Read the last post to figure out the gas explosion part of the title…I’m still a bit stunned by the whole thing. Anyway, I couldn’t help but add another blog post about dinner in Haiti tonight. Just too unique an experience to hold in.
So the plan was to meet the World Bank peeps for drinks to discuss Haiti development projects. As we arrived at the hotel restaurant, a man in a Haitian army uniform jumped out of a vehicle with a machine gun, and I swear it was pointed right at my face. I might be making that part up about the face pointing, but it’s amazing what goes through your mind when you see a machine gun all of the sudden within poking distance. Following the machine gun man out of the car was the president of Haiti (again, I’m pretty sure this was the case, but my eyes were focused on the barrel). Martelly is a pretty noticeable celebrity (former rapper), but it’s hard to compete with a machine gun.
We had a nice chat with the World Bank people, but somehow managed to sit next to them at the bar for a half hour before realizing that we were all there to meet each other. It would have helped if they had been wearing matching WB t-shirts advertising globalization. Somehow, drinks with the WB people turned into an impromptu dinner with a different set of people we had never met before from the US Embassy and the Dept of Labor. Interesting dinner conversation to say the least, and another beautiful sunset over the Caribbean. I happily enjoyed violating another food-health warning and ate fish. You pretty much can’t eat anything in Haiti if you read the entire brochure (which of course I did). Dinner ended with an interesting conversation about my setting up an air quality monitor at the US embassy here. Finally some interest in my idea!! It might require some more travel, which isn’t easy with three kids, but has the potential to make a major impact on understanding quality of life issues here.
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