Our journey began at 5am in the rain in NY. Sam, Tom, Karen and myself were to meet at the airport for a 630 am flight to Fort Lauderdale. Karen took her expired passport so she missed the flight and took the next one down to Lauderdale and met us there. We then waited for the charter flight that was supposed to leave at 1 to Cap Haitien Haiti. While waitng for the flight we met 4 people who were on the charter with us who were volunteering at the For Haiti With Love clinic. One was anursing student and the other 3 were just going to volunteer with the clinic and orphanage. We were only allowed 50 pounds of luggage each and 10 ponds on a carryon bag. They weighed it out exactly and we all had to move things around in order to get it on the flight. They also weighed each one of us on the scale to make sure the plane didn't have too much weight. Naturally the airline Florida Coastal Airlines was late. As we walked out onto the runway in Fort lauderdale we arrived at the prop plane which was to take us on our 2 hour and 40 minute journey to Cap Haitian. It was one of those small puddle jumpers that you couldn't stand up in. As we flew on this old prop plane we passed over islands I had never even heard of. We then passed Cuba in the distance and began our desent into Cap Haitien.
As we arrived it was just as I remebered it from last month. We all got off the plane to see the wreckage of another plane sitting on the runway. Not all that comforting to see at an airport if you could call it that. A regular jet we were told could never land there as the runway was very short. I was told that this was the largest plane that could land there. We were met at the airport by Presime, roselyn, arly and an interpetor named George. We went thru what they call Customs. That would be 1 guy sitting at a desk stamping the 10 passports of our arriving flight. Baggage claim consisted of just our bags and 1 guy insisting on seeing our claim tags. Not sure why he needed to see them as noone else really on the plane. We then loaded into 2 trucks to go thru the slums of Cap Haitian. The streets were not busy as it was 5 o'clock on Sunday. As we passed the housing you could really see the extreme misery people were living in. As I have been here before I really tried to look into some of the houses. There were no roofs on lots of them. The locals looked miserable. The roads were filled with holes that could eat cars and trucks. We weaved from one side of the road to the other in order to avoid ditches in the road. We finally arrived at hotel. This hotel makes the last one we stayed in look luxurious. We got to the rooms and paint peeling off walls and very small. Most of the windows are just screens in the rooms. It is very loud as we are inside the city this time.
Dinner
Pressime and Roselyn picked us up with their volunteers and we went to dinner at Le Kay. Food wasn't bad. We talked to them about how the hospitals refuse care to those who can't afford to pay. Patients must pay up front for the gloves the doctors wear as well as any other supplies u need while in the hospital. Pressume and Roselyn told us even things that are donated to the hospitals must be paid for by the patients. For Haiti With Love which is run by Presume and Roselyn take no money from patients for any services. That is the way it has been for forty years since Roselyns parents started the clinic. During dinner 4 girls in their 20s came in that were in nursing school. For Haiti With Love pays for them to go the nursing school in exchange they must work for the clinic for minimum of a year. These girls were orphans in the clinic when they were younger and have remained there and are now in nursing school.
We talked about For Haiti With Love being the only burn clinic in cap haitien a city of 400,000. They treat about 500 patients a week without a doctor on staff. Only nurses work there. They were very tankful for the new table and flooring we gave them. They are in desparate need of another patient table and other supplies. We talked of the possibility of opening a western style burn clinic at Sacre cCouer hospital 1.5 hours away. There issue was that again it would be a pay for service hospital. They told me a story of how a mother and father came into the clinic with an roughly 8 year old daughter who had been badly burned in the face. They said they didn't want to have a "ugly daughter". Pressime and Roselyn couldn't do much for her except try and treat the wound with their limited resources as best they could. The parents had no money to go toa pay for service hospital. A week later they found out they let the daughter die on purpose so not to have an ugly daughter. It was heartbreaking to hear how difficult life is here. The crazy thing is they say is we would need to figure out how the hospitals would have to carve out money for services if we helped build this burn clinic.
On the way down to cap we met a doctor by the name of Dean on the plane. He was running a clinic in Virginia and he comes down monthly. He told me a story of how there are 14 containers (40 footers) sitting in the port in Cap filled with both food and medical supplies. Apparently they were aid from 3 years ago but no one would release them because customs wanted to be paid for their release. You would think after the quake they would release the goods for humanitarian reasons. He went over to the port chief who showed him the containers on his last trip. He gave the port chief 1 carton of cigarettes and the port chief said for about 1000 us per contianer he would relase them secretly to him. It is very corrupt down here.
Anyway tomarrow I am taking the road to Laberdee to try and get to the docks to get the last of Medical Angels supplies that were left there bymistake. Pressime and some federal police will be joining me on my journey over the mountain. Hopefully we will get into the dock as there have been some new issues with Royal Caribbean. Karen will start the morning by training Physical Therapy aides on how to give PT. They have no training but she will try to teach thru an intepetor. Sam and Dr Tom will go to Sacre Couer hospital while I go over the mountain. In the afternoon I am going to the orphange. I have a meeting with the land owner about buying another plot of land the orphanage wants. We are going to try to raise the roughly 15000 they need for the children. Anyway we will see what tommorrow brings.
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