bagage.
The podcast that transports our emotions. Every Thursday, a slice of life.
My American Cousins
In this first season, in French, Saran Koly, who loves telling stories, especially true stories, takes us to Haiti. Her texts were written between 2010 and 2011, and they are shared in their original forms, however, some names have been changed to keep the anonymity.
We have transcribed and translated a few episodes into English. Just for you!
Alone or accompanied?
Being a freelance journalist is great, but it requires a lot of organisation! Between the do-to-list, to-absolutely-do-list, check-list and other lists that you never really do, I barely make it through. The idea of this trip to Haiti has been developing for "long" in my mind. Well, the notion of “Long time” is relative anyway.
In January, I had some health problems, I was put on bed rest, had a quite low blood pressure. No check-list, no to-do-list, some things can't be planned, they have to be lived.
From my hospital bed, I can't move, I have to rest but I can't sleep. I overthink. Between the comings and goings of the medical staff, I try to forget what I am kept here for, I have no idea when I'll be discharged or how: alone or accompanied? Anxiety hits. I turn on the TV, my window to the world: "a young man coming out of the rubble 12 days after the earthquake" says the TV anchor. When it's not your time...
I will be getting out of the hospital on my own.. His ashes will be scattered in what they call the garden of memories next to Montpellier. In this kind of situation, people don't know what to say. "This is life", "Life goes on", "You are young...", "God always has a plan", "When the time comes...". It wasn't his time.
They are right, I am young, life goes on. In Haiti too, life goes on. Alone or accompanied?
Day 5: My American cousins
Bwa pi wo di li wè lwen, men grenn pwomennen di li wè pi lwen pase.
The tallest tree says it sees far, but the scattered seed says it sees further than the tree: he who travels has a greater chance of discovering things that someone who never travels will never see.
It was better that I didn’t talk about it. Between fear and superstition, I wondered what exactly I was letting myself in for. Checklist: flight tickets? Tick. One way. Crazy? Reckless? Call it what you will.
Broke? Yes. The one-way ticket cost a third of the price of a return ticket, so I jumped at the chance. 100 days: the countdown begins! 100 days to learn, share and report. It’s not long.
Paris to Port-au-Prince via Pointe-à-Pitre. Haiti, one of the poorest countries in the world. Kidnapping, urban violence, Tonton Macoute militia...
I grew up with a yearning to meet my ‘cousins’; a proud, strong people. The first black republic. On 1st January 1804, the first victorious slave rebellion in history established a new State on the island of Hispaniola. Ayiti, ‘land of high mountains’, a name borrowed from the language of the Taíno people, the island's inhabitants wiped out by Spanish conquerors in the 16th century.
A flag: red and blue
A motto: Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité.
‘It’s true that France’s presence did not leave good memories’. This according to Nicolas Sarkozy, the first French President to visit Haiti. A visit that lasted all of 4 hours!
Day 2: Couchsurfing
Se anvi bay ki bay.
It is because we so enjoy giving: a gesture of generosity even when you yourself are experiencing hard times.
Last year, in Latin America, I travelled through CouchSurfing (CS), a community of travellers founded on networking and mutual understanding. I have fond memories of ‘CS’, a big family where you connect with others, stay on their couch, say goodbye, meet again.
Nathalie* and Sarah*, two Haitians who are active members of CS, will be hosting me in Port-au-Price for the first few days. They found my profile interesting and would like to help me get to know their country.
Nathalie has an apartment that is still standing but, traumatised by the earthquake, she prefers to sleep in a tent. Sarah has nothing now. She’s staying with friends. Yet they offered me hospitality. I have my tent, a sleeping bag, everything should be fine.
We’re in touch by email on a regular basis. But five days before I leave, Sarah stops responding to my messages.
I have the telephone numbers of Sarah. She didn’t give me her address. I call her. Nobody answers. She’s due to meet me at the airport.
I hope nothing bad has happened.
* Names have been changed
D-Day: the countdown begins
Kay piti nat anba bwa.
When the house is small, you hold your bedding under your arm: even if it’s a bit tight, make room to accommodate everyone.
During my stopover in Pointe-à-Pitre, I’m anxious to try to reach Sarah by phone. She doesn’t answer. No big deal, once I arrive in Port-au-Prince it’ll be easier to contact her. And by then, if she got my last message, she’ll have all my flight details. I won’t give myself an ulcer over it.
Meanwhile, bizarrely, random phrases pop into my mind: ‘In Haiti over 200,000 inmates escaped from Port-au-Prince prison and killed, raped and pillaged anything that moved’ (extract from an email exchange with my brother). And: ‘Think about it carefully kid. There are so many adventures to be had in Africa, and at least finding your way would be easier there’, from a father overcome with worry about his little girl’s ‘chaotic’ life.
Time for a reality check. All this is nothing. In Haiti, the homeless sleep under tarp, while others have hung out sheets as shelter. When it rains, their tear-filled eyes are their only protection.
D-Day: the longest day
Arriving in Port-au-Prince, I let women in their Sunday best laden with luggage pass in front of me. They’d stopped by the hairdresser’s before catching the plane. Their hair is smooth and caked with gel, with a few sequins shining on their side partings. Their ponytails are lengthened using pony braid extensions like ones you see in Château d’Eau in Paris.
Starched white nylon blouses with gold buttons, topped off with copious cologne, which sometimes smells a little ‘off’ in the heat. When these ladies arrive, you must let them pass. Especially if you don’t want to be whacked in the ribs with imitation Louis Vuitton bags or have your big toes taken out by high-heels. Luggage reclaim is a scramble. The building is an annex to the airport. The arrivals hall is closed. Full of cracks, it could not withstand the earthquake. The attendants toss over our luggage, and everyone scrambles to collect their things. What a shambles.
The plane was late and it’s already night-time in Port-au-Prince by the time I get out. Nobody has come to meet me. No phone. There I am, with my backpack, my little suitcase in one hand and my tent in the other. There’s a flash of lightning, a storm is coming. But where will I sleep tonight? A man comes towards me: ‘You want a taxi?’ ‘No thank you, someone should be coming to meet me. Do you know where I can find a phone or internet access?’
He lets me use his phone. Sarah still isn’t answering. I am going to get an ulcer after all.
‘I’m not going to leave you here in the rain, you’re coming to stay at my place.’ But where’s that? And who is he? I say to myself: listen honey, do you have another solution? No? Well then! That’s how I spent my first night in Christ Roi, in the very modest two-room home of Philippe, who I now call my guardian angel.
Walls, a table, a few dishes, an old TV and a tape recorder from the 90s. ‘This is my mother’s house. She died. My concrete house collapsed, so here I am in this little tin shack.’ Photos of his daughter decorate the blue walls. His wife and their four children went to rest in the country a few weeks ago, traumatised by ‘the event’ and its aftershocks. Electricity is coming, but for now, there’s none. He offers me the double bed he has made up for me so nicely. He’ll sleep on his children’s bed opposite.
I refuse. I can sleep on the floor with my sleeping bag. Philippe gets annoyed. He’s offended. So I get into the double bed. too tired to argue but feeling guilty. How can I ever thank him? With money? He won’t hear of it. He lights a spiral-shaped anti-mosquito lamp whose smell reminds me of my family holidays in Guinée Forestière. I’ve found my American cousins.
Sunday is the Lord’s day
I hear some electric guitar playing in the distance, or perhaps it’s a ‘maringouin’ (mosquito) tuning its latest chords to my ears. It’s 6am. But I’ve had enough sleep. Sunday: the Lord’s day. A non-practising believer, I write His name. Let’s just say I’m in a contemplative mood. I’ve been unfaithful to religion many times.
But I believe...I do believe. Being alive is already a lot to be thankful for. They must believe something similar: ‘There but for the grace of God’. I’ve searched my little heathen head for another explanation, but I haven’t found anything better. My mother often said, ‘all God does is good’. I don’t agree. But I respect.
My first introduction to Haitian Protestantism: the Church on the Rock in Tabarre, with Reverend Gérard Forge.
The faithful gathered under a large tent. Due to lack of space, some are sitting on a bit of wall, while others in the sun have brought their own chairs. We arrive at the second service. The pastor has been preaching since 6am.
The girls have ribbons in their hair and little white socks. Some have patent leather shoes. There’s not a single crease on the men’s starched shirts. Their trousers are well cut. Some young men wear jackets that are a little too big for them. Although there’s an occasional breeze, it’s hot. I’m not sure a jacket is necessary in these conditions. With or without the jacket, God is hardly merciful. I’ve always found religious vocabulary pompous.
Do all the faithful understand the prayers? Or are they just a litany providing access to meditation?
We close our eyes to pray. We cry. We sing. In the space of a second, I get carried away by so many different emotions. And then I come back down to earth, without touching the ground, floating somewhere between what I believe and what I see. But I respect.
What’s Haiti like after the quake?
What’s Haiti like? It's a common question.
I feel at home. Port-au-Prince is a bit like if Conakry, Abidjan and Salvador de Bahia existed in the same country. Physically, I look like them. We have common ancestors. I like looking like them. I secretly wish I had their dignity.
So far, I only ‘know’ Port-au-Prince. Port-au-Prince is not Haiti, it’s just one of the country’s difficult realities. I still have so many pieces of this mosaic left to find.
The other day, at the Media Operations Centre*, a French consultant (who was very nice by the way), came to assess the state of the Haitian media for the French foreign ministry and said to me: ‘It’s just terrible what they’re going through!’
Around us, several Haitian journalists are putting the finishing touches to their articles before sending them. He hasn’t actually spoken to them. Maybe it hasn’t occurred to him. Maybe it slipped his mind.
I thought it was vulgar to talk like that in front of them, without even letting them speak.
I didn’t know the country before the earthquake. I wasn’t even there in the days that followed. I arrived in Port-au-Prince two months later. What I see is journalists working. Many of their wages have been cut in half, and that’s just the ones who are still employed.
Others have been made freelance. They struggle to provide information. These are men and women who’ve been affected themselves. Traumatised, they’ve picked up their pens and microphones again, to serve others.
What happened happened, nobody was prepared. What I see is a whole population pulling together, taking ownership and trying to pull through. A population who have long understood that the State is a concept as hypothetical as the Haitian dollar.
Seeing is not difficult. It’s more what I don’t see, what I imagine, that’s hard. Out of curiosity, they want to know where I come from, what I’m doing here, my first impressions. I dare not ask for anything in return. I prefer to listen. I imagine everyone I meet has lost someone: a father, a mother, a brother, a son or a cousin. A friend, friends, a livelihood.
Some had walked along dust-filled streets strewn with corpses. Others had blocked their noses to keep out the stench from putrefying bodies. I imagine the pain of every Haitian. I discover their propriety. Startling. Each of them has dried their tears, even if deep down their heart is bruised. Jokes circulate about ‘the event’, ‘bagay sa’, ‘goudougoudou’. People laugh to keep from crying. I’ll never know the full extent of the trauma. But I can imagine it.
*Set up on 19 January 2010, the centre began operating on 20 January. Created by the international organisation for press freedom, Reporters Without Borders, with the support of Québecor (which provided equipment), and the Haitian ministry of culture and communication, it aims to help rebuild Haiti’s independent press.
Only three months...
Escorted by two ‘security guards’, I travel to the Pétion-Ville Club camp. Before 12 January, this was a golf course, the largest in the country, but now it’s a huge refugee camp. Over 40,000 people took up residence here after the earthquake.
Alexandra and Perrine are from the units that keep order at the camp. They don’t have bludgeons or handcuffs. At night they patrol with men.
It’s Saturday, 10 April and hundreds of willing families need be registered and relocated to Corail Cesselesse, a site 20 km from Port-au-Prince.
This is the news of the day, of the week, and perhaps of the coming months.
In three months, there’s been a succession of emergencies, each one different from the last. Before the heavy rains, the camp needs to be cleared and 7,500 people in high-risk zones need to be moved (with their consent). They have several ‘options’: either return to their home if it is still standing and has been assessed, or find a host family. The latest being the Corail site.
At its most basic, the Pétion-Ville Club camp consists of an upper town and a lower town.
The international press has gathered at the top, where the heads of families line up to calmly register with the IOM (International Organization for Migration). Meanwhile, the spokesman for CRS (Christian Relief Services) gives a series of interviews.
It’s time for me to come back down to earth. On my first visit, two days earlier, I was unable to speak at length with the residents.
The road is tortuous. You have walk along large trenches where waste water is drained. It rained all night. The ground is muddy, impassable. Yet traders selling fritay (fried food), beauty products and coal have set up in the same place as usual. Children are running in all directions. They run in clusters. Curious little ones ask: ‘ayisyen ou ye?’ (Are you Haitian?) or shout ‘blanc’ (foreigner). The boldest ask me to draw their portrait. Well, if they’d asked more politely...
The small market has been moved a few metres higher up. There’s talk of setting up a bus station where one was before. Workers are digging channels, collecting mud and carrying it in wheelbarrows... Cleaning up, again and again.
‘Cleaning up’ is the buzzword. It is through this type of work that some residents are able to feed their families. They do what international organisations call ‘cash for work’. Funny phrase. I thought ‘work’ that doesn’t pay ‘cash’ was slavery?
Others have set up their own micro-enterprises. That’s how I met Rose, aged 32. She’s married with three children. Her hair is roughly braided and she looks tired. Under the grey USAID tarp, the heat is suffocating. Rose doesn’t complain. She focuses on removing dead skin from the feet of her customer. ‘Before the earthquake I had my own beauty studio, so I tried opening one here and it worked’. But life is hard and she misses her old life.
When I step back from my journalist ‘role’, I realise just how vulgar my questions may seem.
How dare I ask questions in the face of so much poverty and overcrowding? Questions like ‘How do you feel here?’ and ‘How do you see your future?’.
In the residents’ words:
‘I don’t feel comfortable, I need a real home’, Katiana, aged 25, and an orphan for many years, told me. She’s living in the camp with her two younger brothers. One has TB and has been undergoing treatment for 8 months.
‘I have a wife and four children, I still haven’t found work to feed them, so to pass the time, I play cards with my friends. It passes the time’, a father of a homeless family told me.
His playing companion told me, in impeccable English, how his life has changed since he was deported from the United States. The family breadwinner during his years of exile, the former driver feels helpless about his situation.
One phrase in particular keeps coming up: ‘We live day to day waiting for something better.’
Three months already.
The art of handling the steering wheel
Driving in Port-au-Prince requires flair. I don’t have a licence. I should apply here.
First come, first served. Are you dawdling? Honk. Are you crossing without looking? Honk. Has the light turned green? Honk!
Honk-honk, the philharmonic orchestra of Port-au-Prince plays the melody of the man in a hurry. You lose your patience but the traffic doesn’t budge. There only ‘rules’ are ‘go on, push forward and I’ll sneak in there’ and, ‘I’ll mount the pavement only to come back off it 3 metres further on’, or my favourite: ‘So what if I just cut in front of someone?’
Sometimes some an overzealous police officer even stops a car:
‘Papers!’ A small reprimand and the waltz continues.
With the large trucks collecting debris that fill the city’s already congested roads, I’m surprised by the drivers’ fair-play. Here, apart from two or three little comments and a dirty, threatening look, nothing.
I remember motorists’ impatience in Tunis whenever I went to visit my mother. Countless times fights had to be broken up due to a scratched car or someone cutting in front. Or pushing and shoving to get to the front of the taxi queue.
In Abidjan, it’s on the road that you see the most unlikely exchanges. One taxi driver to another:
- ‘Hey you, where did you get your licence?’ asks a man irritated by a wôrô-wôrô’s bad driving (in Abidjan, an un-metered public taxi).
- ‘In your village’ the other replies before moving off again, one wheel on the road, the other on the pavement.
In Paris, it’s on the metro that you get a feeling for the city’s mind-set. 7pm. The train is due to arrive at the platform. A busy Parisian is on the metro train. Tired and stressed from a long day at work, he waits to get off the train. Standing in front of the doors, his hand is poised to lift the handle. Alert, he knows he’ll very soon be making his way through the merciless crowd that awaits him on the platform. Open Sesame. He’s barely out the door before impatient passengers start piling inside the already packed train. Beware of pickpockets and watch your toes.
Need I remind you that in Paris, the metro is scheduled to arrive (approximately) every 10 minutes? A luxury? And that’s when there are no strikes, passenger accidents or damage to the line.
I prefer walking, and I walk whenever I can. In Haiti, it’s a completely different story for pedestrians. Pavements no longer exist, traders having commandeered the space for their stalls. The dark trails of smoke from tap-taps (modified pick-ups with two benches inside for passengers) don’t inspire confidence. To the cars, we’re ‘inconveniences’. So they honk. Avoid the puddles – a speeding car could splash you and another could honk its horn, as you remain rooted to the spot, stunned! Real life stinks.
In the evening, at around 7pm, endless queues of workers wait for transport home. When a tap-tap approaches, the best sprinters jump in while the vehicle is still moving. Two, sometimes three, customers squeeze onto a motorcycle taxi. Sometimes, in desperation, the crowd rushes on board the trailer of a large truck. Not a single seat. Standing room only.
The smartly dressed refuse to get in. They’re probably waiting for a benevolent private car to give them a ‘roue libre’ (a lift). Big-bottomed women who’ve lost the flexibility of yesteryear cannot climb in. The younger ones push in front of them. Heave-ho.
The old man gazing
Every time we’ve taken this route, I see this old man. He’s holding a book or perhaps a notebook in his hands, but his gaze is always somewhere else and he has a half-smile. He’s not reading. He’s gazing into space, somewhere on the balcony of a cracked house. You wonder how it’s still standing. His greying hair reminds me of my father. The man always has well-ironed shirts. I wonder who does this for him.
I remember my first day in Port-au-Prince, in Christ Roi, at the home of the taxi driver, Philippe. Early in the morning, he went out to buy some salami and macaroni for breakfast. While I was having my shower in a basin he’d installed in the bedroom so that I had my privacy, someone knocked at the door. Shall I answer? Should I? I chose to answer. A petite lady was holding an ironed grey polo shirt in one hand and several belts and starched shirts in the other. In broken Creole, I explain that Philippe had gone out but would be back soon. She gives me the grey polo shirt and leaves.
Five minutes later, there’s another knock at the door. I open it. It’s the lady again. She tells me about an Alfred. Alfred? I don’t know him, I give her back the polo shirt. Philippe returns. The petite lady is behind him; she’s laughing heartily. No, actually, she’s laughing at me. Philippe and Alfred are the same person. The pair talk about a ‘blanc', yet the shirt is grey. And I haven’t seen any whites around here. I learn that the diminutive lady is something of a neighborhood dry cleaner. She does washing, ironing, and she even waxes shoes. Christ Roi is hardly the Hilton, but at least it has its ‘cleaning service’. Entrepreneurship and improvisation.
I thought I was in a fairy-tale, you know, the ones where an old woman asks for help from a nice young woman? It always ends with a beautiful princess dress and a prince charming, right? Mine ended with uncontrollable giggling and new terminology. Whether you’re black or white, when you’re a foreigner here they call you ‘blanc’.
Evacuate! Tomas is coming!
It’s me again. Saran Koly. I’m no longer a journalist. I’m still in Haiti, in Port-au-Prince. Pleased to meet you. I’ve been working so hard these past few months that I didn’t even have time to think. Let alone to write. I apologise in advance if this post is long. There’s so much going round in my head.
I’m back today because the situation is serious. This is nothing new, some might say. Do you have a solution? The Haitian Government has found one: as opposed to being told ‘you’re doing nothing’, ‘there’s no leadership’, it’s saying ‘leave, go to stay with family friends, leave the camps. Total evacuation.’ Some write ‘Tomas’ with an ‘h’, others without. The National Hurricane Center in Miami said that Tomas has arrived and is headed straight for us. Impact expected on Friday.
Threats of heavy rain, gusty winds, thunderstorms, scattered showers with the risk of flooded rivers, landslides and low-intensity flooding for the Sud-Est, Ouest, Sud, Nippes and Grand’Anse departments. If you say it like that, it’s a bit like the end of the world, isn’t it? I forgot to add that, meanwhile, other departments are trying to contain the cholera epidemic. Toll: over 330 people dead, over 4,700 hospitalised.
So we’re asked to implement safety procedures.
Instructions:
Stay tuned to weather reports for any new developments. I have no radio or television. But I have this wonderful invention called a BlackBerry, and I watch Tomas’s every movement on the National Hurricane Center website. This is not reassuring.
Watch for rising water. I live in the hills above Port-au-Prince like many privileged people. I'm not afraid of flooding. This is the advantage (perhaps the only one?) of my embourgeoisement...
If your home is under threat from flooding and landslides, prepare to evacuate. Evacuate? Where? When? How? I ask this question of all those Haitians who don’t have the fortune of living in the hills above the city. To those who haven’t even had a roof for nine months. But I receive no answer.
Do not cross swollen rivers under any circumstances. Don’t worry, I’ll try to stay dry. But what about the remote areas information is slow to reach, those where they’ve only just heard about an unknown, devastating disease?
Do not let children sleep on the floor, keep important documents secure. Children have been sleeping on the floor for nine months; home-made futons have got the better of their fragile backs. If they can sleep through the storm, it will be to escape reality. So hard. Childhood, was for me best time of my life. I always talk about it nostalgically. What about them? What will they remember? Earthquakes, cholera, hurricanes, trauma. I’m moved every time I see clusters of schoolgirls, their hair decorated with ribbons and hair slides. Their uniforms are immaculate and they walk decisively. But where to? What’s their future?
The population is also advised to observe anti-cholera procedures. So far, there have been no confirmed cases in Port-au-Prince. The other day I saw two men dragging a huge block of ice across the street. In transit, the ice block picked up used sheets of paper. It also got dipped in stagnant water and dodged a large pig splashing about in a pool of shit. It probably finished up crushed and sprayed with chemical syrup, in the dry throat of a schoolboy.
What about you? Do you have the solution?
The comeback of ‘Baby Doc’, his father’s son
In the country of the unexpected, the former dictator Jean-Claude Duvalier, ‘Baby Doc’, has returned home after 25 years in exile. This is the news of the day. I was preparing with a quavering voice to speak to you about this day of remembrance for those who died in the 12 January earthquake. Feeling overwhelmed, I took some photos, drawn by the beauty of the singing coming from a church next to my office. My post will come later.
No respite. One case closes and another opens.
Who is Jean-Claude Duvalier? Here’s a short CV for the uninitiated. First student job: President (for life) of the Republic of Haiti at the age of 19. Papa had died, and he needed a suitable successor.
Skills: Being his father’s son, a bloodthirsty megalomaniac. King of censorship and founder in chief of the ‘Republic of Port-au-Prince’, a congested capital city where all the Haitian people’s essential services (work, health, education) are concentrated. The postponement of the second round of the presidential election, pending the official results of the first round, not forgetting the cholera epidemic, which has still not reached its peak, was not enough. He had to come back too. Wearing a tight-fitting dark jacket, his baby face ageing now (he’s 59, after all), he arrived at Toussaint Louverture international airport on Sunday night with his wife. During his passage through the streets of Port-au-Prince, some even applauded. Supporters, no doubt. Obscene.
Just yesterday, thinking of Côte d’Ivoire, I told myself that reality wins out over fiction. Today, I observe without understanding. Who can celebrate the return of this man? And what is there to celebrate? His departure in 1986 was celebrated. What happens to all those families expecting a fair trial? The trial of the man who ordered the murder of one of their own? The exiled dictator who plundered the State coffers before he left. The man who only cared about himself and his inner circle. What’s he going to do? Where was he for the past 25 years? Enjoying a peaceful retirement in France. Côte d'Azur. Ironically. In the country of human rights, one doesn’t want to play host to all the world’s poor. Keep the Roma in Romania. The Africans in Africa. The Haitians under the rubble. But when it comes to dictators (fallen or otherwise) with well-fed bank accounts, one can make an exception.
The president for life is back. Vive la République!