Mirlande's Haiti

Mirlande is the mayor of Acra camp, an internal displacement persons (refugee) camp on the grounds of a factory smack dab in the middle of Port au Prince. She’s not really the mayor, but as she took us on the guided tour yesterday, she shook hands with people at every point along the rows and rows of tents like a true leader. Visiting IDP camps is an important part of the work, because it gives one the truest sense of how people are living and what is needed. However, it also makes one feel voyeuristic and sad. With Mirlande leading the way, a lot of these feelings were mitigated by her genuine engagement with those in the camp and her enthusiasm for our presence. Mirlande, a self-described talker, gave us the low down:

“Here’s where ARC built a water tank; the faucet broke the day the donor came to inspect it. This child here attended ARC’s child-friendly spaces program and her mother is my good friend. People used to live on that garbage pile, but were moved because they were getting diseases. My husband and I live in the “Libya” section of the camp; people are fighting all of the time. Hahaha!”

I find it difficult to explain my new job to friends and family. My title is “Protection Technical Advisor.” Within the humanitarian community, this is a familiar title, but the tasks, even among the experts, seem nebulous. I’ve told my mom that when people have to go into refugee (or internal displacement) camps, my job is to provide guidance to our water and shelter and health programs to ensure that we respect the human rights of the people we serve.

Protection is about dignity. Today when I walked through this meandering urban camp of about 35,000 it was the utter lack of dignity that punched me in the gut. There was the stench of sewage, piles of garbage being picked through by pigs and dogs, little babies sitting in filth and people bathing in alleyways. To me, this all added up to a terrible loss of dignity. How can we possibly allow people to live like this? Why haven’t our interventions worked? What can be done to solve this?

The answer is simple: get these people the hell out of the camps. To work toward this simple answer is not so simple. Bound by humanitarian law (and common sense) we cannot force people to leave. Also, while some of the lingering in camps might be because of the “dependency syndrome,” most of the people stay because they have nowhere else to go. Housing is scarce as people still dig out from the earthquake.

At the end of our tour, I tried to slip Mirlande a $20 bill. She had been an employee of ARC, but because of lack of funding she was let go. She gave us the tour of her own good will and I wanted to thank her. She very quickly refused and I pushed back. She was adamant and explained that “the camp has eyes everywhere.” I immediately felt embarrassed and amateurish for compromising her position in the camp and apologized profusely. Mirlande instantly summoned her mayoral poise and offered a quick solution: the volunteer organization she created when ARC funding ended was having a fund raiser next week and I could make a contribution. What a woman, what a place.

Hello Haiti

Haiti.

Haiti Haiti Haiti. Haiti. Oh, sweet Jesus, Haiti.

My first impression of this country is amazement of how quickly one can travel to the worse emergency in the world. This hits me directly after the wall of heat and humidity does, the likes of which my hair has never known.

Climbing the hills of rubble-strewn and traffic dense Port au Prince I quickly channel my inner-Uganda road traveling skills. I block out my peripheral vision saving me from fearing 75% of the near-miss collisions. For the remaining 25% collisions, most of which would be head on, I channel my inner zen (yes, I have some) and ignore them and stare and stare and stare at this crazy place.

The average car ride in Port au Prince is 1 hour through snarled, congested, hilly roads, so switching to developing world passenger mode suits me just fine. As I press my nose to the glass and try to imbibe as much of Haiti as I possibly can, I return to my first impression. This place has all of the hallmarks of the third world: goats and bush dogs, constant animation of tiny shops selling soap and chinese candy, and utter utter poverty.

The displacement camps from the earthquake a year and a half ago are everywhere. Every crevice of every open or semi-open space is jammed with plastic sheets and tents that must be absolutely ungodly in these soaring temps. I haven't yet been able to visit a camp, because the ones I've seen in town are too dangerous for us to stop in, even to snap a photo.

I haven't been able to talk to too many Haitians yet either, because I've been running from meeting to meeting and also because moments of idle chit chat are denied to me by my inability to speak French or Creole. Relegated to muted observations, Haitians seem a bombastic people.From the cheers as the plane landed to the movement around me to the recent election of a pop star as President, the Haitians seem bold.

Yesterday afternoon, we took the earthquake tour. The area I'm staying in does not seem so badly hit, but as we traveled closer and closer to the city center, the impact of the earthquake was much more visible. We passed the palace, which was striking not only for it's destruction (the main once proud dome of elegance appearing awkwardly decapitated) but also because it appears they were setting up for the inauguration of the President on these grounds on Saturday. How strange it will look to the world, this juxtaposition of new promise and old terrible problems.

Chop it like it's hot

This week I made my lunch for work, which was great, because I probably saved about $50 or the allowance I need for the dog walker. I had a Honey Maple Turkey and Picante Provolone sandwich, an apple, pretzels and a few Pepperidge farm cookies. Today, however, I ran out of fixins and bought my lunch at “Chop it.” I’m a big fan of the make-your-own salad craze. Since it began, I get more or less the same thing: a spinach salad with feta, cranberries, artichokes, carrots and an egg. While away from the US I finally learned to like cucumbers, so now they get tossed in too. I usually get the light Balsamic Vinaigrette.

I had never been to “Chop it” before and stood in the queue quickly trying to calculate how much my usual items would cost and if I should swap some of them out for less costly items. For example, artichoke hearts can cost $1.50 and these make- your-own salads can add up. Indeed, I did opt for the last minute switch and chose soy beans (or edamame as they are known in Japan and in urban lunch establishments.)

I got to the top of the considerable queue with incredible speed. And then I saw why. The servers behind the counter were moving at light speed. I’m serious. They tossed in my ingredients before I was even sure I wanted them. The little additional flare of “Chop It” that distinguishes it from the other places is that they then indeed chop up the salad with furious fervor and punctilious panache. It was like watching Edward Scissorhands. And just like Edward, everyone was friendly and polite.

It is particularly unnerving when an impatient, hurried person such as myself gets outpaced. Like a slug I tried to regain my composure as my tossed salad was tossed to me. Upon receiving ever-so tender instructions to move to the register, I lurched forward. My feet felt like concrete compared to the tizzy of roughage around me. I handed over my ticket with trembling hands. I feared I would not get to my wallet with enough speed and I would be THE ONE who halted the precision of the salad assembly line. Henry Ford is certainly beaming down from heaven on “Chop it.”

The salad was pretty good. I missed those artichokes, but whenever I eat edamame I feel like I’m adding years onto my life. So, I think it was worth $8.69. Once a week anyway.

Revolution Backtrack

Hmm. I have been planning to write about my abhorrence to violence and my selfish wish that in places like Syria and Uganda, where I have loved ones, revolution might be muted. My thinking was that I believe change is necessary in both places (for similar and different reasons). However, I realize that when revolution hits close to home, it’s harder to be clear cut on the outcomes if they involve putting these loved ones in possible harm’s way. And then bin Laden was killed and I was happy.


Before this big news, I received a phone call from Samson, my 16 African “son.” He was home on leave from boarding school and as we went through the usual litany of questions about school results (not great) and miscellaneous requests (basketball, denied.) I found myself bringing up the recent and still on-going riots in Uganda and getting quite practical about it. It was not a conversation about who was right and who was wrong. Instead I very sternly and clearly stated that Samson should stay out of Gulu and Kampala town centers and that if he did find trouble starting to brew he must promise me he would run away quickly. I explained that recent events often target young men and teenage boys, whose testosterone-infused curiosity makes it hard to walk away. “Please Samson, promise me you will run away.” “I promise Jess.” “Really?” “Yes, Jess I will run away.”

Similarly I watched my dear friend Hala well up with tears as she thought about her twin two year olds she just left in Damascus to visit New York. News from Syria is not good. At one stage she looked at me and asked “What do you think is going to happen Jess? “ And my reply was “Well, I thought you were going to tell me the answer to that.” As I looked at the pleading in her eyes, I realized that I had to provide her with an answer. Not based on my nuanced understanding of geopolitics and Syria, but based on a friendship that required comfort.

I do not want either one of these dear people and the places where they live to experience revolution. Change would be ok, but only if anarchy and violence do not ensue. Why does everyone want change so quickly, I started to ask myself? Surely a step by step approach, which includes rather than excludes current regimes, is the better approach. I find it troubling that my sympathies shifted away from clear and passionate support for necessary change now that it is personal.

With bin Laden’s death I got my answer to what I would do if I met Hitler. I am happy both are dead. I’m elated in fact that this terrible man has met his maker and that it was a US bullet that did it. I joined in with the USA chants. I thought for once, liberal guilt be gone! Who cares what this looks like outside of the US?

I understand the hypocritical implications of this.

I also understand better than ever that it’s harder to be absolute about something when it effects you personally. New York is my home. Damascus is Hala’s home. Gulu is Samson’s home.

Shoulda Coulda Woulda

As I ascended the famous Dupont Circle metro escalator this morning for my first day on the job I was, among other things, reminded that I was not in New York or Gulu for that matter. In what I think is typical DC fashion, there was a man performing “Don’t Worry, Be Happy,” which echoed throughout the long climb to the surface. This seems fitting for the first day of the rest of my life.

The emails are starting to come in and meetings and road trips are already being planned. I’ve got a lot to think about and perhaps should make this entry quite short. However, I pause to acknowledge the inevitable moment of regretting how I spent the last three months of what I shall now refer to as “leave without any idea of when or if it might end.”

Should I have written the great American novel? (note: I say novel now instead of memoir after the Mortenson ruckus.) Could I have driven across country for the first time or at the very least gone to the Caribbean for a week? Would I have spent my time differently if I had known there would be a job at the end of the tunnel?

Well, I guess we’ll never know. What I do know is now it’s time to shift gears. I feel a bit like I’m playing work today instead of doing it. I know the work is coming, but for now I look outside my window, which overlooks Dupont sidewalk cafes filled with goat’s cheese salads and pinot grigios and I smile, because I’m not in Gulu. I’m right where I said I’d be…yeegads!

RIP Cafe Cento Sette

In 1997 Kate and I lived in a “one bedroom” apartment on 13th street and 2nd Avenue. After almost a year of crashing on couches and apartment sitting, this was our first New York apartment (with the help of Kate’s dad who was our guarantor.) We had a deal that each stayed 6 months in the bedroom and then 6 months in the living room on the futon that was also our couch. We had no closets. I remember yelling at Kate, because her mom would send us superfluous gadgets all the time. Her heart was certainly in the right place, but it felt like one more salad spinner would send our apartment over the edge. I also remember milking my 6 months and it sliding into 7, 8, 9 months without protest from Kate.

During our trials and tribulations in the East Villages we had a blast. It was hardly the hardcore edgy hood of the 70s and 80s, but it was also quite different from the gentrified EV of today, which has a Star bucks, Subway, HSBC and Chase bank on every corner. I had my first and only New York gun story on that block: cops chasing a guy with guns drawn; no shots fired thank god. We had a crack addict that sat harmlessly on our stoop a lot of the time. We also had never-ending cool bars, restaurants and boutiques.

Shortly after arriving in the neighborhood we started going to the Italian place on the corner, Café Cento Sette. It was pretty cheap and we both found dishes from which for the next 14 years we did not stray. Kate ordered Penne della Casa, which had fresh mozzarella, eggplant and tomato sauce. I ordered Penne Ala Vodka, which had ham and shrimp in it. Every time we went we ordered that with a Caesar salad and talked incessantly, first about how awesome our dishes were, which never failed us and then about everything else under the sun.

We got to know the owner, an Italian woman whose name I never got, in typical New York friendly-but-not-too-friendliness. We even moved with them when they relocated from the corner of 13th and 3rd to the corner of 10th and 2nd. We made all of our friends and family eat there and never did we have a bad experience. We loved it for that reason alone. In a big anonymous city, the secret of New York City survival is having those few spots sprinkled throughout the city that you can always count on…constancy in the midst of chaos.

On Friday, I planned to meet my friend Hala who was in town from Syria. I hadn’t seen her in about 2 years and we had much to catch up on. Her twins who were now 3! And of course I wanted to hear all about the current situation in Syria, which even that very day was not sounding that good. As we competed with each other to cram two years of conversation into the first few minutes of our meeting, we strolled over to the East Village. As I walked down Second Avenue toward our dining destination, Cento Sette, Hala and I both paused from geopolitics to confess that we both already knew what we would order. I, of course, would get the Penne ala Vodka and Hala, who had been introduced to the place by me and had returned many times with other friends, would get the mushroom tortellini.

With what must have been prophetic irony we talked about how the restaurant fronts seemed to change with each return trip to the neighborhood. And then I saw it. Where my beloved, constant favorite restaurant should be: “STORE FOR RENT.” Amidst reunion and political consternation I was stunned into silence by the failure of MY restaurant. Even now, as I receive messages of condolence on my facebook page, I wonder what the impact will be for me. Maybe, like before, the owner will move to another location; maybe to Queens where rents are still affordable. But given the state of the economy (oh, has it finally directly impacted my life?!) I think this might be the end of Café Cento Sette.

The Confidence Trick

In my third year living in Uganda my relationships with local people started to feel a bit like Groundhog’s day meets Falling Down. I couldn’t figure out why people that I had known for years were beginning to disappoint me and by disappoint me I mean steal from me. This sad truth of working in the developing world crystallized when I read Greg Mortenson’s interview with Outside Magazine. In his defense of recent allegations, he spoke briefly about the “confidence trick” as part of the blame for unexplained disconnects between the Central Asia Institute and some of the schools it supports. It was a true a ha moment in my never-ending attempt to understand the tricky and chaotic field of humanitarian and development work.

Greg Mortenson has been catching hell this week and perhaps deservedly so. Chartered planes and potentially fabricated Taliban abduction stories don’t play well in the media. So I thought I’d lend my two cents to this much ado, which is: I don’t really care what happened or didn’t happen in the books.

My work in Uganda was never a news story. It was never deadly enough or explosive enough or near enough oil. The closest we came to receiving attention was when the Ugandan national newspaper covered our “Chiles Pay and Keep Elephants Away” project, which was astronomically scooped internationally by that idiot who killed an elephant in Zimbabwe. The issue of gay rights in Uganda did make waves internationally for a minute, but only because it was linked to nutty and hateful right-wing churches in the US. Mortenson did something those of us in the humanitarian/development profession are equally parts envious and proud: he brought the world into a conflict zone and focused on the progress and people. As the story goes, in the midst of bombs, he found space to bring in lots and lots of books. He broadened the narrative beyond the numbingly endless stories of bombs and bloodshed and captured our attention on, of all things, the education of girls.

I sympathize with insisting on certain standards, like getting properly paid for your work and *gasp* even comfortable travel and serious security. (God knows I’d have paid for an option other than Air Burundi if I had the cash!) But he’s not completely off the hook. Chartered planes are a tad too comfortable, no matter the availability of funds. The rule of thumb is that an organization’s administration costs should not exceed 10% of the operating budget. As hard as that is, other organizations work very hard to stick to it. The Central Asia Institute, with or without celebrities, is not exempt from this.

This leads me to a larger concern that Mortenson himself acknowledges. He is not a development expert. There is a whole profession behind the headlines, based on academic studies and field research. Do-It-Yourself AID risks people’s lives. I suppose he’s learned this.

Humanitarianism and its oafish sibling development don’t have very good spokespersons. While we bomb Libya and ask why it isn’t working, no one with any real power says, “well perhaps we should try something else.” It doesn’t mean we’re not trying something else. Millions of humanitarian and development dollars are going into places where we have active military campaigns. But it rarely reaches the headlines. You won’t hear sun-burnt Ben Widdemann deliberate over introducing grafted mangoes or improved soy bean seeds like he worries on air about Western Governments supplying “the rebels” (whoever they are, btw) with RPGs.

So is it helpful to bring down a humanitarian hero by comparing him to someone as despicable as Bernie Madoff? Uh, no. Mortensen should stay involved with CAI. He should not try to de-link himself from this work for the simple reasons that it is impossible and unnecessary. Sure, he needs to learn his place, which isn’t steering a multi-million dollar development organization, but rather telling stories that keeps people interested (with or without fabrication). He should be to CAI what Angelina is to UNHCR. A little sexy attention goes a long way to elevate this otherwise unsung work.