HAITI: MEDICAL MISSION TEAM EVACUATED BECAUSE OF FOOD RIOTS: FIRST-HAND ACCOUNT by DR. NORMA MURRAY: 14/04/2008 (MaximsNews Network)

     UNITED NATIONS - / MaximsNews Network / 14 April 2008 -- The following is the first-hand account of Norma Murray, MD, member of the medical mission team evacuated from Haiti this week because of the food riots:

"The Church of the Presentation in Upper Saddle River, NJ started a twinning project with a parish in Haiti in 2002.  When the twinning committee met with the Haitian parishioners they asked them what they needed the most.  The answer was medical care, and Dianne Montuori, co-leader of the group and a nurse at Hackensack University Medical Center in Hackensack, NJ, told them they would be back in six months with doctors.  And they were.  And they returned almost biannually after that.  One time the mission needed to be cancelled for political unrest and another time for financial reasons.  An offshoot of the mission, NoVa Hope for Haiti, Inc. (Colette McDermott, executive director) is a non-profit organization that has attained NGO status in Haiti (www.novahopeforhaiti.org).  In 2007 the agency bought a farmhouse and 12 acres of land just outside the town in 2007, and has plans to build a free-standing clinic and surgical suite with residences for resident and visiting doctors to be run year-around.  In addition to providing direct care in the clinic, the agency plans to train health agents to go up into the mountain communities to educate and triage problems.  An agronomy school is also planned to teach modern farming methods and to promote the growing of trees.  I joined the mission in April 2006 as a pediatrician, and enjoyed the experience so much that I have attended each mission since then.  

The April 2008 mission started without any major problems.  Most of the team members knew each other and had been to Haiti before, so we knew what to expect and what to do.  Even the walk through Haitian customs with our bins of supplies was free of problems.  We had initially planned to fly from the capital into Les Cayes and take tap-taps from the airport to Aquin.  The bus would drive from the capital and meet us there with our bins of supplies and the medications.  However, there had been some unrest in Les Cayes and four Haitians had been killed at the end of the previous week, so the decision was made for the entire team to drive and two extra cars were secured to take the team members who did not fit on the bus. We believed Les Cayes was far enough away from the mountains around Cavaillon where we would set up the clinic on Monday, and from Aquin where we would stay in the only guesthouse in the area large enough to house our entire team together.

The cars and the bus were waiting for us outside the airport so we packed up and left Port au Prince on the road that skirts the edge of Carrefour, a district in Port au Prince known as the site of riots and protest.  The day was sunny and everything was quiet on the road.  We were in high spirits and we had no idea we were riding into trouble.  I was sitting in the first car and we had sped away from the others in the slower bus, because the driver had to drive the 5 hour trip back to Port au Prince after dropping us off at Aquin, and didn’t want to be on the roads during the dangerous dark hours.  The other car stayed behind the rickety bus just in case there was a problem.  At Miragoane, a town about 30 minutes from Aquin, we ran into a UN checkpoint outside their garrison there.  They were checking for zam (weapons).  We had none, explained we were going to conduct a medical mission and were waved on.  We arrived at Aquin and waited nearly an hour for the rest of the team.  The bus had run out of gas.  Par for the course: this was Haiti.  A call was made from the road and diesel fuel arrived on a motorcycle.  Therefore, we felt we would be in no danger to continue the mission.

At the UN checkpoint, the team members on the bus were told people had been transporting arms to Les Cayes and they were expecting more trouble there.  They were not told it would be dangerous to travel to Aquin or Cavaillon.  At dinner that night we gave thanks for a relatively easy arrival and made plans for the following day.  We had planned, like the first day of every clinic, to set up the community center of the Church of the Immaculate Conception at Cavaillon with a pharmacy table, a supplies table, 4 cubicles separated by hanging sheets, each with a wooden exam table for the doctors and the health counselor, a registration table and an area for the nurses to take temperatures, blood pressures and weights.  There would also be chairs set up in various areas for waiting.  The medications we had ordered from IDA in Amsterdam had finally cleared customs on Saturday, but our person on the ground in Port au Prince had not been able to get to the airport to get them.  She was planning to get the boxes early on Monday and join us in Cavaillon so the pharmacy could be set up.   

On Monday morning, we arose to find a beautiful, breezy and temperate day.  We also looked toward Cavaillon and were disconcerted to see two columns of the thick, black smoke of burning tires along the road out of town.  The hotel staff reported to us that a roadblock had been set up there. During breakfast, the team had a discussion and decided to try to get to Cavaillon.  We grabbed our water and snacks for lunch and boarded the bus, confident that because we are known in the area as medical missionaries, we would be allowed to pass and would be able to set up the clinic.  As a precaution, we hired a young man who works at the hotel to run interference for us on a motorcycle.  

At the first roadblock, composed of tree branches and tires burning at the sides, our advance team was able to talk us through.  What the crowd around the blockade knew but did not tell us, was that about a quarter mile down the road was a really serious road block.  This was a pile of large rocks and boulders about 18 to 24 inches high.  The roadside sloped downward on both sides and it would be impossible to go around it.  The barricade would have taken some time to build, and it became apparent that despite the best efforts of the young man from the hotel, and one of our translators, that they were in no mood to dismantle their work for us.  The bus backed up a safe distance and then turned around.  

As we approached the initial roadblock again, someone in the back of the bus decided to take a picture and the camera flashed.  That caused the protesters to surround the bus.  Their faces, disfigured with anger, shouted to us in Creole and began to point fingers and put their hands on the bus and hit it.  They were looking into the bus and we were afraid they would try to grab our packs, but none of them actually reached into the open windows.  Some of them picked up broken pieces of cinder block and came menacingly toward the bus.  We were fearful that they would be thrown, but in fact they were placed under the wheels of the bus to prevent them from moving.  The same courageous Haitian translator, who has been a faithful member of the mission for several years, again risked his own neck for ours and got out of the bus and asked to speak to the leader.  The demand was for the picture, and once the data card was taken from the camera and handed over, the blocks were removed and the road was opened.  In the mean time, several members of the team had become so traumatized with fear that there was hysteria and uncontrollable tears.  

The Haitian and Haitian-American members of the team felt at higher risk than the rest of us, as Haitians feel they are more likely targets for kidnappings than the white members of the team.  When we reached the hotel, we all closed ranks to try to calm everyone down.  At that point, we met and decided to wait a day or so to see if this was a one-day protest that would blow over, and if not, we would go back to the capital.  However the situation changed when we were notified by the Haitian team members who had gone into the town to buy phone cards that both sides of the town were blockaded.  

We could hear crowds of people shouting in the streets down the hill in town.  We then realized that we were isolated and would be unable to leave.  We noted that the schools were closed because of the protests and asked the children in the neighborhood when they would be opening.  We were told that they would get a call when the schools re-opened, but that they didn’t know when that would be.  Our anxiety level rose when we received news of protesting and unrest in Carrefour and it was then we realized that our situation was indeed serious.   We notified the State Department of our location and the details of the state of affairs in Aquin.  We did have water and food for the time being, and no one had stormed the gates of the hotel so we were told the safest thing to do was to hunker down and stay away from the windows.  There would be no helicopter rescue by the Marines, which was what some of the team expected the State Department to do.  Others of us realized that without a military presence in a sovereign country, a helicopter rescue without an evacuation order that included the embassy would be tantamount to invasion and understood that the political consequences would not be good.  

We also found out that there were as many as 25 other missionary groups in the country, although some of them were electing to stay.  We let them know that we certainly did not want to stay.  We were hoping the national police force would begin to clean the roads, or that the UN might send one of the helicopters that flew over daily.  However, we were told the UN does not carry civilians in any of their vehicles.  Learning that the airport at Les Cayes was closed to commercial flights made us realize we probably could not get out by vehicle without help.  We tried to keep busy by playing cards and dominoes or reading, but mostly we kept coming back to small group conversations about the latest news, the latest phone call and speculation about what we should or could do.  

Another hotel guest, a Frenchman working for a firm that was negotiating construction of a water purification plant for the town left abruptly in a car that had been sent from Port au Prince to evacuate him.  He promised to call us and let us know if he made it.  He called several hours to tell us he did.  We knew that our large team would not be able to do the same, and surely would not make it through Carrefour.  The Haitians on the team told us that more than likely, the blockades would be taken down on Saturday or Sunday so that the town could be re-provisioned, and the team felt resigned to probably having to wait until then and then driving out.  

Most of us had not called family on Monday, wanting to wait to let the situation clarify, and not wanting to unnecessarily alarm elderly parents, young children and spouses.  However, by Tuesday, when there was more tire-burning and shouting from the streets, many team members including myself were calling family members to ask them to call the offices of the State Department, their congressmen and senators, and their pastors and archbishops to try to put pressure on the American government to arrange a rescue of some sort.  We were sure we would not be able to get out without significant outside support.  Emotions were running high and some members of the team sent emails to various places that exaggerated our situation in an effort to force someone to do something to help us.   The hotel kept the electricity on for part of the day so we could use the computer to send and receive email and we consulted the various news agencies on the web.  

Our team leader, Joe Nuzzi, was on the phone several times a day with the State Department representative Ann Marie Cassella in Port au Prince, and on Tuesday she reported that she was working at home on a cell phone because the embassy was closed, as the staff was unable to get to work because the capital was so volatile and the protests and rioting had spread out of Carrefour.  We were joined on Tuesday morning by another guest, a banker from Les Cayes.  He had had to close the bank but was unable to get home.  On Tuesday evening we all reported to each other what our family members were attempting and tried to maintain hope.  

We called Father Lampey at the Church of the Immaculate Conception in Cavaillon and a local man there who provides help to the mission, and they were surprised to hear about the barricades, because they told us there were none in Cavaillon.  We were all imagining all the other people from the mountains around the town who didn’t know and who had walked to the clinic only to be disappointed and we were saddened.  This added to our sense of powerlessness.  From the vantage of the rooftop veranda, we could watch the town and the farms surrounding the hotel.  Motorbikes were buzzing up and down the main road but life on the mountains around us went on as usual as goats were herded upward, farmers scratched their crops into the soil and horses and burros descended the mountains with bags of mangoes and other crops to sell along the main road.  

On Wednesday morning, a man from the neighborhood around the hotel stood outside the enclosing fence and waved the saw he carried and ranted in Creole for a good 5 minutes.  I did not understand much, but did recognize the word blanc (white person) and the gist of his message was that we were inside eating and he was outside without enough to eat.  We determined that starting with that evening’s meal we would ask the hotel staff to set out our buffet meals indoors instead of on the outdoor dining area where we were visible to any neighbor that passed by the enclosing fence. Shortly after breakfast (late because many on the team were sleeping late because we had no where to go and not much to do) a group of us was playing cards and having conversation on the veranda behind the hotel when we heard three sharp high-pitched popping sounds of small arms fire, followed by automatic gunfire.  

We made a mad dash for cover behind a concrete bar, only to be approached by the cook who was walking around unconcerned and told us not to worry.  The noise was in town and not outside the gate.  We were safe in the hotel, she said; as safe as in the embassy.  That was only tires popping on the road.  Team members who had been on the rooftop veranda at the time had seen a UN convoy that was escorting a fully packed and brightly painted bus through town.  The convoy had taken gunfire and had returned it.  The town was noisy for a while, and the local priest, Father Gousse Oremil, came for a visit to try to allay the anxiety he knew we must be feeling and to report the local conditions.  He told us that the town was short on food, especially bread, and that the young people had taken control.  Most of us interpreted those things as ominous.  He promised to return in the evening and say mass for us.  After the mass, he stayed to have dinner with us, and then promised to return the next evening.  He is a very calm, soft-spoken and gentle man who not only runs St. Thomas parish in Aquin but has ten churches in the surrounding mountains to which he must walk and he oversees 9 schools.  He also is executive director of Fonhsud, a Haitian agency dedicated to the economic development of the Department of Sud He told us that he had closed his schools for the entire week.  Despite his upsetting information, his quiet and confident affect was calming.  We also got another call from the businessman who had left on Monday.  He indicated he was trapped in a hotel in the capital and wished he had stayed in Aquin.  We learned sometime later that his firm had managed to get him on a flight out of Port au Prince.  

Wednesday morning Haitian team members visiting the town reported a massive blockade consisting of two cars and a container across the road at the entrance to our street.  Some of us wondered if we were being targeted and if we were indeed being held hostage by the elements who were perpetrating this obviously well-organized action which we now heard had spread over the entire country.  Wednesday afternoon, we were also visited by Dr. Danielle Coumeau, a doctor who commutes between Aquin and Port au Prince.  Her message was also that we were safe in the hotel and that the people were protesting the government’s refusal to release food from the ports and to decrease the cost of food that had increased 100% in 6 weeks.  Noting that not only our street, but all the streets were blockaded at the main road to prevent circumnavigating the main blockades, she told us we were not targets.  She said that they were not planning to storm the hotel, and that we should stay put.  To do otherwise would be dangerous.  Her presence also was comforting to many of the team members, some of whom were beginning to have stomach cramps, vomiting and diarrhea or headaches from the anxiety they were feeling.  We learned Wednesday afternoon on the news that the protesters were calling for the resignation of the Prime Minister and that the President would make a speech that evening.  However, he had not by the time we turned the radio off and went to bed.

My husband, Brian Murray, called to report what he was doing at his end and what the responses had been so far.  Senator Scott Garrett’s office had called the Office of Overseas Services and wanted a list of names with cellphone numbers in Haiti and US contacts for each team member.  He had not heard back from the offices of Congressman Rothman or Senator Menendez.  The State Department told him they knew where we were and the state of the situation and that they could not coordinate a rescue.  

Luckily for the team, Brian had met Dr. Max Stamper of MaximsNews Network, a former UN official, while working out at the local gym and they had become friendly.  He notified Dr. Stamper of the situation, who immediately gathered information and sent emails to a long list of people at the UN [U.N. Under-Secretary-General Jean-Marie Guehenno and U.N. Assistant-Secretary-General Dmitry Titov, Hedi Annabi, U.N. Secretary-General's Special Representative for Haiti and others].  

Later, on Wednesday evening, I got a call from Peter Schmitz, Chief of Staff of the UN Peacekeeping Mission in Haiti, from Port au Prince.  Mr. Schmitz told me he was reviewing the resources that he might bring to bear on our situation and gave me his office and cellphone numbers.  He asked if we had food and water for that night and I affirmed that the hotel staff was supplying our needs along those lines.  He told me to call if a situation arose in the night and that he would be in touch in the morning.  The fact that he had not said that he could not offer any help, even though he had not promised anything, helped to increase the sense of hope and calm I was trying to maintain in myself.  

Mr. Ken Durkin of the State Department in Washington spoke to my husband that evening and told him that the state Department was negotiating with the UN peacekeepers for an escort out of Aquin and possibly a UN flight to the capital.  The Les Cayes airport was still closed to commercial flights at that time.  Other family members had called their New York congressmen and senators and church officials in the archdiocese of New York, and Father Bob Stagg of the Church of the Presentation was actively pressing our case with the State Department.    

The team was becoming more fearful and our discussions became more argumentative.  Some team members had wakened to noises in the night, and on Wednesday evening, team members demanded keys to the iron gates that closed the access to the building and each level so we could escape the building in case of fire caused by torches or Molotov cocktails being thrown into the windows.  The hotel manager was happy to comply, although he reassured us that no one was planning to attack the hotel.  In addition the main gate was locked at night and the property was guarded by an armed guard.  Nevertheless, having the keys allowed team members to sleep a little better.     

On Thursday morning, our ranting neighbor was back with another verbal tirade, but on both occasions, neither the hotel staff nor the neighbors in the nearby homes joined him, but seemed to ignore him.  That made me hopeful that his sentiments were not held by all the people in Aquin.  There seemed to be no tires burning on Thursday, but the news from town indicated that fuel was becoming scarce and the local gas station was closed.  Without fuel for the generator, the electric pumps would not be able to fill the cisterns for wash water and toilets, and there would be no more electricity for the computer and to recharge the cellphones, which would obliterate our ability to communicate with family, friends and the officials we were counting on to help. That would cause our situation to become desperate.  Earlier that morning, I had observed a motorcycle arriving twice with large containers of what I believe was diesel fuel.  The cook arrived on foot carrying two chickens.  The hotel staff was doing their best to protect us and to keep us comfortable.  We got the news that President Preval had spoken to the people in a 5-minute speech that indicated that there would be no resignation and that there would be no short-term solution to the food crisis; rather he had asked that farmers plant more rice.  Those of us who had hoped that a resignation would prompt the opening of the barricades were disappointed, and we all felt the speech was inflammatory."  

We were told by Ms. Cassella that the airport in Les Cayes was re-opening and the flights would resume that morning.  There was a sense of excitement among the entire team later that morning when that airplane flew directly over us.  That plane also clinched the decision that our escape route would be to the west to Les Cayes and not eastward toward the still-heated Carrefour.  We were in touch with several members of the UN garrison in Les Cayes, including Eddie Lindor.  The reports were that things were calm enough for businesses and banks to open in Les Cayes and conditions were also calming in the capital.  The State Department representative, Ann Marie Cassella, called back to tell us there would be no escort by the UN and asked if there wasn’t another road out of town.  She was asked if she had consulted a map, because the road we were on was the only drivable road from the capital to Les Cayes, and it was still blockaded, despite the message she had received from the UN that the road was clear to Les Cayes.  

Our team leader reiterated to her that although we were not in immediate danger, we felt isolated and powerless and were quite mindful that our situation depended on continued provision of food and fuel that was out of our control, and might not be in the control of the hotel management in the near future.  He noted also that we were afraid our bus, which was old and prone to break down might not make the trip out if we were to get out by road.  Also, the windows were large and we were afraid of gunfire and stones thrown from the roadside.  However, on discussing the possibility of hiring cars and drivers to escort us to Les Cayes should we be able to get out, Mr. Dadou, the hotel manager, indicated that he had retained a minivan and pickup truck with local drivers that had been going to drive us from the Les Cayes airport on our arrival before we learned of the troubles that had started there the previous weekend and had forced us to drive to Aquin instead.  However, they were across town and could not get to us until the roads were cleared out.  Mr. Lindor of the Les Cayes UN garrison told us that the road from Cavaillon to Les Cayes was open and that the UN garrison in Les Cayes had had a meeting and that they were planning to open the blockades from Cavaillon to Aquin and then escort us to Les Cayes.  

Later, we got the word that the blockades would be swept but that Mr. Schmitz in Port au Prince felt a UN presence with us would draw gunfire from the side of the road and would not be safe for us, and that the Special Representative to the Secretary General in Haiti had denied the escort.  Mr. Lindor suggested that we call the State Department and ask them to call the office of the SRSG to ask for the permission.  We indicated that reliable transportation and local drivers had been arranged for us by the hotel management and that given trustworthy vehicles, we agreed that UN presence might be counterproductive.  We felt our best bet would be for the UN to insure the blockades were down and then rely on local people to get us through to Les Cayes.  That evening, Thursday, as the sun went down, we put an IV into a team member who had been unable to keep any food down due to anxiety and had become dehydrated.   

In the dusk, a series of fires appeared on the mountains immediately around Aquin.  It is not unusual to see fires on the mountains in Haiti, as each community will burn its trash at night.  However, it usually appears as a small dot of orange on the hillside.  What I observed was a row of 3 or 4 large dots in a straight line on the mountain to the east of us, followed by a huge conflagration on the peak of the mountain behind us, and rows of 3 or 4 fires on each of the two hills to the west of us.  The Haitian translator who had been so brave during our initial attempt to get to Cavaillon explained to me that they were probably just burning an area to prepare the fields for planting, but I felt uneasy for the first time, and did not sleep well Thursday night.  

I got up early on Friday morning and went to the roof.  I found another team member already there who was also unable to sleep.  We watched the sun rise over the mountains and saw the town come alive.  We heard the horn of a large truck for the first time all week, and I saw an empty panel truck emerge from a non-blockaded side street and disappear down the road toward the capital.  I also noted three tap-tap taxis move one by one westward along the main road. They all drove down the street to the large blockade and then turned around and picked up passengers who looked like they were dressed for work.  They also appeared to drive out of town toward Port au Prince.  The road to Les Cayes, however, was empty except for motorcycles and foot traffic.  After watching for a while, I went down to report what I had seen.  The blockade on the eastern side of town appeared to have been taken down.   On the home front, Peter Schmitz had emailed my husband that the UN garrison at Les Cayes had sent a convoy that was actively breaking the barricades along the road to Aquin.

Fr. Gousse Oremil arrived about 9:30 or 10 AM, and announced that all the barricades were down.  The promised minibus and truck arrived and Fr. Gousse announced that he would drive to Cavaillon to verify that the road was clear to that point.  We all went to get packed, and one team member called TortugAir and made a reservation for 15 seats on a chartered flight out of Les Cayes, guaranteed on her credit card.  We would call them when we left the hotel and they would have the plane there two hours later.  

When Fr. Gousse arrived back to report that the road was indeed open, we were packed and ready to leave.  Fr. Gousse and Dr. Coumeau were both prepared to accompany us in addition to the two local drivers.  They would draw less attention and could to try to defuse any difficulty that might arise with protesters along the way.  Dr. Comeau arranged the seating to try to keep most of the white faces in the middle so as to arouse as little attention as possible.  The luggage was packed and tied down in the bed of the pickup and what did not fit there was carried on our laps.  Fr. Gousse would ride in front with the truck and Dr. Coumeau would ride in the minivan that would follow.  There were only enough seats for 13 of the 15 team members, and our bus driver and one of the Haitian-American team members who had spent 6 years in the US Marine Corp volunteered to ride in the open truck bed with the luggage.  We bid farewell to the hotel staff who has cared hospitably for us for 2 weeks out of each year and for whom we all have very fond feelings, and left the safety of the hotel.  Joe Nuzzi called the embassy and notified Ann Marie Cassella that we were moving, and we called TortugAir and told them we would see them in two hours.  It was about 11 AM.  As we drove down the side street, I waved goodbye to smiling children’s faces, but met some angry adult stares as we approached the edge of town on the main road around the area of the former burning tire blockade.  We were all stunned at the frequency of the blockades, and the state of clearance of the road was open to debate, as the vehicles had to swerve around boulders and logs and piles of stone still in the road.  We all prognosticated that the roadblocks, only half-cleared, would be back up on Monday morning.  

About 15 minutes up the road, we suddenly had to stop as we came upon a UN convoy that was engaged in an operation which also included the National Police and the local police of San Louis du Sud.   I could see several men clearing two large truck tires, a palm log and some large rocks from the street behind the convoy, and the attention of the officers was to the right side of the road.  The two team members in the truck, which was in front of the minibus in which I was riding, were exposed and suddenly we heard a “pop” of small arms fire, and they dropped into defensive prone positions on the luggage.  I do not know whether the fire came from the heavy police presence in the road or from the roadside, but I suspect the latter.  Shortly thereafter, two men were lead out of the roadside area and were put into the custody of two local police officers.  We had not called the UN to that point to notify them that we had begun to move.  Our truck, which the officers no doubt thought to be a tap-tap, was commandeered to move the arrested men and the officers to the next village, and they all got on top of the luggage. Joe called Eddie Lindor of the UN, who said he had in fact been called by Ann Marie Cassella.  He asked for the color, make and license numbers of the vehicles.  Dr. Coumeau tried to stop them from putting the men on our truck, by getting out and screaming in Creole that she would not put herself in mortal danger and would go no further unless they were removed, but the convoy moved off with all the officers except our new passengers.  Fr. Gousse talked her back into the truck and we took off again.  

Those of us riding in the minivan didn’t know how far we were supposed to transport the prisoners and officers, and feared we would have this unwelcome burden until Les Cayes.  When another vehicle got between the two vehicles and we couldn’t see the truck, I was nervous.  I felt very afraid for the occupants of the truck and truckbed.  If they were to draw fire from the roadside, there could be bloodshed.  One of the team members sitting next to me kept repeating that we had left prematurely, and another team member was crying softly.  In about 5 minutes, at San Louis du Sud, however, the truck stopped in front of the Police Station, and we lost our extra passengers, to everyone’s relief.  Dr. Coumeau received a call on her cellphone at the next town, so we stopped at the side to allow her to exit the minivan to take a motorcycle back to Aquin to attend to an emergency.  We quickly caught up to the truck that had stopped at the side of the road to allow an emotionally traumatized team member to exit briefly to take care of a gastrointestinal emergency.  When she re-entered the truck, we started again and the drivers drove as fast as they could through the towns and around the remaining debris of the barricades, sounding their horns constantly to warn the people at the sides of the street and any on-coming traffic that they were not going to stop.  We fled past Cavaillon and on to Les Cayes.  The streets of Les Cayes were calm and the stalls lining the streets were open.  People were walking and riding bikes and motorcycles and there was more vehicular traffic there as well.  

At the circle, we turned right onto the road to the airport, and about a quarter mile from the airport, the truck sustained a flat tire.  There was a spare, so three team members stayed to help the driver fix it and the rest of the truck passengers were absorbed into the minivan that proceeded to the airport.  Our mood was lifted because we believed we were now safe, and Joe Nuzzi remarked that in the past the flat tire would have been regarded as a major event, but after the events of the last few days, it was downgraded to an ordinary Haitian inconvenience.  At the airport, we were relieved that we did indeed have all the 15 seats that had been promised, which is never a guarantee in Haiti, but were a little disappointed that the plane was not already there to meet us as promised, and had yet to leave Port au Prince.  However, we were notified that our American Airlines flight out of Port au Prince would be delayed, so we should have no trouble making the flight to Miami.  The American Airlines reservation had been hopefully and lovingly re-made daily by the sister of one of the team members who works for the airlines.  She had been in daily contact with the team and if we were not going to get out that day, she rolled the reservation over to the next day.  She had been only too happy to confirm the reservations for all 13 of the American team members for Friday.  The two Haitian team members would say goodbye to us in Port au Prince and would return to their lives and families there.  

The presence of calm in the beautiful airport in Les Cayes and the knowledge that we could come and go as we wished allowed us all to breathe easily for the first time since the morning of April 7 and many of the team members ate some snacks as we waited.  The 19-seater arrived and we boarded with four other passengers and took off for a slightly bumpy and noisy flight to Port au Prince.  The island looked so quiet from the air.  Upon arriving at the domestic airport at Port au Prince, the entire team applauded.  We were met with Haitian family and friends of the team and we said goodbye to our Haitian members who had been so courageous and loyal.  Members of our support team based in Port au Prince provided transportation to the International Airport.  Once settled there, the team members got some food and were able to call family to let them know we were coming home.   

My greatest frustration about this trip, and that of the entire team, is that we were unable to see our friends in Cavaillon and unable to fulfill our promise to them.  We were unable to check on the house in Cavaillon or use the medicines we had left there, nor the ones shipped to Port au Prince.  If we had had our medications with us, we could have run an impromptu clinic in Aquin.  Working for our neighbors would have allowed us to do something constructive instead of endlessly worrying.  As it is, we were able to donate some of our supplies to the hospital in Aquin, and the donations of clothes and toothbrushes and toothpaste and soaps we gave to Fr. Gousse to distribute to his flock as he sees fit.  The medicines in the NoVa house in Cavaillon will expire before we are able to return, so Dr Coumeau will go to Cavaillon to get them as soon as it is safe.  It was not a total loss.  

I have been asked by most people I have talked to after returning if I would go back to Haiti.  The answer is something I do not have to think about.  I will go back, but not tomorrow.  The need we went to try to alleviate a little is still there and is not going away soon.  The unrest and protests will eventually stop and the situation will stabilize and become safe again.  Our timing and intelligence about the nature of the protests were less than perfect, but our friends kept us safe.  They will welcome us back another time in the future.  Haiti is a land of rich and poor and any country with a dichotomy like that is bound to create instability on and off as various parties jockey for power, but in the ten years of this mission, there has been only one time that the mission had to be cancelled for unrest: during the coup.  If we had been scheduled one day later, this mission would have been cancelled, too, but our timing was unfortunate.  During all the missions, including this “mission that wasn’t” I have felt welcomed and appreciated by the people who are nearest to me.  I truly enjoy my service there and the comraderie of a team of people who all feel compelled to give their best.  I feel fulfilled and rejuvenated at the end of the week, despite the heat and the exhaustion.   

The Haitian people suffer severe poverty and all its attendant problems everyday.  Someone once said that the worst part of poverty is that you don’t matter.  Our patients matter to us and they appreciate so much everything that we try to do for them.  I have to go back.  Haiti is a beautiful island and her people are hospitable.  In the situation in which we found ourselves on April 7, it was the local people and their parish priest who protected, cared for and ultimately rescued us.  

However, I also have no doubt that the UN was instrumental in insuring our safety, and I am grateful to them for keeping their promise to open the road from Les Cayes all the way to Aquin.  They insured that the rescue attempt succeeded.  If they had not met us at the roadblock that was being re-constructed on the road to Cavaillon, I believe we would have found ourselves in deep trouble, as that stretch of the road is surrounded by heavy vegetation and did not look very populated.  I also wish to thank the office of Senator Scott Garrett, whose staff kept in touch with my husband and tried to help us through the Office of Overseas Services, and Ann Marie Cassella of the US embassy in Port au Prince who was in constant touch with information and encouragement, even though the State Department was unable to provide much direct aid to us."

Labels:  Haiti Medical Mission, Norma Murray, MD, Joe Nuzzi,  NoVa Hope for Haiti , Church of the Presentation in Upper Saddle River , NJ, Hackensack University Medical Center , Dianne Montuori, Colette McDermott, Father Lampey at the Church of the Immaculate Conception in Cavaillon, Father Gousse Oremil, Father Lampey, Dr. Danielle Coumeau, Fr. Gousse, Mr. Dadou, U.N. Peacekeeping, Peter Schmitz, Brian Murray, Max Stamper, Father Bob Stagg, Eddie Lindor, Fr. Gousse Oremil, Jean-Marie Guehenno, MaximsNews Network, Dmitry Titov , Hedi Annabi, United Nations, U.N., food riots, civil unrest, evacuation

 

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