisters of St. John Don Bosco. Working with their New York fundraising office, I was putting together a proposal for school meals to be funded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, where I used to work. The plan centers on Les Petites Ecoles, 100 schools that are privately run (like 90 percent of primary schools in Haiti). Aside from two government schools, they offer the only education available in La Saline and Cité Soleil, the poorest slums in the city. Before the earthquake, these 100 schools had at least 25,000 pupils all together, aged 3 to teens. Our proposal envisions 20 schools run by the Salesian Sisters in other poor neighborhoods scattered around the city, teaching another 5,000 kids. After the government, the Salesians are the second-largest providers of ed- ucation in Haiti. Adherents take vows of poverty and service — no chiefs of party with $125,000 salaries, Western- style houses and private cars and driv- ers here! The priests and nuns I met here during my brief visit are ab- solutely dedicated to their order, which operates in some 130 countries and has the reputation of providing the best vocational education in the devel- oping world. Our hotel was the kind of place where you should stay when doing de- velopment work. Two stars, maybe. The public areas were nice, if down- right funky, with an odd array of small 18th-century cannons, 19th-century iron industrial implements and mod- ern iron sculptures of people and birds — all strewn through the courtyard, open-air lobby and a charming patio/ bar encircling the pool. The hotel seemed to be an array of a half-dozen houses, walled into a sin- gle compound and subdivided into sin- gle hotel rooms and small apartments for short-term rental. The restaurant was on the second floor, again open on two sides, filled with the fragrances of flowering tropical trees. The food was satisfactory: ample servings of meat, rice and beans or plantains (but skimpy on vegetables), accompanied by delicious, spicy sauces of doubtful healthiness due to high salt and oil content. The roomwas another matter. Very poor lighting made it hard to read, but it wasn’t dim enough to hide the dingi- ness, poor workmanship, broken tiles and chipped baseboards. The closet was ample but lacked poles and hang- ers. There was a small living room and poorly equipped kitchen downstairs, while the bedroom and bathroom were above. The patterned bedspread and elaborate set of five matching pil- lows were an odd stab at elegance. I’d have preferred hot water. As I tried to go to sleep each night, I’d hear the bark of a dog or a rooster’s crow, along with people’s voices. On Saturday nights the loud dance music struck my untrained ear as a Carib- bean version of the popular musical genre known as Highlife. A Memorable Mass On my last morning in Haiti, I at- tended Mass at the Salesian Church of St. John Don Bosco. I’d been told it was quite close, but it took a long time to make our way around the piles of rubble and over the deep potholes of 36 F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L / J A N U A R Y 2 0 1 1 Most of the buildings looked fine — but how to tell which ones were in danger of collapse?