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I spent a few days at Port-au-Prince’s only public hospital this past week. A heartening and heart-wrenching experience. My report for yesterday’s Free Speech Radio News broadcast:

MP3. Also, I want to share why I love working for an organization like FSRN (besides their great editors). Read more →

A quick update: I left Haiti last week for Seattle. I’m in Washington DC now speaking to a few policymakers/staff about the dysfunction of the relief effort. I’ll be in NYC later this week, then Austin, then back to Port-Au-Prince in May.

I spoke at a few venues in Seattle, but I want to pass on this live radio chat from yesterday morning on 90.3FM KUOW’s Weekday program. Host Steve Scher interviewed me, NPR sometime-Haiti correspondent Martin Kaste, and longtime Haiti relief worker Jack Andrew. There was some back and forth at times, and knowledgeable talk about how Haiti got to where it was before the quake. I learned some things! Listen below, or at KUOW’s page. Skip ahead to around the 12 minute mark past the pledge drive.

MP3 here. Let me know in the comments if there are messages you want me to pass on to folks here in DC…

Update: I also spoke (a little more openly about the political problems in Haiti) to 91.3FM KBCS’s One World Report last week, scroll down and find the clip here.

Read the story, published today by Inter-Press Service, below or listen to the radio version at Free Speech Radio News.

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Mar 30, 2010 (IPS) – On an empty road in Cite Militaire, an industrial zone across from the slums of Cite Soleil, a group of women are gathered around a single white sack of U.S. rice. The rice was handed out Monday morning at a food distribution by the Christian relief group World Vision.

According to witnesses, during the distribution U.N. peacekeeping troops sprayed tear gas on the crowd. (Jan. UN photo above)

“Haitians know that’s the way they act with us. They treat us like animals,” said Lourette Elris, as she divided the rice amongst the women. “They gave us the food, we were on our way home, then the troops threw tear gas at us. We finished receiving the food, we weren’t disorderly. ”

Some 9,000 U.N. peacekeepers, known by the acronym MINUSTAH, have occupied Haiti since 2004, including 7,000 soldiers of which the majority are Brazilian. The mission has been dogged by accusations of human rights violations.

“It’s time to begin thinking about changing the nature of MINUSTAH’s mission,” Brazilian Defence Minister Nelson Jobim told the Brazilian newspaper O Estado after the January earthquake struck Haiti.

“MINUSTAH’s mandate is to maintain the peace, that is, security, but the U.N. needs to realise that its mission is no longer solely to strengthen security but also to build the infrastructure,” he said.

So far, there’s no evidence of a shift in policy. Read more →

I got a call yesterday afternoon from a newspaper. They asked me to track down a Haitian family and interview them – the only information they had was the general area where they live and some of their names. “I think this will be a test of your detective abilities! Also, don’t take any risks,” the editor wrote to me.

Of course, it wasn’t too difficult to find them. Everyone knows everyone. I called Weed, a motorcycle taxi driver I met after the earthquake who has since become a trusted friend (he’s teaching me how to drive a moto). He picked me up and we headed out, camera slung over my shoulder.

Over some broken, pothole-filled roads out of Delmas, until we hit Grand Rue and weaved through traffic. I remembered how eerie Grand Rue was, the morning after the earthquake, smelling faintly of bodies, quiet and empty of cars and people. Life goes on.

Weed pulled over into a dim alley. Hopped off the moto and asked two men sitting against wall if they knew the family. I mispronounced the surname at first, then got it right. “Oh yeah we know them. He’ll take you there.”

We were led through a maze of narrow alleys – past old men playing checkers, naked children bathing, women washing clothes. Expressions that sometimes seem like glares softened into little smiles each time I said hello. A baby girl sleeping face down on the grimy concrete, a smudge of feces on her butt. I fought off the impulse to snap a photo.

The family is desperately poor, living under a thin tarp that leaks in the rain in an alley. 19 people all together in one tiny space. When we finished the interviews thirty minutes later, the same guy led us back out, taking a different route. “Pi rapide konsa” – it’s faster this way.

Arrived back at the guest house. Amber Munger, a human rights worker, saw me walk in. “You should know something,” she said. Read more →