Days 103 & 104 (1/27 – 28)

Friday  - Only one team and a few Conference delegates for breakfast this morning. After the Delmas 33 crew left for their local site and the delegates got off to their meetings it got rather quiet. With the large number of teams this month (26) and the Delegates at the Guest House, the quiet was almost deafening. The Haitian Staff has been feeding and caring for up to 50 or 60 people a day for the whole month. They are beginning to look a bit frazzled and a day or 2 of relative quiet will be welcomed by all. They will only have the Delmas 33 team and a team returning from Furcy for dinner tonight. The UMVIM staff and delegates have been invited to the Gala de la Conference at the La Reserve Hotel and Restaurant.

The Gala is the main social affair at the end of the Annual Conference and doubles as a celebration for the elected President on election years. Since it was one of those years it was also Gesner Paul’s celebration party. The bad part was that it was a semi-formal affair and we were supposed to dress up a bit. Since my wardrobe consists of shorts, t-shirts and sandals it was a stretch. Fortunately, I flew down in a pair of long pants, a long sleeve shirt and loafers. Gerda, the housekeeper, had done my laundry the day before – so everything was clean. I borrowed an iron from Belorjn, the Guest House Assistant Manager, and a tie from Jim Gulley. Jim had 3 neckties with him. I can’t imagine bringing 1 tie to Haiti let alone 3.

Our unusually dressed ensemble arrived at the La Reserve promptly at 7:00 PM and were escorted to our tables. Our ensemble consisted of, from UMCOR, Melissa Crutchfield, Assistant General Secretary for International Disaster Response; Jim Gulley, Coordinator for Haiti; Cory Kramer, Acting Head of Mission in Haiti; Lauren James, UMCOR/EMH Liaison (and her visiting parents); and the Haiti UMVIM staff – Tom, Sarah, Mario and me. There were about 135 guests in all – including Reverend Georges M. Mulrain the President of the MCCA (the Methodist Church of the Caribbean of the Americas) who officiated over the EMH elections. The introductions, speeches, presentations and musical entertainment were all done before dinner. So, it was after nine o’clock before we got into the buffet line. However, the food was very good and the La Reserve was a beautiful setting. It was hard to remember that we were still in Haiti.

Saturday – Not a lot of team activity today. Our Delmas 33 team went to work as usual and Wendy’s (Tom’s wife) team went home. Wendy has been here for a month and we’re all sorry to see her leave. She is a great organizer has gotten all of our donated supplies in proper order. We have one small team coming in late this afternoon.

After going through my emails and doing some more prep work on materials that I want to present at a series of meetings next week, I decided I needed to get out of the office. I grabbed my hat and sunglasses and hit the streets for a long walk. The Guest House sits in the center of a triangle of 2 main roads in Petionville – Route de Freres and Route de Delmas. I walked up Route de Freres to the apex of the triangle where it meets Route de Delmas and then went down Route de Delmas  to just past Delmas 60 and took a side street back to Freres and then back up to the Guest House. I’m guessing it was about a 5 mile circuit. It was a great walk. The streets were crowded with people, shoulder to shoulder street merchants selling everything imaginable,  stores, cars, trucks, motorcycles – just so much energy and color and sounds and smell. I got a few curious looks and heard an occasional comment about “the blan” but I’ve discovered that a smile and a “Bon swa” are almost always returned in kind. I never felt hassled or threatened and truly enjoyed the experience.

Tonight was another evening out. Lauren James’s (UMCOR/EMH Liaison) parents were in town so Lauren made dinner reservations for the UMCOR/UMVIM staff (12 of us) at the Club Latino. It was the last night of the week long Jazz Festival in Haiti so they had a very good jazz combo playing. The Club has a large outdoor dining area and really good food - great evening in Haiti with good friends.