Day 6: Island Time

Today we got hit with that age old Carribbean problem, island time. People here are on their own schedule, and when something happens, it happens, and what the clock says doesn't matter so much. That's hard for us Americans, especially because we're the types who go all the time. But patience is a virtue, right?

We got up at a decent hour, ready to go by 9 or so. Our hosts had some meetings and things to do, so we then were expecting to leave about 10:30. That turned in to noon, and we soon realized we weren't going to get anywhere today. We spent part of that time concepting the Haiti Water Project video, but otherwise not much happened.

L to R: Jonathan, LeeAllie, Jason, Frantz, Jen, Matt

About 3:30 we rounded up one of the local Haitians on the campus and shot the first two quick images in the series we'll use for the HWP video. That only took about half an hour, then we were back to nothing.

Jason, the other HWP guy here, was bored and restless as well, so we coerced a vehicle out of the campus and went exploring. He had been to an old French fort built around 1800 high up in the mountains, but wasn't quite sure how to get there. So we just started driving up. And up. And up. Some of the streets were nearly 40 degree inclines, and a lot of it towards the end wasn't paved - the 4-wheel drive Nissan was our savior on that one. We loved it - a great way to solve our cabin fever from the day.

We asked directions a couple times, but finally got to the fort around sunset. Jonathan snapped some great shots.

We found a much easier road back down (it was paved), but got a little turned around once back in Petionville. One interesting phenomenon we've all noticed is how alive the streets come at night here. There are very few street lights and many buildings don't have electricity, so you'd think as the sun went down, people would disappear to their homes. Yet, it seems the numbers only increase. Vendors come out, people selling anything from shoes to electronics to medicines to fruit to meat (cooked and uncooked). The sidewalks and even streets are just packed with Haitians.

We hit some awful traffic, and made it back to the campus about 8pm, well after sundown. Jennifer had warmed up some spaghetti for us so we chowed down. We were then planning to head for bed due to our 5am start time tomorrow when the work and witness coordinator and our driver, Frantz, told us he couldn't leave until 9:30. So we don't have to rush to bed, lucky for you.

Here's hoping tomorrow is more productive than today.

View from the library balcony on campus