The Betty Black Blog

J$670, US$7.70, E5.35, Y699. That is the weekly income of the average Haitian. We bandy about the phrase “Poorest Country in the Western Hemisphere” as we would “the Tallest Building” or “the Longest River” without really stopping to think what it means. We tend to transfer ideas to things we know and most of are subconsciously placing mental images of Haiti in a Jamaican context so let’s work with that.

A typical view of Port-au-Prince -ROB

Take a trip on the Mandela Highway and have a look at those shacks along the side. Think of downtown Kingston then surround that on all sides with the shacks as far as the eye can seen. Think of Coronation Market sitting in the middle of the Riverton Dump. Think of sewerage flowing in the gutters. Go downtown and drive the length of Princess Street and back again. Try to turn your car around. Think of going to work everyday in a car with iron pipes welded to the bumpers for protection in traffic. Think of locking up your business and fleeing before dark in fear of your life, for at night gangs of youths, armed with the leftover grenade launchers and flamethrowers of Duvalier’s Tonton Macoutes, roam the streets. Think of returning home to your comfortable suburban home and starting the generator and the water tank…every day. That is the life of “the One Thousand,” the privileged families of Haiti who have a car, a generator, a water tank and the hope of living past 60. The rest of the population go home to one of those shacks without the hope of even hanging curtains at the window or buying a bed from Courts much less eating a decent meal. They sleep five to a room, with luck they have a blanket to sleep on. With luck someone five or ten houses away has a phone.

The people are colourful but the city is grey -ROB

With luck they don’t have to walk too far to the stand pipe where their luck will run out as the water coming from that standpipe will ensure that 90% of them get sick. When they do get sick they have a 40% chance of basic health care. Think of the Kingston Public Hospital. Now suppose that was Andrew’s Memorial or Medical Associates; in other words, that that was the best care available. But think of KPH with half the personnel and equipment that is has. Before they die, at roughly 60 years old, they would likely have had malaria, typhoid, meningitis or tuberculosis, or all of the above. They might die from those or possibly cholera or AIDS. They will have twice as many babies as the average Jamaican but those babies will be five times more likely to die.

What looks like a garbage dump is the Market -ROB

My husband visited Haiti several times when he was Group Security Director for a large Caribbean group. When he came home after his first trip he said to me “Think of Jamaica in comparison to Switzerland; Haiti makes Jamaica look like Switzerland.” There are millions of people poorer than the most destitute Jamaican. And for every Jamaican, no matter how poor, there is always hope that one day, they or their child will live in Norbrook and drive a Lexus. There is no hope in Haiti. Years, decades, centuries of being oppressed by their rulers have taken every shred of hope from them. The only hope left is that one night they can sneak across the border to the Dominican Republic or take off in a waterlogged boat and survive long enough to reach Jamaica or Cuba or, even better, Florida. Subsequent governments have bled the country and its people dry then gloated, for right in the middle of the thousands of shanties they have built a beautiful park and an exact replica of the U. S.’s White House, complete to cupola and fence!

An aerial photo of the Haiti/ Dom Rep border

The geography of Haiti is awful for over the last seventy years the hillsides have been denuded by charcoal burners. When flying over, the border between Dom. Rep. and Haiti is as obvious as on a map: green on one side and brown on the other.  The city has a miasma of dust over it at all times. The one room shacks which house 95% of the population are made from poor quality concrete block held together with weak mortar, sometimes made with gutter water or even sea water. There is no steel. More substantial buildings will use some steel, but nothing close to what is required under Jamaican building codes. In the poorest Jamaican shanty-town, the residents will often plant fruit trees or some greenery, even a row of “flowers” in discarded paint tins or cheese pans.

The permanent cloud of dust and disease which covers Port-au-Prince -ROB

There is none of that there. It is all dry and grey. It is also hot for, as we know, it is vegetation which helps to keep us cool and clean the air. When the temperature falls to 65°F in Kingston or 50° in Miami, it is still 90° in Port-au-Prince.

Satelitte photo of Port-au-Prince before January 12th

This was reality in Haiti and it’s capital, Port-au-Prince, BEFORE 12th January, 2010.

To Help Haiti, please read our Post from January 15th