The Rainy Season

I now understand why Haitians call this their “rainy season”. Yesterday after meeting with Anne Hastings and Roger Desir, Nixon and I were headed back up the hill to Pétionville when it began to rain. Now, I’ve been in rain before. After all, I do live in Oregon where we have a lot of rain. But not like this rain.

The curb-side gutters soon filled with water rushing down the hill, pushing all of the debris along. When the water encountered cars parked along the road way, the water shot up as if it were a geyser.

Children were coming home from school. Not only were they drenched to the skin with water, they were seeking to cross streets through the rushing torrents of water. At one point, the rush of water was so great, that the entire roadway became a 40 foot wide stream.

Parents rightfully concerned about their children walking home in this rain, decided to drive to pick them up. While it is something I would have done as well, the addition of cars on the streets only made the traffic more of a nightmare. Talk about grid-lock! We were caught at one corner for over 30 minute before the traffic began to inch along.

As trying as this was for those of us navigating our way through the traffic, it was that much more difficult for the people walking along or trying to sell their wares along the streets. At one particularly slow intersection, Nixon pointed out his mother (Madamn Blanc) tending her stall. This is how she make her living and supports her family.

I couldn’t get out of my mind how this rain must be for the thousands of Haitians still living in the many tent cities around Port-au-Prince. There is no way they could possibly keep this amount of water out of their tents or their possessions dry.