Saturday 18 – Monday 20

This is the final blog as we’re back in the Dominican Republic waiting to head off home.

We spent Saturday morning doing some last minute bits and pieces before heading to a hotel for an afternoon’s relaxation.  Stuart didn’t fancy that idea too much, so he went with Carwyn to another Haitian hospital.  By all accounts it was a bit of an experience, but it’s probably one to leave for now and let him tell you himself.  The hotel was a nice moment of decadence for us to finish our time in Haiti and was followed by a meal at a restaurant where, without exception, we all ordered cheeseburgers.

When we got back to the village we found some of the scout members waiting for us so they could say goodbye.  It was really lovely of them and they are such warm and friendly people. As is traditional, there was a prayer and a hymn and so we all sang Kumbaya. They did this much better than we managed and if we ever came again I think we might put in a bit more rehearsing beforehand – as we’ve discovered, we can’t even clap in synch.

Sunday, we got our coach back to the DR and the journey seemed to go on forever as we made several unscheduled stops.  As before, we had to wait at the border, but this time we all had to get off the bus and take our bags to an office to be searched.  That took a while and then, when we got going again, the air con broke down and we sweltered the rest of the way.  At the other end, our taxi driver was waiting for us, as arranged, to take us to our hotel and we all looked forward to cocktails, a pool and hairdryers (well, some of us).

And so here we are, ready to leave.  It’s been quite an experience and we’ve got a presentation in progress to show when we get back. It just remains to say thank you to Carwyn and Reninca for looking after us for the last fortnight – they remain calm and friendly and funny under conditions that would drive most of us mad with frustration. We look forward to seeing them when they come to England in July. And we look forward to seeing everyone else back home very soon.

Posted from Puerto Plata, Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic.

Thursday 16^th

Well, the last time we left you, Wednesday evening was going without much incident other than some spider trapping and we were just about to head off to bed.  On the way back to the hut, however, Emma stumbled across the biggest, fattest toad any of us had ever seen (honestly, the woman is a magnet for wildlife) and that stopped us dead in our tracks.  Colin dashed for his camera to get photographic evidence and we then chased the dogs, who by now were chasing the toad over the grass.  Just when we thought we’d had enough excitement before bedtime, we then became aware that there was a lot of chanting and drumming going on nearby and the boys thought it would be good idea to go and explore the source.  Amanda joined, followed by Emma in her pyjamas and Nicola dashed out of the shower to throw on some clothes and join everyone else.  We headed to the gate to investigate but realised we didn’t have a key to unlock the padlock and we couldn’t see our security guard around to ask. Going nowhere, we finally went to bed with the eerie-sounding drumming /chanting still going on, feeling like – as Nicola pointed out – we were in some kind of horror movie. We found out next day it was only the evening service for the evangelical church down the lane, which possibly left us all a little bit deflated if we were to be completely honest.  Still, good to know our imaginations are still in fine fettle.

The plan for this morning was a visit to the Citadel: the one main tourist attraction in the area.  Once again we’d hired a tap tap to take us, so, after breakfast, off we set.  As with our trip to the beach earlier in the week, people randomly jumped on for a lift not realising it was a private hire and got a bit of a surprise when they saw us all inside.  Other than that however, everything was going swimmingly until our arrival at the base of the mountain, when we had the first indications of the mayhem about to ensue.   Out of the open back of the vehicle we could see a mixture of motor cycles and cantering horses as if a convention of Mad Max aficionados had found themselves double booked with a Magnificent Seven re-enactment group.  We watched happily from the sanctuary of our tap tap until that decided to give up at the first indications of an incline and looked in serious danger of rolling backwards into a ditch.  At this point, Stuart leaped valiantly from the vehicle and refused to countenance getting back in – we realised we were all going to have to get out and rethink our plan.  As soon as we did, we found ourselves in the middle of a melee as everyone surrounded us trying to get our business and we found ourselves separated from each other.  The big question was, do we go to the top by horse or motorcycle? While we tried to make up our minds, chaos continued around us with people clamouring and shouting and making rational thought more difficult than normal.  At this point, one of the horses decided to help things along by getting amorous in the middle of the road and wasn’t keen to be put off his business.  He got a thump in the head for his efforts from one of the handlers and the whole scene took on a slightly surreal air.

We eventually decided to go the rest of the way by motorbike and did the steep incline most of the way up the mountain, giving us some magnificent views.  The bikes took us to the point where you have to walk the rest of the way.  This was tough going as it was very steep and the sun was hot and we were being followed the whole time by men on horses waiting for us to collapse.  We soldiered on, however, and, with a sense of achievement reached the top.

The Citadel itself was built under the orders of Henri Christophe in the Eighteenth Century and 20,000 Haitians died during its construction.  It has magnificent 360⁰ views, is mightily impressive and well worth Googling if you’re interested in more details.  It was also built, as you’d expect, without any thought to health and safety, which meant we could go right to the edge of the walls without any sort of barrier between us and a very long fall down. Not that everyone was equally enthusiastic about this, though (Stuart).

We all headed back impressed with what we’d seen and went back to our normal routines in the afternoon.  At 5pm we went with Carwyn and Reninca to Grace’s birthday party at her family’s house.  Grace is one of the children from the home who has been adopted by Nancy, one of the nurses who work there.  It was an honour to be allowed to join them for their special day and the whole family was friendly and welcoming and gave us the kind of personal experience you would struggle to find as an ordinary tourist. They are a fabulous example of what the whole HHA enterprise is capable of achieving and we were all incredibly pleased to be a part of it, however briefly.

Friday 17^th

Well, everything is coming to an end now and today was our last full day of tasks.  The girls finally finished their masterpiece in the paediatric ward while the boys cleared out some storage rooms in the hospital.  In the afternoon, Colin built a ping pong table from salvaged wood and Stuart set off to do a management training meeting with some of the hospital staff.  By the time he got back, everyone was painting the new shower block and singing along to Colin’s iPod.  With any luck you could be treated to a rousing rendition of Bon Jovi’s ‘Living on a Prayer’ at some point in the future.

We’re starting to think about going home now, seeing friends and family and what meal we’ll have first. It won’t be the same without the UN helicopters taking off and landing next door but the prospect of cocktails by the pool sounds very enticing.  We will aim to blog one final time from the Dominican Republic, but, for the moment, that’s our adventure pretty much at an end.

Posted from Puerto Plata, Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic.

Tuesday 14th

This morning we all went to help an English lady called Hannah, who works for the Cap Haitian Health Network. She’d been sent some donated medical and drug supplies and she needed them sorting into order and itemised. We turned up to a not-very-large, airless and dimly lit room, stacked with cardboard boxes, and began the long and painful process of getting the contents into some kind of recognisable order. The next four hours were spent sorting through catheters, syringes and latex gloves, which possibly sounds more fun than the actual reality. It was extremely hot work and seemed to be going nowhere, so that in time patience was wearing a bit thin and we were probably the closest we’d ever been to frayed tempers. Just as we thought we’d all had enough and we were getting nowhere, order seemed to materialise out of the chaos and the job was done.

We then had to wait for our lift back to the village and, when that arrived, we then went searching for our lunch which seemed to be in transit somewhere between our accommodation and the hospital. We finally gave up on non-essentials like eating and got back to the serious business of painting Humpty Dumpty in the paediatric ward. Apparently, there was a lack of enthusiasm from the patients for Stuart’s and Colin’s daily sporting activities (due to hot weather) and so the boys came and joined us and engaged their more ‘artistic’ sides. There were some different techniques on display, but, with luck, you might get a chance to take a look if we ever manage to get our presentation together about Haiti. One to look forward to!

Wednesday 15th

We hadn’t exactly been looking forward to this day, ever since we arrived – we were going to visit Shada, which is one of the worst slums in the area. This was yet another painting project as we were going to decorate a small hut for a Lady called Madame Bwa, who wants to start a vocational training centre for the most deprived teenagers. There is a high level of teenage pregnancy and prostitution amongst the young in the slums and Madame Bwa wants to encourage them to get skills and decent jobs.

We were dropped off by the river, which was the colour of sewage and covered in oily looking slime. It’s banks were covered in discarded rubbish and the whole place smelled awful. We had to make our way down some tiny alleyways between shacks of wood, corrugated iron and crumbling concrete. Whole families live in one room, without electricity or running water and there are open sewers that you have to jump over. Everyone stared, as we obviously made a pretty unusual sight, and shouted Blan (white) after us – just a tiny bit discomforting.

The hut we were working on was dark and there was rubble on the floor, which made things tricky from the start. The paint – like all Haitian paint – was the consistency of water and wall coverage was definitely minimal. Things took more of a downturn when we spotted a large spider lurking in one corner. Then Emma managed to disturb a nest of spiders that she said were spotted orange and poisonous – only they were orange because she’d managed to cover them in paint. Then one of the locals had to take over as nobody fancied taking on that particular corner of the room anymore. We then had a massive cockroach climbing up the wall and decided this was more wildlife than any of us really needed.

We finally ran out of paint and had to call it quits, so we made our way back to the riverside to wait for our lift back. Once again, we found ourselves in Haitian time and had to wait for half an hour for the car to arrive. While we hung around, we found ourselves surrounded by the local children and getting more calls of ‘Blan’.

Everyone was looking forward to having a shower when we got back to the village, only on our return there was no water and our lunch had gone missing for the second day running. The rest of the afternoon was spent painting or doing sports and so ended another day’s work.

We went back to the village for dinner, rum and trapping large spiders (still no shower, though).

Sunday – Scout Camp continued

Although invited to take part in exercises, toilet and devotions at 5.00am we decided to rejoin the camp, in Haitian style, nearer 8.00am (after our own breakfast of  cold spaghetti bolognese and boiled eggs) to be offered a camp breakfast of spaghetti topped with what may have beeen creme fraiche – or possibly salad cream.

After breakfast we launched into a few games with the assistance of Showlo, our interpreter, with whom there had perhaps been a misunderstanding as to timing ! It would be true to say these games did not go quite as smoothly as the previous day – most of the boys ran off to play football – but they seemed to enjoy themselves. Showlo then arrived and things ran a little more smoothly – it is so much easier to explain the rules of games to 60 boisterous and exciteable scouts in their own language. It was soon time for Church – since the service was expected to last some 3 hours we decided to let the scouts go first and catch them up with just an hour of the service to go ! As we arrived at Church we were ushered in and those sitting at the front were asked to move to allow us the best seats. Reninca had warned us that we might be expected to stand up on our own adn sing a hymn but, fortunately, we were not after all required to stand up and perform our well rehearsed rendition of “He’s got the whole world in His hands”. The Church service was an experience we all enjoyed, and then we strolled back to the campsite for lunch (rice, beans and chicken) and then a series of relay games which we ran to much amusement with much chaos. Assuming the Scouts would be going home at 3.00pm (as per the agreed plan) we thought that was our work done but but it seemed they hadother plans. We had exhausted our supple of games and so we aked their leaders to sow us some of the traditional games played in Haiti which were pretty similar to thos e we paly at home. We finished off with some chants, some dancing and a moving closing ceremony in which the “Hammerson Haiti Team” and the 8th West Wickham Scout Group were thanked for making the weekend possible. It was a truly great weekend and a great example of the Worldwide Brotherhood of Scouting.

While the boys had been busy with the scouts, the girls had been finishing decorating the paediatric ward and helping out with some admin jobs – just in case they were missing work back home.  After finishing they decided to walk back to the village before it got too dark.  It was allgoing without incident until Amanda screamed ’Tarantula’ and Emma just managed to avoid walking straight into it.  This is now officially classed as a near death experience.

Monday 13

Today was rest day and everyone went to the beach in the back of a tap-tap – basically, a pick-up truck with long seats in the back . It was a bumpy ride but worth it when we got to our destination.  We all enjoyed the chance to relax and were suitably chilled by the end of the afternoon.  On the way back we thought  we’d driven into the middle of a riot as there were police vans, UN vehicles and hoards of shouting people.  It turned out it was only a learner driver.  Maybe we’re letting our imaginations run a bit too wild?

Saturday 11

Today was the day the scouts arrived for their camping weekend, so after breakfast (mashed potato) we had a run through some of the games they would be shown how to play. We also had a discussion on the pros and cons of singing Ging Gang Goolie but, much to Colin’s relief, it was decided we might give it a miss on this occasion (unlucky Berg).

Then it was on to the hospital where the girls started painting some pictures on the walls of the paediatric unit and Nicola showed some pretty impressive artistic skills.  The boys, meanwhile, prepared for the afternoon’s activities in some of the hottest weather so far.

At 2pm we set off in the ambulance, poised for the scouts’ arrival with Stuart questioning whether this was the wisest  move of his life but, in true Haitian style, things didn’t exactly start on the dot and there was some waiting around for them to arrive.  When they did, however, they came all together singing and looking smartly dressed and fabulous.  Then, what proved to be the long and arduous process of putting up tents delayed the proceedings even further and, in the end, it was decided the best thing would be to start playing games while there was still some daylight left.  The games, though, were a big success and the scouts were enthusiastic players of Over and Under, Frisbee Football and Duck, Duck, Goose. They also loved having their picture taken to the extent that you got buried under a sea of bodies every time they saw you had a camera. As Reninka pointed out later, holding a scout camp is a big event for everyone concerned as there aren’t any recreational activities at weekends and the last camp was about 2 years’ ago.  We left as it was getting too dark to see anything, with the promise of another round of games the next day.

Thursday 9th – Friday 10th First of all, a big thank you to everyone who has left comments on our site – We really enjoy hearing from you all at home. Unfortunately, we have very limited access to the internet and we rely on regular trips to the hospital where we can use theirs. However, given the administration required to run a hospital in Haiti, monopolising their resources for our travel blog seems a tad selfish which we hope helps explain why we can’t reply to everyone individually – as much as we’d like to. Well, when we left you last, we’d just enjoyed breakfast. Our tasks followed on from the previous day’s activities: finishing off painting the huts, an afternoon of games at the hospital and a visit to the children’s home. The weather appeared to improve at last and, as Colin pointed out, our risk of getting trench foot from all the rain had significantly diminished. Our hopes were dashed in the afternoon, however, when more torrential rain arrived and we ended up going to dinner in our waterproofs. The evening was finished off in traditional style with a couple Prestige beers, a few card games and the revelation that Emma is a bit of a card shark. Friday was gloriously sunny as we began moving the hospital beds into the huts where Eddie and Bernard will live. It was extremely hot work, but going relatively well until Amanda fell off one of the access ramps and had to be carried out of a pile of weeds by Colin and Stuart! She is now officially classed as the most accident prone (and messiest) member of the group and a walking (hopping) disaster zone. After a bit more work, we all took a trip out to take a look at Cap Haitian. Our first stop was the tourist village – which consisted of a row of wooden shacks – where we could pick up some souvenirs. Then Reninka took us on a guided tour of the town, including the place where Stuart’s daughter, Julia, stayed on her visit to Haiti. You can still see the town’s colonial influence, especially around the main square, which is very pretty; and, under better circumstances, the whole place could be beautiful. As it is, most places, including the beach, are rubbish dumping zones, while one of the cleanest places in the town is a depot housing garbage trucks. However, there is a sports bar where the UN forces come to relax and it provided an opportunity to enjoy burger and chips and a glass of wine – assuming you were happy to ignore the unsettling shade of yellow. Another plus is that the bar is also next to the only supermarket, so it was possible to pick up a bit of a luxury item – Pringles. By now it was getting dark, so we all had to return to base and prepare for the scouts’ arrival the next day.

Wednesday started with cold showers all round and a breakfast of pasta, fruit and boiled eggs.  From what we’ve gathered so far, we can probably expect this to be the norm over the coming days.  Pasta isn’t the usual choice of breakfast for most of the group, although Stuart and Amanda made valiant efforts to get through it.  However, it remains to be seen how keen we are by day 13!

This was the day we started work in earnest, as the morning was to be spent either gardening or painting a couple of new huts that will be the residence of Eddie and Bernard (both spinally injured in last year’s earthquake).  Colin and Stuart pursued the manly activities of cement mixing for the construction of a wheelchair ramp (which both Amanda and Emma both trod in whilst still wet!) and then moved on to cutting the grass… by machete.  Emma and Nicola painted to an eclectic mix of music on Colin’s iPod, only to have their work painted over in a completely different colour by the future residents.  This was no reflection on their handiwork, but just an indication that everything is so hard to come by in Haiti, including matching shades of Magnolia.

After lunch we went back to the hospital where we led teams in various games and the boys showed some impressive techniques with the shot putt and the javelin – who knew they were such athletes?  It was a fun afternoon and saw some very competitive natures come to the fore – which was great.

Later, the girls played with some of the special needs children who are looked after on site. The children are delightful and the team who work with them do a brilliant job, constantly interacting with them and providing lots of affection.

Finally, Stuart then did some liaising with the scout troop about the camp we are meant to be holding this weekend. From what he’s established, we now anticipate 100+ scouts to descend at the weekend and we can expect to join them at 5am for exercise and devotion.  I think we all await organised chaos and will keep you posted.

Dinner of chicken, rice and beans and then a spot of relaxation joined by our Swiss friend, Sybil who works with the Swiss Paraplegic Foundation, which assists the Hospital in its treatment and rehabilitation of spinal cord injuries.

Thursday morning was breakfast of omelette rolls and fruit and we are now off to finish painting the second building and landscaping the grounds of the volunteer village; the sun is shining (for the first time since we arrived) so we look forward to being nicely tanned by the end of the day.

We have now arrived at the village after a 5-hour coach journey from the Dominican Republic to Haiti.

Crossing the border took a while and was amazing to watch.  Seeing the UN trucks and staff should have given us some indication of what we were heading into.  Once over the border there’s a definite dip in road building quality and an increase in the number of goats, chickens and donkeys.

On arrival, we did a tour of the hospital and saw the buildings in progress and also the results of Hammerson’s previous fund-raising activities – spinal, caesarean & neo-natal buildings….then onto our accommodation where we were greeted by three friendly dogs, Pickle, Bob and Justin.

We all chose to share a hut which consists of 3 rooms, a dodgy bed and a bathroom (which despite the rumours does NOT have warm water). The boys have been banished to the bathroom next door. The village has its own private ‘bar’ staffed by Eddie and Bernard. They are both victims of the earthquake and this is a new venture to give them some independence.  Eddie is struggling with the concept at the moment as he drank 2 rums to everyone else’s 1.

Dinner was followed by some highly competitive games and a growing suspicion that some members of the team are not above cheating (Colin?)!

Then off to bed in anticipation of the next day’s activities!

Hi Hammerson friends, family and significant others,

We have arrived safely in the dominican republuic after a nine hour flight. In which Colin and Amanda sat behind the family from hell and Stuart ate Nicole and Emma’s lunch.

Chilled last night at the hotel and had a good night sleep (after a couple of night caps!!) now preparing to leave for the long bus journey to Haiti today. Reninca has told us about a number of projects that we can get involved in. Stuart has volunteered Colin to train the Haitain paraolympic javelin team.

Stay posted for more….

Posted from Puerto Plata, Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic.

…to the Hammerson Haiti team travelblog.

Posted from Lambeth, England, United Kingdom.