photos

exterior wall cracks after 3.5 aftershock
interior wall cracks

walls going up....

spreading cement before it sets


sailor man Dan
Capitol building in Puerto Rico
old building...

Dancers at l'ecole des danseWrigley Field- Cubbys lost

Its been over a month since I have made a post...very neglectful of me. I don't even know where to start this. Suffice to say internet is very slow today and this may not even get posted.

Its been 6 weeks since Martelly was inaugurated President of Haiti. Have we noticed any changes? Not really but not for his lack of trying. First thing he must do is to nominate a Prime Minister who needs to be accepted by the senate (which is ruled by the Inite party). His first choice was voted down. I have not heard who his next choice is officially. This in itself could take months as history shows for the confirmation of the previous PM. People remain hopeful for change.

Since the inauguration, I have been to Chicago to witness the graduation of my son from Navy bootcamp in May. We were able to spend one day with him before he returned to base to be shipped out to Texas for further training is the security forces. Since he is a reservist (not sure that is the right term for Navy) he will be based in Portland. He did very well during his 9 weeks in Chicago- I'm a proud mom to a strong young man!

The rest of us were able to enjoy a few days in Chicago, taking in a Cubs game at Wrigley Field and doing a bit of walking about the city.

I had 10 days to catch up with work before Fiona and I headed to Puerto Rico for the International Rehab meeting. About 1200 participants from around the world were there. We attended meetings that included Disaster planning and establishing rehab after disaster. HHH/ TCHH had a poster displayed and Colleen O'Connell, MD PMR was on a panel discussion.

The interesting part for me was being in a group of people from Italy, UK, Nicaragua, New Zealand, Austrailia, Switzerland, Mexico, Austria, France, Ghana (representative) and as there about 15 in our group, I've forgotten where the rest are from- Most were MD's, heads of Departments of Something or someplace...Fiona and I, along with Dr. Moise who was in another meeting were seemingly the only ones from ( or representing) Haiti.

Puerto Rico was beautiful. We stayed in Old San Juan and were within walking distance of the old town area. Lots of little shops in colorful old buildings along the narrow cobblestone streets. Shopkeepers were sprucing up for a visit from President Obama~ the first US President to visit since President Kennedy in 1961. The majority seemed to be very excited about is visit despite the fact that 1) it was a 'four' hour trip (to Gilligan's Island). 2) Tickets to participate in drinks or lunch were extremely expensive and 3) it cost an extreme amount of money to prepare for the visit. There were reports that there would be some protests but apparently even that turned out to be a very small group that received no attention.

The worst part about the trip was that I lost my phone (and a bunch of pictures of my trip) but even that wasn't as bad as it could be as Puerto Rico is like being in the states...I went to the local mall to the AT&T store and 30 minutes later walked out with a new phone (but without my pictures). Someone will find my phone and sell it and be happy with themselves no doubt.

Back home in Port au Prince, we have seen progress made on our building. They poured concrete for the main floor (turned out to be a very loud all night project that kept me mostly awake all night) and the walls are starting to go up! I'll post a variety of photos soon.

Last week we had an aftershock of 3.5 and reports of 20-30 people injured from people panicking during the rush out of a school were treated. A few buildings that were already declared 'red' collapsed. Our guest house apparently is fine- we'll have an engineer check it but no new cracks were found. However, my apartment that had not sustained any damage in the initial earthquake did receive damage. Because this 'aftershock' was vertical vs. horizontal, it pushed up the columns and the caused a lot of cracks. I've been assured that it is still safe and in the event of a 'horizontal' earthquake most likely the exterior wall will fall out but the ceiling will remain intact. Interesting how comforting that is. Honestly, I'm more concerned about the occasional creepy bugs that we see- scorpions and milipods. They are scary!