Haitian art and hearts

The art of Haiti had captured my awareness and wonder in the early eighties. Of course, it was linked to my affinity to Africa and the aftermath of slavery. With that in mind, my wife wanted to return to Portugal where we had honeymooned three years before. I am not one to go back but accepted her wishes. En route to the airport, she grilled me about tickets, passports, and such so I handed her the papers as I pumped gas. Her whiteness and shortness of breath were apparent as I was washing the windshield. “Your passport has expired!!!” A short drive to my travel agent and they were working on plans to get a renewal in New York. I gazed at her world map, “Where can we go without a passport?” “Caribbean?” “Even in Haiti?” “Well, yeah.”
The next morning in a waiting tank at Miami airport, I struck up a conversation with an amazing young Haitian returning home. With his newly earned petrol-chemical degree, he was looking forward to creating ethanol and salvaging some devastated terrain in his homeland. Karl was one of twelve children from a prominent judge who was part of Baby Doc’s regime. Karl’s heart showed through with his intent to help Haiti survive, unlike his siblings, all of which were living in Chicago or New York City.
Our first few days in Port au Prince were spent in galleries and art schools collecting. We met Karl for lunch and I expressed a desire to help the people of Haiti. His wisdom came through when he explained education makes a difference, not money. If you sponsor the education of one individual, the long term return is exponential. An educated person will marry a like-minded individual, have offspring that receive schooling, and the cycle continues. Schooling was free in Haiti but you could not go to school without a uniform. The next day we met a family of six living in a single concrete cube that measured six feet aside. The father tended to landscape at Karl’s father’s house. Wages were enough to feed the children but very little clothing. The oldest girl was twelve and excelled in her three years of school attended. A school uniform would be a month’s wages.
The following day we rented a car to see the countryside and drove to Les Cayes. On our return, we stopped at a rural open market place. One booth had a lot of children’s clothing so we had a good time stacking up thirty-odd pieces of shirts, shorts, and socks for our newly adopted family. The attempt to cash-out created a problem as the old vendor lady insisted on an astronomical amount of money. Their Creole language failed my comprehension of French or English. Reaching a point of bewilderment it finally came to me that she had seldom ever sold more than one item at a time. I set our pile aside and brought forth and paid for one or two items at a time. She could not add or multiply! We went away with our goods and everyone was happy.