God’s mountain

The highest hill in Petionville fills the sky and greets us each morning - it's been here forever and has seen so much.  Solid earth – with some patches of scree and full, full of houses embedded in the earth, houses that might slide away at the slightest tremor if it were not for the massive, stolid determination I can see now.  The highest hill - protective and overwhelming - stretches one way undulating from the peak at roughly the same soaring altitude eastwards.  And west, it plummets down to earth in full view.  Gollum might have been here.  And the Mines of Moria beneath.   There’s a clean descent westwards interrupted only by a few solitary trees breaking an otherwise solid blue sky.  The colours tessellate like ceramic tiles, azure joins earth.

It’s more than a hill to the ten thousand families here.  And to anyone that can see it: it’s God’s mountain – because these souls that live here so simply – perched incorrigibly - have more than you can imagine.

Each home has grey breeze-block walls and fifteen feet of real estate.  In daylight and from a distance the windows are black pin holes and at night pierce one’s soul like a hundred Jerusalem stars.  It breathes at night.  And accommodates the camp fires providing supper and supports the sleep of tired workers on a few dollars a day.

In the daytime, the cool concrete is somehow camouflaged with subtle colours, faded, though still hewn out of the bed rock of Port-au-Prince.

On this trip I can see Haiti is happy again – though I’ve only known her a short while – when I first saw her she was sick.  Now she is standing and singing with full voice.

Haiti really is happy again – I can see it in the hilltop houses. In the streets of vibrant colour, determination and patience!

Don’t want for anything, Haiti! Then you won’t feel the world’s indifference.

tent, church

Petionville

The best away to start any day is Mass, and Mass with a devoted community is all the more striking.  The trade off with morning prayer and mass at five is bed at 8.40pm which isn't that good for my travel buddy.  It's pitch dark then, the sun hasn't risen and the compelling hillside that is in full view is decorated with bright lights of yellow and gold.  In the convent there are about twenty novices and about twenty experienced nuns.  They are the Sisters of the Poor of St Hyacinthe and being here now, if only for a short visit, is absolutely serene.  I’ve met the sisters before – this is my fourth visit to Haiti – but each time the relationships becomes stronger, I am compelled to help in some naive way and  worry about being in the way, as they include us in their private meals and welcome us with such love and affection.  Today I had a chance to paint – some of the hills of Petionville . . and my first painting from life – extraordinary, given how long I’ve been painting.  I hate to think that I've restricted myself to painting from photographs for so long, and not broadening my experience a little more.  One of the sisters sat with me and we agreed we’d each make a painting and then exchange them at the end for keeps.

The heat is constant and brilliant.  The sky is enamel blue.  I saw one tiny cloud today that remained at the base of the hill all afternoon.  There is a breeze, this stirs the trees and it’s like paradise.   The suffering each year as a direct consequence of the earthquake is receding.  Or so it seems.  We are, admittedly, cocooned in the grounds of the convent in Petionville with its security and high walls.  It’s a beautiful garden and the streets that surround us are mental.  Not so much traffic noise in fact.  And the cockerels compete with one another all day.  I heard them start at four. 

I still love the hustle and bustle – the chaos and disorder are an essential part of Haiti’s energy and drive.  The bubbling and the thriving energy on the streets is like Manhattan, there’s the same relentless surge and conviction.   But in Haiti there is also a genuine spirit and endearing character that is matched nowhere else. 

buses, taxis and dollars

What a way to begin.  An early start from a strange bed, a long flight, and remunerating for eleven hours in the air on all the challenges that lie ahead.  This takes its toll and when one finally rolls off at the other end in an uncomfortable time zone and unforgiving humidity, strange swarms of baggage handlers and surly officials there’s little energy left to face the questions and the insanity of such a trip.  And yet the weird uncertainty of it all mingles with holidays makers in the same queues and palm trees.  We had fifteen bags at the journey’s start and we went from taxi to hotel, then bus and taxi then to another bus with little time to rest between each relay.  It was one surreal jolt after another.  It seemed as though there was some conspiracy against such an endeavour, everything incurred extra charges, everyone wanted to know where we were going and why, in broken or almost indecipherable noises and actions.  If we paid the asking price then things we’re done with such speed and certainty – but always the price was extortion.  Dollars streaming away, each step exceeding the mental arithmetic and the financial limits we try to set based on some rational view of what things should cost. Though glad to be through each stage.  Then passing through two borders, the first, the Dominican Republic was uneventful.  The second, the Haitian border, and we were mobbed by young men who said they’d check our immigration cards and asked for $10 entry fee, which turned out to be a scam.  Even the’ legitimate’ officials seemed to know it was going on – and as few of the officials on our bus plainly said it was wrong, they still seem complicit it in all by not speaking out against it.  It’s a fragile world this one – and rocking the boat might get you into deeper water or worse. 

And then we arrived.

Friends met us and the ordeal was over.  We were welcomed into the convent and had a great night’s sleep.  Worries washed away.  It was safe and quiet – and the one thing we wanted was possible; sleep.

view from the road

Container leaves Guildford

all set

Well, we're all set to depart from Gatwick in the morning.  Leaving behind storms across Britain which are common place in Haiti during certain times of the year.  No one really notices when the storms blow across that land.
Thirteen cases, two tents and two guys venturing forth into the unknown but ready to take what comes.