Towards Leogane

by Reid Thomas Boswell, MD MP

One by one, in the wee hours, most of our team trickled into gate B30 at Logan for our 6:05 AM flight, bleary-eyed and desperate for coffee. Ah, yes, the coffee war: Starbucks vs. Dunkin. Doesn’t matter, the Haitian coffee makes both look tame, and despite the best efforts of Bill and I, there apparently is no Starbucks in Haiti and the Seligmans and their Dunkin’ devotion are equally out of luck. Our flights to JFK and then on to Port Au Prince were almost seamless, except a bit of turbulence on our descent to Hispaniola. We were on a large Boeing767-300, and there seemed to be numerous American mission groups aboard with some scattered Haitian expats. There was a team of dental students from Temple University heading out to the west coast to spend a week extracting teeth (about all that can be done in rural Haiti). There was a group of kids from Eastern Nazarene College headed to Leogane to do some maintenance work at a local health clinic. The young man sitting next to Linda was downright wide-eyed with excitement.

Baggage claim could only be described as utter chaos. With a bigger plane there were way more people claiming baggage than we have ever encountered, and finding our 50 lb. medication filled duffel bags and then trying to re-group was (as Nick and I agreed) exactly like herding cats. Then customs. Customs was almost a random experience, with some of our team sliding easily through with nary a glance, others required to show baggage claim tags (but not all), some required to produce the list of items in our bags, and then a few (including our intrepid leader Linda), who were pulled aside and interrogated. The guy who asked me to produce my list of items in my bags clearly had some advanced pharmaceutical training. I gave him my lists, he looked them over with a knowing expression, nodding as he went down the list, and then waved me on, keeping in mind that the list included words like Lisinopril, ceftriaxone, omeprazole, albendazole, etc.

Finally, we were all able to walk out of the terminal to the awaiting Hopital St. Croix trucks. This is my 3^rd year going to Haiti, though I missed last year. Immediately, the sensual recall of this country enveloped me, and I was transported back: the smells, the vivid colors, the noise, the high emotion, and the fantastic Caribbean heat. The bags were carefully packed and headed back to the guest house at Hopital St. Croix, while most of us headed to the artist colony at Croix de Bouquet, where we shopped for the now famous (at least in our Parish) hammered metal artwork. The ride to Croix de Bouquet was difficult and our seasoned driver used every skill he had to maneuver through the dense traffic. Traffic rules are pretty much non-existent in Haiti and I have learned not to look while our driver plays chicken with large dump trucks as he passes slow moving tap-taps or other vehicles that do not meet his standard of appropriate speed. As far as I can tell, there is only one traffic light on the road from Port au Prince and Leogane, but nobody really pays any attention to it. We spent about an hour walking through the shops, marveling at the amazing hammered tin art and watching the craftsmen plying their trade while on their knees or squatting on the ground.

We made it safely back to the inviting guest house just after sunset and enjoyed a delicious dinner of chicken, rice and beans, fried plantains, vegetables and salad, washed down, of course with the premier Haitian beer, Prestige. We met with our host, Robin, to refresh our memories of the rules of the guest house and indeed Haiti in general. Six of our 22 member team will be sleeping at the Nursing School. Sleep was the number one agenda for the evening, with our predawn start and “Spring Forward” time change (though I enjoyed little of that thanks to an apparent allergy to my malaria medication).

Today, most of the team went to church (generally a 2 hour service in Creole). I demurred, having experienced the lovely side effects of Benadryl. The rest of today will be spent relaxing and then getting ready for our first clinic tomorrow, sorting and counting meds, organizing team members, and most importantly preparing emotionally for helping to take care of the hundreds of patients we will be seeing in poor, rural areas in and around Leogane. I am excited to be back in Haiti and hope my rusty primary care skills will re-emerge somewhere in my cortex. This is a great team, and as I have said before, I believe we will make a difference, even if it simply to show up. Bondye beni ou.