We successfully made it through the airport in Port-au-Prince and we're en route to Atlanta, Georgia, U.S.A. I'm so sad to be leaving Haiti, but I'm really looking forward to showering for the first time in ten days.
From the beach, we returned to Pastor Paul's house to spend the night. Because the house has a large, flat roof and the weather was nice, several of us opted to sleep on the roof. What began as a wonderful evening falling asleep beneath the stars ended with me being dragged out of a dead sleep as the first pitters of rain turned into a full-fledged thunderstorm. We had just enough time to fold up our cots and sleeping bags and flee downstairs to the interior of the house. (Apparently during this fold-up process, I told Olivia that I was still asleep. I don't recall that conversation, so I probably was sleepfolding.)
I started to follow Olivia, Sandy and Kristen down to the women's guest room, but Madame Pastor pulled me aside and set me up in the kitchen, where it was a little quieter and more private. There she literally tucked me into bed with a glass of water.
Poison water.
I drank it all. What a mistake. It wasn't the verboten tap water, but it was salinated well water that kept me awake for several hours. I'll let you imagine. I told Jeff about it in the morning (trusting Madame Pas, but still wanting someone American to know what I ingested, just in case I die later) and he told me it was safe to drink, but that the salt probably upset my stomach. Still, at his advice, I dumped the rest of that water and switched to bottled lime-onade pop for the remainder of the day, just to be certain. But I felt back to normal after I got some food in my stomach, so no harm no foul.
We had another big, Haitian breakfast, then piled in Jules' truck for a trip into town. We visited Watland's mother at her home, then went to see the house Watland is building for himself and his wife to live in after their wedding this Saturday. He's building this house single-handedly!
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| Photo by Haiti H2O. |
From there, we travelled into the city to check out Lenord's studio at the radio station, where he records his weekly radio program. You can even listen to Radio Macaya right here! Jeff and Olivia were both interviewed about St. Paul's and about our time in Haiti. They elected to speak for us because their Kreyol is best of the team. Basically, now they're Haitian famous. Haha.
From the radio station, we returned to Pastor Paul's house for lunch and last goodbyes to all of our Haitian friends (with the exception of Jules, Lenord and Beauty, who came back to Port-au-Prince with us). It was about three hours to P-a-P and I only got carsick once. After that, I ate some ginger-coconut cookies and moved up to the front seat, which much improved the situation.
At Jules' house we ate dinner, organized luggage, then debriefed the week over spice cake and juice.
Our last Haitian experience before the airport was going to the grocery store this morning to stock up on Haitian goodies. The store looked like a Shop-and-Save, so not very thrilling. It was air-conditioned though, something we haven't felt since the plane from Atlanta ten days ago.
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