Back in Haiti

You may recall my posts on my louiseinsenegal blog about my trip to Haiti in November 2010, and I am pleased to say that things have improved enormously since then.  Most of the rubble has been cleared away, displaced persons' camps have gone, roads have mostly been cleared away and the security situation has improved although Port au Prince is still quite a dangerous place.

But I was given a little tour around town on the Saturday, visiting the rather interesting museum and the iron market.  The latter has a fascinating voodoo section, with some very strange items on sale.

Voodoo is still a big force here, but difficult to see much of it.  In West Africa voodoo is seen as just another religion, albeit a traditional African one, and people are happy to talk to you about it.  In Haiti however it has become associated rather too much with the misuse of spiritual power and so it has become rather hidden away.  People still believe in it but have become embarrassed to admit to it.

On one Thursday evening I was taken to an old traditional style wooden hotel where a local band, RAM, play a live set every week.  They play the traditional voodoo music of Haiti, 11 of them on drums (four different types), guitars, metal gongs and a collection of strange vuvuzela-like tin horns, plus two singers and two dancers. A colleague described the sound as a "train-wreck".  I think that was pretty accurate, but it was a lively, fun, musical train-wreck which I really enjoyed.

I also had to spend a few days up in the north, at Cap Haitien and at Fort Liberte.  In that part of the country the security situation is much better and I was able to wander around the streets.  I got to visit the partly ruined Fort Dauphin in Fort Liberte, but also the incredible UNESCO World Heritage site of La Citadelle Laferriere - see next post...