CANDLELIT CHRONICLES: HISTORIC HAUNTS

On Haiti

Yes, Gentle Reader. I hear you. Some of you are expectant, waiting for pearls of wisdom to spill from my lips. Others are groaning in dismay: "AGAIN?" Yes, AGAIN.





I call it as I see it, and today the Universe provided me with not one, but two, news accounts about Haiti that strike me as pertinent and amazing. Haiti as a country has fascinated me since earliest childhood, both its history and its Spirituality.I've perused the Madison Smartt Bell trilogy, the Haitian Revolutionary Series, and it is an eye-opener. Mr. Bell's breadth of scholarship is amazing, and he couples it with a writing quality that reads smoothly and captivatingly.





Today's news is good, in one event. Just as a survivor was discovered among the rubble a full two weeks following the quake, so too has yet one more survivor appeared, alive-an ENTIRE 4 WEEKS after the first quake! Now that to me is an an amazing miracle of Providence--when one considers how the poor fellow must have suffered, but what a joy of reunion for his ecstatic and delighted family! Especially good news, since the Haitian government ended search-and-rescue on Jan. 23, 17 days ago.


Truly it boggles the mind.





http://www1.voanews.com/english/news/americas/Man-Pulled-Alive-From-Haiti-Earthq...


http://www.aolnews.com/world/article/survivor-pulled-from-haiti-quake-rubble/193...





Let us remember, however, that these are only a few-upwards of 200.000 died-there was one major quake on Jan. 12, and aftershocks on Jan. 15 and 22. Millions are homeless (in a nation where home residency involves much less than what Americans and Western Europeans consider the right of every citizen-sometimes it's not even shelter). Research-Haiti was not poor only when a slave state; that poverty erodes dignity of life right through the present day.





Please stay tuned for the next entry, in which we will orate on the American presence in Haiti: historical and contemporary.