Since January 12th
there's been a lot of talk on TV and in the press about how "dignified" Haitians have been in the aftermath of their recent catastrophe.
But my dictionary defines dignity as "the state or quality of being worthy of honor or respect."
So how did those journalists view Haitians before the earthquake? And why would anyone assume dignity to be in short supply amid the poverty of the poorest country in the Western hemisphere? Did they imagine that only some thin membrane prevented the population from degenerating to cannibalism in times of disaster?
And what's all this about "shoddy construction" and a lack of "building codes"? Were they really so unaware of the trade-offs likely to be made when the average annual income is $1300 — for food, clothing and earthquake-proof construction?
I find it absurd
to suggest dignity might be even harder to find amid the near-total destruction of their entire country. Unless totally absent — which it often is, conspicuously, among the particularly wealthy — dignity should, correspondingly, be more plentiful in Haiti, under the circumstances. Poverty, tragedy and dignity have worked together very well, every day, throughout the Third World for several hundred years.
That's only conjecture, of course, since I've never been confined to such circumstances. But I do imagine I'd find the dignity necessary to endure them. Unless I take my dignity for granted, like those journalists.
I doubt Haitians are any more remarkably dignified today than they were before the earthquake. And I'm certain they're no less dignified than when, in 1791, they stood up to their masters and said, “Enough of this! We cleared the land, we planted the sugar, we tended it, we cut it down, we carried it to your ships and made you wealthy. It's we who've made you rich but we won’t be owned by anyone anymore. This land belongs to us from now on, not you. Get out!”
In fact, it would be more logical to assume Haitians would be among the most dignified and courageous of people, having successfully risen from servitude to fight back the European powers that enslaved them and to whom they actually paid restitution — as if guilty of some wrongdoing — with cash they couldn't afford, over a period of 150 years.
Equally telling about the Haitian character
in my opinion, is the dignity they naturally accord others. English-speaking people regularly mispronounce the name of the country “HAY-tee.” But the Haitian Creole word is spelled “Ayiti,” which has three syllables, not two. And that word, itself, comes from the original Arawak Indians’ name for the island that was once theirs alone. It simply means “tall mountains” or “land of tall mountains.” Ha-i-ti.
I find that significant. Very few Arawak Indians would have been left by the time Haiti became the first independent country in the New World, so they could hardly have been in a position to insist what the name of the new country would be. But by choosing that name, the former slaves chose to dignify the memory of the original inhabitants of the island who'd been decimated, like so many of their own, and by the same colonizers.
I know less about Haiti
and the details of its current situation than the breathless journalists of CNN who've now officially pronounced Haitians to be "dignified" in their suffering. But what they were telling us, had they thought about it, should have been, “Haitians have remained dignified in their suffering.”
I have no special qualifications to to say so, but I've been to that country, too. I have my own anecdotal experience of the place and was an admirer of Haitians, their popular and folk music, their painting and the little literature with which I'm familiar, for quite a long time before I finally visited.
and the details of its current situation than the breathless journalists of CNN who've now officially pronounced Haitians to be "dignified" in their suffering. But what they were telling us, had they thought about it, should have been, “Haitians have remained dignified in their suffering.”
That’s why, in 1996, I bought myself a ticket to Port-au-Prince. The brief two weeks I spent in Haiti, mostly in Jacmel (near the epicenter of the quake) were among the most memorable of my life; a voyage into the history and personality of the marvelous — and very dignified — inhabitants of the Land of Tall Mountains.
Which brings me back to what irks me
so much about the word "dignity" as applied to Haitians in their misery. The following took place on my very last day there, in Port-au-Prince:
so much about the word "dignity" as applied to Haitians in their misery. The following took place on my very last day there, in Port-au-Prince:
I’d been taking pictures, throughout my visit, with an unfamiliar camera that eventually became my own. I was killing time before catching my flight back to Montreal, drinking a beer on the main thoroughfare, the Delmas, in an open-air bar, observing the passing crowds through a powerful telephoto lens.
Across the street was a huge pile of garbage, as there was on every corner along the stretch. But at the top of the pile, I saw someone moving. I pulled focus. It was an elderly man, shirtless, standing waist-deep in the filth, his bony back to me and his arms immersed to the elbows, searching, I assumed, for what might be useful or edible.
But then he slowly turned to reveal his face. It was then that I could see the pupils of his eyes were completely white and that he was blind. Then, just inches from where he was groping, I saw a dead dog. A dirty, dead white dog.
I had the picture framed
in focus and properly exposed — or so I prefer to remember. But I couldn't press the shutter. I concluded at the time — perhaps explainable by everything beautifully bizarre I'd seen during the previous two weeks — that if I were to take that picture, I'd be taking away whatever remained of the blind man’s dignity, even though he'd never have known it had been stolen by me and my camera.
Because for all I knew, the blind man may have been having a relatively good day. It was not for me, or anyone who might have seen the photograph in the future, to judge how much dignity the man possessed or deserved to be accorded. And at that moment, he was undoubtedly worthy of my honor and respect, despite what the photograph would have suggested.
I guess that's why I decided to keep the image in my mind rather than on film where it would have been arbitrarily interpreted by others.
in focus and properly exposed — or so I prefer to remember. But I couldn't press the shutter. I concluded at the time — perhaps explainable by everything beautifully bizarre I'd seen during the previous two weeks — that if I were to take that picture, I'd be taking away whatever remained of the blind man’s dignity, even though he'd never have known it had been stolen by me and my camera.
Because for all I knew, the blind man may have been having a relatively good day. It was not for me, or anyone who might have seen the photograph in the future, to judge how much dignity the man possessed or deserved to be accorded. And at that moment, he was undoubtedly worthy of my honor and respect, despite what the photograph would have suggested.
I guess that's why I decided to keep the image in my mind rather than on film where it would have been arbitrarily interpreted by others.
Although I’ve literally shouted for joy whenever I’ve seen images of survivors pulled from the rubble of Port-au-Prince, and though I'm happy that the world has genuinely rallied to their cause, with everything else I've seen and heard about Haitians' "dignity in suffering" these last few weeks, I'm happier still that I turned my camera away that day in 1996.
About the photographs:
All the above photographs are my own and copyright by me. They were taken of Haitians in Jacmel or else in Guantanamo, Cuba, which has a sizable Haitian refugee population. The woman in the top photo was Clarita, now deceased, who founded the "Tumba Francesca" dance school in that city.
SINCE WRITING THIS BLOG ENTRY IN FEBRUARY, 2010, HAITI HAS BEEN STRUCK BY A CHOLERA EPIDEMIC WHICH WAS ALMOST CERTAINLY BROUGHT TO THE COUNTRY BY THE U.N. NEPALESE CONTINGENT WHICH WAS STATIONED IN NORTHERN HAITI, NEAR THE MOUTH OF THE ARTIBONITE RIVER.
THE EPIDEMIC THREATENS ABOUT 200,000 PEOPLE AND IS A MONUMENTAL BLUNDER UNDER THE CIRCUMSTANCES, SINCE A CHOLERA EPIDEMIC SWEPT THROUGH NEPAL JUST LAST SUMMER. DOCTORS WITHOUT BORDERS HAS PROVEN TO BE THE MOST RELIABLE SOURCE OF FACTS AND AID AND WILL REMAIN INDISPENSABLE OVER THE NEXT YEAR OR MORE.
DAVID
