Fieldwork Photos

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Burning Garbage, Kreyol, and Sweet Baby Girls

I write this from my desk (table) in my bedroom, as the smell of a burning pile of garbage wafts through my open windows. Burning garbage is probably not something that I will ever get used to, but in the absence of any kind of waste management infrastructure -- if there is, I certainly don't know about it -- what is one to do? And forget about recycling.... For the last few weeks, the garbage from our house has magically disappeared, and I wondered where it was going. As it turns out, the garbage was not being taken out to this magical rubbish pile; the neighbor boys, two adorable early teenagers who spend their days playing at our house, have been hauling it to a neighbor's yard. Yeah. So I guess that she yelled at them, as you do, and now the garbage is going onto the burn pile. Sometimes I wonder what might happen if anything else were to catch on fire. There's certainly no neighborhood fire department or anything, and our well is currently dry, so that wouldn't be an option... All of this reminds me of something that I saw today while I was riding through the streets of Petyon-Vil on the back of my driver's moto. (Yes, I have hired a private moto driver. Girlfriend does not have 2 1/2+ hours to spend stuck in traffic every day. Worth every penny. Dear family, I'm buying a helmet tomorrow.) As we were leaving my friends' house after Kreyol class today, a man walking on the street had a large piece of trash, though I don't know what. As a nice truck came by, the man threw his trash into the bed of the truck.

Most of my time these days is spent in Kreyol classes learning from my friend Soulouque. While Kreyol is a relatively easy language (no verb conjugations, for example), I am reminded of how difficult it can be to learn any language as an adult. This is particularly true of languages that require specificity to ensure that one does not accidentally say something sexual, which can happen with just about every sentence. However, between what I remember from last year and a week of intense review last week, I can already tell that I'm improving....or at least my confidence in my ability is improving. I think that I'll continue classes through September, giving me three months of training, and begin data collection toward the beginning of October.

It's hard to believe that I've already been here for almost a month. Everyone told me that my time would fly once I got to the field, and other than three days that I spent tethered to the toilet with food poisoning, it really has. I feel like I'm in the groove, strong, confident, and I'm enjoying my time here. I love walking through the streets of PV, despite the cat-calls directed toward blan (foreign) women and the traffic that makes me afraid to step off of a sidewalk. I love my morning drive on the back of a motorcycle, and the feeling of freedom that it brings. I love hanging out at night with the neighborhood boys, practicing my Kreyol and making the two year old daughter of our housekeeper giggle. Tonight her dad, my roommate's driver, came home and played music, and I danced with her and another neighbor girl. They laughed and laughed, and little Melinda giggled and threw her head back in delight. This island is magical, in good ways and bad, and I'm excited to continue my journey....

Sweet Melinda, just as charming as you can imagine.

Bon nwi,
Rachel

Not chikungunya, but chicken food poisoning

I've had serious food poisoning for the last almost three days. I'd love to write more, but when you've got diarrhea into a toilet that has a tank with no water and you're throwing up into a grocery bag at the same time, all while wearing a headlamp to make sure that you can see what you're doing, well, that's fewer free hands for blogging.

Hopefully I will be better tomorrow.

Rachel

One week in

Well, I'm here. I officially moved to Haiti on Friday, June 27th! I've been here for just over a week now, and what changes already! When I arrived, I assumed that I would be living at a school that I've worked with on my previous trips to Haiti. I stayed there for a week, but unfortunately, that did not work out as I had hoped, for myriad reasons, so I set off to find a place of my own.

A good friend introduced me to an American social worker who has just moved to Haiti as well and has a large house with rooms to rent. We hit it off quickly, and I moved in on Saturday. What an adventure! One of my buddies took me bed shopping on Saturday. I was concerned that I would have a hard time finding a mattress at a good price, but as it turns out, pretty much every street in Petionville and Delmas is lined with people selling refurbished mattresses. My friend bargained on my behalf, and I wound up with a perfectly adequate double-sized mattress and box for less than US100. Score! Throw in some plastic file crates and a shoe rack that functions just fine as a place to store my clothes and I'm settled in. 

My own room!

The electricity here is funny. EDH is the state-run power, and is only on at random times during the day. It's not hard to tell when EDH is on; the neighbor boys come running into the house yelling ay-day-ash!, ay-day-ash! (the Kreyol pronunciation) to let us know. Everyone gets excited about EDH. We do have an inverter and a generator here at the house, though, so we won't be without power. The water is another story. Sometimes it works, sometimes notsomuch. Luckily it is working tonight, so I was able to take quick little cold shower for the first time since I've moved in. Fear not, friends, I did shower at a friend's house yesterday. 

So, I'm settling in and will start my Kreyol lessons through a friend tomorrow, I hope. This weekend wore me out and I caught up on sleep and sanity today. 'Twas nice. 

Bon nwi,

Rachel