Cite Soleil

In this developing nation “on permanent hold,” Cite Soleil is a section of Port-au-Prince known for its extreme poverty and violent neighborhoods controlled by truly ruthless gangs.  Unfairly or not, Haitians themselves uniformly describe the area as a living hell.  Even tough police fear to tread here.  Similar to any ghetto, regular citizens cannot enter without navigating the complicated red tape and in fact, paying protection by arranging an armed guard.  According to sources in government and the medical sector, even NGOs and recognized charitable organizations must pay.  Only the Catholic nuns that have long labored in this township have relative immunity from kidnapping and physical danger.  Its populace used to favor Aristide the deposed President until he recently returned from exile.

In 2004, when Aristide’s popularity was on the wane, street demonstrations were seen, and talk of a coup was heard, I was in Haiti and visited Cite Soleil under unusual circumstances.  A  concierge at a hotel for foreigners was impressed by my street outreach and willingness to interact with regular youth who were often ignored by foreigners.  Originally from Cite Soleil, he asked if I would come to his neighborhood under the protection of a gang leader, his cousin or something.  I immediately said yes.   A beat up taxi appeared outside the hotel the next afternoon, and I was driven into a rough area where we stopped at a single story house (sorry but you will have to wait until my book to hear the rest of the encounter). 

This trip, I wanted to revisit the neighborhood but I no longer had a working number for the concierage or his hotel.  So I mentioned my interest to a few IAS colleagues.  One suggested I contact Dr. Bill Pape and he suggested the organization FOSREF that does AIDS prevention in two centers there.  They reluctantly agreed to bring us.

Approaching Cite Soleil, I saw two soldiers/police in full body armor with guns at the ready – something you do not see in ordinary neighborhoods of Port-au-Prince although most businesses and many private homes have armed security. Our host said I must not go there -- even the FOSREF representatives that work on the outskirts of Cite Soleil also expressed fear for their safety if they attempted to walk the streets. We spent time with Cite Soleil outreach workers, a tough-minded but sincerely dedicated group doing HIV outreach.  They said they could not bring me to the streets. so we settled for a group of lovely teen girls to talk to about spreading the message.

It is sad to think that in such an impoverished country like Haiti there is an even more impoverished neighborhood that is segregated from the general population. What does that say about the government? What does that say about the popular  leaders of Haiti? Of course the worst news is that young people there are treated like third class citizens in their own country. FOSREF tries to give them AIDS information but is not able to do it the way that I do with AIDS Attacks -- but in 2011 it has become even more dangerous and thus impossible

A dirty little secret

Pedestrians in Haiti like their counterparts in many Third World/Developing nations have no security or rights when walking the streets.  This is NOT an exaggeration but the honest to God truth.  Every vehicle has complete right of way and the freedom to drive up to a walking and avoiding them by mere inches.  It doe not matter if this is some callous rich person driving his Land Rover and in a hurry to do business or get home -- this is also the excepted practice for everyone with a car including well-known NGO’s that raise funds to operate for the Haitian peoples’ welfare or Church and religious organizations that preach values to respect your neighbors.  Diplomatic cars with immunity are also prime offenders.

This situation is not exclusive to Haiti but is the case in every poor country where foreigners and the in country elite take advantage of special privileges and very lax police oversight (many who look the other way in exchange for gifts/bribes).  The last country that I visited exhibiting this same king of shocking road madness was the Congo, D.R.  There I saw dogs being hit left and right in front of children – and once a pedestrian, a woman carrying water on her head.  Bystanders rushed to her aid and she got up but the offending driver honked incessantly to get the crowd to move.  She was standing up when our car passed.

Some of you know that I am physically challenged (no complaints, just an observation).  I have had quadruple bypass and have coronary disease; I have serious diabetic neuropathy that affects walking and my eyesight; and while doing street outreach, I fell and broke my right arm – TWICE in the space of three months – necessitating surgery for a steel pin to attach my lower and right arm above the elbow (I also had broken finger and toe bones).  So I walk very carefully now especially in traffic.

In Port-au-Prince, simply the worst city traffic conditions that I have seen mostly due to major earthquake damage,  I have been extra cautious and tried crossing the road waiting for a break in the traffic.  However, vehicles of all sizes rush upon me and honk and honk and honk!  I could not turn back to go the other way.

On two occasions I made a gesture of striking the vehicle and if I had my walking cane I would have struck out.  I hit the side of one passing car and he was surprised.

Yet the dirty little secret is everyone is cognizant of the fact that as a white man, I have special rights.  It is decidedly not fair but that is the truth.  Even vehicles accustomed to their own way, are aware that hitting a white foreigner would be inviting trouble and police (investigation and resulting bribes).

That said, I am as guilty as the drivers and their privileged passengers because when people drive me in this maddening manner, usually to help the TeenAIDS’ mission, I don’t say enough.  I compromise my principles along with offending church people, foreign government aid workers, diplomatic personnel, etc.  When you think about it, we should all be embarrassed by our acceptance of this racist, class attitude that preys on poor pedestrians including little children walking to and from class.

You can see the fear and anger on pedestrians’ faces especially parents holding on to their babies in a death-grip. We did say “Watch out” a few times in frustration.  Yet, one afternoon, t Maryna, Samantha and I yelled in unison when we thought that a weakened, hungry dog was going to be hit by our car and ones coming the other direction.

Aquin (Fond des Blancs)

Drack had told me that he would like to bring me to the central high lands of southern Haiti, his hometown. The drive can be anywhere from 3 to 6 hours depending on the time of day, the rivers to be forded, and the traffic. It is only a 100 or so miles so you get an idea of how bad the roads are. Many still show the damage of the 2010 earthquake with huge potholes and large cracks criss-crossing the roads. Because most of these country roads have never paved or were years ago, their condition is, frankly deplorable. However that does not slow down drivers of cars, motorcycles, trucks or buses. Pedestrians walk on the roadsides at their considerable  risk (see post “A Dirty, Little Secret”).

We forded two rivers in the dark; one relatively large and one small. We were driving at night and Drack had to yell to men bathing on the other side where was it best to cross. Essentially we had to do a u-shaped maneuver. He rolled up all the windows as he explained that he had previous experience where the water poured into the car.  This being the rainy season, there was no way to judge in the night how deep was the river.  At one point, Maryna accidentally spilled some water on Sam’s foot causing her to scream – she thought it was something alive and slimy.

To kill the time, Samantha and Maryna play a game called “20 Questions” although the new rules in the car were as many questions as it took to get the right answer (some answers were “black hole;” “The U.S. Constitution;” “Mt. Everest;” and “Christina Aguilera.”  (Go figure… )  I joined in on a couple of rounds. Although we asked Drack to join he declined preferring to concentrate on driving, though he did listen and loved the final answers.

Drack’s family home was nestled in a tropical-wooded area. The house was built of unfinished concrete blocks with a tin roof and had no electricity. The bathroom and the shower (water in pails) were outside and open to the heavens. However I paid for the gas to run the generator so that I could run my sleep machine (C-PAP), to charge our batteries and have lights. An older woman with a kindly countenance cooked our meals -- the best being the grilled white fish direct from the sea that she had marinated in fresh limes. 

For the two days, all of us became engaged in conversations in and outside of the house. I was busy with my AIDS outreach – it’s my main activity wherever I go.   Drack visited many of his old buddies. I spoke with a very interesting young man Yves who was one of Drack’s childhood buddies. Like many Haitian young people, his dream is help his country and its people. However a contentious part of our conversation dealt with the assassination of Osama bin Laden. He wondered why the United States hadn’t treated the terrorist like it did Saddam Hussein, who had a perfunctory trial before being hanged. I explained that there were political considerations that overrode a strictly legal rules.

And that Obama’s decision was approved by an overwhelming majority of Americans who wanted to see this sad chapter finally put to rest with Bin Laden’s death.

We started off the morning at a town meeting in an open-sided hall overlooking Aquin. The acting Mayor Mr. Briel introduced me to the crowd of 160 that was mostly adults. I told the story of Ben, my PeerCorps member who was born with AIDS. Like all my stories, it was both sad and uplifting and the facts of HIV/AIDS were imbedded in the storyline. Mr. Briel asked for financial help for the town. I explained that I was not a wealthy NGO and did not have funds to contribute – explaining that my volunteering to come to his area was my major donation. However, I am going to talk my Rotary club in Norfolk and see if there is some way it can donate bio-sand water filters to ensure clean water and the prevention of Cholera.

On Saturday afternoon Drack drove Samantha and Maryna to the beach for some well-deserved R & R.  It was essentially a deserted beach for miles on Haiti’s southern coast.  Maryna described it as a paradise and their photos back up their claim.  Why do beautiful, deserted beaches exist along Haiti’s pristine Caribbean waters when million dollar hotels crowd the sands in other locales.?  It is the result of a collapsed tourist industry that was devastated by the initial news that Haitians were among the first AIDS carriers (that we now know was an injustice and a slander of a nation).  Also factors were the political unrest that brought in UN peacekeeping forces and the horrific 2010 earthquake – and now the spreading Cholera epidemic.   Poor Haiti.

While they were at the beach, I spoke to teens at the high school, to both music and English language classes.  Later, I spoke on the local radio station so people that hadn’t come to any of our meetings or to the school were informed about TeenAIDS’ mission.  

Earthquake stories

It was on a mild January afternoon in 2010 when the ground underneath Port-au-Prince and its environs began to violently shake. People were just arriving home as office businesses were starting to close. Kids were on their way home from school or playing with friends.  The market places were full with shoppers buying food for dinner and children were doing their homework or watching TV. The initial shock was so huge that Drack said it sounded like a deafening roar – a thumping series of tremendous loud noises as the earth split apart.. At the time, he was talking with teens in a building in the slums about his vision for a future Haiti.

Immediately he KNEW it was an earthquake and ran quickly to avoid the crashing concrete of collapsing buildings all around him.  Within minutes he witnessed hundreds of dead and dying some with missing heads and limbs with blood running everywhere. The screams of people permeated the  air as large dust clouds rose into the skies from the devastation. He ran to find his car – luckily, it was only slightly damaged.

Drack was still able to get a cell signal and called his fiancé Stephanie who had arrived home a short while before and was miles away up in the hills above the city. They spoke briefly and reassured each other that each was safe. Drack said he would be home when he could but he had no idea of the time because many thoroughfares were blocked by massive piles of concrete rubble, broken telephone poles with bodies everywhere. He tried to help get people to safety and was stopped by one man who begged Drack to give him his car’s jack so he could help his sister get out from under a fallen wall. He told Drack that he was going to cut his sister’s arm off to save her life. Drack never heard what happened. He finally made it home hours later.  Both Stephanie and he were some of the lucky survivors.

A total of 250,000 people are estimated to have died in the earthquake a number that approximates the amount of Haitian lives lost to AIDS in the last 30 years.  With AIDS deaths, most victims were given Christian burials by devastated family members.  But the authorities had to dig huge pits in and around Port-au-Prince where the decomposing bodies were unceremoniously buried.

Yves, a childhood friend of Drack’s recounted how he was living in a two-story house in Port-au-Prince. They were all students that had just returned from afternoon classes and were getting ready to eat their communal meal. Wearing just their basketball shorts and no shoes or shirts, they sat down to enjoy their student rations of rice and beans with spicy fish sauce on the second floor where a breeze cooled the stifling air. Seconds later it sounded like bombs going off in rapid succession.  Suddenly the front wall facing the street crashed to the ground. Without a moment’s hesitation, Yves jumped and slid down the wall into the street followed by his  screaming roommates. Then there was a calamitous roar as the entire building collapsed on its foundation. No one died except for their cat.

Everywhere he saw mangled bodies surrounded by families wailing over their lost loved ones. Barefoot, he lead his friends out of Port-au-Prince in large columns of fleeing refugees as the aftershocks continued to toss them off their feet and tumble weakened structures.  They walked almost 50 miles in two days on their way back to their homes in Aquin. Family members met them at a river crossing and brought them to the relative safety of the central interior where damage was less.  With tears in his eyes Yves told me that 600 of his fellow students and most all of his teachers perished in that first hour including his best friend. Unfortunately, they had not left campus. 

The aftershocks went on for months and buildings continued to fall killing thousands more desperate people that had sought shelter wherever they could from the rain and cold evening temperatures.. Drack said that there were so many dead which had to be buried within a matter of days that huge pits were dug and decomposing bodies where dumped en mass and covered over.

It really seems as if the people of Haiti have suffered an inordinate amount of tragedy in their history beginning as slaves from Africa.  Certainly, they are proud of the fact that they were the first black republic established in the world and the second democracy after the United States in the Western Hemisphere. At various times, they have been occupied by foreign powers, suffered from tremendous maladies, and from the abuses

High School Visits

Lycée Francais

We visited two special secondary schools in Port-au-Prince. One was the exclusive Lycée Francais Alexandre Dumas. The other top-notch institution was the privileged Union School founded in 1908.   Many of Haiti’s top families and diplomats send their children here where they learn impeccable English as well as French (Creole is optional).  Future leaders in business and government will graduate from these schools.

At both place, I spoke in English – I needed no translation. I much prefer speaking without a translator because it takes half the time to tell a story about AIDS compared to waiting for the interpretation. I can also better judge the reactions of the teens when I say something dramatic or humorous, both important points to my story telling and that teens love.  They respond best to human interest stories of real people that I have known – the human pathos stays in their mind better than a dry lecture on HIV prevention fact6s.  I hear, “I really liked how you talked to us  - it is very interesting.”  I put in facts as part of the story.

Lycee Francais

Lycee Francais: At the end of the school day, we met in the library with 25 older teens. It was equally mixed between boys and girls. So I knew I could have some serious fun in my lecture.  I always try to start off each talk by shaking hands, looking them in the eyes, and introducing myself -- and asking for their names.  This approach is unusual and adolescents respond because they feel the special attention.  It is a technique that I learned from my early political days. When I lectured at Harvard’s School of Public Health, I taught health and medical professionals that they needed to use this approach to be more effective.  With teens, it sets a mood that I am interested in who they are and I am not just talking down to them.

At the end of the talk, there were a lot of questions. One dealt with the origin of HIV, which is a question that I get a lot. One young woman asked I thought that since condoms protect young people from HIV, why should teens postpone sex if they want to have it?  I explained that condoms sometimes break but more importantly, the first sexual experiences for young people can impact them psychologically,  especially if one partner is using the other, used coercive peer pressure or lied about loving them..

Union School:  I spoke to 130 young people from grades 6-12. I asked the head teacher to mix the students up so that the youngest were sitting with older students. A remarkable young man named Karim Duval (18) arranged this assembly after hearing about Dr. Bill Pape’s request to Union to arrange my talk.. When speaking with him beforehand, he told me that he is going to Northeastern University in Boston in the fall.  He has already visited to see the school and so we had a lot to talk about because I lived in the Cambridge-Boston area for close to 20 years while doing graduate studies at MIT and Harvard and running my art publishing business, Paté Poste on Beacon Hill. He is also going to Costa Rica this summer and I plan on putting him in touch with Giovanni, who is our Global Board representative in that country.

I started off with the story of Rafael of Guatemala and how he had contracted HIV/AIDS as an illegal alien living in Boston. Because Rafael was so angry with his situation, he told me that he was going to give AIDS to as many women as he could because someone had given it to him! When I explained that I would have to contact the public health authorities, he disappeared and I heard that he “lost” himself in New York City.  This story always generates shock in a teen audience.

The questions were perceptive. One young student asked if dogs got HIV?  After the initial laughter, I explained that monkeys have a form called SIV (for Simian) and so do cats  but they don’t die.  This gave me an opening to ask, “Do any of you have dogs?”  A sea of hands jumped into the air.  And of course, I spoke about the love of my life Jazz, my 10 year old Yellow