14870: (Chamberlain) Haitians seek diversion in traditional cockfights (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Greg Chamberlain <GregChamberlain@compuserve.com>

     By Michael Deibert

     PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti, Feb 19 (Reuters) - It's Sunday afternoon in the
hilly and crowded Port-au-Prince neighbourhood of Nazon.
     As people head home from church dressed in their Sunday best and
others pause to sample the aromatic pork fried by market women in black
pots, Emil Piton, 63, heads to the "gague" or cockfighting ring he owns.
     Inside, dozens of men gather around a concrete pit littered with
feathers and spattered with blood. The tin roof above them does not quite
reach down to the concrete blocks supporting it, and the resulting space
lets some air into the otherwise sweltering room.
     "How much men? Place your bets!" Piton says as the men, beer or rum
bottles and cigarettes in their hands, eagerly gesture to the two birds,
one black and one greenish-brown, being led into the pit by their owners.
     In a flash the hoods which the birds wear to keep them calm are off,
and they are clucking and clawing away at one another.
     Cockfighting, a tradition in many Caribbean and Latin American
countries, is older than the nation of Haiti itself, imported to the region
from England and France, where it was hugely popular in colonial times,
historians say.
     Perfectly legal in Haiti, the sport is less vicious than the version
practiced in some parts of the world. The birds do not wear metal spurs and
rather than fight to the death, they fight only until an owner calls time
and a winner is declared.
     Although it seems brutal to some, cockfighting is as much a part of
Haiti's traditional life as bullfighting is to Spain, and there have rarely
been any voices raised in protest.
     In Haiti today, as an economic downturn sends people scrambling for
survival in an atmosphere of instability and political crisis, the
tradition provides a much-needed release for the country's beleaguered poor
majority.
     "When there is a gague, people are there only to attend and watch the
match, our problems can't enter," said 27-year-old Lithene Pierre as he ate
bits of spicy conch from a plastic cup.
     "Cockfighting is a distraction from the losing battle that so many
Haitians are fighting with poverty," said Michele Wucker, author of "Why
the Cocks Fight: Dominicans, Haitians, and the Struggle for Hispaniola."
     "The cockfight mirrors Haiti's political violence, but it also
provides a 'safe' arena where Haitians can release frustration and
aggression. Spectators may lose money betting, or an owner's pride may get
bruised, but only the birds really get hurt."
     Haitians have watched their country get poorer in recent years as the
value of its currency, the gourde, has tumbled, and the country has been
racked by political unrest.
     Since his re-election in November 2000, Haiti's President
Jean-Bertrand Aristide has been locked in a bitter dispute with opposition
politicians over May 2000 parliamentary elections that observers charge
were tabulated to favour Aristide's Lavalas Family party.
     In recent months pro- and anti-government protests, riots and strikes
have affected all parts of the poverty-stricken Caribbean nation of eight
million.
     Inside the gague, none of that seems to matter. As the birds claw and
peck at one another, a great roar goes up from the crowd whenever contact
is made.
     The birds stagger and rush around the pit, with men standing on any
available surface and leaning on their neighbours, straining to watch the
action.
     The crowd is overwhelmingly male. The only women present are the
vendors selling rum, moonshine and snacks.
     As a reminder that cockfighting is not only a pastime, but a
significant business, a man passes out cards advertising a match to be held
the following weekend.
     The prize for first place will be 3,000 gourdes or roughly US$67, an
astronomical sum to most Haitians and more than most families bring home in
a month.