Update from Haiti

Max Wright is in Port-au-Prince right now, he shares his thoughts

Haiti trip thoughts


Feb 18th
3:30-pm Flight to Fort Lauderdale uneventful, ate dinner, trying to hit the sack early, received a call from my wife, Spirit Airlines called and canceled the morning flight to Haiti … stated that it was due to the earth quake, offer another flight on the 24th, after much conversation, and not making progress went to bed trusting God for the morning travel.

Feb 19th
Checked all the options that were reasonable and about 10:30am found 2 seats on American Airlines book them and headed to turn in rental car to catch the 2:30pm flight.
Upon arrival at the terminal it became apparent that Spirit Airline pilots were on strike, they had apparently lied when they said that the cancellation was due to the earthquake disaster.
As we were getting ready to board the plane, they ask for a moment of silence, stating this was the first commercial flight into Haiti since the quake, the silence was maybe 5 minutes … quite long to be done for show, and I sensed it was a real reverence for what has happened. Arrived PAP at 5:00pm to find for the first time a standard passenger ramp leading directly into a walkway that paralleled the old terminal. Then exited back outside to get on buses to go to a newly constructed building for immigrations and customs. Met my friend had a late dinner, back in Haiti at last.

Feb 20th
As I travel around the city of Port au Prince today … the earthquake devastation is quite unbelievable … but it’s real…. For those whose homes are no more ….it’s a nightmare. For business it is equally devastating, in that many of business can not reopen due to structural damage, so their employee’s are now without work.

Before the quake many saw this city as a disaster area, with over crowing, high crime, crumbling resources, but now it really is.

Entire areas of the city have home after home … nothing but rubble. Any area that has been cleared away or somewhat vacant has is now occupied by a makeshift tents.

Life for some is unbelievably harsh, and everyone is affected.

The resilience of the Haitian people is amazing. 4 weeks after the earthquake, vendors are on the street, food vendors, little lean-to shops selling shoes, jeans, dresses, charcoal, a charge for you cell phone. The inventiveness of the people to make do with what has been drug out of the rubble.

SO today it’s 84 degrees and not a cloud in the sky. What kind of further disaster will come as the rainy season comes, hillsides that have rubble, may wash a way taking, with it tents and people. Creating a muddy mess that not only is hard to deal with, but most probably will cause the spread of disease, as human waste starts running the streets, hill and gullies. Although I did see a few port potties, maybe 6 or 8 places over the city, with a population of hundreds of thousands?

The Haitian people will survive; they are strong willed people that have paid a high price for the incompetence and greed of the leadership of the country. They will survive.

With God’s help they can thrive.

I do question whether the world has the intestinal fortitude to see the thru the rebuilding of Haiti to something much better than it has been in resent years. The American public has no stomach for the hard thing in life, war, poverty, disaster, even when it directly affects us.

As I visited a hotel and shop complex that was completely demolished, there is a spirit of sadness, so many have lost their life. Places I have been before that are no more. The large Caribbean market that has so many of the goodie of life, and charged what I perceived exurbanite price is no more, all the finery and high prices don’t exist now.

Schools with 600 students flatten, rubble, most of students dead.

With all the disaster, life is moving forward, I saw a young man teenager, among one of tent cities, with his MP3 player around his neck, earphones enjoying the music.