Thursday, September 7th

The rest of my time in Anse a Pitre went by very quickly. It was back-to-school time in both the DR and Haiti, which meant that street vendors added stacks of composition notebooks and sharpened black pencils to their usual wares of coconuts, jeans, and gasoline.  Even without the red and yellow of changing leaves or the snaps of parents' cameras, that first-day-of-school feeling was palpable to me. New haircuts, new friend groups, the question marks and possibilities that hang in the air--September's children have some things in common all around the world.

One last thing I'd like to write about is something I think I've mentioned before, but I know I need reminding all the time.  One of my work shifts at Sadhana Forest was sorting through the "Recycling Hut," which is essentially a whole hut full of trash that has been left by volunteers or collected from the surrounding land.  For two hours, sweating through my gloves, I sorted through all sorts of left-behind items, from clothes and shoes to bottles caps, band-aid wrappers, and toothpaste tubes.  I had bins for "paper," (which gets burned as part of cooking dinner); "reusable soft plastic," (any size/sort of plastic bag in which we could carry a transplanting tree or use at the market); "reusable hard plastic," (bottles that could be repurposed); "clothing" (used to mulch young trees); "reusable string"; "art possibilities"; and then the most difficult: "non reusable metal, hard plastic, or soft plastic."  I felt so defeated each time I put something in that bin. There is literally nowhere for it to go. I thought about how every little piece of garbage I generate, either in Haiti or in the U.S., has to have a home somewhere.  Every q-tip and juice box and piece of tissue; every piece of packaging ends up in a place.  At home, I don't have to think about it as much, but I hope that, even here, I will continue to think more like someone who has to live among whatever I generate.  Someone in Haiti told me a few years ago, "when you throw something away, there is no actual 'away.'" A sobering and challenging thought.

As a final note, if you are interested in coming on a BUMC visit to Haiti with me in February, let's talk! Our trip dates are February 2-10.