I took this course so I could have a better understanding of Haitian culture. Through the coursework and the first hand experience in Haiti I feel that I now have an idea of what their lives are like. It is hard to explain how that experience changes and enhances your life. Once you’ve been to Haiti it is always with you. There hasn’t been a day that’s gone by since I’ve been back that I haven’t thought about what I saw there. When I first got back I noticed that I didn’t turn the TV on for a couple of days. I had completely forgotten about it. Before I would just turn the TV on just for the noise. The day I started writing this blog we had a storm that morning and our electricity was out and I immediately thought of Haiti because the electricity went out there everyday. When I am in traffic I can’t help thinking about how orderly our traffic is and how clean our streets are. Haiti has a deserate, chaotic and unorganized feel to it. I don’t mean that in a bad way at all, but their ordinary is much different then our ordinary. My husband and I have a small acreage outside of Fayette and when I got home I was looking the place over and I realized that we don’t need a 10 – 12 foot fence with razor wire around our property to feel safe. From now on when ever I eat Lasagna, mango, watermelon, oatmeal, PB&J, or lobster I will be reminded of all the food we ate there. I will never beable to go to an airport or museum or see a bus or taxi without being reminded of Haiti in some small way. I enjoyed sharing this experience with all 21 fellow UIU travelers. I feel richer for having been there and I hope to go back in the future.

When coming back to the United States, I encountered many obstacles. Traveling to Haiti, made me think deeply about the wants and needs of life and how those designer brands are not that important after all. I also found it difficult to adjust to the fact that people can be so wasteful with what they have, when others would be striving to afford it. It was nice to see the kids so happy, due to the fact that if something tragic happened in the United States people would face depression, and not adjust to the rapid change of life. On the positive side, I can\’t wait to visit Haiti again, helping the people in need, and sharing stories about how Haiti is improving.

When people would ask me, How was your trip?” I would struggle with where to begin my conversation. Let’s begin with how things are the same. Families care for each other. Mothers and fathers bring their sick children to the clinic with a desire for them to get the care they need to become well. Family members look after their elderly and their children. They feed their children, bathe them, wash their clothes, teach them how to behave, and love them. If you give a group of kids a ball, they are going to kick it around the yard and if you give them a piece of candy, they will eat it. They are no different than us.
Where they live and how they live is where the difference is. Their water supply is different, their public services/utilities are different, their transportation is different, their homes are different, their infrastructure is different, their employment is different, and the list goes on. I find it difficult to describe to people what it was like, because I don’t know where to begin. I could talk to you all day about my experience and sadly, you probably still wouldn’t be able to understand. Though I lived in Haiti for a week, I didn’t live the life of the people I was helping. Though I didn’t have the comforts of my home, I did have indoor plumbing, my own bed, electricity most of the time, plenty of clean water and food, bug spray, sunscreen and a whole bag full of medication. I didn’t have to cook my own food, wash my own laundry, or clean my house. Though I may have thought that I had it rough for a week, by the standards of the people that I was serving, I had it quite easy.
I would strongly encourage anyone to take a service learning trip for their cultural class requirement. You don’t just learn about Haiti or another culture when you take this class. You learn about the world. You learn about politics and the long lasting effects of poor leadership and corruption. You also learn about yourself and your place in the world. It forces you to examine if you are content with where you are in your own life and whether there is more that you can be doing to either help others or to be involved in your own political process. It gives you a greater appreciation for all the things that you do have when you live and work among people who have so little. I know you could not teach to me in any form of media over any length of time the knowledge that I gained by living for a week in Haiti. I know this because I struggle to explain my experience to people and there just are not enough words or photographs to make them see what I was able to see during that week. Understanding the history of how Haiti got to where it is today by use of the book and our class presentations really helped me to understand how people can still be living like this today. I don’t know what the answer is for Haiti. I do know that Haiti is filled with a lot of people who are not much different than us who are just doing what they can to survive and at this time in their country’s history, they still are in desperate need of help to meet their basic needs. I am glad that Dan and I were able to spend 8 days of our lives doing what we could to make a difference for a few.