d.e.c.: Archive

foodfriendsfever

My lady friend came all the way to Jérémie to visit. We got all of our friends on a really special and isolated beach south of Anse d’Hainault and had a cookout and took photos of each other eating the food. My favorite siblings. “David konn bay blag ayisyen kounye a.” -Pierre Renel After the excursion, Lauren and I camped on my boss’ private beach near...

Jun 22nd

May 18th

Makandal, Jérémie

Hebert is a guy from Port-au-Prince who moved to Jeremie for reasons that he’d rather not talk about. “I came to Jeremie because I came to Jeremie,” he told me with a smile. He is interested in community organizing and neighborhood revitalization. My boss—a lovely tenacious nun from Missouri who has been living here since 1989—told me, “He is just too...

May 18th

Fort Matin

Sorry. I took a little trip the other day. It went like this: View Abricot, Dame Marie, Fort Matin in a larger map We left Jeremie early in the morning. There, we found a bit of rioting due to some reversed election results for the Deputy of Bonbon and Abricot. Some ‘vagabonds’ were burning tires, barrels, and smashing glass bottles in the street. We skidaddled, and passed a...

Apr 23rd

still here/lost the blogarithm

Last weekend I went to Castillon to document the selection of 50 new houses that we’re going to rebuild. It’s a really isolated, resource-poor, and mountainous zone. I slept well in a down sleeping bag, even. I spent three days there, and we did a lot of hiking throughout the zone with the Health Agent. This is the sub-zone of Tosier. There are perhaps 20 homes here. It is about a...

Mar 5th

biznis fanmi a

Here is a family making cassava flour (and then bread, probably). First, the older brother peels the manioc root. Then Mom squeezes out all of the moisture (and cyanide) from the root in an old t-shirt. Then little brother grates it all to hell. After they dry the flour out, they can make delicious breads. It can be made sweet, with sugar and cinnamon, or salty with spices and coconut...

Feb 21st

unctuous

This is Hebert and I in Makandal. He organized a co-op in the very poor neighborhood which has facilitated the construction of a bunch of new homes that we’ve been supporting. Behind us are some unusable latrines that we’d like to repair. A really sweet mute woman in Testasse (perhaps she’d be less sweet if she could talk?). Lastly, this is my boss with a bunch of chillun....

Feb 12th

trying to be culturally relativistic even when it...

If you are a big fan of the beasts you may not want to read this. There’s this guy I know who I will call Ti Terib. This isn’t his real name. He has a congenital defect that causes his arms to curl up into his body, but he was lucky enough to get surgery at a young age. While he can’t move anything heavy around or reach the glasses in the top of the cupboard, he can write and...

Feb 4th

"Big Setback" for Haitian Democracy as U.S. Gets... →

Forces Runoff Elections Between Two Right-Wing Candidates, CEPR Co-Director Says

Feb 3rd

Deportations

Two good articles on Haitians being deported from the US and the DR. My friend Jeff who spent some time in Jeremie in late 2010 wrote this post for the Huffington Post. This article was written by another journalist friend of mine in Port-au-Prince, showing how cholera has affected deportations from the DR. Enjoy!

Feb 1st

Jan 30th

Jan 18th

3 notes

“If I spend all day shooting in a camp, I find that I can pretend until I...”

– http://www.aolnews.com/2011/01/15/a-journalist-in-haiti-a-year-of-collecting-pain/

Jan 16th

Govt in Jérémie illegally raze homes of 47... →

Jan 15th

Rockslide and Razing Homes in Jérémie →

Rains caused a rockslide on Friday morning, killing a mother and 3 of her 10 children. Government showed up during the day and razed the homes of almost 40 families without any prior notification. Most of the families slept in St. Pierre School last night to get out of the rain, so I went down and talked to a lot of them this morning. Everyone lost almost all of their possessions, including birth...

Jan 15th

a quick visit to the u.s.

This trip gives me some bandwidth, so I can do a quick “photo dump,” if you will. Be warned, there are lots of photos after the jump, some of which may not be good to look at while eating. The city of Jérémie from the road to Les Cayes. This is home, for now. Casimir teaching a lesson on HIV/AIDS and responsible sexuality at a school in Sassier Carpenters at work, building...

Dec 28th

US will pay for Haitian vote fraud →

Dec 15th

Haiti's election: Whomever they voted for, the... →

My Dad recently told me that I post too many half-assed entries without any substantive explanations, and that sometimes hearing about gunfire and riots in Jeremie without any explanation frightens him. He’s probably right. I am, however, really really busy right now. I have several things I want to write about, but for now I’ll share this very concise roundup of the issues in the...

Dec 11th

the will of the people!

I saw this t-shirt last week. “There is no change without citizen participation.” Presidential election results announced last night with no provincial counts, and Celestin curiously beating Martelly by less than a percent. Everyone in Haiti recognizes that this is a robbery, including the US Embassy. Lots of rioting last night, and quite a bit of gunfire. I’m sure the gossip...

Dec 8th

Cholera violence in the Grand'Anse →

On Thanksgiving Day there were three men in Jeremie accused of spreading cholera through a vodou powder. They were attacked by a mob, had tires put around their bodies, and were burnt alive. I wasn’t going to talk about this because I didn’t want to really freak my family and friends out, but the media has picked up on it so I may as well acknowledge it. This kind of activity is...

Dec 3rd

good article on the election →

It’s looking more and more like we can count on a Jan 16th run-off.

Nov 25th

1 tag

tèt chaje

Cholera hit the Grand’Anse on Friday. There has been one death and eight hospitalized as of yesterday, and several NGOs are setting up tents for an outdoor cholera treatment center. I went to the hospital Friday afternoon. It was empty! Apparently when the cholera patients showed up the rest of the “sick” patients scrammed. Time to buckle up… I’ll update as I learn...

Nov 21st

1 tag

cholera update

It is moving, but despite reports to the contrary, cholera isn’t in all of Haiti’s 10 departments yet. MSPP has confirmed cholera in 7 of the 10 departments (Artibonite, Central, Ouest, Nord Ouest, Sud, Nord, and Nord Est). This map has accurate and up to date tracking of cholera cases. As you can see, Jérémie is one of very few unaffected regions. This is largely due to the fact that...

Nov 19th

2 tags

the scoop on cholera in the grand'anse

On October 21st, the Ministry of Public Health confirmed the first case of cholera in St. Marc, 100 miles northeast of Jérémie. Only one week later, all of our Health Agents (44 of them), facilitators, nurses, regional supervisors, and staff met to discuss the possibility (or inevitability) of transmission to the Grand’Anse, and the implications of such a public health emergency. A...

Nov 15th

2 tags

An Open Letter to Mr. Clinton Regarding Haiti →

While many donors have sought to invest in Haiti’s economic recovery, we at the daily level watch the unnecessary deaths of hundreds of Haitians. Fatalities that were preventable with the options we presented your organization. It is time for an honest evaluation of what does and does not work in Haiti. We directly and openly challenge you and your organization to move beyond the...

Nov 12th

2 tags

good reporting on the cholera epidemic →

I’ve read a lot of questionable reports on what’s going on with cholera lately. Here’s a nice exception, though. Clinics and hospitals are buckling up and preparing for what is now an uncontainable epidemic. This article gives you an idea of the underreporting of cases/deaths that’s taking place. For good epidemiological info, check out Jim Wilson’s website:...

Nov 10th

Tom

Woke up this morning to this: Aye! Thankfully, my house is sound and my solar panels are embedded in cement: I just took a little walk around Jeremie after the heavy rain let up this afternoon. There isn’t a terrible amount of overtly visible damage in town, though I hear that towns along the Grande Anse river and crops all over the Grande Anse department are devastated. I...

Nov 5th

Oct 20th

2 tags

A favor, please

If you read my last post about the Next Generation of Young Women Responsible Sexuality and Soccer Program that I am coordinating, you already have a good idea of how wonderful it is… Edit: I added some actual data, and to make this a less cumbersome request, I made this. All you have to do is click some buttons and tap some keys. This was the final match between Fond Rouge Dayere and...

Oct 8th

Oct 5th

1 note

Sep 29th

Sep 25th

2 tags

Sep 22nd

4 notes

3 tags

Sep 18th

2 tags

Plasmodium vivax

I never thought it possible. The amount of sweat that my t-shirt and sheets held upon waking up Sunday morning was almost double than what it had been consistently for the past two weeks. A genuine personal record. After a weekend of high fever, dizziness, and some colorful phlegmatic experiences—there are some more symptoms that I’ll spare you non-nurses—I was elated. I had broken a pesky...

Sep 15th

David Gets Ready To Go To Jèrèmie

I leave for Haiti quite soon. So let’s get down to it. Why am I going? I first went to Haiti when I was 18, in May of 2006. At that point I was vaguely interested in public health, but much more interested in diversion. I had all of the typical “aha!” moments that folks often get when they gain ‘perspective’ from traveling to poor countries. In short, I really fell in love with the...

Aug 24th

Pitchfork Reviews Reviews: Bob Marley in I Am... →

today it is 97 degrees in manhattan which means that if you’re on the subway platform waiting for the subway it’s 110, i am on the subway platform right now waiting for the train and listening to the Bob Marley greatest hits comp Legend, which someone once wrote was a CD you owned if you only…

Jun 29th

37 notes

Haitians on Foreign Aid →

Not at all surprising, but good to think about as I get ready to join the “international parade.”

Jun 24th

when you need tough →

keep it in the u.s.a.

Mar 10th

“It’s my contention that African-Americans with saxophones and...”

– Chuck Folkers, http://www.oedilf.com/db/Lim.php?AuthorId=527

Mar 3rd

Watch

january, 2009

Feb 25th

“Dove® + Friends + Shopping = a perfect day”

– Dove PROMISES® Message

Feb 25th

Feb 22nd

Somali pirates offer aid to Haiti →

Feb 21st

1 note

“doesn’t it make you feel powerful?”

– kate, on the virtues of knowing html

Feb 21st