If you have something to say...
Say it on the Huffington Post
If you have something to say...
Say it on the Huffington Post
The Blog
This adjustment started at the peak of my adolescence, when I moved to the U.S. After introductions, I had to explain who I was and why I didn't fit their expectation of a Haitian girl. I'm often referred to as the "white Haitian" or the "light-skinned chick."
Today's children, even in the rural reaches of Haiti, are well versed in HIV prevention and the use of condoms. In a society of women relatively unafraid to assert themselves but plagued by unfaithful husbands, how useful is this education?
This year, a luncheon hosted by the Women's Refugee Commission focused on the need to protect and empower displaced adolescent girls -- one of the most vulnerable groups within a refugee setting.
Today I am living on $1.50 for all of my food and drink costs. Why? Because 1.4 billion people around the world don't have the option, and because I want to support a friend who showed me how to be a better man, a more gracious leader, and a more inspired human being.
It turned out that Carnival was just about the most dangerous time to go downtown.
Rape, invisible and ubiquitous, is perceived as sexual and inevitable, and we tend to think of children and women as collaterally damaged during war. In truth, all over the world, girls and women are fully, bodily engaged in conflict.
Dayle Haddon, a top model in the 70s and 80s, was 38 when her husband died unexpectedly. Left without an economic base or source of income, she tried to go back to the world of fashion and beauty, and was succinctly told that she was "over the hill."
I have spent the last two years in Haiti, and the sound of rain is forever changed. Where the sound of rain once brought comfort, it now brings worry that comes with my intimate knowledge of what rain means these days in Haiti.
How is 'need' and 'sustained recovery' being assessed if not through continuous dialogue with the injured group, in this case Haitian people and its governance?
Baseball in the Time of Cholera started out as a film about Haiti's first little league team but soon took on international importance as a cholera epidemic infected over 500,000 Haitian people.
Two years after Georges Anglade's death, PEN Haiti announced its re-emergence on the international literary scene with full fanfare last weekend.
The fight for women's rights has been a long struggle in Haiti. Until seven years ago, rape wasn't even punishable by law. It wasn't a crime until some very brave Haitian women won the battle in 2005.
We believe that the art of this nation can be the catalyst to begin a positive and expanding spiral for the people of Haiti. I believe in Haiti. I deeply admire its people and have great respect for its artists and intellectuals.
I remember thinking that I loved the Creole language and found it whimsical in sound, and warm, loving and childlike in meaning.
It is time that the government of Haitian president Michel Martelly and Haiti's parliament ratify the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court and give the victims of Haiti the justice that they have so long been denied.
Everyone was astonished by the condition of both buildings from the earthquake ... and the tent camps that still remain in the main square.
