Having a Little Laugh

While our Haitian neighbors are still in a nightmarish catastrophic state, my town has returned to something close to normal. I have one of those unfortunate personalities that makes me want to suffer right along with victims but I know I have to override that feeling with logic. Someday I will grow out of all that guilt I choose to carry around and let taint every comfort and opportunity that I am lucky enough to have, someday. After a few days of hating myself for just being, I decided to stop the craziness and start laughing again along with my friends. Maybe it is you-have-to-be-there humor but I will try to explain some things I find funny.

A lot of the market clothes come from the U.S., household and Goodwill rejects. Most of those charity clothing drops, usually placed in far corners of grocery or drugstore parking lots, send the donations in tight plastic-wrapped blocks on ships headed all over the world. Upon arrival to developing countries, Haiti in this case, I don’t know what happens exactly but our pit stained, faded, unfashionable clothes, end up being sold from big heaps in street markets. I often recognize unfortunate fads from 2001 and occasionally I see people in clothes I used to own, a YMCA T-shirt or American Eagle tank top. The funniest views, however, are the English phrases that mean nothing to the wearer, big men in tops that say “Girls Kick Ass” or really old women sporting “Stop Staring” across her saggy chest. My favorite is a really elderly man in my town who is never without his fatigue bottoms and his rifle along the back of his neck (horizontally, snake taming style). Every once in a while he wears my favorite T-shirt that says in huge white letters “Stop Bitching, Start a Revolution”. Every time I see him meandering with rifle and T-shirt, I get a good smile and wish I had my camera.

I get really mad about the chickens in my business. They are always in my yard and I can’t start a garden before I buy surprisingly expensive chicken wire to put around and above any plants. If I sweep leaves into a pile, they have a chicken play party. They poop on my patio and I have to use precious water to clean it, they sneak into my house when I leave the door open and one even got on my bed and then tried to fly out of my shuttered window. While I already have been unknowingly eating fertilized eggs, I decided to take the next step, to start eating those little jerks. As a lifelong vegetarian, I won’t be cooking them myself but gifted chicken will be accepted. Last week I ate a chicken leg at a friend’s house and found that while it is tricky with the bones and very chewy, it’s kind of good. I wouldn’t be surprised if by the end of this, I eat all farm animals. Cows are okay, but pigs and goats are also innately annoying.

This month, I have started giving environmental education classes in the high school. I am now more comfortable with what works but my first class was like a bad joke. There was a lot I didn’t know, how class is usually a chalkboard copying lesson and that the students and teachers can leave class whenever they please. In nervous anticipation, I had over-planned games, activities and information when their class periods are only half an hour. I didn’t foresee the competitive streak that instigated kids storming out of class because they were wrong about what decomposition is or what paper is made. I also didn’t expect the kids from other classes peering in through the open windows doubling my audience. I was so red in the face as I packed up my visuals, I felt the blood would never disperse.

A lot of people think I am a nun and ask me confusing questions about church events and medicine distribution. There is also a whole band of one and two year olds who thought that my name was Maria for months. They would chant Ma-ri-a from their day care when I walked by until my really smart one year old neighbor finally got them all informed. Now I am a Jah-meen, Jah-meen, so pretty.

Some of the mannerisms can also be pretty funny. When it’s hot, people pull their shirt up to bare the stomach to catch a little breeze. It has become such a habit, I often look down while mopping or cooking and wonder when I pulled my shirt up. I try to keep from doing it out of my house but not everyone is of this persuasion and there will often be a group of men drinking beer in plastic chairs in the street confidently baring their bellies. Another is the lip-point, like a directional air kiss that substitutes our finger point. It is very useful while giving and receiving directions and while I still can’t do it, I won’t be giving up trying. The finger wag says “I don’t want that”. I use the wag frequently when it music is blaring and someone is trying to pour me a beer or when motorcycle taxis in the big town really want me to take a ride. I even think it is a little funny when little kids use it while they are crying at their parents giving them a cold bucket bath when it is chilly or making them leave a fun time.

I realize that these little everyday sights may only amuse me but if it comforts me to seek out a laugh, I don’t see anything wrong with it. Anyway, my latest update is that I am off to help with the Haitian relief in Jimaní, a Dominican border town. Organizations are working together there to aid earthquake victims and I will be volunteering with USAID mostly translating for American doctors and lending an extra hand. I have no idea what it will be like but I will let you know.

In a Time of Tragedy

There is no information I can give, a river width from Haiti and 60km from Port-au-Prince, that you can't get from the news sources online. In fact, I have been waiting all day to get online myself. We shook like a carnival ride, where you can see the road, parked motorcycles and street light poles swaying back and forth, stomach lurching, paradigm shifting, but everything standing. People were out in the street, laughing and panicking, excited and dizzy. We noticably shook a couple of other times before people started getting the news on TV. A hospital had collapsed in Haiti. As we kept shaking, it started to unfold. As more information was revealed, it looked worse and worse, unfathomable. The lack of communication to Haiti became excruciating for those with family in the midts of it. My friend's brand new baby and wife are in Port-au-Prince, another friends sisters, another's parents.

After a sleepless shakey night, Wednesday felt more sad. People started crossing the border to look for their families. Some crossed just to spread the news. As of yesterday, whole Haitian towns felt the shake but had no idea the epicenter or the impact. Without communication or news, they were, and maybe some still are, in the dark about the tragedy. It seemed impossible that you could be so close to worldwide news and have no idea.

My town sits here in somber, without our normal blaring music, waiting for news of loved ones and changes that might come. They are starting to worry about where the Haitians will go, or rather, if they will try to come here. Last night, watching the news with some neighbors, we saw footage so brutal, it looked like an action film. We volunteers are thinking about what we could possibly do but it seems like money is what Haiti needs. Money for medical aid, water and food. Eventually, for rebuilding one of the most dense, underpriviledged cities in the world. As we shake this very moment, I wonder how much it is shaking there and when it will end. When will all the horror cease?

On a personal note, I want my mom. I have never felt so homesick as in these past two days. Trying to be strong and composed, to keep myself educated and aware, all I really want is my family to give me bear hugs and tell me everything will be okay. Even though, I think we all know it won't.