My experience in Haiti showed me an entirely different culture than my own, exposed me to new adventures, triumphs, and challenges, and helped me shape my perspective of the world.
Though I barely had a grasp on the basics of Creole when I arrived, my students were determined to teach me as much of their language as I would teach them of music, so we all learned quickly. Teaching music in private lessons, group classes, and large ensembles was a valuable experience; adding a new language forced me to evaluate how I was directing and teaching. My teaching refined as my Creole improved; and I have been able to use many of the teaching techniques I learned in Haiti here at Lawrence.
My students inspired me; by their eagerness to learn, despite the deficiencies in funding, limited instruments, practice space, and music, I often began an afternoon teaching a private lesson and ended with a group class after cellists saw me teaching, ran for an instrument, and joined in. I also had the wonderful opportunity to learn bass and play with the beginner group, an achievement my students found hilarious.
Haiti also gave me unique opportunities to take drumming lessons with some of the world’s greatest drummers. After hearing the kids all jamming on drums, I was determined to learn and bought a drum. Anyone who knew how to play became my instructor and soon I was able to bang out rhythms with the rest of the kids.
I learned to speak Kreyol, teach private lessons, group classes, and large ensembles, teach and play bass, play Haitian drums, eat mangoes (a talent, really), teach kids to swim in a foreign language, ford streams, how to survive a hurricane, what to eat (and not to eat…) how to survive sickness in a developing country. I also learned the value of simple conveniences: clean running water, 24-hour electricity, glass windows to keep out lizards, pavement, climate control, the English language, washing machines, and temperatures below 90. More importantly, I gained a new perspective of the world. I had never experience life in a culture so entirely foreign to me, and when I returned, I felt more understanding and accepting of not only the new culture I was familiar with, more accepting and understanding of people that were thrust into the unfamiliarity of my own way of living.
I fell in love with Haiti; with the culture, the people, their way of living, their food (fried plantains!) beaches, mountains, fruit, music, tap-taps (public transportation), artwork, and enthusiasm for life. I ate fresh sugarcane, learned a new language, hiked up and down mountains, swam in waterfalls, lived through a hurricane, was introduced to fresh tropical fruit, sugar, and rum, learned Haitian folk songs, dance, and rhythm, saw the lowest poverty and the height of prosperity, talked, laughed, danced, sang, and traveled with numerous people I hope to keep in contact with.
A map of my experience in Haiti would be similar to the contour of the mountains there; peaks, depths, and everywhere in between. When students succeeded were peaks; getting sick was the low. Dancing was a high; having a sea urchin spine in my foot for two weeks was a low. A performance by my student with polio was a high; to realize his limited future was not. I hope to return soon and familiarize myself further with the rich culture and continue to work with my students for a deeper understanding of music.
Some experiences:
One afternoon in Jacmel, I was teaching a class of older beginners and needed another bow. I found the cello storage room, and opened a case to find one, and nearly had a heart attack when a little kid popped out of the case. I looked around in wonder and realized that the younger beginners, who didn’t have class at the time, had taken all the empty cello cases and built a castle-fort out of them. Naughty kids.
Another amusing instance: during a sectional with 6 cellists, I made them the mistake of telling them that if they played a rhythm correctly in orchestra, I’d buy them all pate (fried hot-pocket type food, sold on the street, about 10 cents) the next morning. They all played it correctly, so of course, off we trooped across the street for food, where I also bought for a little kid and his mom who were passing by and laughing at the story.
The low times included the week of being sick from food or water; losing weight quickly, going without running water, air conditioning, a fan, or toilet paper, and living on rice. I realized one evening that the hottest part of the day was past, I wasn’t doing anything but breathing, and all I could do was lay there and sweat. After that, I emailed my mother a request for clean water, air conditioning, and popsicles.
During my third week in Leogane, an American doctor living next door took Irina and me on a tour of the children’s malnutrition ward of the hospital. Babies, bloated protein deficiency greeted us and stared at our foreign faces; I held one tiny orphan, found on the street, now with an IV, who was approximately three weeks old, unnamed and so malnourished his skin pigment was breaking down and hair falling out.
My students offered to braid my hair for me; when I accepted they were astonished to find that my scalp, like the rest of my skin, was white. Similarly, a few other Americans were buried up to their necks in the white beach sand after discovering their skin was the same color.
These experiences are only a tiny part of the seven weeks I spent in Haiti, and formed a wonderful, unforgettable experience.
