7481: Re: 7432: Usefulness of spring break trips to Haiti

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Tom Bliss and/or Karen Sandberg <santa@sparc.isl.net>

In reply to Shirley Jean I can only speak for myself, but my short 
three-week visits to Haiti have left me a changed person (perhaps "changed 
American" is more accurate).  I have not been to Haiti since 1988 and have 
no idea whether my time there benefited anyone but myself, but would like 
to think that those whose wounds I dressed were somewhat less miserable
for 
it.  That the shit I cleaned from the beds of dying tuberculosis and AIDS 
patients made their last hours a little more comfortable.  I don't know
how 
to solve the problems there, so I just did what I could.  I rode the 
tap-taps and joked with my fellow travellers therein, I horsed around with 
kids in the streets, I got dirty, I took photos, I loved it.  Did they
love 
me?  I hope so a little.

Tom