Behind its Mountainous Curtain

Haiti, Day IX: To fully appreciate Haiti, one must reach beyond the carnage of Port au Prince traveling beyond Morne de’l Hospital and Morne Saint Laurent along National Highway #3. This weekend’s travels took me thru towns like Niva and Meye, delivered me to Peligre Hydro-electric Dam, and returned my to the chaos known as Port au Prince by way of Port de’ Saint Marc along National Highway #1. It was a drive over steep cultivated mountains, across flowing brown rivers full of children bathing, thru lush green valley’s where farmers grow rice, corn, banana, and breadfruit, and along a shoreline of white sand and turquoise water. If it were not Haiti, it just might be paradise.

After a week in and around angry Port au Prince, it was refreshing to again experience a child’s beaming smile and twinkling eye and adults eagerly engaging in a Creole conversation with an English-speaking stranger. Relatively untouched by the 12 January earthquake, rural Haiti has not been soured by unfulfilled words promising reconstruction, only of countless unfulfilled words promising government reform.

Make no mistake, rural Haiti is still Haiti; roads are broken and unpaved, homes are shanties and shacks, the air is dusty, and transportation is often by burro. There is a quaint charm to rural Haiti, especially when compared to metropolitan Port au Prince. However, make no mistake, this is still Haiti racked by endemic poverty, historic corruption, and government inaction.

And, as if to reinforce the point, there was no mistaking the four armed checkpoints welcoming our return to Port au Prince.