Back to Port-au-Prince

The last few days of our stay in Baudin went well. We were able to meet with some of the local engineers and contractors that were involved in the design and construction of the church and school in Baudin to hear what they thought about the damage and their ideas for repairs. I worry about reconstruction as I know they do not understand earthquakes and how to design for them. There is still no building code in Haiti but I think most organizations that have contributed to the releif efforts will demand the buildings are built to some seismic building code.

I arrived in Port-au-Prince (PAP) on Thursday afternoon and am already missing the countryside. The views in the mountains are just incredible. It was really neat seeing the people in Baudin again. On Thursday we made a stop in Jacmel on our way to PAP. It is a port town on the southern coast of Haiti, and although smaller than PAP, is much cleaner and nicer (before the EQ at least). There we stopped to meet the interim bishop, who used to be the pastor in Baudin. He had us inspect a couple of his schools which were quite large (one was 4 stories and the other was 5 stories). After that we headed to PAP. The ride from Jacmel to PAP was about 2 hours and was paved the whole way, which felt like a luxury after driving on gravel roads for the last week. It was a very curvy road that wound through the mountains before flattening near Leogone, the epicenter of the quake.

In PAP, our first order of business was to meet with Catholic Relief Services to see if they might contribute to our efforts to support Baudin. It was neat to hear what they were apart of. We were able to see Martin, our translator's damaged house and then went up into the hills, where he is currently staying at a friend's place. I am still shocked to see all the damage in PAP. Every block there is something to see, be it collapsed buildings or fields/streets full of tents. On some of the hillsides it seems like 75% of the homes have collapsed. Once again I tried to upload pictures to no avail. There are people out trying to clean the streets as well as dump trucks and bulldozers but they still have a long way to go. It is sad to see but at the same time happy to see how helpfull and gracious the Haitians are to each other and visitors after the catastrophe.

Yesturday we dropped the other members of the group, John and Rob, off at the airport and then headed to Fonkoze. After some car trouble (Martin, I, and a couple of Haitian good samaritans had to push start his truck backwards down a one-way street, haha), Martin dropped me off at Fonkoze. I think I have found a permanent place to stay that I will move into sometime next week, but for this weekend the intern coordinator has been gracious enough to invite me to stay at her home, where I am writing from now. It is a very nice place and I must admit I feel a little guilty that I am living this nicely. The last few days have been a little overwhelming at times but I have been trying to remain calm. Sorry for the long post. I will try to keep posts shorter but felt like I had a lot that happened in the last few days.