21117: (Hermantin)Miami-Herald-Haiti's shoeshine brigade has dirty job in dirty time (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: leonie hermantin <lhermantin@hotmail.com>

Posted on Mon, Apr. 05, 2004



'IT'S A JOB': Dieufete Sanon, 29, has been shining shoes in Port-au-Prince
for 12 years. MICHAEL A.W. OTTEY/HERALD STAFF

Haiti's shoeshine brigade has dirty job in dirty time

Hard times in a small Haitian village forces its sons to leave home to shine
shoes in the gritty capital.

BY MICHAEL A.W. OTTEY

mottey@herald.com


PORT-AU-PRINCE -- They walk the streets of Haiti's capital city or sit on
street corners waiting for dusty or muddy shoes.

They are the city's shoeshine brigade, hundreds of men and boys who have
left farming communities to earn money where they believe there's lots of
it.

The collapse of Haiti's agricultural base, farmlands left fallow by
environmental damage, abject poverty and the will to survive have driven
them here.

Some are as young as 9, trying to make a living to feed themselves and
families left back in rural areas.

Many of them come from Séguin, a small village nestled in the mountains, 35
miles south of Port-au-Prince. There, they once worked hands into fertile
soil. Now those hands are permanently stained with shoe polish.

''It's a job,'' said Dieufete Sanon, 29, who has been shining shoes for 12
years. ``You have to work hard at it.''

In Port-au-Prince, a city where festering refuse is strewn and piled high
everywhere -- garbage pickup is virtually nonexistent -- and where water
perpetually pools in badly broken or unpaved roads, the shoeshine boys and
men need not look far for customers with soiled footwear.

They work in a city that is tough on souls and soles, and that presents one
of Haiti's many ironies. Consider that once a customer steps away with shoes
that now sparkle, barely a half-block later those spit-shined shoes are
likely to be dirty again, no matter how hard the wearer watches his or her
step.

WORK AROUND IT

But that's Haiti, a shockingly poor nation that works around, rather than
on, its problems. Bad roads? Don't demand that they be fixed. Drive a 4x4.
No 24-hour electricity? Add a gasoline-powered generator to your home. Dirty
streets? Just keep shining your shoes.

For those with the means, keeping those shoes clean is not exactly an
expensive proposition. For five gourdes -- barely more than 10 cents --
those shoes can spring to life.

But for the shoeshine brigade, some days are still tough.

''There are times there is no activity,'' Sanon said. ``When there are
strikes and demonstrations there is no business. This year has been very
bad.''

The strikes and protests have finally subsided, but the hellish week that
followed the departure of former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide robbed
Haiti's poorest of income. The shoeshine brigade -- the poorest of the poor
-- stayed off the streets like everyone else.

After his father died, Sanon left Séguin at age 17 and started shining shoes
in Port-au-Prince. Now the father of six children by three women, he has
returned to farming part time to supplement his income.

''Sometimes I don't make enough to feed all six kids,'' he said. ``So I have
to try to farm to make extra cash.''

He grows peas and corn and other vegetables on a patch of land he owns in
Séguin. He counts the two goats he owns as blessings. And on a good day he
shines 17 to 20 pairs of shoes.

Because his father needed him in the fields, his schooling ended in the
first grade. However, he does know how to read and write, a rarity in Haiti
for someone with minimal schooling.

NO EDUCATION

That's not the case with Ti Néné Petion, 12, who began shining shoes at age
9.

Also from Séguin, Ti Néné has never attended school and does not know how to
read or write. Asked if he can count money, he smiled, nodded and offered a
resounding ``Yes.''

Ti Néné said he would like to go to school, but wonders how would he eat.
Like the others, his day on the streets begins at 6:30 a.m. and runs until
5:30 p.m. He goes home to a one-room flat he shares with five other
shoeshiners, including his brother, Colbert Petion, 21.

''I don't like it,'' said Ti Néné of shining shoes. ``But if I can't find
anything else, that's what I have to do.''

''Shining shoes does not really bring in a lot of money,'' said Frederic
Bardotte, 52, as he shined shoes in the southern city of Jacmel. Bardotte is
also from Séguin. If he shines 20 pairs of shoes in a day, that's 100
gourdes, slightly more than $2.

Bardotte has been shining shoes for five years. He also washes cars. If he
had a place to sleep in Port-au-Prince he would also work there, he said.
Jacmel is closer to home.

But while the boys and men from Séguin provide a needed service, they aren't
exactly welcomed in some places.

''They're making the streets dirty,'' said Jean Maxon Guerrier, 54, mayor of
Delmas, a Port-au-Prince suburb. ``It's a big problem. You find them all
over the sidewalk. I tell them a long time ago there wasn't anybody doing
that [shining shoes] in this country.''

Guerrier, who is a doctor, said he would like to find a place off the
streets where the men and boys can shine shoes. He said ideally it would be
a place where they could also learn to read and write.

FEEL HARASSED

Sanon and the others said the mayor's office harasses them and confiscates
their boxes with the brushes, polish and other supplies necessary to work.

They said they're forced to pay a fine of 50 gourdes to get their boxes
back.

''Sometimes we are arrested,'' Sanon said. ``They don't like us sitting
here.''

Guerrier said that while he does have the young men chased away he does not
fine them. ''They don't have the money to pay,'' he said. ``There are things
that I permit and things that I don't permit. But you never will please
everybody.''

Sanon said if he had his way he wouldn't be on the streets shining shoes and
running away from code enforcers from the mayor's office.

When times are good and the money is rolling in, he and the others
participate in a cooperative they've formed. Each person contributes 250
gourdes to a pool that is then given to a different person in the group
every Monday.

But since things have been slow, they have not done that in months, he said.

''I'd rather be doing something else,'' Sanon said as a customer appeared.
``Like owning a small business. But right now I have no choice.''

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