Sylvia's Journal

Every morning I wake up about the same time, 5 AM. This gives me plenty of time to write, get dressed and turn my rough ideas about what will happen during the day into something a little less improvised.

I dreamed about government contracts and small print, rules and regulations; this was probably triggered by learning last evening why we are responsible for several activities that appear to have little to do with each other. Alison played an active role in my dream because she was confronting our government reps with things that did not add up, were forgotten or made our lives miserable. She did this with great charm and respect, as she does in real life.

There was also a bride in the dream who I helped get out of a car, which required many hands. She was wearing a family heirloom bridal gown with several of the women who had worn it before in attendance, including those whose marriages had fallen apart. I was wondering whether seeing their dress in action again was difficult. Some of those women were relatives. They were all very skinny. And finally there was something about Haiti and lots of money. This is actually true. There is much money here, asides from the very wealthy private citizens, the US government also has access to enormous reservoirs of funds, which is why we are here. Spending it in ways that show compelling results to Congress is a different story altogether. This is also why we are here and why there is much work to be done.

Yesterday afternoon we closed the second of the three events I am here to (co)facilitate. The last one starts today, a teambuilding session with our Haiti team that is still very new and not even complete. They are not new to each other as many of them have been transfered wholesale from one organization to another after their contract ended. I have gotten to know many over the last three days but today all the staff, including the drivers, will be part of the session. This requires a design that does not depend on reading and writing skills. Antoine and I have discussed this and we have a very (very) loose design that involves a tree, with Antoine being the trunk. I get to apply the fertilizer.

The two facilitator teams practiced their sessions yesterday and critiqued themselves and then listened to feedback from their peers. Neither was easy. The level of disappointment is deep and the sense of futility is palpable; there have been too many well-meaning attempts to bring about positive change. Here I am part of yet another. Why would it be different this time? It is easy for me to say they have to become more leaderly in their behavior. This can cost you your head in Haiti as many people have learned. It’s a lesson that is not very useful and certainly not a behavior worth emulating.

A representative of our funder, the person who has a lot to say about how we spent the US tax dollars, swung by the hotel after everyone had gone home. We chatted while we had a local Prestige beer, and she listened intently to my explanation about our program. I am always a bit surprised when people like her get enthusiastic and want to know more. I assume they get to hear stories like that all the time. I expect such people to be jaded, but she was not. She confides that Haiti has been one of the most difficult places she has worked in, mostly because of the pervasive sense of pessimism and despair. She grew up as a missionary kid in the Ivory Coast and is an anthropologist by profession; she knows a thing or two about development and cultural change. Her French is impeccable. Our enjoyable informal conversation counted as my formal debriefing, to be checked off my to do list.

A band made dinner more festive last night. I had an overpriced vegetarian pizza that tasted like catsup and washed it away with superb pistachio ice cream. The two items together cost about 25 US dollars, probably because everything is imported. I wonder how Haitians who dine here can afford it.

Next to my table were four twangy-talking Americans, senior citizens, from the southern half of the US. In some respect they looked like missionaries (pale), in others they did not (Hawaiian shirts and dyed hair). I tried to listen to their conversation to alleviate my boredom during the long pizza wait. My interest was first tweaked by a story about an out-of-wedlock child of a mother who is now in her eighties and can still not talk about it; somewhere there is a half sister with kids and grandchildren who cannot be acknowledged as part of the family. It was all very sad and juicy. And then the conversation turned to colonialism and the various colonial rulers. The Dutch were also mentioned and I tried to move closer to the table without being too conspicuous. I wanted to know what they were saying and thinking about my people and debated whether I should simply join them and say, hey I am Dutch but I am also one of your people know (and don’t you love our president!). I would have loved to know who they would vote for and why. But then the long awaited (and tasteless) pizza arrived.

I brought out my computer and turned my attention to recording the band. I had hoped to link to the file here so you could listen in, but I cannot figure out how to do that (yet).