Dominican Republic to Haiti Day 10 - Saturday (November 8)

Our tenth day in Dominican Republic was our last. It was one of those days that we were just happy to get through. It started out with us getting up ½ hour late because the alarm clock didn’t go off. (can’t remember why). We got ready quickly and grabbed some breakfast. We were planning to take a 6-7 hour bus ride from Santo Domingo, DR to Port-au-Prince, Haiti. There are no direct flights from DR to Haiti, so the options were to take an adventure on a bus or to catch a flight to US and then another to Haiti. We chose the $40 bus ride. One of the SCORE drivers was going to take us to our bus station. It ended up that two of them took us since they didn’t really know the way. We gave them the address and they looked up directions (although they didn’t look totally convinced that they knew where they were going). We said goodbye to our teammates. We left in plenty of time so that we’d get there at least an hour early.

DR takes Christmas seriously--a view in Santo Domingo on the way to the bus station.

The trip to the bus station was an adventure on its own. Our drivers called the bus station a couple times, looked at maps and asked people on the streets; they drove in circles with nervous tapping on the brakes at red lights. Roy and I tried to trust patiently in the backseat. (We thought we had been transported back to Africa! :-) ) Finally we got to the station 25 minutes before our planned departure, we prayed a quick prayer of thanks and they dropped us off and wished us well. Neither Roy nor I speak much Spanish and no Creole, so I really felt like a tourist. Our bus was a tour bus. We laughed when they showed us a video of the fancy bathroom in the back. When we checked it out later, we found it to be a really run down version of the video. It didn’t even have a way to lock the door while in there. Then in the uninhabited mountains about 2/3 of the way to the border our bus died while going up a hill. The bus drivers messed around with it for 20 minutes or so and then we were on our way again. (Roy thinks it overheated.) I was thankful that it wasn’t too hot that day, because while the bus had AC, we were in a tin can warming up while it was broken down. A few miles down the road the same thing happened again but we were on our way in just a few minutes the second time.
 

This was a neat intersection to see the first time, but not the second time when we were going in circles on the way to the bus station.

We got to the border crossing, and Roy and I got tricked by a “helpful” young man. He asked for our passports and the $20 border fee right outside of the border patrol office. He then handed a second guy our passports and disappeared with the money. Of course we realized it about the time it was too late. Oh well, at least he didn’t take off with our passports.

Finally we made it back on the bus and into Haiti. The border between DR and Haiti was marked by a 4 foot chain link fence. We could see differences right away. Lots more people hanging around, the road turned to gravel (we found out later that a flood damaged the original road), and colorful painted taxis became common. The language also changed from Spanish to Creole and the people looked more African and less Latino.

view of the Haitian road with taxi in the center.

a Haiti shop on the side of the road

We were thrilled to get to Haiti and Rhoda, a CVM missionary picked us up. She took us to her and Jan’s house. We were welcomed and that night Kelly came over for a wonderful supper that Jan had prepared for us. (Rhoda, Jan and Kelly are all CVM missionaries. Jan and her former husband, Keith served in Haiti for 26 or so years and Keith passed away a couple years ago. Keith was the vet. Jan has a neat sewing school that we would get to see the next day. Kelly has been there since 2005, and has a neat Give a Kid to a Kid program going…more about that tomorrow. Rhoda is a CVM agricultural missionary and was preparing for a CVM training of trainers for CVM future and present missionaries and Haitian trainers that happened in December.)

CVM missionaries: Jan, Kelly and Rhoda

We no longer had the air-conditioned luxury of the SCORE compound, but we had a welcoming home, and we were thankful that we came late enough in the year that we didn’t have really hot temperatures. There were lots of mosquitoes and we were thankful for mosquito nets and thrilled to hear that the Chikungunya virus was not near as prevalent now as when it first appeared in the country. 

Happy to be safe in Haiti

Jan's house has a balcony where you can climb on the roof. It didn't take us long to climb out.

Overlooking Port-au-Prince, capitol of Haiti