Embroidery

The images in the embroidery are vibrant renderings that depict the animals, lore, and lives of the people that live on the island of laGonav.

If you'd like to purchase artwork or simply contribute to the Women's Art Centre, Courageous Women Theatre Group or the Matenwa Community School for Development please contact me or go the the school's website to connect with Chris Low directly.

www.matenwa.org

Again, the youtube video really captures the spirit here as well.

www.youtube.com (search Matenwa)

Art Centre and Work

This building was skillfully built by the wise, calm, capable hands of Boloslo. There is a picture here of him holding one of his six daughters. He is also the area's bone setter, gently working to set the broken bones of people, as well as all animals. He is a master craftsman and gentle, kind soul.

He, as well as any men, are welcome to attend the meetings and productions of the Women's Art Centre. Abner Saveur, the head or principal, of the Matenwa School was also a regular here.

There are two rooms above the studios that house visiting artists, educators from around the world.

Art Centre and Work

A fifteen minute walk through cornfields and past the yummy kanape tree the winding path opens up to the colorful women's art centre. It was founded as a venue for local women to create artwork, thus generating self-sustaining income for themselves and their families. Traditionally, men work outside the home leaving little recourse or livelihood, for women and their children, who do not have a (reliable or employed) man in their lives.

The art centre got off the ground with collaborative assistance from Ellen LeBow, artist and educator. When we visited last, six years ago women were painting large silk scarves with designs indigenous to the region, animals, mermaids, plants, birds. The production back then took place on Chris' back porch. Whenever these women come together to make art, meet, practice or perform, they sing a powerful, moving, self-written song of strength, endurance, thankfulness and love.

This new, gorgeous, spacious centre houses a music room where guitar playing is taught and composed, songs are written and sung and theatre practiced. Another room functions as the basis of the spectacular scarf making. While we were there we watched, fascinated as huge silk banners commissioned by Vassar College were gracefully completed.

The next building has two airy rooms where the detailed and well-crafted embroidery work is done. Haitian sequined 'flags' are probably the most well-known of this islands' art. The intricate beading and minute stitching are sparkly masterpieces.

Our host mother, Josyen, heads the embroidery group, teaching and keeping accounts. We were thrilled to be able to bring back to the states the embroidery work that was finished to send on to a gallery in Boston. I'm finishing up some basting and ironing and will send them off next week.

I've been in touch with the gallery owner and she's allowed that we could purchase what we'd like and send her the rest. If you see something you'd like to own, directly supporting the women of Matenwa, in these photos or want to stop by and take a look at the whole collection please give me a call, soon!

Social Justice

Our arms and aim are a little better with regular throwing practice. Rock throwing is a very useful skill. One uses it to seek revenge at night, knock down yummy fruit, keep a creepy dog away, crush a tarantula (sorry, just can’t put up with them watching me from inches away while using the latrine) and regularly amuse youngsters with our (my) ineptness.

On another note, we heard an anecdote about how the culture of the community has changed since kids started school at Lekol Komunite Matenwa. A neighboring family would discipline their small children by throwing rocks at them, which unfortunately wasn’t uncommon. After her kids have been going to school for several years, she now brags how if her daughters don’t go to the market to buy the soap she needs, she leaves just their laundry unwashed. Natural consequences and non-physical punishment are the norm here now. Parents and students learn and teach about human rights here in Matenwa, and very specifically that children have the same rights as adults. Social justice is intrinsic in everything this school community does.

Swimming Superstition and Fact

On our way to Grand Sous, we would dutifully greet every passerby and household with the requisite, singsong, BONJOU! When folks stopped to talk to us and found out we were going to Grand Sous, they would issue dire warnings, tell us their heads hurt and hearts would stop if we went on, because they would be worried sick about us. “Only put your feet in, please!” urged the well-meaning grannies. “The water is deeper than the banyan trees high” “The current is strong like hurricane!” protested the old uncles. Several months ago, a boy died there, struck by another high jumping youth who cracked his head open, horribly, their heads hit under the murky water. The local superstition that it was somehow cursed and our extreme caution, absolutely no current, coupled with our ability to swim well, created a place where we had a little paradise, mostly to ourselves.

Valencia and friends

Valencia, Libne’s thirteen year old sister is Matenwa’s ‘foutbal’ star. Like many girls of Matenwa, she participates in the daily foutbal games and practices but she is the only girl to play with the teenage boys’ team. She is ferociously outstanding. As we went to market with her one day she explained all the trees we passed and plants, opening up a whole new scenery to us. We went swimming with her, which was a riot, as she didn’t know how to swim but was very, very eager to learn. There is a saying here that Haitians don’t swim if they can’t see the bottom. Most people have never swum before. Of course, Valencia gleefully plunged in (with a life jacket) and within the hour was trying to dive. When she swam at you or laughed, she did it powerfully and with abandon!

More Grand Sous

On our way to Grand Sous, we would dutifully greet every passerby and household with the requisite, singsong, BONJOU! When folks stopped to talk to us and found out we were going to Grand Sous, they would issue dire warnings, tell us their heads hurt and hearts would stop if we went on, because they would be worried sick about us. “Only put your feet in, please!” urged the well-meaning grannies. “The water is deeper than the banyan trees high” “The current is strong like hurricane!” protested the old uncles. Several months ago, a boy died there, struck by another high jumping youth who cracked his head open, horribly, their heads hit under the murky water. The local superstition that it was somehow cursed and our extreme caution, absolutely no current, coupled with our ability to swim well, created a place where we had a little paradise, mostly to ourselves.

Grand Sous

We gratefully found an idyllic pool of water, near Grand Sous, our last week of our stay. It took an hour walk through the relentless heat, past ogling children, down into a lush ravine where a spring fed stream tumbled over a small waterfall. There were huge banyan trees, breadfruit trees, birds, butterflies, a tantalizing glimpse of what Haiti had been before massive deforestation. We spent three glorious visits here. To actually submerge in water was an indescribable pleasure. We had to clamber down a rock face (Max spotted us) to the 7 ft. deep pool of water. While we were mostly the only swimmers, bringing two or three kids with us from Matenwa, whom we tried to teach to swim (Genevieve, instructing en Francais and Max gamely standing in the deep parts for children to swim to and from). We, of course, were never alone. Irritatingly, even here, we would be trailed by several boys, even men, who would stand around, trying to engage or tease us. If we could ignore them for a couple of hours they would eventually saunter off. In the end, it was all worth it, to sun, cool off, jump and dive from the rocks and splash around in the abundant water.

New Friends

As we pick up a little more Kreyol and familiarity, we’ve started to hang out with more neighbors. We went to the market with Libne (Leeb-nuh), a gorgeous, gregarious eighteen year old, who is visiting home from her last year of high school in Port au Prince. Strolling in her celebrity-like wake, we admired her enthusiastic embraces of grandmothers and aunties, she was quick to pick up babies, and graciously tolerant of much male attention. Libne would walk hand in hand with Genevieve, asking her to repeat phrases in Kreyol until she got it perfect, then quizzing her ten minutes later. She also trustingly accepted Genevieve’s offer to help carry laundry back from the stream. Eve learned how to precariously balance a thirty-pound metal basin (towering with clean, wet clothes) while walking up a rocky path.

Communication Disconnect

Our internet connection has lapsed the last few days of our stay, sorry to cut out on all you three faithful readers! It feels odd not to correspond with Nick, checking on the cats and garden, hearing about his crazy work load, as well as crazy play load. But, it was way opportune, it being the link that needed to be severed, giving us a chance to really live fully in another culture and land. When we first arrived, we were careful not to trip in the dark, for fear of getting injured and not having access to medical help. The last week, not only did we not stumble in the dark anymore, (well, not very often!) we felt less afraid, and more capable and confident that we could manage, without our rather imagined safety nets.

Before we left and enroute I felt rather panicked about not having a cell phone that would work in Haiti (FYI, Verizon does not offer international service). Nick, always so helpful, researched what could be done and had his World Edition Blackberry enabled for our trip. Unfortunately, it too did not work outside of Miami. For future reference our best bet would have been to purchase a phone in the Port au Prince airport and phone cards, while we were there, Voila and Digicel were working, albeit sporatically. There isn’t postal service within or to Haiti or any organized, public transport other than taptaps (taxi-like pickups) and the dangerously overcrowded buses, so people rely on the spotty cellular communication even in the remotest locations.

The so-called 11th department of the Haitian Government (there are officially ten departments) is the vast diaspora, Haitians living outside of Haiti. Their monetary contributions to remaining family, schools, villages accounts for the largest percentage of Haiti’s economy.

Along the roads and at every junction are small, well-built, colorful kiosk-like shacks with enticing names like Perseverance, Lott, Salvation, and the Solution Center. We thought, maybe we could exchange our US dollars here but found them only to be lottery/pay day loan type establishments. One can not exchange US dollars for Goudes (their monetary unit) in a bank in the US, at the Miami airport’s currency exchange, nor even the Port au Prince airport. Eventually, we would write a check or give dollars to the treasurer of Lekol Matenwa and he would drive a motorcycle into the town, where he could deposit it and withdraw goudes from the school’s account. (39 goudes to the US dollar)

The going rate for a full day of farm work was about 500 goudes a day, around 8 US bucks. Regular work like that was hard to come by.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Haiti

Reading

We do still have something in mass quantity…reading time. Here is the entire list of our digested literature so far: The Last Life by Claire Messud, Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe, Ender’s Game and Speaker for the Dead, both by Orson Scott Card, The Dispossessed by Ursula LeGuin, Franny and Zooey and Catcher in the Rye, both by J.D. Salinger, The Comedians by Graham Greene, On the Road by Jack Kerouac, The Dispatches by Michael Herr, The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver, Krick? Krak! and Breath, Eyes, Memory, both by Edwidge Danticat, “A” is for Alibi, “C” is for Corpse, “D” is for Detective, and “G” is for Gumshoe, all by Sue Grafton, Dreams of My Father by Barack Obama, and My Unwritten Books by George Steiner, Sometimes a Great Notion and One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey, In the Time of Butterflies by Julia Alvarez and finally, The Piano Tuner by Daniel Mason. Nearly all of these books have “cross-pollinated,” among us, and all have been satisfying, to say the least. We found some new favorites this trip. Mariam adored The Piano Tuner and is really enjoying My Unwritten Books. Genevieve takes the award for crazy fast reader, recommending both Poisonwood Bible and The Piano Tuner after downing each in two days flat. Max likes to talk about what he has read, including his faves of the trip, The Dispossessed and, surprise, The Piano Tuner.

An apt quote we read during our trip was this, about traveling:

I am a part of all that I have met;
Yet all experience is an arch wherethro’
Gleams that untravel’d world whose margin fades
For ever and for ever when I move.

-Alfred, Lord Tennyson, “Ulysses”

Live Simply

I suspect when we return, we will relish a few feasts of longed-for food. (Chinese/Thai food, milkshakes, waffles, apples and margaritas, top last night’s list, we torture ourselves nightly with this question, “What do you miss most?”) After our initial binge of cravings, I then hope we will settle into a less packaged-and-prepared, more healthful-and-Haitian-like diet. We’ve certainly lost some extra weight, and we feel a bit hungry most of the time but have enough water and snacks that we packed (jerky, trail mix, power bars) to stave off real irritation and fatigue. We have noticed that people share what they have, offering something to anyone who comes to their porch, especially water and roasted corn, being the necessary staples. Hopefully, like Gail Alexander (Laura’s wise Florida friend) predicted in our heartening last minute conversation , we will return home with a greater appreciation for what we have and choose to live more modestly, resulting in a more balanced, informed lifestyle. Live simply, so others can simply live is a profound and relevant adage.