25816: docteed (publish NYTimes essay) (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Docteed@aol.com

July 24, 2005
Haiti Eyes
NT Times

By M. CATHERINE MATERNOWSKA
I have been working in Haiti -- on and off -- for 22 years, and it seemed
insane to me that, after all this time, I would die like this, in one of the
country's violent moments. I somehow thought I was immune.
It was April of this year, and five of us had packed into a small rental car
and traveled north out of Port-au-Prince -- heading to a meeting of our
nonprofit organization. Our attackers came out of nowhere, four men dark in the
sun
through our grimy windshield, half crouching and waving their hands and guns.
They forced our driver from the vehicle. I thought they wanted the car, so I
jumped out of the back seat. But they hit me in the head with the butt of a gun

and pushed me back in. Shouting and brandishing their weapons, two of them
jumped in the front, one on each side of the woman sitting there. The other two

shoved in back; one of them sat on my lap and one crammed in next to me, his
gun cocked at my head. The car accelerated wildly, leaving our driver in the
road. The new driver ground the gears, banged us through potholes, veering
dangerously. The men screamed at one another, gasping for breath and sweating.
My friend, squashed against the far door, looked catatonic. My other friend
began to pray. I told her: ''I can't die. I have two little boys!'' I kept
staring at the guns, old and worn with use.
The men shouted: ''Where is your money? What do you have?'' I could see the
face of the man beside me. He was angry but also scared. So I helped him get
our bags, our jewelry and our money. ''There must be more!'' yelled the angry
driver. ''Women are crafty!'' They grabbed my breasts and ordered me to pull up

my skirt and groped me in search of hidden money. The driver swerved down
another gravel road, fishtailing. They were shouting -- arguing about where and

how to execute us.
The strange thing was that I knew the men who were doing this. I don't mean
that I knew them personally, but I knew all about them. I'm a medical
anthropologist, and I went to Haiti to help solve the public health problems
resulting
from too many people in too little space. I believed that family planning
would help. I spent 10 years living and working with the masses in Cite Soleil
--
a harsh, urban landfill in Port-au-Prince.

In many ways, I had watched the gunmen grow up. They used to be hungry little
boys. I watched them live through a decade of atrocities: their fathers shot
in broad daylight; corpses littering their streets; their mothers beaten and
raped with the muzzles of guns. As men, sitting across from me, they would
clench their fists and tell me how otherwise decent human beings can do such
things. They talked about drugs and guns. Sometimes, if I questioned too
closely,
they would turn their heads or bury their faces in their hands, weeping.

These were the men who had helped make my understanding of health, Haiti and
the world a terribly complicated thing. From my first day in Haiti, more than
two decades ago, I knew that my experience there would change my life. And it
has. I tell everyone I have Haiti eyes. I fell for the country's intoxicating
culture, its intelligent and vibrant people -- people determined to find their
place in the world. But over the years, I've watched Haiti turn; I've watched
hope become despair. I've realized that family planning or even decent public
health won't heal the ills that years of political instability, corruption,
rebellion and poverty have caused. The simple job I had envisioned had also
turned -- it was no longer simple, and it was much more than a job.

In the car, the men kept on shouting, arguing, waving their guns. I had
visions of my boys, 7 and 5 years old. I looked at the gunman next to me, but I

couldn't speak. I shook my head and pleaded with my eyes as if to say: no, no,
no.

Then, for some reason, he touched my arm and bent close: ''You're going to be
all right.'' He screamed in Haitian Creole for the driver to stop. The
agitated driver ignored him, but the man yelled again: they'd got jewelry, lots
of
money, computers -- we were useless. And finally the driver slammed on the
brakes. My catatonic friend fell out of the car, and my praying friend jumped
over
her. As I was pushing to get out, the man grabbed my arm again, looked me in
the eyes and said, ''Kouri, kouri pi vit ke posib'' (''Run, run as fast as you
can'').

I have run, in a sense, all the way back home to Northern California.
Seemingly, I am safe. But I don't feel that way. My sleep is interrupted by
nightmares; the gunman orders me to work on public health projects in Haiti.
And
I keep
thinking about what he said: Run, run as fast as you can. I wonder now what I
should be running from: him, Haiti, my work? I'm not immune to Haiti's chaos
anymore. It has engulfed me. In time, I will return, but for now, my Haiti
eyes need rest.
_____________________________________________________
M. Catherine Maternowska is an assistant professor of obstetrics and
gynecology at the University of California at San Francisco. She is the author
of a
book on Haiti and family planning, to be published next year by Rutgers
University Press.

"   Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company

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