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26714: LOCCM (reply) : Re: 26700: Lebleu: (ask) Digital Map Request of Port-au-Prince (fwd)
From: LOCCM@aol.com
I am returning to Haiti for my 155th trip since 1971. I have a home there
as well as two orphanages, 37 churches several schools and clinics. I am very
familiar with the current situation in Haiti and have never seen it this bad
before. The architecture is generally described as extreme squalor with
shacks built of cement blocks or sticks and mud actually built on top of one
another. Some have roofs so low that you cannot stand upright in many parts
of
the homes. Roofs of rusting tin leak rain on the interiors and sometimes
dwellers have to stand upright during rainstorms to escape the drips. I try
to
tell then that even chewing gum will fix many of these leaks but they do not
have the ambition or understanding to try even this simple repair. They wait
instead for me or someone else to fix it for them or they continue to buy
lottery tickets. The beautiful gingerbread houses like the hotel Ollafson
that
graced the city for a century or more are deteriorating and not being
maintained for lack of interest. Since Aristide returned to office, life
for
everyone except the politicians has gone from desperate to extremely
desperate.
Even the rich are afraid to leave their homes for fear of kidnapping and
robbery. Some poor have been kidnapped for as little as $20. The poor cling
to
life without hope in quiet crisis day by day. Many eat once every two or
three days with no hope of jobs. Hundreds of families who spent their days
squatting behind a small pile of wares in the filth of downtown P a P hoping
to
sell enough to survive for another day, have been robbed so many times that
they have been forced to "set up shop" in smaller surrounding villages like
Croix du Bouquet and have blocked the streets with their merchandise that you
can scarcely squeeze one lane at a time without running over them. The only
other comment that I can give you about the architecture is that I expect many
building in PaP to be burned down during or after the coming election. I
doubt that my comments have helped you but you may contact me today if you
like.
John Ba Mwen