Cite Soleil: Upstream Thoughts

Wednesday, July 23, 2014: Cite Soleil is a place all it's own.  Sometimes I struggle to describe what I see, especially because I know I don't see or know even a small fraction of what it holds.  Yesterday, we were walking down the block and I saw this: a group of 5 kids, maybe ages 4 to 6 years playing in the "canal", which is the dump/bathroom/sewer from all of Port-au-Prince that runs through Cite Soleil and ends in the sea.  The kids looked like they were treasure-hunting, digging through the refuse of Port-au-Prince.  Innocence.  Just play.  Passing the time.  They then climb up the cement wall of the canal and find their next source of entertainment, a broken down school bus parked on the side of the road.  They decide to climb up the sides of the bus and somehow all of them make it through the open windows into the inside of the bus.  The nurse in me has cringed an uncountable amount of times already.  There are so many things wrong with this picture.  The potential for illness, diarrhea, cholera, injury, tetanus, something worse...  I know fingers and all things of play somehow end up in their mouths.  I cringe again.

I think of interventions.  Someone could reprimand the children or teach them not to play in the canal or not to climb up the sides of a abandon bus.  But how backwards is that and how much of the bigger picture would be ignored?  What about poverty?  The situation that put these kids here or created a slum like this?  A slum that packs in people so they are almost living on top of each other and also doubles as the city dump?  What about not having enough money for shoes or activities to keep children busy so they are not on their own, entertaining themselves in the streets?  What about the fact there are no adults watching them because they are all busy trying to make a dollar to feed their families for the day?  What about not having any political infrastructure for garbage cleanup, aid for poor families, or affordable schooling to keep the children busy and build them up?  It's effed up for sure.

I read this this morning.  Isaiah 42:2-4: "He will bring justice to the nations.  He will not shout or raise his voice in public.  He will not crush the weakest reed or put out a flickering candle.  He will bring justice to all who have been wronged.  He will not falter or lose heart until justice prevails throughout the earth."  May there yet be hope...