22310: Kathleen: RE: English class in Haiti (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: kathleen burke <kathleenburke704@hotmail.com>

Every time I go by the military encampment at the bend of Papay/Hinche road,
or see a young man on the street in U.S. Army camouflage, or another group
of young men sitting on a truck with nothing behind their eyes, I worry.
Where will this end up?  As far as Phillippe is concerned, he is now back at
his base in Gonaives they say. I worry even more about the report I heard
from So. Africa on Paris radio station - Aristide himself, not a
"porte-parole," saying that he was preparing to return to Haiti, talking to
U.S. and France, to resume his place as the duly elected president of Haiti,
vs. the "de facto" government now in place.
I keep thinking of the English student Saturday who said he was a politician
"congressman" in Lavalas, and his day job is as a social worker for partners
in health, visiting patients in Thomonde.  When he said he would die for his
politics i thought how sad it was that was necessary or at least customary
in haiti. Elsewhere, Chavannes Jean-Baptiste wrote that the brutal section
chiefs would resume power "over our (MPP's) dead bodies. I hope the day
comes when no one dies or kills for his or her political affiliation in
Haiti.

kathleen