I’m always the first to complain about people’s stereotypes regarding Haitian culture. I hate it when people say “you don’t look Haitian” or “you speak very well ‘for a Haitian’”. I realized that I’m so irritated by these comments that I miss an opportunity to teach others about what makes my culture so great. Better late than never, right? First lesson: how we eat.

Haitians (in general) eat three meals a day with very little snacking in between. Breakfast is usually something pretty heavy like eggs and boiled plantains or even spaghetti. Kids often have a lighter dish like bread and café au lait (yes, we drink coffee as children) or hot chocolate. The picture below is smoked herring (chiktay in Creole) which is sautéed with onions and hot peppers (we mostly use Scotch bonnet). You can eat this with bread or boiled plantains. I like it so much I can eat it throughout the day as a snack with crackers.

Lunch is a pretty heavy meal, as well. Most dishes will consist of rice and beans in some form and meat. Some people also like to include a vegetable such as yuca, plantains or bread fruit. The dish below is red beans and rice, fried pork and plantains. Fried pork (griyo in Creole) is a very common dish sold by street vendors all over Haiti. It sounds easy to make, but there’s a trick used to prepare it that makes it nearly impossible to replicate at home. I think it has to do with the cut of the meat and the spices used.

Dinner is usually the lightest meal of the day. In my neck of the woods, we never really ate any rice or meat after 6 PM. It’s very common to have a porridge like the one pictured below made from grated plantains (you seeing a theme here) with some toast. Or, we sometimes had hot chocolate with a baguette. I must note that Haitian cuisine is very versatile in terms of porridges which can also be made from yuca, millet, and cornmeal.

This is of course a brief explanation and there’s a whole lot more to Haitian cuisine. Don’t worry, I plan on sharing more in the future ; especially the many uses of some of the vegetables I mentioned here. Any fellow Haitians who eat/ate differently at home, please feel free to share.

I had the unfortunate experience recently of having to explain death to my daughter. Back when she was 6 years-old I had to tell her about the parent of one of her friends passing. I was very matter of fact about it – can’t help it, it’s my personality, and all I told her was that he had been ill and passed away. For a few months afterwards, I remember how she was afraid of dying every time she was sick. So lesson learned and I needed a new approach.

This time I told her that the person went to heaven. That immediately brought on the questions about what heaven was like, did she now have wings, does she hang out with the angels, etc. I answered as many questions as I could and eventually referred her to her trusty Bible.

In terms of the Haitian culture, there are various ways parents handle telling children about death. Some ignore it completely thinking that the child will eventually forget about the person. Others announce the news indirectly by their own grieving or overheard conversations. I was about my daughter’s age (8 years-old) when my mother first started telling me about people going to heaven. Since I have no recollection of being scared afterwards, I think it was the right time.

My daughter handled this sad news pretty well. She told me she felt sad and later drew a picture of the person in heaven dancing on clouds. I’m going to assume for now that this approach was more conducive to her personality

How do you handle talking to children about death? Do you have any cultural norms or have you developed your own? Do you remember the first time you were told about death?

In times like these, it helps to recall that there have always been times like these. – Paul Harvey

It feels like since my last post, the world has turned upside down – literally. With the Japan earthquake causing another shift in the earth’s axis, it’s no wonder mayhem has erupted. I was disappointed to see that international military intervention (a fancier way of saying war) was necessary in Libya and who knows how many more casualties this will cause. And Libya is one of many countries facing unrest in the region…

Every once in a while, I get this feeling of doom and gloom. It seems like humans have made so many technological advances, but we still haven’t figured out how to settle disagreements without fighting. I always remember the irony of hearing how World War I was supposed to be the war to end all wars only to say 21 years later – just kidding. Even after World War II (they were supposed to mean it that time), we still are trying to solve with problems with the same methods that we’ve seen fail over and over again.

It’s no secret that Venezuelans are very polarized when it comes to politics. I don’t know if it’s all the other disasters/unrest that’s been going on, but lately I’m getting the sense that Caraquenos are feeling the doom and gloom, as well. This may be limited to the places I frequent the most, however it’s there. I usually blame the media for over-reporting on certain issues, but this time I don’t think there’s any way around it…big stuff is going down all over the world.

As Mr. Harvey states, there’s nothing new happening here – simply history repeating itself. I only hope that these times hurry up and go away because I could sure use some good news for a change

P.S. If you’d like to help with the Japanese relief efforts, Google has set up this page to get you started.

I was recently reading a post at I Eat My Pigeon where Liv was talking about the similarities and differences of living in Japan, Ireland and Italy. It dawned on me that I’ve noticed a lot similarities here in Venezuela not with South Florida, but Haiti. At first glance, they appear to be two completely different places, but there’s no escaping the Caribbean/Latin American blood.

Street vendors: Known as buhoneros in Venezuela, street vendors are just about everywhere. From bootleg CD’s/DVD’s to costume jewelry, you can get a variety of items right on the street. In Haiti, street vendors are more abundant and also sell food – aside from licensed hot dog vendors, etc., I have yet to see informal food sales here. My first job out of college was working with street vendors all over Haiti. The motivation of street vendors to make a living reminds me that most people in poverty do not wait for handouts.

Unreliable service people: Your washer and dryer stop working. You ask your neighbor if they know a repairman and they give you a number. You speak to the repairman who says he’ll be there Monday at 10 AM. You plan your day around being home when he arrives. At 11 AM when there’s no sign of said repairman, you call him and he says he was hung up at another job and won’t be there until 12 PM. The day either ends with him finally showing up only to tell you the parts he need will take a week to find OR after waiting another 2 hours for him to show up you tell him to forget about it. This has Haiti written all over it

Rural lifestyle: The first picture is of Caracas and the second is of my hometown of Jacmel. Believe it or not, once you leave Caracas, there are a lot of small towns that look very much like the second picture. You see small homes perched on the side of a mountain and you wonder what’s keeping it from sliding down. You find people sitting on their porch in the middle of the day, greeting the occasional passerby. Everyone knows each other and the days move at a slower pace. Every time I drive through one of these towns I can almost immediately identify characters from my own town: the oldest families, the youth itching to leave, the gossips who know what’s going on with everybody else. It always gives me a bit of nostalgia, but it also feels nice to have this cultural connection in a foreign place.

Through the pushing of the rising for independence the wheel rolls of human history. ~ Vellupillai Pirapakaran