21724: JHudicourt: multilingual encounters (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: JHUDICOURTB@aol.com

A friend of mine went to spend a week-end on the Ile a Vache at the wonderful
Port Morgan resort.  He happened to wake up fairly early and walk around.  A
US coast guard boat showed up in the harbor of the hotel.  As any
self-protecting business in Haiti the hotel has an armed security guard.  The US coast
guard pointed their weapon at he man and hollered:  "Drop your weapon!  Drop your
weapon!"  The security guard, totally baffled by the language just stood
there looking.  My friend the hotel guest told him in Creole that he'd better put
the gun on the ground cause people have died in Port-au-Prince for not doing
what American soldiers told them to do.  So he did.  The Coast guard then
approached the shore and started asking questions about the whereabouts of a couple
of "drug dealers".  Apparently the islands off Haiti are often visited by odd
run-aways and criminal types since there is really hardly any kind of
policing.  A group of locals then came to see what was going on.  When they
understood that the US Coast Guard was looking for strangers and had looked already on
various places on the island.  The population recommended that they go back to
the main commercial town of Madan Bena a look a little harder...  "Nou met
tounen Madan Bena, al fe yon ti gade anko."