Jovana

When I started to write this post, yesterday afternoon, I was sitting next to Jovana. Jovana is eight years old and in second grade at the La Croix School. I tried to be a good influence on her, but I don’t know how well I succeeded. I taught her to play Fruit Ninja on my iPod, and she’s took to it like a pro. I wanted to go and play soccer with her but she was still in her church clothes and she didn’t really want to go to play anyway. She is related to Pastor Pierre through his extended family who lives in the north of Haiti, but they ceased to be able to care for her so she has been taken under Pastor Pierre’s care. Pastor Pierre can’t give her his full attention because he is already so busy with running the mission, but he sees that Jovana is cared for. The women who work at the mission make sure she always has enough to eat, that her clothes are clean, and that she has always has a bed to sleep on and a roof over her head. She has people looking after her but she doesn’t she doesn’t have a parent playing with her, making sure she does her homework, or raising her the way most kids do.

Every week a mission team has been here, at least one volunteer has commented that the kids in Haiti are living as kids should live. Sure their health care is lacking and they might not have a comfortable bed to sleep on, the poverty these kids live in allows the to play with all of the other kids in the community, to run around with out a care in the world. These kids aren’t stuck inside playing video games or being forced to learn mandarin at age five the way kids in the US are, kids in Haiti are experiencing the deep joy that comes from being apart of a community, a deep joy that most America kids miss out on because of all of our material distractions. Haitian kids are experiencing the “real things” every kid should enjoy. The ideal world people envision for Haiti isn’t one similar to the US, but a world similar to the way Haiti is now, just without the cholera or the political upheaval. There is this sense that, because of their poverty, these kids have an enriched life and are closer to an “ideal” life because they don’t have all of the stuff we have, and they’re not weighed down by material possessions the way Americans are. They might not have the healthcare or education opportunities we have, but their poverty allows them to live simple lives that have a greater authentic joy to them than our lives full of material possessions have. This notion extends beyond the children and to their families and all life in the rural communities. There have been many days where I’ve walked through a Lakou with American families and they’ve said how jealous they are by the simplicity in the Lakous. The people all live together with a “real” sense of community we that don’t have in the US. Life is simpler in the communities, and even though there is less stuff, the simplicity is worth it. In the Lakou people always see their neighbors and they don’t stay cooped up in their homes the way we do in the US. This is not a sentiment I seen only with Americans in Haiti, rather it was something I came across with other Americans in Ecuador and South Africa. I remember some of my college friends looking at the rural life in the Galapagos and thinking how great it would be to have such a nice and simple life not burdened by material possessions or the need for success we have in America. The Galapagos have some spectacular beach property, and that combined a small house and none of the material burdens we have in America would make for the ideal life. There is this sense among so many who visit Haiti, Ecuador, and the developing world that, despite people’s poverty, those in the developing have more enriched lives than Americans have. America has sacrificed relationships and community for material wealth, we’ve won the rat race by cutting out the human part within us. The developing world, with its few possessions, is still “human”.

On the surface, this makes sense. Going through a Lakou in Haiti or playing soccer in Langa or Soweto in South Africa, there is this intangible sense of community that is rarely felt in America. You feel special just for being there, you feel needed by these kids, and loved just for your presence. This is a feeling’s potency makes it difficult to describe, there is nothing in the US that is really like it. I’ve felt it whenever I hang out with old friends from college or whenever I am apart of a group that wins something big, but it’s a rare feeling that isn’t easily found in the US. Every time I’m with a kid like Jovana, every time I feel this sense of community, I can’t help blame my American life style. Would I be happier living a life of poverty than as a traditional American?

What we see when we interact with rural Haitians, what we see going through the Lakous or playing soccer with kids in the townships is all real. These people have a unique sense of community that has a certain beauty to it, but their lives are much more complicated than just that. Jovana, even though she seems like a really sweet kid when the missionaries are there, she has another life once the missionaries leave isn’t very happy. Jovana doesn’t really have any parents guiding her. Her biological parents are currently living in the North but aren’t well enough to care for her. Pastor Pierre was kind enough to take her in, and people watch after her here at the mission, but she doesn’t get the love from her mother or father. She doesn’t have anyone to raise her. And Jovana is lucky. We see her smiling and playing with us despite her parents’ absence, but we don’t see all the kids with absent parents and no pastor Pierre to care for them.

The Lakous are very close knit, but this sense of community isn’t always a happy thing. In the Lakous, as in many of the other communities in the developing world, are very poor, and keeping cash around is very difficult. Everyone knows when someone has extra money, causing high instances of theft. One of the reasons having a goat is such a good form of savings is because its a lot more difficult for your neighbor to steal. Your neighbor can steal the five dollars you saved much more easily. This is another reason why Grameen Bank, the bank that has championed microfinance, has been so popular in the developing world, it gives people a safe place to keep their money.

Poverty is a complicated phenomenon, it has some qualities that are good, but the full story of those in poverty is much darker than what might appear on the surface. The apparent beauty of poverty is deceiving. When we walk through a Lakou at first, we might see some very happy children and joyful parents, but that is not the full story. I will be writing more on this topic with the hopes that I can present not only the side of poverty that we see, but the side that we don’t see.