| Haiti, Five Years Later |
| By Qiu Ru-lian Translated by Tang Yau-yang Photos by Hsiao Yiu-hwa |
In January 2010, a massive earthquake struck Haiti and killed hundreds of thousands of people. Though that was five years ago, the collapsed presidential palace has yet to be rebuilt. General Hospital, the best hospital in the national capital, Port-au-Prince, still seems to lack everything it needs. The public health system is in shambles. Even garbage collection is inadequate. People often have no choice but to burn their garbage on the streets, clouding the air and seemingly masking the nation’s quandaries. The Caribbean Sea below gleamed like a giant blue pearl as my airplane descended. However, the bright, relaxing sight soon yielded to rows upon rows of houses with rusting metal roofs. That brought me back to reality and reminded me that this was no vacation paradise, but a nation in need. Haiti occupies the western third of Hispaniola, the second largest island in the Caribbean and the 22nd largest in the world. The Dominican Republic to the east occupies the rest of the island. Haiti is one of the poorest countries in the world. No wonder people take whatever work they can get—sometimes too enthusiastically, like the man who almost snatches your luggage cart out of your hands at the airport so he can push it for you for a fee. After all, that is his job—a decent job at that.
Though this church—the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Assumption, located in Port-au-Prince—was downed by the January 2010 earthquake, devotees still come to sing and pray. Colonial days Hispaniola was originally inhabited by the native Taíno people. Christopher Columbus, the famous European explorer, set foot upon the island during his first voyage to the New World in 1492. His arrival marked the beginning of Spanish colonial rule of Hispaniola. Tragically, within just a couple of decades, the indigenous people were all but wiped out due to enslavement and diseases such as smallpox. Spain ceded the western third of Hispaniola to France in 1697. The new rulers brought in large numbers of African slaves to grow cotton, sugar cane, and coffee. Haiti became a significant producer of the latter two crops, supplying 40 percent of all the sugar and 60 percent of all the coffee consumed in Europe. Such large-scale, focused cultivation of cash crops for export came at the expense of local agriculture. To this day, Haiti relies on imports to meet its own domestic needs for food. Haiti’s slaves revolted in the late 18th century following the French Revolution in Europe. Bloody conflicts ensued in the colony. After a prolonged struggle, the Haitians declared independence on January 1, 1804. Jean-Jacques Dessalines, the first emperor of Haiti, ordered a massacre of the white Haitian minority, resulting in between 3,000 and 5,000 deaths in Haiti in 1804. The weapons and the color of blood on Haiti’s flag are vivid reminders of the country’s violent and treacherous path to independence. Unfortunately, the nation did not enjoy much peace and progress after its independence. Political instability has plagued Haiti for most of its history.
A street-side scene in Port-au-Prince. Haiti has an unemployment rate of over 40 percent. Due to lack of a formal education, many adults have no marketable skills. They mostly make their living by selling goods on the street or by ferrying passengers with motor scooters. Some simply idle around, waiting for opportunities to land in their laps. A weak health care system Haiti’s already weak economy was dealt a severe blow when a strong earthquake struck on January 12, 2010. The disaster robbed many people, already poor, of what little they had. Despite an outpouring of aid from the international community, reconstruction has not fared well. The collapsed presidential palace has not been rebuilt. Likewise, 85 percent of General Hospital, which is much closer to people’s lives than the presidential palace, is still covered in rubble. To accommodate large numbers of patients, makeshift wards were set up across the street from the hospital in a building that belongs to the Ministry of Health. The wards feature beds of various sizes, all flimsy and seemingly ready to collapse. There are no pillows or covers on the beds. Despite the poor facilities, patients throng outside the hospital, waiting to be seen. At the nursing station are five young women in blue and white plaid shirts, suspender skirts, and nurse’s caps. They seem to be putting patient charts in order, yet at the same time they seem to be at loose ends. Emilie, 18, told me that they are interns. They are not allowed to provide medical care to patients as nurses do. They help feed patients, assist nurses to change dressings for patients, or take care of other miscellaneous tasks. Most of the time, however, they wait around at the nursing station. Haitians can see doctors for next to nothing, but they must pay large sums for medications. Therefore, it is not uncommon for patients to stay in a hospital but not receive any drugs for their illnesses. Many just lie in their beds, waiting for miracles to descend on them. Their medications are not the only thing they can’t afford—sometimes they can’t even afford a meal. Free meals To help these patients out, Tzu Chi volunteers have been providing free meals at General Hospital since 2013. On Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, volunteers make a combination of rice, red beans, vegetables, and a unique local sauce, and bring it to the hospital. When they arrive, families of patients immediately line up to receive their meals. The food, though simple, is a very good meal for many of them. Jaff, 12, broke his leg in an automobile accident. He has eaten food served by Tzu Chi volunteers numerous times since he checked into the hospital three months ago. His mother has just about used up all her savings on his treatment. He has been in the hospital for so long because she cannot afford the complete surgical procedure to repair his leg. He has had to receive piecemeal operations whenever she can afford it. Two children, all skin and bones, share a bed in the pediatric ward. Their diapers hang loosely on them. They stare at the ceiling, their eyes blank. Their small bodies are conspicuously devoid of the boundless energy typical of children. Tzu Chi volunteer Emeline Desert picks up one-year-old Gloria, who seems to be in better shape than the other children. The little girl has been hospitalized for some time, so she recognizes the volunteers. Emeline puts some rice on a plate to feed her, but Gloria cannot wait. She grabs a handful of rice and stuffs it into her mouth…only to spit it right back out with a howl. It is too hot. “She is very hungry,” Emeline says. Gloria’s family is too poor to afford meals. The three meals provided by Tzu Chi each week are just about all she and her family get to sustain themselves. Just as everybody is trying to soothe Gloria, another commotion arises. Two men, grasping the four corners of a dirty bedsheet, call out for people to make way. The sheet sags under the weight of a boy who looks to be about 12 or 13 years old. His head hangs limply from the sheet—he has just passed away. The men take the boy to a truck and, as if throwing out garbage, swing the boy onto the bed of the truck. The boy’s family follow close behind, crying inconsolably.
Tzu Chi volunteers in Haiti provide three weekly meals at General Hospital. Orphans If you look on the bright side, at least this boy had a family. Many children in Haiti do not. They are orphans. According to the United Nations, Haiti had 380,000 orphans before the earthquake; now that number has reached more than a million. Many orphanages are occupied beyond capacity.
A malnourished child in a ward at General Hospital The Institut du Bien-être Social et de Recherches is an orphanage in Port-au-Prince. Despite its small size, it is home to 82 children ranging from ten months to 18 years in age. The orphanage operates on a shoestring budget, so older children sometimes work outside to help with its finances. Unskilled, the children can only work menial jobs like washing cars on the street. Some children are too young to work, so they help out by looking after even younger children. The lack of resources at the home manifests itself in more ways than one. To save money on water, they skimp on showers. Simple steamed rice counts as a meal. On this day, Tzu Chi volunteers took 70 10-kilogram (22-pound) bags of rice to the home, hoping that it would help relieve their financial strain a little. While these orphans struggle to live another day, some children their age reside in lavish homes on a hillside not far away. They swim in their own pools, without a care in the world. The wealth in Haiti has always been in the hands of a few who live in luxury. Their lives have not been impacted by the earthquake in the least. Our vehicle drove through a slum and ascended a winding road. Our driver, Paul, knew exactly where to go. Just as we approached what appeared to be a dead end, he turned into another alley, and we continued. Eventually, we arrived at a hotel in Pétionville, one of the most affluent areas in the nation and a tourist attraction. We saw mothers and children frolicking in a swimming pool and people eating delicious food by the pool. We looked at a hill opposite the hotel, and our eyes met a shantytown composed of cinder block buildings painted in bright colors. It is said that the idea of painting the facades of the buildings in a rainbow of colors came from a deceased Haitian artist. The irony is that however colorfully painted these homes are, the well-being of the residents is just as remote and elusive as a rainbow far up in the sky.
A woman with a load balanced on her head walks by a building with colorfully painted advertisements. Life goes on even though the nation’s reconstruction is progressing at a glacial pace. Many people do whatever they can to make a living. On this day, though it was only 7 o’clock in the morning, vendors of all sorts had their wares out at a market in La Saline. Some people, demonstrating a great sense of balance, carried goods in wicker baskets balanced on their heads as they wove through the streets. Not far away, smoke was rising from burning piles of rubbish. “Garbage collection has been suspended due to the coming election,” said a vendor with an air of resignation, “so we have to dispose of garbage ourselves.” It is more like a matter of routine for them now. Amidst the smoke, people moved about here and there. Smoke or not, they had work to do and livelihoods to be earned.
Bath time for orphans at the Institut du Bien-être Social et de Recherches. Though living conditions at an orphanage may not be ideal, at least the children there get fed. |
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