Journal Entry – Tuesday March 12, 2013
It’s almost midnight as I’m writing this – today’s been a bit of a blur – think I’ll stick with bullet point highlights:
…Drive to Hinche (several hours). Get stopped twice at roadblocks set up by Haiti National Police. At the second roadblock, they make Bwa turn the truck off. After they check out the truck and our papers, Bwa can’t get the truck to start. Dead battery. No one – INCLUDING the Haiti National Police – has a set of jumper cables. More interference by Satan, I’m assuming, because we’re still supposed to preach in Hinche tonight, and we’re already WAY late – it’s well after dark at this point. So we all start praying. Now how’s THIS for divine intervention: Immediately after we start praying, the Haiti National Police offer to GIVE us one of THEIR truck batteries – for FREE. (Something tells me that’s not a common occurrence in Haiti…)
…Finally get to Hinche – the place is PACKED – standing room only, probably two or three hundred people crammed in there. Everything goes well (me and Jeff are glad Jim and Carl are speaking tonight – all of us are pretty wiped out at this point).
.…The hotel we’re staying at is about 3 miles outside of Hinche – feels more like 30 miles on the washboard roads. Get out there a little before 10pm. JT and Bwa drop us off, they’re staying somewhere else. JT mentions casually as they leave, “Oh, by the way, no one here will understand English.” Great, this should be fun. Place is called Pandiassou – looks like a beautiful, sprawling Southern Plantation, but it feels more like a tropical version of the hotel from “The Shining” – there’s only one other guest here, and we’ve seen a total of 3 staff – none of whom speak English.
(The photo at top is the Hotel Pandiassou in the daytime – looked SUPER creepy when we arrived in the pitch dark.)
…I really wouldn’t want to be here, with no interpreter, knowing any LESS Creole than I do – even as it is, it’s been tricky navigating our way through check in, getting someone to fix the broken air conditioning unit in our room, and figuring out what to do about food. We discover, after having had nothing to eat all day, that the hotel restaurant closed at 9pm. We find one female staff member at the restaurant. I know enough Creole to pull off, “Eske’w ka fe’n manje, souple?” (can you make us food, please?”) and she knows enough English to pull off, “Sam-wish?” I say, “Wi, mesi madam,” and 15 minutes later we’ve got four sandwiches.
Ok, I am REALLY wiped out – going to bed.
