Wednesday, August 24, 2011

Two hours in captivity

On a Friday afternoon, three loyal Operation Hope volunteers decided to accompany me to the “forbidden city” so I called it, driving a 14 passenger 1986 Ford van, beige with clear windows.  A section of the National Route # 1 was psychologically blocked within the limits of Cite Soleil .  All traffic from the Northern part of the country will detour towards the Airport and traffic from the Southern part to Delmas area and Route Neuf was impracticable.  For those who lived this time, it was virtually a war zone.  I could not stop noticing the gun shot holes in the fragile constructions as we entered the city.  Within minutes, we were stopped by a group of armed people I referred to as youngsters in disguised, dressed to panic those quick to react to this apparent reality they learned to adopt as theirs.  
Very quickly, we were asked to get out and to follow them in what later I come to believe was a class room in a non identified abandoned school with one access door and a window.  I do not recall how many they were but there could have been at least fifteen.  Not a single time we were shoveled or pushed but their demeanor was intimidating and mine to them was more questionable as I was very calm and relaxed.  I have been in Cite Soleil before; I could not possibly be seen as a stranger.  Certainly one of them must have seen me before or heard of me.   We were controllably positioned in the room away from the door and the window while we were temporally put on trial, with questions coming from all angles of the room.  I was very poised in answering them as I try to keep a photographic memory of each one of them but yet soon realized my first mistake, when I identified myself as a member of a Non Government Organization (NGO).  I had to quickly ask them to see me simply as an individual who has embarked in a quest to help my fellow Haitians and that I have not been or the organization I represent, enjoying the privilege of Non Government Organizations. 
They were very anti-Non Government Organization as they explained to me how they have been exploited by the NGO’s throughout the years.  The NGO’s as they explained, have come and gone, at least forty of them taking pictures of their trifle life condition and engaging in never ending ridiculous projects.   They raised millions of dollars and had done nothing for this community.  

We were interrogated for about two hours when finally after a few phone calls I assume to be made to their leaders, we were asked to go away and to their surprise, I stated that I had no plan to leave the City now and had plan to stay overnight which was nothing but an impulse answer to further enter the life of the fearful.   
With full knowledge of my intents, they escorted us in different blocks referred to as “quartiers” and for the first time I was exposed to worse I have ever seen before in all my trips to the city.  I could not hide my tearful eyes from them or from my volunteers.  The scenes were unbearable; I was mad of myself, mad at our government and mad at the world.  Some of them, they reported, were victims of random bullets from the “MINUSTAH” the UN Peace Corps occupying the country, a term I do not use lightly under the realization that they lost their purpose as a PEACE CORPS as they killed women and children at random.  

We were later taken to the only hotel then, where I spent my first night in the city with gun shots echoed from everywhere throughout the night.

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