Being Canadian Means You Speak FRENCH!!!!

Today was our first day without a distribution in a long while. It feels weird not waking up at 4:00am in the morning! Never thought those words would come out of my mouth!!! Even though there was no distribution scheduled, everyone still got up at around 5:30am to get ready for the 6am international news update with Master Cheng Yen. After breakfast was served, it was already about 7:30am. Around 8am, three Tzu Chi volunteers, including myself, headed to the Canadian Embassy here in Haiti. The Canadian Embassy is infamous for always having a huge line of people waiting outside. At first I did not know what was going on, but then upon a closer look, all of these people are waiting to get their VISAs approved. What a hard thing to go through everyday, especially the rate of rejection is way higher than acceptance. We drove to the embassy hoping to get in somehow. I was under the impression that we had an appointment set up, all ready to go, but ummmm...yeah...that was not the case. Luckily, we just walked up to the gates with our passports and it was an easy entrance. A little too easy, if you ask me. I felt quite bad due to the fact that the long line of people probably have been waiting for hours on end before we arrived. So we got into the building no problem, and went to the reception area to ask for someone from CIDA (Canadian International Development Agency). We went through all the security machines and it was pretty funny, because one of the Tzu Chi volunteer is from Canada and the security guard was speaking to him in French the whole time. He just said, "Uh....English?" It was pretty funny, so I stepped in and spoke French with her. It was kind of funny due to the fact that most people coming to the Embassy probably spoke English, at least be bi-lingual you know? It was as if to say that all Canadians should speak French no matter how big Canada is. So we ended up not getting a meeting time with CIDA because they were really overloaded with work.

After getting back to the compound, I went straight to do some more report writing. That seems to be the main theme of this week...reports...reports....reports. Not long after, news came in that we were heading down to Léogâne to do a walk-through of tomorrow's distribution for 2,000 families. Yeah this is going to be our biggest distribution since I've been here, so everyone is sort of worried, due to the low number of volunteers, as well. There is also added pressure and stress due to our first time distributing at K-Pity, just down the road, which did not go over so well. We had to leave early and not all the family received a voucher. It was super frustrating. So with all that in mind, we headed down to Léogâne, which is an hour and a half away with not much traffic. I love the trip down to Léogâne, because it is like a safari trip. The roads are super bumpy, like jungle terrain, and we will pass many towns just next to the ports. Everyone seems to dread it due to the bumpy roads, but I just love it, and I always love to sit in the back, where it is the most bumpy. Yeah, I am weird I know. So we got down there and met up with the Canadian Army at their base. We all headed over to the Soccer Stadium, where the distribution site is going to be tomorrow, and did a walk through. A simple walk through turned into a giant headache, because the place was really big with a lot of openings for people to come into. The most important thing and easiest thing to a smooth distribution experience is having only one entrance and one exit for the people. When there are multiple openings, people can come and go as they please and it is harder for police/army forces to keep a close eye on security measures and also requires a lot of man power. So that was our first challenge, and then there are two camp cities within the big stadium site, so that makes it complicated, because we have to clear everyone out of their tents. We finally coordinated everything with the locals, it took a long while, with me translating back and forth with each of the organization leaders. We finally came up with a final plan, after throwing 3 out of the main gates, of using barb wire to keep everyone inside an isolated area for distribution. Then we proceeded to head to City Hall to meet with the Mayor. He ended up not being there and we had to talk to his secretaries. *One of Haiti's biggest problem is the government system. So this is no exception. We have tried to work with the town's governmental systems and the mayor for a while now, but it has not seemed to improve. The Mayor, due to the Rumor Mill, has not been shined in a positive light.* So we ended up talking for hours about the situation tomorrow and it turns out that the vouchers that passed out were not passed out to the right people, which happened the last time at K-Pity Camp. We were so frustrated. It was just talking in circles and they said maybe it's the language situation and confusion, but now I was there, so there was no excuse. Anyways, long story short, the distribution is still on, but we just have to come back for the other 700 families that were left out. It just makes it so difficult because the distribution site is located right where they live, but we are NOT going to distribute to them??? This makes no sense at all.

Coming back we head super traffic time. There were times we were just at a stand-still and did not move. It was fun. I was enjoying the time in the "Indiana Jones" SUV (Yes that's what I call it). When we finally got back at around 5pm, we were super hungry due to not having anything to eat all day. I went and started writing more reports and talked with more volunteers about their experiences. When dinner was served, I was too busy to eat, again. The daily evening meeting was starting and I was pulled aside to translate for one of our first Haitian Tzu Chi Brothers, he was just newly inducted into the Organization. So hooked him up with Skype and I translated from French to Mandarin to Master Cheng Yen how he came about becoming a member of the Tzu Chi Family. I was super excited that most of my tasks were going to be done tonight...but then of course CURVE BALL. Yeah, so the main Tzu Chi Volunteer leaders are going to meet with the President of Haiti (whom has been in hiding ever since the earthquake struck) tomorrow. All of our paperwork are in Mandarin, so they asked me to translate all of them to French before the end of the night.....yeah....easier said than done. These were all excel spreadsheets with tiny words on them. I ended up starting the translation at around 9pm till 2am in the morning. 5 hours of translation....Mr. President I hope you approve of our efforts in Haiti.

So 2:30am going to bed now....got to wake up at 4:00am to go to the distribution....can anyone say NAP!