The Big Truck That Went By: How the World Came to Save Haiti and Left Behind a Disaster

"In the end, the same exact rivers flooded in the same exact way they had flooded a few years before, and the aid workers simply came back." 

The cycle of misapplied aid followed by another disaster perfectly summarizes Haiti's endemic problems as well as its persistent dependency on other countries. Hopes rise and fall like the Caribbean tide as promises are made, broken, and made anew. Rather than solving systemic problems, aid groups and NGOs apply band-aids to the country's wounds, only to reapply them when they fall off a short time later. 

"'Charity,' Préval emphasized from the marble podium, 'has never helped any country escape underdevelopment.'"

Addressing the United Nations, Haitian president René Préval argues for more permanent solutions to Haiti's problems rather than the scattered, transitory approaches that have so far failed to provide any semblance of self-sufficiency. The charitable approaches may help in the near term—and they may assuage donors' guilt—but handing out millions of bottles of water and thousands of tarps are no substitute for long-term economic development.

"I watched the front wall crack in two, daylight pushing through the throbbing dust. With every heartbeat, the floor disappeared from under me and reappeared and was gone." 

Katz describes in visceral detail the experience of living through a powerful earthquake, especially in a city built on extremely shaky foundations. When the earth beneath his feet, normally stable and solid, rebels and turns against him, the feeling of terror is overwhelming, and he is faced with impossible choices—try to escape and risk a building collapsing on top of him or remain on the second floor and "ride down on top of it" (15). 

"My job now was to stay alive and find a way to keep updating the story and send in photos. That was what we always did when there was a crisis." 

Reporters in disaster or war-prone countries face risks not unlike military personnel, and the choice between survival and doing the job is not mutually exclusive. While Katz and his fixer, Evens, navigate mountains of rubble and constant danger from aftershocks, he knows that "the story" is of utmost importance. Fears of danger are irrelevant; the maw of a media-hungry public must be fed.

"People who spend enough time in Haiti know that there are sometimes 'days without rules.'" 

Citizens of developed countries take certain things for granted, like clean water, consistent power, and a certain degree of law and order. In Haiti, Katz reports, civil unrest is never far away. In the immediate aftermath of the earthquake, with chaos on the streets and an entire population vulnerable, he wonders if looters and profiteers will reign over the city. On the contrary, however, he finds an almost eerie calm punctuated by cries for help and a focused search-and-rescue effort. 

"Architects and engineers, poor and unscrupulous, many with no training, built how and where they wanted."

The cause of the massive devastation has its roots in poor construction among other factors. With a major influx of people into Port-au-Prince, builders struggled to keep pace with demand. The result was poorly built housing using substandard materials with little to no oversight from government agencies, hobbled by lack of funding and leadership. Weak centralized enforcement leaves a void quickly filled by anyone who wants to make a fast buck.

"But mere hours after the disaster, I had seen backhoes and bulldozers working, and here, as with the cigarette man in Pétionville, commerce continued to function in spots." 

For those who have never experienced a disaster on the magnitude of a 7.0 earthquake, it would be natural to assume that life grinds to a halt. On the contrary, Katz finds resourceful citizens emerging to help neighbors in need. It is remarkable how, even in the midst of a natural disaster, the desire to stake out a bit of normalcy can override the overwhelming emotional impact of the moment.

"If we had only looked, we might have known." 

Five years prior to the earthquake in 2005, another, smaller quake hits the capital city, but authorities report no damage. Surviving this 4.3 quake with no casualties allows the country to ignore the inevitable: the fact that Port-au-Prince is overcrowded, poorly built, and short on first responders. The evidence is there, however, if anyone cared to look. In a memo written shortly after the 2005 quake, a diplomat wrote, "The last thing Haiti needs now…is an earthquake" (52).

"Logic had fragmented in the assault from the ground. Even the mountains beyond the city looked violent." 

Driving back into Port-au-Prince from the countryside, the destruction of the city is even more vivid. The aftermath of the initial earthquake, however, is only the beginning of the trauma. The aftershocks are an ongoing reminder that you can never let your guard down, and that the whims of nature care nothing for human wants or needs.

"Blacks, soldiers, settlers rich and poor were all turned into mere people, leveled by common misfortune." 

Formed on a major fault line, Haiti is no stranger to earthquakes. A particularly devastating one hit the island in 1770 when Port-au-Prince was home to "one of history's most rigidly stratified civilizations" (55). Earthquakes, however, don't distinguish between the wealthy and the destitute, and this disaster, like so many others, proved to be a great equalizer. Mansions crumbled just as quickly as hovels, but people of economic advantage were able to flee the island, leaving the poor behind in the rubble.

"In contrast, it's a putdown for someone who considers himself nèg  to be called blan by another Haitian, the ambivalent reference meant to associate the target with the wealthy Haitians whose lighter skin and features derive from European and Middle Eastern ancestries." 

The island of Hispaniola has a history of social stratification based on skin tone. Blacks quickly learned that lighter skin conferred greater privilege. In the neighboring Dominican Republic, for example, skin bleaching became fashionable because of the social advantages. In Haiti, the concepts of blan and nèg are complex, referring not only to skin tone, but more specifically to economic status and purity of ancestry. "A Haitian man is always a nèg, even if he is of European descent, in which case he is a nèg blan." (Warner, R. Stephen and Judith G. Wittner. Gatherings in Diaspora. Philadelphia: Temple University Press. 1998.) This kind of self-segregation and exclusion is another lingering effect of Haiti's colonial history.

"'What you don't understand, Katz,' a longtime aid worker once snapped after I'd written a critical article, 'is that there are a lot of people out there working really hard. Really hard. And they are trying.'" 

Katz never questions the good intentions of aid workers, NGOs, or even of governments and private donors. The question of intent, however, is irrelevant when so much goodwill is wasted or misdirected. Many of these aid workers look around at the slums, the crumbling infrastructure, and the corrupt politicians and feel just as frustrated as the people they try to serve. Unfortunately, in this line of work, good intentions are not enough.

"U.S. soldiers asked their mothers to send Vicks VapoRub, which they smeared under their nostrils. Those with fewer means smeared thick white mustaches of toothpaste in a line or an artful curve under the nose." 

With hospitals and morgues overwhelmed and so many bodies left to rot under the hot sun, Katz describes the powerful stench—"a sour, meaty thing with an oniony tinge" (71)—that fills the air. Those exposed to it on a daily basis must come up with creative solutions to mitigate it. While those jaded few accustomed to scenes of death may be able to relegate them to the back of their minds, ancillary problems like odor never let those scenes remain in the back for long.

"'They're just throwing food at people!'" 

An unemployed father waiting in a two-hour line for food is frustrated by the military's system of aid distribution. The soldiers, often with no training in this kind of work, tend to default to what they know: using force to control crowds with little empathy for the plight of the victims. Once again, the soldiers may have the best of intentions, but without proper oversight and direction, those intentions may just make the problem worse.

"Yet for decades, researchers have told us that the link between cataclysm and social disintegration is a myth perpetuated by movies, fiction, and misguided journalism." 

One of the biggest mistakes aid groups and foreign governments make in their rescue efforts is the assumption that civil unrest will inevitably follow a natural disaster. When following that assumption, resources tend to be allocated first and foremost to militarized control rather than to selective and efficient aid distribution. In the immediate aftermath of the earthquake, Katz observes cooperation and mutual support, not looting and chaos.

"Not only have you gone—no, done—somewhere dangerous, but you did it so thoroughly that it got to you." 

After a colleague urges him to take a break, Katz flies home to Louisville, Kentucky for some rest and healing. He visits a therapist, fearing he is suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. Upon reflection, he realizes the degree to which Haiti and its problems have gotten under his skin. He has not only lived in Haiti, he has "done" it. His experiences have gone beyond those of a visitor or tourist; they have given him a unique insight into the plight of the average Haitian.

"Millions needed help more than ever, but now this meant something different than a few free days' worth of rice and cooking oil." 

Disaster relief comes in stages. First is the immediate need to save lives and find survivors. Once that is done, the hard work begins. Now comes the time for long-term thinking and permanent solutions, and this second phase is where the relief effort in Haiti was badly bungled. Conflicting interests, micromanagement of aid money with too many strings attached, and adherence to faulty economic plans were all culprits in a prolonged endeavor that ignored systemic problems and left Haiti in little better condition than before the earthquake.

"'Don't cook here, Adrienne. If you cook here, it will look like people don't have problems.'" 

As Katz and Evens tour one of the settlement camps on the outskirts of Port-au-Prince, residents complain of a lack of food, water, and latrines. As with the initial rescue, distribution efforts are concentrated on the densely populated urban core while those camps outside of the city are ignored. Residents are so desperate for assistance, one man admonishes a woman for cooking because he fears that, if the media shows a meal being prepared (no matter that the woman cooking has no vegetables), it will create an impression that the camp has plenty. In the pursuit of survival, every Haitian is aware of the power of the media to bolster their case.

"The scenarios were two sides of the same coin—the idea that only a transformative, external force could solve Haiti." 

Plans to "fix" Haiti too often center on a massive rebuilding effort, but Katz argues that this is folly. The idea that only outsiders can repair a country as broken as Haiti discounts the internal resources available: the government, the entrepreneurs, the workers and craftspeople, and the citizens themselves who have far more of a stake in rebuilding their country than foreign entities who usually want to remake Haiti in a manner that suits them. 

"'We are a country that can advance, but they have to see us as people.'" 

When former U.S. presidents Bill Clinton and George Bush lead the U.S. aid delegation, Haitians understand all too clearly the importance of the visit. In an effort to create a favorable photo opportunity for their wealthy benefactor to the north, they wear their best clothes and, ironically, try not to look like they need the aid for which they are so desperate. In doing so, they must convince Clinton and Bush that they are a nation of human beings rather than some abstract geopolitical equation to be solved.

"The delegates, in their diplomatic politesse, usually referred to the scourge by the antonyms transparency and accountability, but the meaning was plain: The Haitian government would steal their money if given the chance." 

Katz articulates one of the biggest obstacles to aid in the wake of the earthquake: fear of corruption. "Transparency" as a condition for aid sounds perfectly reasonable, but the implication behind the word is the assumption that Haiti is corrupt by nature and only with diligent oversight will it be able to judicially manage financial assistance. As with so many stereotypes about Haiti, the assumptions and the reality are miles apart. Most of the financial mismanagement, Katz reports, comes at the private contractor level, supposedly the bastions of efficiency.

"We saw the National Palace destroyed. I would like to see Haitian engineers rebuild it, not foreign engineers, so we can look proudly in the future and say that Haitians built the National Palace." 

When the development council listens to the pleas of average Haitians, a consistent theme is that aid money should benefit the whole country, and that Haitians should be allowed to participate in the reconstruction. Despite these entreaties, Bill Clinton and U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon insist on pushing for a plan that includes investment in foreign industry. Once again, plans are plagued by assumptions that outsiders know what's best for Haiti.

"Many of the medical professionals who'd come to help vowed that they would remain in Haiti 'as long as necessary.' But they were now finding out that 'as long as necessary' could well mean forever."

Medical professionals are first responders, and their primary task is to treat injuries and sickness. Four months later, with the earthquake having exposed systemic vulnerabilities in Haiti's healthcare system, those professionals are confronted with long-term problems, ones they are not trained nor equipped to deal with. Having set up free clinics, many Haitians now have access to health care they never had before, but doctors no longer treat earthquake-related injuries; they provide primary care, something their mission did not include. Shipping out now would leave a void in the health care process for millions who need it.