Former Journal photographer remains in Haiti

Renee Dietrich

works with

disabled children

(Renee Dietrich worked as head photographer at The Journal from September 1995 to November 1997, and at The Messenger in Fort Dodge, Iowa from November 1997 to October 2002. She won many state and national awards for her photography during that time. From 1988 to 2002, she traveled to Haiti once or twice a year to do service projects and independent photography projects.

She moved to Haiti in November 2002 to become Director of Advancement for the St. Joseph's Family. The organization consists of three children's homes -- St. Joseph's Home for Boys in Port-au-Prince, and Trinity House in Jacmel, both homes for former street boys; and Wings of Hope in Fermathe, a home for mentally and physically-challenged children and young adults.

Dietrich lives at Wings of Hope, on a mountain side, a 30-minute bus ride from Port-au-Prince. Her duties include grant writing, fund-raising, and public relations.)

By FRITZ BUSCH

Journal Staff Writer

FERMATHE, Haiti -- As Haiti inches toward civil war again, foreigners and nationals flee the country while they can.

Roadblocks and burning tires are becoming the norm in some more and more parts of the country. More and more schools and shops are closing. Shops that remain open are busy as customers stock up on survival items.

More and more armed rebels have been seen. A certain siege mentality is starting to permeate the country.

Renee Dietrich, a former photographer with The Journal, remains on the job with no plans to leave, dedicated to taking care of what she considers her "family," -- disabled, formerly homeless street children.

Most Haitians have to find a water source every day. Dietrich uses two five-gallon buckets of unpure water to wash and flush the toilet. She is able to drink from a jug of purified water.

The state electric company is unreliable. An inverter system runs off batteries charged by a diesel generator or electricity.

The generator is used for about five hours a night. It costs about $10 a day to operate the generator, which is expensive for the facility. Diesel fuel is becoming tougher to find.

Fortunately, the weather on the mountain is cool. Dietrich wears jeans and long-sleeve shirts most days and sleeps with a sweat shirt on.

As a journalist, she's always thought of herself as someone who would run toward trouble, not away from it.

"This is my home now and these children are my family," Dietrich said. "To abandon them and this country that I love so much is inconceivable to me."

Compared to some parts of Haiti, Fermathe remains rather calm, according to Dietrich's last e-mail that she sent in the wee hours of Friday morning, Feb. 27.

Wings of Hope, a home for disabled children, was created when French missionaries announced they were leaving Haiti and that they needed to find care for the disabled children under their supervision. The facility is supported by Hearts with Haiti, a non-profit organization based in North Carolina.

The organization operates three homes serving more than 60 former Haitian street children. In 1985, Michael Geilenfeld, a former Brother with Mother Theresa's Brothers of Charity, started a small home for five boys to take them off the streets and offer them a Christian family life.

Graduates of the first home, St. Joseph's Home for Boys, operate Wings of Hope and Trinity House, a home for young boys in the small coastal town of Jacmel.

Leadership of the homes and the boys themselves believe in giving back for having been brought off the streets. There are now 94 children from a nearby slum attending school, thanks to the boys who have voiced the needs of the neglected children (just as they once were) and found sponsors from the U.S. and Canada to help.

A guest house is the major income source for the home, said Dietrich. Many groups have cancelled their trips to the country since the latest turmoil began, causing the loss of $50,000 in guest house revenues and hampering efforts to continue to help the children. Anybody wishing to donate can send checks to Hearts with Haiti, 708 McColluch St., Raleigh, N.C. 27603.

Dietrich wrote a poem about Haiti issues and how major media portrays it:

HAITI: THE OTHER STORY

Images flash across the screen. 30-second sound bites don't accurately describe the situation.

All the outside world sees is violence, bloodshed, angry mobs shouting anti-American sentiments and self-destruction in the name of national sovereignty.

Those that don't bother to look any further into the story will never know or see more than that. They will only see what they want to see. What is easy to see. What is easy to see.

What countless other stories before these have taught them to see.

Foolish savages ruining their own lives. Looking for handouts. Lazy, backward, dirty, ignorant.

What they won't see is the love and courage a mother shows for her children. Rising before dawn to walk barefoot across the rocks to gather water. Cooking for hours over hot charcoal. Spending the day under a burning sun to eke out an existence for her family. Carrying a child on her hip and a bundle on her head as she returns to the stream to beat her clothes on a rock. Then returning to her preparation of a simple evening meal of rice and beans.

Allowing herself to eat only after her children have had their fill. Stooped over candlelight, hand-stitching magnificent creations out of scraps while her children sleep.

Finally laying down on a straw mat to rest her eyes and her mind for a few hours before rising to begin again.

What they don't see is the father. Shedding his own dignity to become a human donkey. Pushing and pulling his cargo up and down the hills...to feed his family.

Bare feet and a bare back showing the strain. Sweat, burden and pain aging him beyond his years.

What they don't see are the children. Crowded into a classroom, sharing one book, one piece of paper, one pencil, if they are lucky.

Soaking in all of the knowledge they can to help them improve their lives before they are forced onto the streets to help the family survive.

Taking time to play, like children everywhere. Not with Air Jordans or big league athletic equipment, but with bare feet and rocks, a piece of plastic and some string, a rusted out bicycle tire rim and a stick. Taking immense pleasure in the simplicity of still being able to be a child.

These are the other stories. The stories of simple dignity and profound love. But, these are the ones left untold because they aren't as sexy or exciting.

They don't ring with gun shots and angry shouts at the camera. They aren't colored with blood and burning buildings. They don't rock with political upheaval. But they are how the country continues to survive. Angels on earth, simply striving for a quiet, dignified existence. Life goes on, even when the government doesn't.