A note to my goddaughter..

Chere Feuille!!!

It was amazing to talk with you last night- what a miracle to be able to call you up there in Quebec from here in Santo Domingo! To hear the sound of the baby's voice was extraordinary and gave me such energy. I had trouble going to sleep and am now up and working at 4 AM after a night of active dreams.

I am sorry about the loss of the family house in Port Au Prince but it will be good to get back to the land in Hinche. I am filled with hope... so glad to hear that you still dream of returning when you are able and the baby is old enough. We will now have our motto " NEXT YEAR IN HINCHE"!!!!

I have not been there yet but I have been to Belledare, which I adore. I will most likely remain there since it is the bigger city perhaps..??? well, who knows ... I did have dreams of a colony up there in the mountains... on the DR side, but who am I kidding? I will never be really content until I return to Haiti. Belledare, as you know, is Haiti's old front door and the town is quite large and developed, with grand old buildings.. now, alas, falling a bit to rack and ruin. But two years ago they had the binational fair there and the town's electric grid was put back on line. There is a grand old library... empty now and disintegrating... and a working hospital... and a great building for a school....

Anyway-- I am inspired again and there is much work to be done.

Since you are there in Quebec, it will be easy for you to start collecting the books. We will need the classics... The Fables of LaFontaine and the Little Prince but also the translations of the other classics. The Fables of Aesop and Alice in Wonderland (I think that we should skip the Brothers Grimm since they are truly "Grimm" and things are grim enough in Haiti already. )

So be on that job.

Yes, I agree that it will be important to send money to the family.. but not too much as what will also be needed are tools and equipment. Let me know when they have an account set up at Fonkose so that I can contribute a bit every month to secure my place in the tribe.

Did I tell you that I was to have been in Haiti during the Quake? I was invited up to Hinche to join a delegation out of NYC to visit Chavannes Jean Baptiste.


It was only because I had a visiting professor from England who needed to get up to Dajabon...and needed an escort.. so I went there with her instead. Would have filed a story on that trip but the Quake happened just upon our return. The other members of the delegation were back in Port au Prince--- as I would have been.. sleeping in the parking lot of the Oloffson!

We are going to need all the advanced farming techniques that we can find. There was an interesting article, just the other day, in the NYTimes. ..They link there to an organization which is behind it...they are Christians and I usually avoid the Christians, particularly in Haiti where the Gospel has been so deeply corrupted. But these Christians appear to speak my mind. It is not right to charge off an entire group of people for the misbehavior of a few. I wonder if you might download their directions and start the business of translating into Kreyole?


There is even a You Tube channel which I would watch if the buffering speeds were not so slow here.. as you well remember!!
Since we are both now living in apartments, there is not much else that we can do except to prepare for going back to the land. Things will be better there for all of us.I had a dream last night in which I was visited both by a beautiful Collie dog and a large Goose.. who was willing to part with feathers for comforters.

This was in response to the fact that the rainy season is now upon us. I know that it is silly to speak with anyone in Quebec about the cold here but it was cold when I awoke. Cold even here on the coast so that up in the mountains there will be a real chill. And the rains have started already. There was already one death from slides up in Santiago so I can imagine that it is going to hit the High Mountains soon.............

Be Well
BE STRONG

and know that whatever plan God has in mind for your destiny is unfolding perfectly. We are both in the same position.. being somewhere other than where we feel called... but knowing that the time for the move is not yet.

I laugh sometimes at the sense of humor of the Great Spirit in thinking that two city women like us are thinking of becoming farming revolutionaries in the mountains!! This has to a God thing because even with my vivid imagination I would never have thought that I would be drawn to live in the high mountains of Haiti!

my deepest love to you

bebete