An excerpt of a journal entry:

A couple thoughts I had today while walking:

Haiti may be seen as an “unsafe” country, and it may be for “foreigners”.  But everyday, children of all ages are walking to school by themselves.  I have seen a few parents walking with their children in school uniforms but the majority of the time, kids are walking by themselves or with their group of friends.  There was a little girl that was walking with us for about 10 minutes today.  Not because we were “blan” but because that’s the way to her house.  She was so sassy and confident, just struttin' her stuff on her everyday walk.  Even in P-au-P the kids are walking to school.  It definitely says something about the culture and these communities; that kids are safe to walk 10-15 minutes each day by themselves to school without their parents having to worry.  It also says something about the importance of education to these kids.  Who knows how far they walk somedays!

Last year we drove past this group of homes that looked like a bunch of silos.  Metal, round homes.  I didn’t think much of it; some foreign company probably financed these homes.  But today we walked into them to locate a mother for our survey.  The "village" was fenced in, with what seemed to be a community farm/garden and a little convenience store at the front.  As you walked down the road to the village center (where all the homes were), we passed a pavilion like structure which was either unfinished or open for the weather.  Rosembert was talking to me about the village.  Granted, it was a little rough to understand his whole story but from the gist of it, it seemed that the village was not as helpful as it may have intended to be.  Rosembert mentioned the difference between a need and a desire.  The people who built the village obviously had a desire to help the people.  But was there a need?  The village structure itself seemed very nice; about 4 homes in a circle with a middle structure ( a concrete slab with a thatched roof over it) similar to a gazebo.  Then there was another larger middle structure in the very center of the entire village.  But after walking through the entire zone of service last year and this year, and seeing all these different villages it seems to be completely contradictory to the way everyone else lives.  They seemed to be closed off from the rest of the community.  Even the homes themselves are so similar, the families are unable to personalize the homes with the bright colors and soft curtains many of the other homes have here. Was this a need or a desire of these people?