Haiti: Part 1 -- the backgrounder

We survived. After exactly one week in Haiti, we limped back over the border into the DR yesterday. Hot, filthy, sweaty, and emotionally drained. Whatever the border officials were asking for, be it 10 bucks, 40 bucks, bribes, tips, whatever, we just handed them the money. Just let us through the wire. The Haitian border, as one can imagine, is not a nice place. If hell has a home, it’s the Haitian border. The final 40 kms was THE worst road we have encountered yet on our year-long journey. It broke my bike. The mission for today is to figure out how to fix it (duct tape and zip ties!), but that’s minor compared to just being back in the DR. Feels like home! We’re taking an off day today, just to relax in the shade, and feel the breeze.


Whew...lots to cover, where to begin...the obvious I suppose, let’s get it out of the way. Haiti is the poorest country in the western hemisphere (by a long shot), and within the bottom 20 poorest countries in the world, and considered by some agencies to be within the bottom 10 worst countries in the world to live, and, is generally considered a failed state. Consider this: Sierra Leone is richer than Haiti, and Iraq is considered a better place to live. Let that sink in for a few seconds. Sierra Leone...Iraq...really?

Yep, she’s in pretty rough shape. We won’t sugar coat it. It’s pretty bad. On the whole, there is no public infrastructure. No water system, no sewer system, no garbage collection. Port-au-Prince, the capital, a city of 3 million people, is one of the world’s largest cities without a sewage system. Walking the streets is something you build up the courage for, then need a drink afterwards. It’s the standard news-clip image: a steaming mass of humanity heaving and bobbing amongst an endless putrid chaos of crumbling concrete, diesel-belching traffic, rotting garbage, and raw sewage. Unfortunately, the stereotype is pretty much true in this case. Nuff said about that. The true heroes are the people of Haiti for their amazing resilience and ability to take each day as it comes.


Unbeknownst to most however, it wasn’t always this way. In the early days, Haiti – or St. Domingue as it was known at first (“Haiti” is derived from the indigenous name for the island “ayiti” – land of big mountains) – was on top. It was the jewel of the empire, and the richest colony in the world. When the Euros first landed (see previous posts) the Spanish took the eastern side of the island (i.e., the DR), the French the western side (i.e., Haiti). The French invested heavily in their new colony, the Spanish did not. As a result, Haiti flourished, DR did not (it’s the reverse now though). One of the ensuing facts of history, is that the French imported African slaves...lots of them. Slaves were expensive, and Haiti had lots of money, so they bought them by the boat load. At first, it worked seamlessly and Haiti became immensely rich on the backs of their slaves, who died in untold numbers through the brutality of the practice.


Eventually however, the ratio of African slaves to French grew to 10:1. Gee, guess what happened? The Africans had enough of the whip and revolted and then basically eliminated their “masters”.  To this day, it is the only successful slave revolt in history, and resulted in Haiti becoming the first independent black republic in the world in 1804. A fact proudly enshrined in their history. A fact also that Haitians are essentially displaced Africans living on an island in the Caribbean. Unfortunately, things have kinda gone downhill since independence, and well, now we have the U.N. and NGOs holding things together by their fingernails. Again, sad but true.


Now, language. A fascinating situation. While the French colonized the place, French is the language of the educated upper class and any official documentation. The true language of Haiti is Haitian creole – spoken by 100% of the population, and the only language spoken by the bottom 85%. So French only gets you so far. On the street, it’s all creole. Haitian creole arose out of a need for the French and their African slaves to communicate, and is therefore a mix of French and African dialects. While we did fairly well with anyone who speaks French, there was a serious communication breakdown with the other 85%. But hey, like being in Vietnam or some such place, it just becomes one big game of charades. Point at something, make the symbol for 2, then rub your fingers together making the money gesture. Amazing how that works!


Then there’s the money. Like everything in Haiti, not straight forward, and no doubt specifically designed to confuse foreigners. The official Haitian currency is the Gourde. One U.S. dollar = 45 Gourdes. OK, but, there’s this other thing called the “Haitian dollar”. At one point in the recent past, the Gourde was pegged to the U.S. dollar at 5 Gourdes to the dollar. The Gourde is no longer pegged to the dollar, but the “Haitian dollar” lives on, and is represented as $1, which doesn’t mean 1 dollar, or even 1 Gourde. It means 5 Gourdes.  On the street, if someone says “un” (one) it usually means 1 Haitian dollar, which is 5 Gourdes, unless they are specifically referring to Gourdes. Following that logic, “5” means 25 gourdes. Unless, the person says “vignt-cinq gourdes”, which means 25 gourdes. OK, so why don’t they just drop this Haitian dollar business, and just use their freakin’ currency which is the Gourde, which is what they are using, but you just have to know that 1 means 5, 2 means 10, 3 means 15, and so on, unless they are actually referring to Gourdes? Excellent question.


OK, that’s the backgrounder for context. Our mission was a one-week route taking us through the north along an arc downwards through the centre and south, and back to the DR border. Fun? Not really the word we would use. More like, it was an EXPERIENCE. Details to follow in next post. Stand by.