This is news I just found that is too good to wait. I just have to blurt it out. Two Haitian companies are making wireless tablets! The brand names are Surtab and Handxom.
There are multiple reasons this is fabulous. First, it is a business people do not associate with the "poorest country in the hemisphere," or any of the other epithets that depict the country as way behind. It is first-rate technology in demand from Haiti, a source of pride. Second, these tablets are selling at a price that is more affordable than those marketed from rich countries. Venezuela just ordered 10,000 tablets. Buyers will include people in Haiti and will certainly have a stimulating effect on business development, education, health, safety and security. Third, the reports out about Surtab detail a modest level of employment but really good pay by Haitian standards. It paves the way for better employment standards for other industries like the garment industry.
This development, of course, is one that could be a factor in building relationships with partners in Haiti. We may want to explore how to assist in making tablets available to our friends there . . . then learn to write and speak to them in Kreyol.
Here are some articles with more details.
Chicago Tribune
The Guardian
Caribbean Journal
--kjl
Wednesday, May 28, 2014
Monday, May 12, 2014
THIRSTING FOR LIVING WATER IN HAITI
“The Spirit of the Sovereign LORD is on
me, because the LORD has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has
sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and
release from darkness for the prisoners, . . . ” Isaiah 61:1 & Luke 4:18
Ralph Jean-Mary and Carline Paul-blanc have both told us that Haiti can be liberated from captivity to poverty and disease, and brought out of its prison of darkness by Haitians. The good will and charity of Americans must work -- with, not instead of -- those whose home is in that country. This admonition is founded in scripture and it guides the Forest Hill Church's Haiti mission in its quest for a partnership of servanthood.
I think our
calling is to help
Haitians to free themselves from the captivity of dependence on others, especially
Americans whose charity is often toxic. That will require years of patience commitment and collaboration. Both we and our collaborators will be transformed. Yes, Haitians can teach us some things about living better lives.
I want to tell you about an organization -- one of a growing number -- that is transforming lives in the Central Plateau of Haiti. It is meeting the thirst for clean, life-giving water and for life-giving schools to people in remote villages. Consider thoughtfully how it uses these critical needs to build human and community capacity for freedom from dependence on absentee donors.
With
joy you will draw water from the wells of salvation. Isaiah 12:3
BREAKING NEWS!
Right now we are learning about a new medical practice being developed by a Haitian doctor in Pignon. She is someone I met last summer and who I visited in October. Her vision for a clinical practice is what we heard from Ralph Jean-mary from the very beginning. We will hear much more about Dr. Roberta Sterling and Life Spring over this summer from Carline and others in our planning group.
Thursday, April 24, 2014
WESTSHORE UNITARIANS AT MPP IN HAITI
Another Cleveland area congregation with ties to Haiti is the Westshore Unitarian Universalist Church. Like our group from Forest Hill Church, they also went to the Central Plateau to serve and learn in the company of the Mouvman Peasant Papaye (Papaye Peasant Movement, in English). Readers of this blog may recall that our FHC team visited MPP in 2012 and saw one of the villages being developed with resources provided by the Presbyterian Church, USA. The Unitarian Universalist College of Social Justice (UUSC) is also a resource partner of MPP's village development program and assists Unitarian congregations to make service learning trips to Haiti.
Last month, Jeanette Nemcek and her husband Bob, a member of Westshore UUC, helped make a connection so that some of us from Forest Hill could attend a presentation at the WUUC. Those of us who went were warmly welcomed and included in the discussion.
Thanks to Rev. Kathleen Rolenz and Intern Minister, Matthew McHale, their story can be shared in their own words. Here is Matthew describing MPP and its work. Below are links to blog postings by Rev. Rolenz describing things they saw and did.
How Was Haiti?
The Town Where Nobody Lives
Power To The Peasant People
Unfinished Business
The Women Of Haiti
We look forward to getting together again soon with our friends at Westshore UUC and others in the Cleveland area with Haiti in their hearts.
--kjl
Last month, Jeanette Nemcek and her husband Bob, a member of Westshore UUC, helped make a connection so that some of us from Forest Hill could attend a presentation at the WUUC. Those of us who went were warmly welcomed and included in the discussion.
Thanks to Rev. Kathleen Rolenz and Intern Minister, Matthew McHale, their story can be shared in their own words. Here is Matthew describing MPP and its work. Below are links to blog postings by Rev. Rolenz describing things they saw and did.
How Was Haiti?
The Town Where Nobody Lives
Power To The Peasant People
Unfinished Business
The Women Of Haiti
We look forward to getting together again soon with our friends at Westshore UUC and others in the Cleveland area with Haiti in their hearts.
--kjl
Tuesday, April 22, 2014
PARTNERS IN HEALTH AND IN TRANSFORMATION
In a follow-up to the previous blog posting on the new book by Paul Farmer and Gustavo Gutierrez, here is an article that reports on liberating transformation being done by Partners In Health in Haiti. The author, Stephanie Garry, a news reporter who now works for Partners In Health, describes again how Liberation Theology works in practice.
Read it here.
Read it here.
New hospital in Haiti proves that aid done right can change lives
You can read more about the hospital here and here (video).
Thursday, April 10, 2014
IN THE COMPANY OF THE POOR
I am posting this video of a discussion by Dr. Paul Farmer and Fr. Gustavo Gutierrez when they launched their book, In The Company Of The Poor, in November, 2013. It is a book I will be reading right away. I invite you to join in the reading.
In The Company Of The Poor the video
In The Company Of The Poor book review
--kjl
In The Company Of The Poor the video
In The Company Of The Poor book review
--kjl
Thursday, March 6, 2014
A SERIOUS DISSENT TO CONSIDER
I want to pass along a three-year old news clipping for your consideration while the echoes of outcry about Crimea's domination by Russia are still reverberating. The instances of the US asserting dominion in and over Haiti in the past 200 years are numerous. As a nation, we have much to answer for both in our attempts to alleviate suffering and to dominate sovereignty in this small country. Is the US and its allies much different than Russia in this regard? Read and think. --kjl
Ricardo Seitenfus: Le système de prévention des litiges dans le cadre du système onusien n’est pas adapté au contexte haïtien. Haïti n’est pas unearticle . . . [continue in English]
Dissent
Al Jezeera
Haiti Libre story
Haiti Libre interview
Wikileaks article Guardian Dec. 2010
entretien Lundi 20 décembre 2010
«Haïti est la preuve de l’échec de l’aide internationale»
- Ricardo Seitenfus: «Pour rester ici, et ne pas être terrassé par ce que je vois, j’ai dû me créer un certain nombre de défenses psychologiques.» (Paolo Woods)
Diplômé de l’Institut de hautes études internationales de Genève, le Brésilien Ricardo Seitenfus a 62 ans. Depuis 2008, il représente l’Organisation des Etats américains en Haïti. Il dresse un véritable réquisitoire contre la présence internationale dans le pays.
Le Temps: Dix mille Casques bleus en Haïti. A votre sens, une présence contre-productive…
Graduate Institute of International Studies in Geneva, Brazilian Ricardo Seitenfus 62. Since 2008, he is the Organization of American States in Haiti. It provides a real indictment against the international presence in the country
Time: Ten thousand peacekeepers Haïti. In your view, a counter-productive presence ...
Ricardo Seitenfus: The system of dispute prevention within the UN system is not adapted to the Haitian context. Haiti is not an international threat. We are not in a situation of civil war. Haiti is not Iraq or Afghanistan. Yet the Security Council, since lack of alternative, imposed peacekeepers since 2004, after the departure of President Aristide.Depuis 1990, we're here at our eighth UN mission. Haiti since 1986 and saw the departure of Jean-Claude Duvalier what I call a low-intensity conflict. We are faced with struggles for power among political actors who do not respect the democratic game. But it seems to me that Haiti, on the international stage, essentially pays for its proximity to the United States. Haiti has been the subject of negative attention from the international system. It was for the UN to freeze the power and transform Haitians into prisoners on their own island. Anxious boat people largely explain the decisions of the international community vis-à-vis Haiti. We want at any price for them to stay home.
- What prevents the normalization from Haiti?
- For two hundred years, the presence of foreign troops has alternated with that of dictators. It is force that defines international relations with Haiti and never dialogue. The original sin of Haiti, on the world stage, is its liberation. Haitians committed the unacceptable in 1804: a crime of lèse-majesté for a troubled world. The West is now a colonialist and racist slave world that bases its wealth on the exploitation of conquered lands. So the Haitian revolutionary model scared the great powers. The United States will recognize the independence of Haiti in 1865. France requires payment of a ransom to accept this reality. From the beginning, independence has compromised and impeded the country's development. The world has never known how to treat Haiti, so it ended up ignoring it. Its revolutionary independence began two hundred years of solitude on the international scene. Today, the UN blindly applies Chapter 7 of its charter, it deploys its troops to impose its peace operation. It solves nothing; it is imperialism. We want to make Haiti a capitalist country, an export platform for the U.S. market; it is absurd. Haiti must return to what it is, that is to say, a place still fundamentally imbued with customary law in an essentially agricultural country. The country is constantly described in terms of its violence. But without a state, the level of violence has not yet reached a fraction of that of Latin American countries. There are elements in this society that could prevent the violence from spreading without measure.
- Is not that a resignation of Haiti seen as an unassimilable nation whose only horizon is the return to traditional values?
- There is a part of Haiti that is modern, urban and touring abroad. The number of Haitians living outside their borders is estimated at 4 million. It is an open world. I would not dream of returning to the XVI century, in an agrarian society. Haiti, though, lives under the influence of international NGOs, universal charity. More than 90% of the education system and health are in private hands.The country has no public resources to run a minimally state system. UN fails to take account of cultural traits. Haiti summarize a peace operation is to make the economy of the real challenges that arise in the country. The problem is socio-economic. When the unemployment rate reached 80%, it is unbearable to deploy a stabilization mission. There is nothing to stabilize and everything to build.
- Haiti is one of the most subsidized countries in the world and yet the situation has only deteriorated since twenty-five years. Why?
- Emergency aid is effective. But when it becomes structural, when it replaces the state in all its functions, we arrive at a collective disempowerment. If there is evidence of the failure of international aid, it is Haiti. The country has become the Mecca. The January 12 earthquake and the cholera epidemic only accentuate this phenomenon. The international community has a sense of duty every day again it ended yesterday. Haiti fatigue begins to dawn. This small nation must surprise the universal consciousness with disasters more enormous. I hoped that in the distress of 12 January, the world would understand what it had done wrong with Haiti. Unfortunately, it has reinforced the same policy. Instead of making an assessment, we sent more troops. We must build roads, raising dams, participate in the organization of the State, the judicial system. The UN says it has no mandate for this. Its mandate in Haiti is to keep the peace of the cemetery.
- What role NGOs play in this bankruptcy?
- From the earthquake, Haiti has become a key intersection. For transnational NGOs, Haiti has turned into a place of forced passage. I would say even worse than that: a place for aid-workers' vocational training. The age of those who arrived after the earthquake is very low and they landed in Haiti without any experience. And Haiti, I can tell you, is not suitable for amateurs. After January 12, because of massive recruitment, professional quality has declined significantly. There is an evil or perverse relationship between the strength of NGOs and the weakness of the Haitian state. Some NGOs exist only because the misfortune of Haiti.
- What mistakes were made after the earthquake?
- Given the massive importation of consumer goods to feed the homeless, the situation of Haitian agriculture is still péjorée. The country offers a free field to all humanitarian experiences. It is unacceptable from the moral standpoint to consider Haiti as a laboratory. The reconstruction of Haiti and the promise that we dangled $11 billion attracts much interest. It seems that a lot of people come to Haiti, not for Haiti, but for doing business. For me, American aid is a shame, an insult to our consciousness. An example: the Haitian doctors that Cuba shape. More than 500 were educated in Havana. Almost half of them, when they should be in Haiti, are now working in the United States, Canada and France. The Cuban revolution is to finance the training of human resources for its capitalist neighbors ...
- We constantly described Haiti as the margin of the world, you rather feel the country as a concentrate our contemporary world ...
- This is the concentration of our tragedies and failures of international solidarity. We're not up to the challenge. The world press comes to Haiti and describes the chaos. The reaction of the public does not expect good things. For most, Haiti is one of the worst countries in the world. We must go to the Haitian culture, go to the terroir. I think there are too many doctors at the bedside and the majority of these doctors are economists. But in Haiti, we need anthropologists, sociologists, historians, political scientists and even theologians. Haiti is too complex for people who are in a hurry; cooperating in a hurry. Nobody takes the time or has the interest to understand what I might call the Haitian soul. Haitians have grasped us, the international community, as a cow to be milked.They want to take advantage of our presence and they do it with extraordinary skill. If we consider the Haitians only by the money we give, it's because we of the way we present ourselves.
- Beyond the acknowledgment of failure, what solutions do you propose?
- In two months, I will have completed a two-year mission in Haiti. To stay here and not be overwhelmed by what I see, I had to create a number of psychological defenses. I wanted to be an independent voice despite the weight of the organization I represent. I made my dissent public because I wanted to express my profound doubts and tell the world that this is enough of just playing with Haiti. January 12, taught me that there is a tremendous potential for solidarity in the world.Although do not forget that in the early days after the earthquake, it was the Haitians themselves, with bare hands, who tried to save their loved ones. Compassion has been very important in an emergency. But charity can not be the driving force in international relations. There should be autonomy, sovereignty, fair trade, respect for others. We need to think simultaneously of providing export opportunities for Haiti and also protect the family farming that is essential for the country.Haiti is the last untapped Caribbean paradise for tourism, with 1,700 kilometers of pristine coastline. We need to encourage cultural tourism and avoid paving the way to a new Eldorado of mass tourism. The lessons we give are ineffective for too long. Reconstruction and the accompaniment of a rich society are one of the last great human adventures. For the last 200 years, Haiti illuminated the history of humanity and the human rights. Haitians must now be given a chance to confirm their vision.
Time: Ten thousand peacekeepers Haïti. In your view, a counter-productive presence ...
Ricardo Seitenfus: The system of dispute prevention within the UN system is not adapted to the Haitian context. Haiti is not an international threat. We are not in a situation of civil war. Haiti is not Iraq or Afghanistan. Yet the Security Council, since lack of alternative, imposed peacekeepers since 2004, after the departure of President Aristide.Depuis 1990, we're here at our eighth UN mission. Haiti since 1986 and saw the departure of Jean-Claude Duvalier what I call a low-intensity conflict. We are faced with struggles for power among political actors who do not respect the democratic game. But it seems to me that Haiti, on the international stage, essentially pays for its proximity to the United States. Haiti has been the subject of negative attention from the international system. It was for the UN to freeze the power and transform Haitians into prisoners on their own island. Anxious boat people largely explain the decisions of the international community vis-à-vis Haiti. We want at any price for them to stay home.
- What prevents the normalization from Haiti?
- For two hundred years, the presence of foreign troops has alternated with that of dictators. It is force that defines international relations with Haiti and never dialogue. The original sin of Haiti, on the world stage, is its liberation. Haitians committed the unacceptable in 1804: a crime of lèse-majesté for a troubled world. The West is now a colonialist and racist slave world that bases its wealth on the exploitation of conquered lands. So the Haitian revolutionary model scared the great powers. The United States will recognize the independence of Haiti in 1865. France requires payment of a ransom to accept this reality. From the beginning, independence has compromised and impeded the country's development. The world has never known how to treat Haiti, so it ended up ignoring it. Its revolutionary independence began two hundred years of solitude on the international scene. Today, the UN blindly applies Chapter 7 of its charter, it deploys its troops to impose its peace operation. It solves nothing; it is imperialism. We want to make Haiti a capitalist country, an export platform for the U.S. market; it is absurd. Haiti must return to what it is, that is to say, a place still fundamentally imbued with customary law in an essentially agricultural country. The country is constantly described in terms of its violence. But without a state, the level of violence has not yet reached a fraction of that of Latin American countries. There are elements in this society that could prevent the violence from spreading without measure.
- Is not that a resignation of Haiti seen as an unassimilable nation whose only horizon is the return to traditional values?
- There is a part of Haiti that is modern, urban and touring abroad. The number of Haitians living outside their borders is estimated at 4 million. It is an open world. I would not dream of returning to the XVI century, in an agrarian society. Haiti, though, lives under the influence of international NGOs, universal charity. More than 90% of the education system and health are in private hands.The country has no public resources to run a minimally state system. UN fails to take account of cultural traits. Haiti summarize a peace operation is to make the economy of the real challenges that arise in the country. The problem is socio-economic. When the unemployment rate reached 80%, it is unbearable to deploy a stabilization mission. There is nothing to stabilize and everything to build.
- Haiti is one of the most subsidized countries in the world and yet the situation has only deteriorated since twenty-five years. Why?
- Emergency aid is effective. But when it becomes structural, when it replaces the state in all its functions, we arrive at a collective disempowerment. If there is evidence of the failure of international aid, it is Haiti. The country has become the Mecca. The January 12 earthquake and the cholera epidemic only accentuate this phenomenon. The international community has a sense of duty every day again it ended yesterday. Haiti fatigue begins to dawn. This small nation must surprise the universal consciousness with disasters more enormous. I hoped that in the distress of 12 January, the world would understand what it had done wrong with Haiti. Unfortunately, it has reinforced the same policy. Instead of making an assessment, we sent more troops. We must build roads, raising dams, participate in the organization of the State, the judicial system. The UN says it has no mandate for this. Its mandate in Haiti is to keep the peace of the cemetery.
- What role NGOs play in this bankruptcy?
- From the earthquake, Haiti has become a key intersection. For transnational NGOs, Haiti has turned into a place of forced passage. I would say even worse than that: a place for aid-workers' vocational training. The age of those who arrived after the earthquake is very low and they landed in Haiti without any experience. And Haiti, I can tell you, is not suitable for amateurs. After January 12, because of massive recruitment, professional quality has declined significantly. There is an evil or perverse relationship between the strength of NGOs and the weakness of the Haitian state. Some NGOs exist only because the misfortune of Haiti.
- What mistakes were made after the earthquake?
- Given the massive importation of consumer goods to feed the homeless, the situation of Haitian agriculture is still péjorée. The country offers a free field to all humanitarian experiences. It is unacceptable from the moral standpoint to consider Haiti as a laboratory. The reconstruction of Haiti and the promise that we dangled $11 billion attracts much interest. It seems that a lot of people come to Haiti, not for Haiti, but for doing business. For me, American aid is a shame, an insult to our consciousness. An example: the Haitian doctors that Cuba shape. More than 500 were educated in Havana. Almost half of them, when they should be in Haiti, are now working in the United States, Canada and France. The Cuban revolution is to finance the training of human resources for its capitalist neighbors ...
- We constantly described Haiti as the margin of the world, you rather feel the country as a concentrate our contemporary world ...
- This is the concentration of our tragedies and failures of international solidarity. We're not up to the challenge. The world press comes to Haiti and describes the chaos. The reaction of the public does not expect good things. For most, Haiti is one of the worst countries in the world. We must go to the Haitian culture, go to the terroir. I think there are too many doctors at the bedside and the majority of these doctors are economists. But in Haiti, we need anthropologists, sociologists, historians, political scientists and even theologians. Haiti is too complex for people who are in a hurry; cooperating in a hurry. Nobody takes the time or has the interest to understand what I might call the Haitian soul. Haitians have grasped us, the international community, as a cow to be milked.They want to take advantage of our presence and they do it with extraordinary skill. If we consider the Haitians only by the money we give, it's because we of the way we present ourselves.
- Beyond the acknowledgment of failure, what solutions do you propose?
- In two months, I will have completed a two-year mission in Haiti. To stay here and not be overwhelmed by what I see, I had to create a number of psychological defenses. I wanted to be an independent voice despite the weight of the organization I represent. I made my dissent public because I wanted to express my profound doubts and tell the world that this is enough of just playing with Haiti. January 12, taught me that there is a tremendous potential for solidarity in the world.Although do not forget that in the early days after the earthquake, it was the Haitians themselves, with bare hands, who tried to save their loved ones. Compassion has been very important in an emergency. But charity can not be the driving force in international relations. There should be autonomy, sovereignty, fair trade, respect for others. We need to think simultaneously of providing export opportunities for Haiti and also protect the family farming that is essential for the country.Haiti is the last untapped Caribbean paradise for tourism, with 1,700 kilometers of pristine coastline. We need to encourage cultural tourism and avoid paving the way to a new Eldorado of mass tourism. The lessons we give are ineffective for too long. Reconstruction and the accompaniment of a rich society are one of the last great human adventures. For the last 200 years, Haiti illuminated the history of humanity and the human rights. Haitians must now be given a chance to confirm their vision.
Dissent
Al Jezeera
Haiti Libre story
Haiti Libre interview
Wikileaks article Guardian Dec. 2010
Tuesday, March 4, 2014
KANAVAL 2014!!
The pre-Lenten festival in Haiti is a carnival of music. Here is a taste of this celebration.
Announcement for English speakers
Listen live!
A selection of this year's Kanaval hits starting with a personal favorite, Boukman Eksperyance, heard in concert last October at Petionville.
Enjoy!
--kjl
Haiti Kanaval 2014 Theme: "Tèt kole pou Ayiti Pi Djanm"
Announcement for English speakers
Listen live!
A selection of this year's Kanaval hits starting with a personal favorite, Boukman Eksperyance, heard in concert last October at Petionville.
Enjoy!
--kjl
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