One car two site visits. How best to divide the time accordingly? Well why not team up and help each other out? Visiting Ecole Mixte de Nancy and Institut du Foyer Savior aka Home of Knowledge, to conduct site measurements, site verifications and client meetings.
Stop A; Ecole Mixte de Nancy, a privately owned school for children from pre-school up to 6th grade. Stop B; Home of Knowledge, a church run school for kindergarten kids up to the 6th grade.
Tensions are very high at the moment when the results of the 28th November election was released last night 7th December 2010. The results was saw Mirlande Manigat with 31.7%, Jude Celestin with 22.48% and Michel Martelly with 21.84%. The people know they voted for Manigat and Martelly, so how did Celestin squeeze into the top two?
This is the key reason why protester's have hit the streets, torching car tires, throwing rubble and ripping down and igniting Jude Celestin posters.
The Rebuilding Centre is the base for the Architecture for Humanity and has recently been awarded a grant for $800K thereabout grant from the Bush/Clinton Fund.
AFH office is housed on the ground floor and this is where I spend most of my days here in Haiti.
The presidential elections in Haiti caused much disruption and 'lock-down.' For four days we stayed in the Maison, not even allowed to go for a jog or a walk up and down the hill!
For months election fever spread throughout the country with campaign posters strewn on all empty walls, poles, fences, fallen houses too! The run up to the 28th November saw more and more poster flying up in the sky, covering opposition posters even one candidate decided to have a different image and re-did his poster!
Belleville, a whole other world in Haiti. A gated community for the wealthy in Port-au-Prince. Driving through this district one can feel as if they were in America or a suburb in the UK. The streets were manicured, the roads were smooth and perfect. You would not have thought this was Haiti!
'Gingerbread' architecture, a term coined by American tourists in the 1950's who visited Haiti has long been the term used to call these timber framed houses. This style of architecture ceased to be built in 1925 as it was banned in the city due to it being a fire hazard.
The Gingerbread Houses reflected a time of prosperity and creativity when Haiti was a vibrant part of the international community. It had hosted the Paris Exposition in 1900 which saw the local Haitian artists incorporating foreign influences into its indigenous art and architecture.
The hotel Oloffson, stands proudly and is the epitome of the typical Haitian gingerbread architecture. It was built in the late 19th century as a private home.
The property owned by the Sam family who had a lineage of Haitian presidents. Tirésias Simon-Sam was president of Haiti from 1896 to 1902 and the mansion was built by Tirésias's son, Jean Vilbrun Guillaume Sam. The Sams lived in the mansion until 1915, when Guillaume himself became president but only for five months until he was torn to pieces by an angry mob.
By chance we found out about this art fair organised and sponsored by Digicel happening near the new American Embassy out in Tabarre. So a few of us decided to head out there to see what was going on.
It was a collection of local artists showcasing a variety of Haitian art. It was an impressive collection and reflected the creative personality of Haiti.
Architecture for Humanity, Bezos Family Foundation together with Global Nomads Group have collaborated to get young people helping with rebuilding Haiti's schools. There intention is to get American & Canadian high school students involved with fundraising and awareness raising.
What happens is that every dollar raised by the students, it will be matched in a grant form by AFH, Bezos and GNG. Schools in Haiti wishing to be part of this grant scheme apply to be registered in the program.
Tap-tap's are readily seen all over Port-au-Prince. These are the Haitian taxi cabs and serve as public transportation in Haiti. Tap-taps are privately owned, but publicly operated as a form of shared taxi. The larger Urban Tap-taps are small pickup trucks, the smaller sometimes mini-vans, with benches and a sun cover, able to maneuver in heavy traffic.
