The village “town criers”, the many roosters and dogs, crow and bark us awake with their symphony of animated calls and responses between 4 and 4:30. No one needs an alarm clock in Kakok, or probably any other small village in Haiti either.
The heavy rain comes again, drowning out the criers off an on. I use the predawn relative peace and quiet to write some of these words, trying to capture the memories of yesterday before they recede into oblivion. By 6 or 7 Ken and I set about surveying our situation, sorting and putting things away on shelves and contemplating the toilet.
I have to tell you about the bathroom and toilet. In anticipation of our arrival Wager has hired a team of masons to build an addition on to the library, a cinderblock and cement elevated room for a toilet, sink and shower, to be the first one in the entire village, and probably the only one in any of the 37 villages on the island. It will have running water from a cistern on the roof, and one of the marvels of modern technology, a real two-stage underground septic tank with a removable clean-out lid that will vent its decomposed effluent into a stone and pipe leech field flowing right towards a small plot of banana trees and sugar cane planted behind the library.
It is amazing. We are all impressed, even dumbfounded, no one expected this level of sophistication and modern convenience. There are only a couple of problems. There is no door into the bathroom for one. The room has been constructed of three tall and solid cinderblock walls against one corner of the library, part of the back wall that includes one small window. By moving a couple of the 5 gallon pails of soup mix donated by the Gleaners against the wall and laying a board across them, we are able to get up enough to swing one leg over the window sill and wriggle through the window into the small room. With a door and a lot more work in can work as a bathroom, but at present it has no water, no sink, no shower and the roof is open to the sky, not to mention no door or way in or out save crawling through the window.
But those things will come in time, the immediate priority is finding water to fill a bucket to flush the toilet and some toilet paper. I find a bucket and head for the bay while Ken searches for TP. Those simple little things in life we take for granted up north, are now precious, rare commodities that require effort, logistics and planning.
The quests for water and TP are successful and the toilet flushes well, almost an occasion for celebration and congratulations all around. We love it. Thanks Wag and all who worked so hard on it.
Boat ride in “The Oxford”, Wager’s hand made, and rough by most standards, typical wooden Haitian sailing boat with a 9.9 Nissan outboard fitted to it. The Oxford is named after Captain Morgan’s flagship that sailed these waters a couple of hundred years ago, and Wagner’s little craft is no less sturdy, stoutly nailed together from native mango and other tropical hardwoods, she is ageless and timeless and a noble and seaworthy vessel for our short ride five miles across the bay.
Les Cayes Immigration office, 50 or so people staniding in line out into the street. As we approach Bruce remarks at the long line that it will take hours. I reply that maybe that is the line to get OUT of haiti, and the line to get in will be shorter. As we near the entrance, Bruce notices the Arrivals door to eh left and says “You were absolutely correct, no line at “Arrivals” and it was true, no line, walked tight in, the immigration officer gestured me to an empty chair, gave me a long form to fill out, I filled in the blanks, handed it back to him, he asked for $20, I handed him a 20 which he swept into a drawer which will hold it until he puts it in his pocket, the whole thing took 10 minutes. The 50 or so Haitians wanting to leave the country were still standing in line when I left, sad but that is the way of life here. They can't leave so perhaps working together many hands can help make life a little better for them here.
Trip back - fire on small island, Wagner says it burns completely, all the houses are mad of palm trees and when one catches fire they all burn.
Meetings, new priorities.
Farewell to Bruce, Arlen and R Heritage Too as they head off for Grand Cayman.
Dinner - Wagner's wife Mirleine cooked us Lobster in a delicious red sauce with onions and rice. It was fantastic, and served on a white table cloth on nice ceramic plates, clean silverware and delivered with a fly cover over the plates of food all the way. We are being treated like visiting royalty, though I know we have not earned it and feel mixed about taking food from people who have so little, but it would be insulting to refuse, and that is the deal. We cam here to bring them a huge cargo of gifts, and to stay and work and help them more, and they are welcoming us and extending what hospitality they can.
Now we are truly living in Haiti. Ken and I are not the only white people on the island (there are 25 or so Irish volunteers staying at Abaka Bay a few miles away), but we are certainly the only white people living in Kakok Village. All of the other visitors on the island are staying at the hotels, perhaps a few in one or two private homes, plus a few who come ashore from their sailboats during the day. Certainly no one else is living in a Haitian house in the middle of a village. We are strangers in a strange land, but feel totally safe, welcome, embraced, loved, appreciated and at home in spite of being far from home.
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