New Year

New Years Eve I went with Nadege to a church in town where a friend of hers was getting baptized. Delmas is an area of Port-au-Prince (quite a large area) and we were somewhere there. We were going to leave in the afternoon but it turned into early evening before we got away. Motorcycle taxi to taptap to other taptap. It was getting darkish and Nadege and I stayed very close together. Her mother said that she had to hold on to me and seemed surprised when I was ok with that. Didn’t bother me at all not to get lost or separated. The taptaps were pretty full as everyone was headed home from work or wherever they were. First we went to Leon and Jacky’s house (her parents and heads of HOM) where we were going to stay the night (what was left of it after the service). Then instead of getting public transport to the church, they dropped us off at the church… gridlock on the streets so that it would have been faster to walk but it was a great people watching opportunity. At one point when we were stopped I made eye contact with a man in a wheelchair who was singing while just sitting in the middle of the road. We both smiled and nodded to each other. The church was relatively empty when we arrived (around 9) but filled up. Lots of singing, standing…a long sermon or talk that I found it very hard to stay awake through since I wasn’t understanding any of it. there was the cutest little girl next to me (sometimes next to me as she was passed up and down the row) she even sat with me for a short while. We didn’t see the baptism and so we don’t know if it happened before midnight or not (not that it matters in the big picture). We left around 12:30—well, tried to leave. When we left the church they were locking the gates out front because people were starting to come for the food they were going to hand out to the people who came to the service even though they didn’t come for the service. It was getting rowdy and not friendly. We waited a little while and then were able to sneak out the back. It was way past my bedtime and I slept well the rest of the night—until the roosters got too much for me.

Saut d'Eau--jumping water