Second report from Balan, Haiti

Tomorrow, we will wrap up our 3rd recording session. Living in a community where electricity is intermittent, we are fortunate that we will have had 9 groups perform! On the legal front, we’ve met one lawyer who seems very qualifed. We have reviewed the contract with him and have discussed the points of concern which he raised about the definitions of gross and net proceeds, the ownership of intellectual property by the musicians, and the community project that they will support. We also discussed the percentage splits. At least at this point, it looks like half of the proceeds will go to fund the building of a health clinic in Balan. All they currently have is a dispensary, and it has lines every day – and, it is a challenging place for the caregivers and patients to say the least.

I’ve also gotten to know the English speakers from my hosts pretty well, Adolphe and Hudson. Both of them are very interested in their communities – they are church leaders as well as community leaders. The challenges they face because of the lack of a formal legal order in Haiti are ones they articulate plainly, accept with grace, and realize they can move past if they have the right plan. They seem to understand that they can use private international contracts as a vehicle to reach the international marketplace through e-commerce – which is our PeaceTones plan. Since English is not their native language, I ask them to repeat many of the things we talk about, to say it in as many different ways as they can, and I feel that they do understand.

One thing is certain for me – I’m uncomfortable working in a country where I can’t speak the language (I can get by in Spanish as a second language) and English isn’t spoken. This was not a problem in the West Bank, Israel and Afghanistan since English speakers were everywhere. But here in Balan, finding English speakers is a challenge. There are a few people who speak Spanish since they worked at one point in the Dominican Republic – and, I’ve had some wonderful conversations with them! Though I have learned a few words of creole, I feel separated from a lot that is going on. So many people have reached out to me in many ways, though, so I feel cared for!

Yesterday, we hiked up mountain to a local village so that RESPE:Balan could do their final health traning. The villagers are the same people who would be able to use a health clinic that PeaceTones may help build, we hope. In the meantime, we climbed for an hour and a half and got to a village where about 200 families live in an agricultural paradise with views of the sea and mountains that are a treat for this bedraggled traveler. We stuffed ourselves, about 30 trainees, 5 teachers, and the student team and me, into a small classroom. After about an hour of listening to training sessions in creole, I found the opportunity to escape the room at a break, and find a little kid to sit next to who was staring into the room. The school room, like every other building on the side of this mountain, are open structures, basically huts, some built with concrete, but mostly not. Everything is open to the elements. So looking into the school room just means looking into the windowless spaces which serve as the windows for the school. While the little boy and I played, one of the musicians we had recorded a couple of days earlier who lives here, and, who speaks Spanish (!!!) came and offered to show me around.

So we began walking, stopped at a small home to ask permission to walk across their property, and then the vistas opened up dramatically to mountains and the sea! I remember Vancouver having mountains which bumped up right against the ocean, and, this view was comparable or better. But my musician friend told me that it hadn’t rained in 3 months, the land here was dry, and people were suffering tremendously. Thinking about it, I realized that the markets they have are basically local markets – it is almost impossible to fly anything of significance off this island; so PeaceTones will offer this musician a chance to see a new vista for his family.

There is a lot to do in the couple of days remaining.
Second report from Balan, Haiti

Jeff