Days 292 – 296 (9/04 – 08)

Tuesday – Today is the start of the semi-annual Partners Roundtable. We have people arriving from England, Canada and the U.S. to meet with the leaders of the EMH (Haiti Methodist Church) to strategize the recovery plan for the next 5 years. Today’s agenda was a trip to dedicate the first 10 houses built in Mellier and the first 5 houses built in Carre Four under the EMH Pilot Project. There was good turnout from the community which along with our entourage made up a good crowd to listen to speeches by Church leaders, UMCOR representatives, contractors and beneficiaries. This was followed by a Haitian lunch put on by the community. The Mellier houses were built by Homes for Haitians and the Carre Four houses were built by Pyramid Construction. There are 10 more homes in Mellier and 15 more homes in Carre Four to be completed.

After stopping off at the construction site of the new church in Mellier, our group returned to the Plaza Hotel in Port-au-Prince for the opening session of the Roundtable. After dinner I came back to the Guest House in Petionville to catch up on my normal work.

Wednesday – Since the Roundtable schedule for today didn’t include any sessions related to my work, I stayed at the Guest House to push the renovation project forward. We have teams coming in next week and we have to have the upstairs bedrooms and bathrooms and the dining room downstairs completed. It’s a real challenge to supervise a construction project through the Haitian engineer without becoming the ugly American. I’ve managed to limit myself to only a couple of yelling sessions so far.

My material shipment from the Dominican Republic has yet to clear customs at the border. The shipping broker has been telling me all week – “Maybe tomorrow”.

Thursday – Today I had to head back over the Plaza Hotel for the Roundtable because I have to give a presentation about the Haiti Home Assistance Program and lead a breakout session on reconstruction. Both the presentation and the breakout session went well. Everyone seemed interested and had lots of questions. When I wasn’t in the spotlight, I had 1 eye glued on my laptop trying to track my Dominican shipment. The shipment was turned back at the border again because the driver didn’t have an original invoice, just a copy. The original was sent to the border yesterday to the broker who apparently couldn’t find it. Oh yeah – the customs agent was also looking for an additional $500.00 bribe which I refused to pay -“Maybe tomorrow”.

Friday – This morning I called the Director General of the Haitian Customs Ministry, whom I had met and talked to 5 weeks ago about this shipment and asked what the additional $500.00 was for since I had paid my fees and had signed documents to that affect. He said he would check into it. Two hours later I got a call from the broker at the border and she said everything was in order and the truck would cross around noon. I had made previous arrangements with the Dominican shipping company to have one of our drivers meet the truck at the U.S Embassy, which I thought would be an easy landmark, and guide the truck to the Guest House. I got an email from the shipper saying we would have to have our driver meet the truck at the border because their driver didn’t know how to get to Port-au-Prince. I emailed back that it was inconceivable to me that they would send a driver to Haiti that couldn’t find Port-au-Prince. I paid for delivery and I expected it to be delivered and I would not send my driver on an 8 hour round trip to the border. Magically, at 4:00 P.M. this afternoon the truck arrived at the Guest House. I didn’t even have to send my driver to the Embassy. When we got everything off loaded and I got the shipping manifest from the driver, it was dated July 25^th. Just over 6 weeks. Have I mentioned that nothing is easy in Haiti?

Saturday – After breakfast I got a small crew together to move and assemble the bunk beds in the rooms. While they were doing that, I cut the plywood sheets that the mattresses would lay on. Because of the way that the beds were built, the top sheets had to be cut 3/8” shorter than the bottom sheets. I kept them as long as possible so that they would stay in the frames and they were a tight fit. The crew came to me all excited because they were too long and I was going to have to cut them all again. I grabbed a flat bar and a small sledge hammer; inserted the bar between the frame and the plywood and smacked it with the hammer. The sheet popped right into place. The Haitians laughed and laughed. That was the funniest thing they had ever seen and they couldn’t wait to try it.