Culture Shock

Culture Shock

The hours of operation really should be posted at the Miami airport terminal security check stations.  They don’t open at 3:30 AM …. Or four for that matter.  But somewhere around 4:38 in the morning the security gate does open and the line of people that stretches to New Jersey begins to filter through the maze of ropes that lead to the x-ray machine.  After that it is another hike to the departure gate to Port au Prince; it is somewhere between gate D 1 and gate D 9,493 … that would be in the terminal across the airport slightly beyond Key Largo. 

Again, it is dark when the plane climbs into the cloudy sky above what I think is still Miami.  Soon the eastward sky lightens and the cloud bank breaks up into small spires of cumulus clouds that eventually grow into a thunderstorm or two. They look like frazzled plants stretching upwards but tilted into the direction of the sun.  Patches of those clouds come and go.  In between an occasional island pops from the ocean blue.  Here and there one can tell an ocean reef by the turquoise in contrast to the dark blue of the deep ocean.  Far below my perch of 41,000 feet I see what has to be a huge container ship leaving a churning wake behind.

The  plane descends to land.  Out of the window are multiple ocean ships carrying their freight.  The bay has an oil sheen that must stretch for miles.  Garbage collects at the fringe of the oil slick where the river through the capital discharges its lethal waste of sewage and sludge.  The lighter oil in the bay keeps the garbage backed up along the coast like a huge bathtub ring.  Land is under the plane now.  It  is made up of a collection of shanty towns made of tents, cardboard and lumber that has washed down the river when it rains.  The single runway is marked with rubber streaks from the many planes; tall vegetation and rumbling retaining walls mark what is probably the boundary line to the airport.  The plane slows down and then turns completely around mid runway to return to the terminal.  Passengers unload then walk quite a ways to a waiting bus that carries us to another terminal at the the other end of the tarmac.  Each bus is about 12 feet wide and forty feet long.  A little big for anything but the airport.

Immigration is a form to fill out and a stamped passport; no questions asked; just as long as one brings money with them.  Baggage is picked up and another form is turned in; no one cares what you bring as long as it has green in it for those who want to carry your bag to the parking lot.

I meet Time’ and …. Uh … the other guy who are sent to pick me up from Jacksonville base, which is about a two hour drive from the airport.  Very gracious hosts who work for SP on base as local drivers who run errands pickups and drop-offs.  They like to listen to the gospel channel on the radio … in French or creole or both, for all I know.  And they like it LOUD.  Time’ is a younger man, probably mid twenties I would guess who, I think, believes he is supposed to be a Le Mans race car driver.  He is definitely one in training.  The truck is a nice Ford extended cab with 44 K kilometers on it; five speed, quick little motor.  He weaves in and out out of traffic most assuredly; very fast, very precise, very close.  I can only watch and bite my lip if, for nothing else, to hold down my corn muffin and coffee from the plane which I successfully do; thrice.

After leaving the airport parking lot I am struck by the garbage.  I wonder if the town is nothing but roads and buildings built on an uncovered landfill.  Were it not for the recirculating AC in the truck I would have lost my lunch upon departure.  Many buildings are small structures that are butted next to other buildings.  More than half have current evidence of damage.  Debris is piled along the road in piles with sewage and garbage in between.  The roads have concrete sections missing with nothing put in to fill the void.  Road damage is evident every few hundred yards or less.  Everything is narrow, crowded with people, animals, cars and trucks.  Traffic drives on whatever side of the road is vacant; horns sound that someone is driving wherever it is vacant.  Tents, leans to’s, shanties, whatever keeps the rain out are the structures that house.  I am befuddled as to how people can live in this; it simply does not register. It isn’t just the living conditions, but it is the quantity of living conditions; virtually everywhere we drive, everywhere I look.  I am numb.