Saturday, May 17, 2014

The array of photos are not exactly in order of story that follows but I hope you will enjoy seeing them.New Jerry art
Happy Flag Day, celebration 211 years of Haitian Flag, May 18th 

I passed on this veve, and kind of regret it. 



Montana pool 

Playing Casino at the Iron Market

at the beach

Mini manifestation

Driving to Jacmel

Welcome to Jacmel

Refreshment

Boardwalk

Our guides and security- The Brothers Dade
Frandy, Jean Jean, Ti Wes






a little birthday celebration..


The top of the National Museum- no photos allowed inside.

arriving at Basin Bleu








Car wash and spa

My friend Beth whom I will miss very much and Karol

my mom


my brother

my baby boy

Be safe, I love you! 


Five months into 2014- time to write an update to my blog site. I just returned from vacation in Portland where I celebrated the birthdays of 2 of my now grown up kids, celebrated the life of my mother in law, visited my mom, caught up with friends (though not enough of them- sorry Jody and Linda)  and said see you in a year to my son being deployed to the middle east as security for cargo ships ala Captain Phillips-style.  A bitter sweet time to say the least. 

Back now for a few days, I’ve nearly caught up with work missed while away which sort of takes away from the fun of vacation doesn’t it? Upon arrival I found that Chikungunya fever has turned into an epidemic - many of our staff have had or are coming down with this nasty viral mosquito borne disease causing headache and joint pain lasting 2-3 days generally. I’ll try to protect myself and hope that I don’t get bit but I’m guessing they aren’t very discriminate as to who those stealth buggers bite. 


In the past 5 months since writing an update to my blog, I’ve had the good fortune to have many old friends / teams visit and made some new friends from far away places. I’ve said good bye to others as they have left, knowing their presence will be missed. One of my favorite things to do is show people the ‘other’ side of Haiti, to experience the cultural side of Haiti. The National Museum is interesting and beautiful, the Iron Market is a crazy fun place to find ‘bargain’ artisan crafts if you are a strong barterer and Champ Mas is full of statues that represent the country’s history. And of course there are the beaches!

We had a four day Easter holiday weekend and decided to head out of the city. We first visited one of my favorite places, Jacmel, a southern coastal city about a 2 hours drive on wind-y roads through a couple of mountain ranges. Jacmel is the sleepy, but charming little sister to Port au Prince. But she is waking up- the new ‘boardwalk’ along the sea is beautiful with its wide mosaic path beautiful in the glow of street lamps. The town square is being renovated to provide a hang out for friends. My friends and I stayed with the family of my driver and also visited their home in the mountains of Jacmel. Our gracious host, Lucienne fed us spaghetti for breakfast and kreyol chicken for dinner; we received fruit fresh off the trees to more than satisfy our thirst- the sweet tang of grapefruit called chadduk, juicy little mandarins, the creamy white flesh of corosol and coconut milk- after the hike up the mountain trail.

To wash off the heat of the hike, we bathed in the cooling waters of Basin Bleu.  Basin Bleu is actually a series of 3 fresh water ponds reflecting a true aqua from the sky. A guide takes you along the 15 minute trail to the final pond filled by the rushing waterfall cascading over the rock walls surrounding the grotto. My first visit to Bassin Bleu years ago, I was too afraid to jump from the rocks; apparently, I’ve become more adventurous because I jumped (not from the top of course) but it seemed high enough. 
The next day we went to the river to wash the van and bathe in the river- a totally Haitian experience. The river thought relatively small was just warm enough and fast enough to lay in and feel as if you were receiving a relaxing massage. We did block out the fact that there were probably more cars being cleaned, laundry and bodies being washed up river from us and just reveled in the moment.  The afternoon was spent at a beach with the local crowd, sellers of jewelry, and wooden carvings wanting us to bargain for a good price as we dined on the fresh fish, piklis and banane washed down with Prestige and Barbincourt. Later we shopped downtown for some of the paper mache masks that Jacmel is famous for. 
The third day of our road trip took us to Aquin for the annual Jazz Music Festival. We rented a couple of tents, relaxed on the beach before exploring the city square in search of dinner and then spent the evening enjoying some great music including Boukman Eksperyans.  Although the tents were not on the beach as they were the first time I came to Aquin, the sleeping mats were much better, a slightly more comfortable but less romantic than sleeping on the beach 20 feet from the sea. 
The next day we returned to Port au Prince, early enough to avoid the Rara bands in Leogane and to spend the late afternoon relaxing and reminiscing about our fun experience.