12622: Haitian enclave fulfills a dream (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: leonie hermantin <lhermantin@hotmail.com>

Haitian enclave fulfills a dream

By Leon Fooksman
Staff Writer
Posted August 4 2002

DELRAY BEACH· On the gritty streets several blocks from this city's bustling
downtown, Merius Francois relives the American dream every day in a living
room-sized restaurant that he opened three months ago.

His place isn't fancy: It only has three wooden tables decorated with Miami
Dolphins tablemats, several plants hung in the corners and an empty ice
cream freezer next to the door. It's off the beaten track, situated in a
fenced-in area next to a boating store on Southeast Second Avenue. And it's
not producing much business either, so he's willing to cook almost anything
with chicken, pork and fish to make a few extra bucks.

But Le Soleil Restaurant is all his, a testament to the Haitian immigrant's
lifelong pursuit of wanting to open a business in America.

"I've always been a good cook and I wanted to be independent," Francois, 28,
said with broken English.

The business corridor around the intersection of Southeast Second street and
avenue is a place of entrepreneurial dreams for many other Haitian
immigrants.

Scores of them have opened small shops there in the past 20 years to sell
wares and services to a burgeoning Haitian community estimated at 15,000
people. About 30 Haitian-owned businesses now operate within the roughly
eight-block area in the heart of the Osceola Park neighborhood, fashioned
after the language and culture of Port-au-Prince, where many of them grew
up.

Patrons who don't speak English or don't have cars can buy almost anything
without venturing far from their neighborhoods -- from luggage, detergent,
religious candles, the latest Haitian music to snapper, okra, jewelry and
televisions. They can get help from one of their own with taxes or
complicated immigration documentation. If they're desperate for cash, they
can even find a merchant occasionally willing to give them store credit.

Inside the shops, the sounds of Creole-language radio stations blurting out
of aging radios often blend in with the stuffy smells of clothing, shoes and
hats stacked in boxes and shelves. The conversations are fast, vigorous and
usually argumentative, anything but boring.

"We talk politics first. It's everything in Haiti and in here," said
Christopher Chery, who comes regularly to the Original Barber shop on
Southeast Second Street, one of several barber and beauty shops on the
strip.

This ethnic business enclave exists a world away from the nearby
tourist-filled East Atlantic Avenue, known for its flashy restaurants and
boutiques. These owners aren't a part of the local business scene. They
don't have an association to air their concerns to City Hall. In fact, many
city leaders have never visited.

"I don't know much about them and I feel badly about it," said Bill Wood,
president of the Greater Delray Beach Chamber of Commerce, which includes
some Haitian business owners but mostly draws members from larger, more
established businesses in other parts of the city.

Some shops opened with minimal start-up costs, hoping to make enough to make
ends meet and to support their families in South Florida and Haiti, said
Joseph Bernadel, a Haitian community leader. But like other parts of
thriving downtown Delray Beach, skyrocketing rents have forced some
merchants out and made others consider leaving.

"This area won't be around in several years," said Jean Robert, owner of
Percy Jewelry, a jewelry repair store on Southeast First Avenue. He said the
rent for his estimated 500 square foot business has risen from $350 to $699
in the past three years. "The same way people have been pushed off Atlantic
Avenue, they'll be pushed off here. The city will want to make this area
more sophisticated."

To operate on this strip means accepting many slow days. There have been a
lot of those in recent weeks because many customers have less spending money
when their jobs in the area's tourist industry slow down for the summer. On
lazy afternoons, merchants can be spotted laying back in their chairs
listening to radios and waiting for their doors to open.

Fritz Delva, owner of Eko Multi Shop on Southeast First Avenue, was chatting
with friends one morning last week as he straightened his store.

He said through an interpreter that he's run his variety store -- selling
everything from dresses to banana soda to shoe laces -- for about five
years. A resident of Delray Beach for about 15 years, he barely speaks or
writes in English, but he survives fine with this predominately Haitian
clientele.

Like other merchants, he is guarded about volunteering too much information
about his background -- a factor of growing up in a repressive society and
fearing the government and anyone asking many questions, Bernadel said.

Several storefronts away, Pierre Normil was telling his friend Medache
Derilus, owner of D-M Photo & Video store on Southeast Second Street, the
potential of the business corridor.

"This could be a tourist area that attracts a lot of people. This has
something different to offer," said Normil, who plays in a band. "If I had
some money I would turn this area into a mall and attract everyone."

Derilus said he has tried to lure customers by attending festivals on East
Atlantic Avenue, taking photos of visitors and then asking them to pick up
the photos at his shop. Sometimes it works.

"They need to know I'm here," Derilus said.

Down the street on Southeast Second Avenue, Joseph Germain was less
concerned about drawing tourists. His take-out restaurant called Lecafe is
usually crowded with Haitian and Hispanics ordering a variety of fish, conch
and meat dishes seasoned just right with Caribbean spices.

Sharing the street with other Haitian restaurants, he isn't worried about
competition. There's plenty of locals in the surrounding neighborhoods to
support everyone, he said.

"You succeed if you know what you're doing," he said.

Leon Fooksman can be reached at lfooksman@sun-sentinel.com or 561-243-6647.




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