How to volunteer in Haiti now.

As I sat on my computer on Tuesday afternoon doing nothing but chit chatting on Facebook, I noticed a posting by friend's son that read boldly "Earthquake in Haiti". My first reaction was just another Caribbean earthquake. I have been in Puerto Rico enough to know that earthquakes in the region are common and very weak. Then I headed downstairs to watch the news and the telephone rang as I approached the final step. The lady over the phone who was responding to an advertisement for a dog asked me if I knew about the earthquake. At the very moment, I assumed the earthquake was a little more than the common earthquake. It gained my curiosity a bit more. I keep my conversation brief with the lady dog seeker and went straight to the CNN channel on the tube. This is when I noticed that CNN had a man on internet connection and was reporting that the earthquake shook strong and that homes and buildings in the Port au Prince area were crumbling. I must admit I started thinking about all of the end of the world theories I have ever heard. I watched CNN for a while, but honestly they had very little information. So I ran up to my office and looked for information on the net, while I ran Facebook in the background to see if any new information would be become available. The information was all the same, but not one of the eye witnesses or news reporter got the message across that this earthquake was strong and did serious damage. After a few Facebook postings that read simply, "earthquake in Haiti 7.1". I decided it was time to sleep, I had a big day tomorrow it was my birthday.

It's my birthday and I am excited. I turn on CNN and see the mass destruction that occurred in Haiti. I thought to myself, "how could this happen to Haiti?" They don't need this now or ever. This is a country that has suffered for centuries, not decades nor years, but centuries. I began to see the images that everyone was watching. The injured with bleeding heads, the babies lost, the elderly standing in shock and disbelief. I think most of them were thinking the same thing I was thinking. Is this the end of the world? Is this the way it all ends. Are there more earthquakes coming today or not. Should I hang and fight for life or submit to God and surrender peacefully. I remember the images that every street beggars uses to increase the daily take "repent the end is near".

Regardless of the time of the world it was in Haiti, I felt the desire to help. What a better way to celebrate my birthday then helping people. I spoke with a friend and we decided to go jointly to Haiti and help whom ever we can. The only problem was that we had no group or organization affiliation. We were basically on our own. But we didn't let that stop us. We kept planning and organizing our grass-root effort to help people in Haiti who needed our help. From that moment, there was no turning back.

The next afternoon, about 35 hours following the strong earthquake, we were boarding a plane to the Santo Domingo. For obvious reason the Louverture Toussaint Haiti airport was not "land-able". After a 3 hours flight from San Jose, Costa Rica, we found ourselves on firm ground in Santo Domingo. The rumors at the airports from journalists, doctors and rude Red Cross workers were that we were 5 hours from Port au Prince. Other rumors including that we would get hijacked, killed, raped and murdered driving on the road to Port au Prince. So naturally, I began to have second thoughts about helping people. I thought to myself "why do I have to help these strangers?". I knew it was the right thing to do at the time, but I was a bit scared. I never expressed my fears to my traveling aid partner. I need to seem focused to ensure that he stayed focused. I did. We were going to Port au Prince to help people. That was our mission.

While waiting for a taxi driver to lower it's proposed fare from $300 USD ( about 3x the monthly salary of the average Dominican worker), we met a group of journalists coming from New York. We shared our plans with them about wanting to get to Port au Prince and hit the ground working. But like us, they were also without a ride. The rabbi they were waiting for was already at a Haitian border town and so they needed to find a ride to a place 5 hours away just like us. They promised us a ride if the car that was coming for them was big enough to fit us in. About an hour and half later a small Toyota Tercel pulls up and we all gave each other the nice meeting you look. We were officially stuck at the Santo Domingo airport and it was about 1:30 in the morning. It was time to bargain a ride to a Santo Domingo airport and work on a gameplan for the following day. The good news was there were plenty of taxi cabs sitting at the airport with nothing do except charge us aiding tourists $40 for 12 minute ride. Which is exactly what one fortunate taxi driver did. It was $40 but he kept the ride interesting and educational. He knew everything about Haiti's history and the Dominican Republic. He painted a beautiful picture of the relationship between Haiti and Santo Domingo. Although, I heard stories of hatred kinship between the two countries, I believed him to some extent. We finally get to the hotel which he considered a 3-star hotel. I never knew the obvious distance between a 3-star and a 5-star hotel. Well, I can detail a few obvious points. One, the 3-star hotel has a pool, but it's not filled with water. The 3-star hotel has a telephone on the nightstand, but does not work. The 3-star hotel has a restaurant and everything costs exactly the same amount at the 5-star hotel. 3-star hotels are for sleeping and 5-star hotels are for relaxing. There is a difference.

Morning came fast, we woke up at almost 11am. The time change and the tiredness caught up. We had little time to plan for the trip to Haiti. We needed to discuss our options, which were limited to bus. So we ran downstairs and asked the front desk clerk about getting to Port au Prince. She without hesitation said go to Caribe Tours and take the bus to Dajabon, a border town. The level of positiveness she possess made us believe she knew where and how to go. What we didn't do as part of our planning was acquire a decent map until we got on the bus. Another thing we didn't do was read the map until we got sleep, ate and relaxed on the bus ride. After starring out the window, I noticed that the street side on the highway side Route 2. So I decided to reference the map with the route and our current location. I had an idea where we were. To my unpleasant surprise, we should have been route 1. Route 2 was headed towards Santiago and then Monte Cristo. I remembered that those towns were on the northwest side of The Dominican Republic. Our plans had just changed. Now, we were headed in a direction where we were going to see less journalists, Americans and people who came to help in general. We were now on our own. All we had was a map.

Sitting next to me, I noticed a man who spoke Creole and Spanish. I kept him in site and waited to make a connection with him. My first question to him was "Are you going to Port au Prince". He said "No" and nodded his head, almost like if he was feeling sorry for us for getting on the wrong bus. He said follow me and I will cross the border with you guys and get you on your way through Haiti and eventually to Port au Prince. It was now about 5:30pm and the we rushed to the border. The border closes early on Friday and it was Friday. After a short walk from the bus stop to the border, we encountered the Dominican army and police force. Both guard the border against illegal crossings. The river that separates the two countries is no wider than 25 feet and no deeper than 2 feet. We had two options either cross the river or wait until morning. Night was approaching fast. All we can see to the Haitian side was mass of people. It looked dark, dirty and dangerous like most things look in the dark.

We found a small hotel in Dajabon to spend the night. It was very cheap compared to the 3-star place in Santo Domingo. We found a nice place to have dinner and went for a short walk around the what seem to be an extremely friendly town with lots of police and military presence. But just like Haiti, it was in the dark. But this was normal here says our new found tourist guide. "The lights go off everyday in the Dominican Republic for about 4 hours", he joked. "But around 11pm they will come back on". I remembered wondering to myself, "wouldn't it make more sense to have power when people are awake and may be eating dinner?". But anyway I made the most of the time in the dark and starred at the beautiful clear skies where stars and the moonlight dance like lovers do in an old Hollywood black and white classic. Although I felt good about the trip thus far, I knew that tomorrow anything could happen. So after a few hours of star gazing and talking with our "tourist guide", I headed for the nap sack in my little cozy room with a snoring travel partner. It could be worst, we could be in a 5-star hotel with a snoring travel partner. Now that would be a true waste of money.

It was about 730am and our tourist guide greeted us on the balcony with fresh fruit and a glass of some very good juice. It was time to head out and I figured by the foot traffic in front of our hotel, it was going to be a very busy morning at the border. We could see the border from the balcony. In fact, we could actually see Haiti and now Haiti looked sunny and bright like most things look in the sun.

After finding some snacks on the Dominican side of the border, we made our way to the office that grants the exit visas for the Dominican tourists. This took a long time. Supposedly, before a tourist leaves the Dominican Republic the military checks and verifies with an Interpol fugitive list. After about an hour and half and about six shady looking government workers in the tiny office where I believed they called Washington, DC, NCIC and Obama on his cell phone to see if we were cleared to enter Haiti. I thought to myself... "A good punishment for me if I was on the Interpol list would be to go to Haiti and help. But thank God I was all cleared to travel to Haiti and not being sent to some U.S. jail lined with a red carpet and great warm food.

As we crossed the bridge that was filled with people headed in the exact opposite direction, I remembered the looked on my travel partner's face when he saw the United Nations' Military. It was as if he saw God. A glow of "here we go" took over his persona. It was a new man was born. Just minutes before I saw a guy who was wondering what the hell am I going to do in Haiti except get murdered. He was nervous and was starting to make me nervous, but I couldn't show. The phase, "Man I am from the Bronx" played constantly in my head. If you ever met anybody from the Bronx, then you know we seem to think it's the toughest place on earth and produces the tougher hearts. And that could be true, but I was from the Bronx, I was in Haiti with a 6-foot-5 tall, milk-white blond Swedish guy. "Where do I hide this guy?". That's what I was thinking. All my life, I could make myself appear more Black or less Black, depending on the job interview or police interrogation. But how do I make this obviously white guy look black. Even young Haitian kids found him strange. All I heard was "Blanc, blanc". They pointed and shouted at him, like Romans at Jesus on Good Friday. I thought the brick throwing was coming soon, but that's when one look at me and said in perfect English, "FAT, fat", as he smiled and busted into laughter. I noticed a sign of relief on my friend's face as if to say, "OK they find fat and white funny".

Our travel guide takes it all in. He was almost like a guide who was just watching everything play out. He's been here before and knows that the Haitian as a people are jokingly and kind-hearted to strangers. I think what surprised him more than us was the powerful spirit that was still among them as survivors of this horrific natural disaster. They were moving like businessmen on Wall Street after the market rallies positively. This gave us the hope to keep going.. and we did.