Haiti Day 6

Day 6
My meeting with Partners in Health occured one hour early this time (at 7:00 am!) I got a call in my room while I was still sleeping, but managed to be sitting down with the principal at 7:10. It was very productive though, and he referred me to a number of people that IfUD will be able to work with.

The extra time meant that I had an hour to go for a walk (which I had not been able to do thus far). I walked from my hotel to the market at Petionville. I de-touristed as much as possible and kept my camera in my pocket. Poor Haitians seemingly buy all of their food from micro outlets on the street. I walked through the main street and it was packed. I passed another fully naked woman that again nobody was paying any attention to. I also passed a gas station that had gas and there was a horde of people fighting for it with no semblance of a line. People had not pulled their cars up to the pump but were standing with various jugs and containers to fill up and then bring to their cars.

I then walked up one of the side street markets and it was the densest market I had ever seen and I had trouble getting through. All of the merchants were woman and many gathered right in the middle of an open street with mobile baskets of goods. Cars would occasionally have to pass through and they would all move their goods out of the way and then would quickly rush back to jockey for a good position. In terms of density, picture walking out of MSG after a concert but with people yelling and selling things all over the place. It was totally insane!

There were people selling meat and fish covered with flies out in the hot sun with no ice. At one point, a tak-tak (taxi/bus type truck) had to get through and there was no room for it. The driver was yelling and someone had to get out to push some people out of the way. There was a woman with a big tray of fish and seafood that had spilled onto the street and she was trying to pick it up before the tires ran over it. I started feeling really claustrophobic and had to get out of there.

A fight then broke out between several women a few feet away from me. One was swinging a large empty tin can and another had a small piece of wood. It caused quite a commotion and went on for a while and went down the street in the direction I was walking as one woman was chasing another. One of the women got bashed in the head and was covered with blood. I had a strange sudden thought to compare how different it was to buy food here compared to Pathmark.

The episode also reinforced just how much the people here are struggling. On the way back, I passed a couple of souvenir stands set up on the road into my hotel. I bought several nice crafts to take home. I think it was the first time in my life that I readily paid the inflated tourist price without bargaining. After all I witnessed this past week and particularly on this walk, bargaining just wouldn’t have felt right.