My first week here

Well, I decided to write a travel blog because that's what I said I would do... so here is my first one.

As you know, I arrived in Haiti last Monday. My flight landed at around 4 pm Port-au-Prince (PAP) time, which is an hour earlier than Toronto time. Altogether, I was travelling for about 14 hours, which isn't as much fun as it sounds (even though I got free drinks in the Miami lounge!). The PAP airport has seen better days. They are upgrading it, sort-of, but is a typical third world airport... no boarding ramp, run down entrance, crumbling terminal! Still, it is quite charming. Naturally, I had forgotten to write down the address of where I was going to be staying, or a telephone number of where I was going to be working, so the immigration guard was a bit suspicious (what kind of person shows up in a country with no idea of how they were going to get from the airport!).

Anyhow, I made it through immigration, and was met by Jeema and Lionel, two people who work for Fonkoze (where I am doing my work term). The drive through PAP was interesting. In the same way as Guyana, there are elements of a first world country (roundabouts, a Texaco), but the details are quite different. The number of people walking on the streets is incredible; the street life is abundant, and people sell everything and anything. Since the unemployment rate in Haiti is around 70 - 80%, the informal economy is quite large, these little shops and stalls are the backbone of the country. And, of course, there are also a lot of stray dogs. I can’t imagine what Ginger’s life would have been like here!

Well, after the drive, I made it to the Fonkoze office (I’ll put up pictures of the office later). I met everybody, and then went to my accommodation. For the next three weeks, I’m staying at a religious house of sorts. It has very strict meal times (7 am and 6 pm, with about a 15 min margin of error), and you have to help with the washing up after meals (mom- that should appeal to you)… The rooms are very simple, but the lodging is rather cheap. PAP is an expensive place, considering the GDP per person (nominal) in Haiti is USD 635. A reasonable hotel will set you back $90 a night, with food a lot more than that. Where I’m staying is $35 a day meals included, which is pricy for a country where 70% of the population lives on less than $2 per day. At the same time, things at the lower end are much, much cheaper than elsewhere. Considering the Gini index for Haiti is 59.2, the country is very unequal (as compared to Canada’s Gini index of 32.1, which has been relatively constant at around 30ish for a long time… I just spent the last 20 minutes looking for Canada’s Gini index over the past 50 years!). But, what I really wanted to say is that although the rooms are spartan, the view is fantastic. The attached photo’s show the view of PAP from just outside my room. They are not that great, so I’ll try and get better ones for later.

Well, I haven’t been up to too much this week. Work-Sleep-Work-Sleep… hopefully i’ll get out of PAP this weekend to see a bit more. I hope everybody had a good week, and I’ll update y’all next week.

-Ian

P.S. - The non-Haiti pictures are of ducks in our backyard on the pool cover. They visit everyday for a swim, but have been a bit confused since the pool cover started being used!

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