23994: Hermantin( News)Holiday of little cheer (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: leonie hermantin <lhermantin@hotmail.com>


Holiday of little cheer



By Ruth Morris
Staff Writer

December 26, 2004

Dinah Liautaud of Delray Beach remembers the parades and pageantry, people
waving branches and children wearing the colors of the Haitian flag.

Gladys Aly, a Fort Lauderdale resident, remembers new barrettes and bows,
new socks and new shoes. The girls got baby dolls, the boys got marbles and
water guns.

Marie Altima, also of Fort Lauderdale, remembers the food: spicy pumpkin
soup, hot chocolate made from cacao, warm bread.

Ask South Florida Haitians about how they celebrated Independence Day in
their homeland, and the aromas and colors will flood the room. But ask about
this particular Independence Day, and the shimmering memories will fade into
something more subdued. As the Haitian community prepares for the holiday,
one that used to take precedence over Christmas for many, the chaotic and
cruel reality of today's Haiti is seeping in and dampening spirits.

Many area Haitians said they would still celebrate the Jan. 1 holiday in the
traditional way, slurping pumpkin soup and visiting church, buying new
clothing for their children, and giving gifts. But most said it also would
be a time for reflection, and for seeking solutions to a cycle of poverty
and political upheaval that culminated this year in open revolt and the
quick exit of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide.

The violence sputters along still, this Independence Day, in messy street
battles between Aristide supporters and detractors, gangs, former soldiers,
police and U.N. peacekeepers. The troubled nation also was battered by two
huge storms this year, which swept thousands to their death and left
countless more numb with sorrow.

"It's sort of like celebrating by ringing wooden bells," said Dr. Joseph
Fanfan, at his family clinic in Fort Lauderdale, of the upcoming
Independence Day celebrations. "There is nothing better than freedom.
There's still something to celebrate. But you have mixed feelings. We seem
to have gone backwards."

Independence Day festivities also will be muted by suggestions that Haiti's
best chance for reconstruction is to submit once again to outside forces and
become a United Nations protectorate. The proposal is mostly academic. The
United States, which backs Haiti's current interim government, has not said
it supports the idea. But the thought is on many Haitians' minds, and speaks
to a shrugging sense of despair over Haiti's future.

"I don't think we have the right formula down there yet," said Liautaud, the
owner of the Tropical Flavors juice bar in Delray Beach.

Liautaud's family fled Haiti decades ago during the brutal dictatorship of
François "Papa Doc'' Duvalier. She faulted Haitians for becoming impatient
with the democratic process, mounting revolts rather than waiting for
elections, and she said her family would spend Independence Day in
discussion, not celebration.

In West Palm Beach, Creole translator and interpreter Eric Toussaint was
more upbeat. Just as his forefathers overcame linguistic and cultural rifts
to fight slave masters, he said, Haitians can unite again. An outdated
Haitian calendar depicting his country's independence heroes hung from the
kitchen wall, along with a tin key chain holder and other brightly painted
Haitian artifacts.

Toussaint and his wife, Rose, plan to make a huge pot of pumpkin soup for
their family on Jan. 1, and to keep all their Haitian traditions alive.
While they speak perfect English, they dutifully stick to Creole with Jakob,
their son, 2.

"We can have another 1804, but we have to be united," Toussaint said. "My
soul is in Haiti," he said. "I've never had a dream where I'm anywhere but
Haiti."

Once a French slave colony, Haiti declared independence on Jan. 1, 1804,
after a fierce rebellion led by Haitian martyr Jean-Jacques Dessalines. It
was a day charged with historic significance: Haiti welcomed the New Year by
becoming the first liberated black nation in the Western Hemisphere after
defeating Napoleon Bonaparte's forces.

Legend has it that Haiti's forefathers celebrated by eating pumpkin soup, a
rich potage enjoyed by former slave owners, but always out of reach to the
slaves. Today, it's the centerpiece of the day's celebration, prepared from
pureed pumpkin and cubes of meat, stewed with cabbage and carrots and
potatoes, and seasoned with green chili peppers and parsley.

Marie Altima sat in a barber's chair at a cluttered salon in Fort Lauderdale
and conjured the culinary delights of Independence Day, lifting them from
her childhood, some 30 years ago. Besides pumpkin soup, there were rice and
beans, hot chocolate made from scratch, coconut cream liqueur, codfish
turnovers and small buns hot out of the oven.

"It doesn't matter how Haiti is," she said, "we love it. It's our place, and
it's free."

Altima said the celebration of Independence Day in the United States is
different. With relatives spread over larger and larger distances, phone
calls replace family visits. And in the United States, some people have to
work on the holiday, she noted. But she tries to keep the spirit of the day
alive.

"I talk to my kids," she said. "I tell them stories about what we do at
home."

Hairdresser Gladys Aly said her strongest memories were of "everything new."
Haitian girls and boys are scrubbed squeaky clean and decked out in new
underpants and new dresses, new shorts and new shoes, then carted off to
their godparents', where they receive a handful of coins.

"You had to take your report cards and show you'd been good," Aly said. "If
you were good you got money!"

This year's festivities also will be a step down from last year's, which
marked Haiti's bicentennial and included dances and street fairs in South
Florida, and seminars on Haitian culture.

This Jan. 1, Miami's Haitian community will sponsor a groundbreaking
ceremony at the renovated Freedom Garden. Community leaders plan to unveil a
7-foot statue of Toussaint L'Ouverture, a self-educated slave and general
who drove Napoleon's forces out of Haiti.

Jan Mapou, cultural director of the Haitian Sosyete Kou Kouy, a cultural
group in the Little Haiti section of Miami, said this Independence Day would
be a good opportunity to reflect on solutions to Haiti's lawlessness and
poverty. He stressed his countrymen's desperate need for jobs, especially to
keep potential gang members off the streets, and for better roads so that
dirt-poor farmers can at least get their harvests to market.

"Were we prepared for independence? It's a question," he said of the slaves
who founded Haiti. "Our ancestors came from different tribes and these
tribes were always fighting. We have a country, but no one has a vision for
tomorrow. We failed. We don't know what we're going to leave for our
children."

Haiti, once seen as rich for its cacao, gold and spices, must now look to
tourism, Mapou said, sitting in a plastic chair in his small bookstore,
which was stuffed with Creole language guides, paintings of women collecting
coconuts, and skirts for sale that have parrots along the hem.

Despite his dispirited appraisal, though, his mood lightened when asked
about Haiti's beaches and potential tourist spots. "Everybody who goes to
Haiti falls in love with that poor lady," he said.



Ruth Morris can be reached at rmorris@sun-sentinel.com or 954-356-4691.


Copyright © 2004, South Florida Sun-Sentinel