Patricko

Patricko is a young handicapped boy - some sort of brain damage due to a seizure disorder - and he was abandoned by his aunts, aunts who were receiving payments from the boy's father to care for Patricko while dad worked in the US. It was the second time they'd abandoned him at a local hospital. The first time they'd reclaimed Patricko in a panic when the dad announced that he was coming back to Haiti to visit, but now that dad was gone again, they left the child at the hospital at the mercy of strangers.

 

At Haitian hospitals, you only receive care if you have family with you. When the doctor prescribes meds, it's your family who has to go to a pharmacy and buy the meds so the nurse can give them to you. If you need a dressing changed, your family has to pay for the gloves, gauze and tape. If you are hungry, your family has to bring you food and feed it to you. Perhaps a kind person who is taking care of their own family member may help you out, but with a handicapped child, everyone stays away.

 

Handicapped kids are considered cursed in Haiti. People don't understand brain damage or developmental delay and they go out of their way to hide, abuse, and shame both the patient and the family. So when Patricko was abandoned, it meant that no one was feeding him, changing his clothes or diapers or sheets, bathing him or giving him any attention at all. Until Anne and Venelia took charge.

 

 

Anne and Venelia graduated from my community health agent class with excellent grades, but more importantly, with hearts of compassion. When I heard about Patricko, I asked them to take care of him until we could find a permanent home. They were on the ward with him every day; they cooked meals for him, washed his soiled linens by hand, played with him, sang to him, and reported to me glowingly that he was starting to make eye contact and trying to sit up. I intended to pay them, but then they told me that a rumor had started circulating around the hospital that a "white person" was paying them $200 every week for their work. They were outraged and explained how they'd announced to the hospital staff with great pride: "We are doing this because it's the right thing to do, not because anyone is paying us."

 

After 3 weeks, our friends at Coreluv, an orphanage nearby, agreed to take Patricko. He's on seizure medications and with good nutrition and one-on-one attention, he's progressed immensely. The once emaciated little boy with peeling skin and bald spots on his head from lying in a bed all day is now healthy and solid. He can sit up on his own and the nannies tell me that he keeps trying to stand. Anne and Venelia are convinced that someday he will walk.

 

Patricko's transformation is a beautiful story, but to me, the selflessness of Anne and Venelia is even more beautiful. In a country of poverty and desperation, they looked beyond their needs to the needs of one of the least of these and gave him the love he needed to survive. In a country where we frequently see people sitting back, waiting for foreigners to solve all their problems, these two women stepped up and did the right thing without any help from me. Now that is a beautiful story.

Back to paradise

During Christmas vacation, I brought my friends to Zanglais, the beach retreat center on the south side of the island where I used to take the youth group every year. I thought perhaps time and distance had exaggerated the beauty of the spot in my mind, but when we arrived, it was every bit as wonderful as I remembered.

 

 

 

 

A long sandy beach with marvelous waves. Lawns of real grass. A gazebo for playing cards and making music. Delicious meals cooked by local staff. A small mountain peninsula overlooking the bay. Gorgeous sunrises and sunsets.

 

There are no photos to capture the magic of the daily excursions I went on, clambering up the steep mountains behind the retreat center, through stream beds and past natural springs, over cow pastures and under mango trees, along little paths used only by goats. I saw flowers that I've never before seen in Haiti and got stuck in thick vines under a canopy of trees. Trees! The Gonaives side of the island has been thoroughly deforested, leaving us with desert, but at Zanglais, 3 hours south of Port-au-Prince, you can still find remnants of the natural jungle that this country used to be. My hikes were the most joyful and invigorating hours of each day.

 

Christmas traditions

My all-time favorite thing about Christmas is caroling. The only thing I don't like about caroling is how cold your toes get after an hour of standing in front of neighbors' houses and singing. The obvious solution is to do your caroling in a warmer location, a location such as, I don't know, maybe Haiti? 

 

 

We drove around town in the big blue truck and visited the homes of some of the Jubilee School teachers, as well as some of my neighbors. Christmas caroling is not a tradition in Haiti, so people were a little confused and embarrassed but overall, they seemed thrilled. I particularly loved being able to do something special for the teachers just to let them know that their hard work and dedication to the children of the slums is not overlooked.

 

 

We even got a huge grin out of "The Big Man", our grumpy neighbor. I call that a successful evening.

 

"We wish you a Merry Christmas, we wish you a Merry Christmas, we wish you a Merry Christmas, and a Happy New Year!"

"He looks just like you!"

The highlight of the month of December was when Judes, our 4th grade teacher, broke his jaw. OK, it wasn't really the jaw breaking that was the highlight; it was the fact that my younger brother decided to come to Haiti for 3 weeks to substitute teach!  

 

 

Barnabas taught English, math, and Bible to 14 rowdy 4th graders, ranging in age from 9-16. His Haitian co-teacher, Wilkens, taught French, Creole, and social studies.

 

In his free time, Barn went adventuring with me, sometimes accompanied by the teenage girls, Bess, Kara and Emma, who loved and hated having a teasing "big brother" presence.

 

 

He also tutored a few children who used to attend Jubilee School and have been transferred to Haitian schools. He helped out with gym classes and with the planning and practice for the school Christmas program. Barn is fluent in French and he had picked up a lot of Creole on his past visits to Haiti, so he was instantly popular. The kids were always playing with him and talking with him and climbing all over him.

 

Everywhere we went, people immediately asked me, "Miss Keziah, is that your brother?" When I answered in the affirmative, the response was always the same: "I knew it because he looks just like you." I thought it was pretty sweet until one day we were all out with our German friends and a lady asked if Aaron, a 22 year old German intern, was my brother. Before I could answer, the lady smiled knowingly and said, "He looks just like you."

 

Barn left at Christmas break and the kids have been asking me daily when he's coming back. They are very disappointed when I explain that he has a job in America and so he won't be able to come back. But if this job doesn't work out, we've always got a spot for you here, Barn!

 

 

Happy New Year from Haiti!