Haiti's Kryptonite

Since I'm in the Caribbean (something I try to keep reminding myself), rain is not exactly an uncommon occurrence here.  Tonight was no exception, except it happened to be the biggest rain storm I've experienced since I arrived.  I knew it would be big because I saw the ominous clouds while I was outside reading One Last Roll of the Dice by Trita Parsi savoring the last bit of sunlight.

I've been wanting to capture the impact rain has on Haiti, so I readied my camera hoping to capture something worth filming.  Take a look:

Two Articles

One of the nice things about being Haïti, aside from appreciating everything I took for granted in the States, like daily uninterrupted electricity and regularly maintained roads, is distance from the hyperbolic and tin-foil hat political primaries.

Next time your sitting in traffic cursing life, think about the engineering required to build something like this. Oh wait, you got a BA?  Sorry, just go back to Morning Zoo.

 But today I was pleasantly reminded that not only do reasonable people exist, but they are numerous!  So numerous in fact, a guy who used to sleep on my couch, won the right to author a guest post for the Washington Post on our most underrated President.  You can read it here.  It's brilliant save for the fact that he is wrong.  Everyone knows the most underrated president is James K. Polk, the man with such a insatiable craving for Mexican food he conquered half the country.

Tacos for everyone! (And California!)

Seriously though, the article is well worth checking out.  Not is the analysis spot on, Miller captures the essence of the man's presidency in the last paragraph - courage - and in doing so, challenges the American people to accept the kind of leadership we claim to crave.

The second article I read today was about the forgotten revolutions.  There you can read all about how the Haitian Revolution helped us acquire the Louisiana Purchase (which, in turn, facilitated Polk's great gobble).  I've posted on this topic before, but I think it's worth noting again because it's important for Americans to understand Haiti's importance within the context of our own history as well as its influence on the rest of the world.  It wasn't always a basket case and it does not always need to be.

BélO in Concert

On Friday night I went to see BélO at the Hotel Montana.  Before the fall of Duvalier, the Hotel Montana was a posh spot for Haiti's chic social set to mingle.  But the Montana mirrored the rest of Haiti went into a slow decline after the coup de tête of 1986 until it finally collapsed along with the majority of Port-au-Prince, on January 12.  This is what the Montana looked like after the catastrophe of 2010.

If only we hadn't bought volcano insurance! (Oh wait, we DID get earthquake insurance.  Thank God. Can we have our money now?)

Despite the tragedy and the difficulties in processing their claims, the hotel has begun rebuilding.  It's not where it was, but it still has tremendous potential.  Take a look at some of these amazing vistas.

Of course this was before the earthquake, but still!

This was the second time I saw BélO in concert.  The first time I went I saw him at Garden Studio in Pétionville.  I went with a friend who is Haitian who also happens to know him, which meant I got in free.  He played his set and then we got to see his new videos "Kote moun yo" (Where are the people) and "Mdamou" (I'm in love).  I preferred the first one to the second, but as usual, he put on a great show.  The crowd was enthusiastic and toward the end almost everyone was dancing.  The most pleasantly surprising part of his performance however, was the little Haitian flag he prominently displayed throughout his set.  It's the first time I've seen the Haitian flag displayed for purely patriotic reasons by an individual citizen.  Now I grant you that BélO is no ordinary Haitian, but in a country short on governance, civil society, resources, and jobs, a little patriotism can spark the first flame of national renaissance: hope

BélO at Garden Studio

Traveling

My car left Customs yesterday and arrived in the Embassy.  To say I was overjoyed is a gross understatement.  Due to the security environment, I am only permitted to drive my car, ride the embassy shuttle, request motorpool, or bum a ride from someone else.  But now that my car is here, I just have to wait for it's CD plates and I will be able to go practically anywhere (minus the red zones).

The red zones are unspeakably dangerous and no blan who has ventured into them has emerged in the post-earthquake era.  There aren't any photographs of what the red zone looks like, but our best placed assets and our most skilled artists worked together to create this rendition of what it probably looks like:

Consular Work

Disclaimer: This post does not represent the official views of the U.S. Government (USG).

Last week my my first week on the immigrant visa line without any assistance.  I was fortunate to receive a generous amount of training from experienced locally engaged (LE) staff and other officers over the past seven days and I feel extremely lucky that they are so patient with my continual questions.

Out and Aboot

This weekend I went to the 6th International Jazz Festival of Port-au-Prince at the Karibe Hotel and a mixer at the Canadian Embassy to raise money for a local school.

rear of the Hotel Karibe

The concert was a great time.  I met Ambassador Merten and his lovely wife, Susan.  Both of them really seem to love Haiti, despite the daunting problems the country faces.  After the Ambassador said a few remarks, I saw a couple of bands play, Jed Levy Quartet and a Mexican jazz band called Aguamala.  You can see a sample of what JLQ played below

Just Made It

I could not believe it, but I should have: at 4:30 am I still did not have a ticket for Haiti.

The day before, after the movers finished and before I was about to spend my last night in DC, I received an e-mail from travel services company (I’ll call them CW) at 4:58 informing me that I needed to buy my ticket.  I sat at my computer for a second, completely dumbfounded.  How could this possibly be?  The romantic answer is anything is possible in my line of work, but the real answer is probably my file slipped through the cracks.