Hands Together
As I stepped off the plane the hot, humid air hit me. I left Virginia early that morning as the sun was just rising. There, it had been overcast and damp, about 40 degrees Fahrenheit. A few hours later, I arrived in the tropics with temperatures in the 90s. What a reprieve from the chilly late November weather I had experienced in the Midwest and east coast! I was back in Haiti after two months away.
Due to funding issues at FdS, the recycling and trash company where I had been working this summer and fall, I am spending the month of December helping out at Hands Together (http://www.handstogether.org/), an educational non-profit. Meeting me at the airport was Father Tom Hagan, Catholic priest, President, and Founder of Men Ansanm, or Hands Together. Immediately, I was whisked away to Cité Soleil to see the area where eight of HT’s schools are located. I was very curious because in my previous five visits to Haiti I had never ventured into Cité Soleil. It is famous, at least in Haiti, as the poorest slum in the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere. The 4 square mile section of town is home to 300,000 people. There are no cops. Government workers don’t come around. Most vehicles are either tap-taps – the colorful taxi pickup trucks where people pile in the back – or motos – small motor bikes in which the driver gives rides to one or more people at a time. We journey into the slum armored in a white SUV with a green HT on the hood and sides of the car. Everyone seems to know Fr. Tom here and wants to say hi, giving a thumbs up or familiar slap to the vehicle.
Cité Soleil
Cité Soleil is the lowest area of the hilly Port-au-Prince, situated between the western edge of the airport’s runway and the ocean. Unfortunately, this means that the sewage of much of the city drains to this part of town. The open canals that serve as the city’s sewage smells dank. Cité Soleil’s main road is paved and divided with a median boasting two lanes on each side – this kind of construction is rare anywhere in Haiti, let alone Cité Soleil. Unfortunately, piles of trash fill one side of the boulevard, so traffic uses just one of the sides.
In September, the United Nations ended their stabilization mission in Haiti, pulling all of their peace-keeping troops out. This, coupled with the gas shortage starting in mid-September (see my last post), meant companies and schools shut down, resulting in daily riots in the streets. The large police station in Cité Soleil was overrun by rioters and the police cars were burned in front of the station. The police have stayed away from the slum since, not wanting to spark more violence. The area is controlled by about a dozen gangs. That first night we met with Iska, the leader of one of the top gangs. The street Iska lived was guarded by at least a dozen men and the first picture I snapped since stepping off the plane was coincidentally just prior to his street. The guards quickly sprung to the car and had me delete the picture. They were very firm that no photos should be taken away from the main street or near the houses so that Iska’s location would be protected. When we pulled up to Iska’s small concrete house, I stood at a respectful distance, in eye-sight but out of ear shot from the one-on-one meeting between Fr. Tom and the gang leader. He was afraid and on edge. Another gang leader, Ougan, had been murdered a few nights prior and the various factions wanted to control more turf. Fr. Tom reassured Iska, attempting to assuage his fears, while also trying to convince him to make schooling a priority in his district.
Childhood Education
Many studies show the value of schooling, especially in children; the current Nobel laureates in economics, Esther Duflo and Abhijit Banerjee, devote numerous studies and chapters in their book, Poor Economics, to this topic. They link the amount of future earnings to the time spent in school – whether that’s a month, semester, or year. You may initially think that a month or even a year couldn’t be distinguishably measured, but they show that it can. In Haiti, the schools were shut down after the first week in September due to the gas shortage and violent riots, and didn’t reopen again until the last week in November. The few schools in Iska’s district have suffered even more of a setback. When I visited a school that housed first and second graders, only five students were there from approximately 200 the year prior. The following week attendance had risen to 22, still a shadow of what it once was. At another primary school in the area which serves 5-7th grades, not a single student showed up. This was in contrast to a school only a few blocks away, but under control of a different gang, that boosted over 500 high-schoolers. The leadership in each district controls what the area will focus on and some emphasize the importance of education and ensuring the student’s safety while other district leaders don’t seem to value education as much.
The following day at another thriving middle school with over 600 students, all clad in school uniforms and receiving a daily meal that HT provides, the top gang leader in that area, Gabriel, showed up in his blacked-out tinted Nissan Murano. He called Fr. Tom over, remaining in the vehicle with his window rolled down, and they began to converse. Gabriel was also concerned with the power vacuum and violence in the area. Watching these interactions as a suburbanite from the United States, it just seemed a bit surreal. But it’s something that this poor population is dealing with daily. HT actually employs some of the gang members through a program called “Project Dismas,” named after the “good thief”. With 80% unemployment, many young men end up in the Cité Soleil gangs. The program’s message conveys that every human life is precious and redeemable. Currently there are 130 members of the program, split among 10 teams. Each team is assigned to a specific school where they perform various jobs such as coaching recreation programs, repairing equipment and facilities, painting, construction, and cleaning work. The work isn’t glamorous, but this ensures the schools’ safety, makes the buildings nicer, and gives meaningful work to these young men, showing them a life outside of the gang.
HT runs 23 schools across the country (mostly in Cité Soleil, Port-au-Prince, and the northwestern city of Gonaives), educating 12,000 students per year and has drilled 450 water wells, giving more than 700,000 people access to clean water. The education is completely free. No tuition, a free lunch, and uniforms to all students. I came with an inherent bias against this type of program, because I was taught during my own graduate studies that for aid programs to be the most effective, there should always be buy-in or skin in the game from the poor. Conversing with Fr. Tom about this, he understood my perspective, but reminded me that some of the current students wouldn’t be going to school at all if HT didn’t provide a uniform or even if there was a small tuition. He reiterated that his mission is to reach the most people he can and turns to his faith that God will provide, in the form of generous donors each year.
Fr. Tom formed HT in 1986 after leading a group of college students to Haiti the previous year. In 1997 he left the US, where he was the chaplain at Princeton University, to move to Haiti full time. Living in Haiti is hard. Poor roadways, inadequate sewage, limited sanitation collection, and little access to clean water are among the greatest hardships. Fr. Tom was lucky to survive the 2010 earthquake that devastated the country. As he walked through the Cité Soleil in the aftermath of the quake he wrote:
When I go through Cité Soleil now [in 2010] I see the eight schools that we built (schools that were totally free and the only free schools like that in the country with more than 9,000 kids). I walk past what was once our clinic that took care of 20,000 — again the only totally free clinic in the area. I see what once were the houses that we built for 150 people and the elderly projects for over 800. I look at the large kitchen area where people prepared hot meals each day for over 10,000 — and all of it is gone.[i]
Instead of giving up and returning to the US, defeated and in despair, HT rebuilt. All eight schools are again in operation at Cité Soleil.
I spend each morning with the school system administrators. Some former residents of Cité Soleil themselves, are incredibly intelligent. I mainly stick with Evens, who oversees the schools. After a staff meeting, we head out to visit the schools, note the attendance, and walk around to observe some of the classrooms. We talk to each principal in turn. Some of them mention the teachers being upset because HT is opening their schools on Saturdays for the foreseeable future. With the missed months earlier this year, they are working six days a week and shortening holiday breaks to make up for lost time. HT still paid teachers their full salary during the months of riots when schools were closed, so they expect teachers to be flexible. Understandably this causes some friction, but Evens is good at compromising and ensuring the children’s educational needs are still met. Another missing piece at the high school was an English teacher that didn’t return. Emayson, a Haitian studying to become a priest, and I spent the last week teaching students English. Luckily, a new teacher has been hired and starts this week. This will surely be a good thing for the students!
Missionaries of Charity
About half the afternoons I have ventured over to the Missionaries of Charity (founded by Mother Teresa), which is the next block over from the HT compound. Besides having possibly, the only Catholic English mass in Haiti, they run a children’s hospital / orphanage for over 100 kids. These children range in age from newborn infants to 4 years old. While I usually return exhausted, they are a joy to be around and get so excited when visitors come and play with them. Being white is also very rare, so they are always touching my skin and pulling at my red beard. These kids just want some love. They are fed multiple times per day and it saddens my heart just how malnourished, some of the youngest ones are when they arrive. Babies nearing two-years-old weigh less than my 6-month-old niece. There’s no baby fat. But they happily smile as I feed and talk to them in my half English / half Creole dialect.
During my previous two months in Haiti at the dump, my personal living conditions were rougher. But this time has been hard for another reason. I feel immersed in poverty on a daily basis and it is overwhelming because I feel like I can do nothing about it.
We can do something. If you feel called to donate, please do so. HT is a good non-profit and they are making a difference in the lives of many Haitians. If you feel called to pray, please do so. Pray that good politicians get elected, pray that love overcomes violence. But please count your blessings. Even for some who work on the compound with me, access to the internet or having a beverage that isn’t water is a treat. Everyone reading this article is facing challenges. But we all have many blessings. Please focus on them. Have a wonderful Christmas and happy new year!
Prayer of St. Francis
Lord, make me an instrument of Your peace;
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
Where there is injury, pardon;
Where there is doubt, faith;
Where there is despair, hope;
Where there is darkness, light;
And where there is sadness, joy.
O Divine Master,
Grant that I may not so much seek
To be consoled as to console;
To be understood, as to understand;
To be loved, as to love;
For it is in giving that we receive,
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
And it is in dying that we are born to Eternal Life.
– attributed to Saint Francis of Assisi (1181-1226)
A Step Along the Way
It helps, now and then, to step back and take a long view.
The kingdom is not only beyond our efforts, it is even beyond our vision.
We accomplish in our lifetime only a tiny fraction of the magnificent enterprise that is God’s work.
Nothing we do is complete, which is a way of saying that the Kingdom always lies beyond us.
No statement says all that could be said.
No prayer fully expresses our faith.
No confession brings perfection.
No pastoral visit brings wholeness.
No program accomplishes the Church’s mission.
No set of goals and objectives includes everything.
This is what we are about.
We plant the seeds that one day will grow.
We water seeds already planted, knowing that they hold future promise.
We lay foundations that will need further development.
We provide yeast that produces far beyond our capabilities.
We cannot do everything, and there is a sense of liberation in realizing that.
This enables us to do something, and to do it very well.
It may be incomplete, but it is a beginning, a step along the way, an opportunity for the Lord’s grace to enter and do the rest.
We may never see the end results, but that is the difference between the master builder and the worker.
We are workers, not master builders; ministers, not messiahs.
We are prophets of a future not our own.
– Bishop Ken Untener of Saginaw
[i] Hagan, Tom Fr., “I am Humbled by These People.” National Catholic Reporter. 2/1/2010. https://www.ncronline.org/news/world/i-am-humbled-these-people
One thought on “Hands Together”
It is always a pleasure to read about your experiences. I am praying for you and all those you work alongside, as well as Haiti as a whole. Christmas blessings to you!
Comments are closed.