DAY 1

ADAMS ACCOUNT OF THE TRIP

We went onto two airplanes. It was fun. On the first plane to Florida we slept. At the airports we rode on trains. We ate breakfast on the second plane. It was nicer than the first plane. Good bye!

HAITI INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT

We landed in Haiti and I roused my sleeping babies who, by now, were definitely finished with traveling. We left the airplane and walked down a long corridor to an outside door where a small bus was waiting to take us to immigration. Abe commented on how different this international airport was compared to Vegas or Miami. My gaze wandered to the piles of rubble and old buildings that lined the lane we drove on. The perimeter of the airport was lined with short fences topped with razor wire. Various uniformed guards with shot guns rambled idly about. Very different.

 The bus stopped at a large tin roofed building with white metal walls and large fans inside that helped keep it from turning into an effective crock pot.  A band played Haitian music boisterously loud as we were herded inside towards a long line. Six green papers were thrust into my hands by a grouchy woman with hair styled to resemble a rooster. I asked her for a pen but she turned on a huff and stormed off while loudly complaining in Creole about Plumes. I turned to Abe with a “what now” look and exhaled slowly while looking around Furtively. A few moments later Rooster Lady  tapped my shoulder and pushed a pen my way. She almost smiled at my “meci”. Perhaps I pronounced it comically.

 Green cards were soon filled out and my hand quivered with my arm muscles which gripped Isaiah on one hip and my bag on the other. Another line. Passports stamped. Another line. Baggage tickets issued, then we moved to the part of the building that reminded me of movie clips I had seen depicting trading stocks and bonds on the floor in New York City. Loud shouting mingled with bodies pressing and hustling to get all of their luggage. An appointed guard had to check and mark each bag’s tag before one could take it away. It still did not prevent one of our bags from being either stolen or misplaced. We spent an extra hour waiting while Abe filled out paperwork reporting the lost bag. I was suddently gripped with gratitude that it was merely a bag and not one of my children. Abe payed the man who helped up gather the bags and ignored his argument that Abe was “big time boss” and needed to pay him “more big time money”.  $20 was more than enough in my mind for 30 minutes of work. Two men helped Abe push our carts piled high with our bags down the street to where our driver was waiting for us in a pickup truck. My whole body quivered with exhaustion from carrying Isaiah and tugging the other three along.  Abe winked at me as many people smiled, pointed at me and said, “Mommy”. One man took $2 from Abe and ran across the street returning with cool bottles of water. My four little puddles of sweat were so grateful and soon resembled children again. We piled into the truckand  I sighed in relief that the journey was over.  Finally.

Our driver, Cliff spoke absolutely no English and was very professional in his addresses to me and Abe. He nodded. Never spoke, just smiled and nodded. Once on the road the kids and I stared at the throngs of people walked on the trash filled streets. Adam and Carol marveled at many of them who carried large baskets and boxes on their heads. Isaiah slept on my lap, Thaddaeus whined that he was hot and I held on for dear life as Cliff darted in and out of traffic, barrelling down the streets without even so much as a pause at melding intersections. I still do not know how we did not collide into at least fifty vehicles at any given time.

 Traffic system in Port Au Prince- Take a road that in the US would be designated as a two lane highway. Add bumper to bumper traffic consisting of large busses, small pick up trucks and mid sized SUVs  that at any moment can fluctuate from four lanes of two way travel to six. Pepper generously with pedestrians. No painted lanes. No traffic lights. No road signs. No turn signals. There. That’s it. I have a gratitude sprung from terror for our diver Cliff. I have no idea how we made it any where alive. A part of me felt that should I be forced behind the wheels we would merely stay put with all the other vehicles pushing and screeching madly by. Another part itched with the  desire to try it. Everyone drove amazingly well under the conditions. And where I was sure to see nasty fender benders, crunched bikes and flattened pedestrians everyone rather gracefully drifted around eachother. Honking is rampant but not in the way I expected. I would turn towards the horn pusher and expect angry words and middle fingers flying but instead it seemed the horns were used solely for the polite purpose of saying “Im here! Please don’t hit me!”