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18763: From Kathy Grey, racine125@aol.com - Here I Am in Jacmel... (fwd)
From: Racine125@aol.com
Here I am in Jacmel, Corbetteers. I send you all greetings!
I went to Port-au-Prince yesterday, that was Tuesday, to bring my newest
international initiate to town. He hopes to get a flight tomorrow
(Wednesday) and the airport is supposed to be open as I am writing this,
perhaps that will change. It was quite a calm trip to Port-au-Prince and
back to Jacmel. Port-au-Prince looks like it is in dire need of an army
of street-sweeping machines, garbage is just piled up in waves and waves
at intersections.
Here in Jacmel, though, life goes on much as usual. The town is still
clean and reasonably active, although the banks and Western Union are as
yet not in function. There has been little or no destruction here to my
knowledge - some pot-shots taken at one local business, but no injuries,
no loss of life, again to my knowledge. The Commissariat was not burned,
though I think Teleco was a bit deplumed, you know? In fact, the day
after Aristide departed, the right-wing folks here were saying that they
had sent Aristide away but they didn't send the police away, and would
all the police please come out, come out, wherever you are! LOL And
please come back to work!
The surrounding countryside is quiet, people are a bit fearful but there
is no terror like in 1993. For a while a group of young men with a
shotgun were joyriding up and down in a camionette, but they have
stopped, probably because like everyone else they have run out of gas.
That's our problem here now - gasoline. We need more fuel to run
Jacmel's electric generator. (That's why you haven't heard from me in a
while, no electricity means no internet. Plus I just finished my second
kanzo in two months.)
And hyperinflation! Food is just out of the realm of reality now, pretty
soon we are all going to be eating boiled dirt. Gas prices have gone up
too, and everything else is following suit behind that.
This brings me, dear Corbetteers, to a stark evaluation of reality. The
average rural Haitian here in the Jacmel area didn't want Aristide to go,
they wanted him to finish his term, but they don't really care that he is
gone, either. What they care about is getting enough to eat! People are
hungry, hungry every day, hungry all the time. No one is going to be
bothered to vote in any damnfool election again, when the people's
landslide choice has now been exiled twice in a row! All anyone here
cares about now is eating.
People want to work! They don't want to steal, they want to work and
earn enough money to buy enough food to eat decently, and go to the
doctor if they need to. So whoever the rulers bring in here now to run
the show, that person had better know that they didn't come in by
election and they are not going to stay by any fake "election" either,
they are going to stay if people start to eat. If hunger gets worse, or
if there is no improvement, they will be out before long too.
Peace and love,
Kathy S. Grey