Trek To Rome

Today we meet Fr. Murphy coming out of the mountains…

Early in the day we film Fr. O’Hare performing baptisms. Why do we baptize? Jesus was baptized, and He instructed the Apostles to baptize (Matthew 28:19). Imagine that, the God of the universe in the waters of the Earth.

The people sweep the debris away from their home, keeping the dirt floor clean. There’s a street light.. tied to a tree trunk. There is dignity in every human being. There is dignity in the poor.

We rented some high-powered long-range walkies for our documentary (a trick Mel picked up working on films in LA). Earlier in the week we gave one to Fr. Murphy before he set out to visit the communities in the mountains.

Our plan is to drive up the ridge line and intercept Fr. Murphy on the walkies in order to film him on his way down. Will the walkie still have battery by then? Will Fr. have trouble using it? I don’t know.

Fr. Murphy rides his dirt bike most of the way up the mountain, but then has to switch to a mule for the rest of the trip.

There are people living up in the mountains in places only accessible by mule. The church cares for them. Every year, Bishop Grullón and an accompanying priest visit every one of the communities. This involves going without showering and sleeping on the floor of churches.

The road is steep.

When we get up higher, we catch a good view of the disparity between Haiti and the Dominican Republic. This photo should sum up what I can’t put into words. Haiti is on the right side of the river, the DR is on the left. Click here for a higher res.

Where are the trees in Haiti? Where is the life of the earth?

The road is so steep.

The truck is bouncing everywhere. John (one of the volunteers) engages the four-wheel drive in the lowest gear and we are still having trouble.

I radio into the cool air.. “Fr. Murphy.. come in Fr. Murphy..” nothing.

The truck can’t make it up one of the steep grades. We all pile out and John takes the hill alone. After a few tries, he is able to get the truck up past this part of the road.

“Breaker breaker.. I’ve got a visual”. It’s Fr. Murphy on the walkie. Yes! We coordinate where we are going to meet him.

We set up to film Fr. Murphy coming down the trail on his mule. The view is spectacular. The landscape is made of long dried grass, with pine trees. Fr. Murphy points out to me that it is unusual to have pine trees in the Caribbean.. especially with Spanish Moss in them. How did Spanish Moss travel here? How did it get up here? Click here for a higher res.

Underneath all the grass is this shale rock. It’s just made of all these little pieces stuck together. You can pull them out.. sharp as knives. They fall down and make a dust.

We set up for the shot and capture the end of Fr. Murphy’s long journey.

We pack up the truck and drive ahead of Fr. Murphy to film his entrance into town. Keep in mind that while you go to work, this is all occurring.. whether we are here to film it or not. This isn’t something special because of the cameras. How many more good things are happening in the world all the time? Mel is on Cam A as Fr. enters town.

We follow Fr. Murphy down the mountain as he visits the towns. At one point we near a waterfall, so we take a small detour to visit. The political parties that paint everything, have even painted the waterfall. Sad.

According to my GPS, we’re at: 19 05.046 N 071 33.080 W. Google has lots of satellite pictures looking down, so I thought I would take one looking up. Below (at right) is the picture looking up at the sky from these coordinates. Zoom in (and out) on the map to see where we’re at:

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There are a lot of beautiful plants here that I’ve never seen before.

We catch a beautiful sunset as we leave the mountains. Click here for a higher res. Fires burn in the distance inside Haiti.

How wonderful was all this? Unfortunately, tomorrow will be our last day in Banica.

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Today we head to the river that forms the border between Haiti and the Dominican Republic.

There are mosquitoes everywhere here. They’re in the room, outside the mosquito net, inside the mosquito net, in the bathroom, in the shower..while you’re showering, in the toilet, IN the toilet WHILE you’re.. they’re everywhere.

Thankfully they don’t seem to hunt during the day like they do in the US. They must be a different species.

There’s a fan in every room in the dorm. I didn’t use it because the temperature was perfect, but I learn that the fan is actually to keep the mosquitoes away!! ugh.. why didn’t i think of that.

The mosquitoes are so light, when they fly into the wind they.. zip.. they’re blown away. I’ve been standing in the fan whenever I can.

This morning I wake up with strange bumps on my hand though. I think they’re bed bug bites.

Mel has’em too.. on his same hand and on his leg. He thinks he saw some “fleas” on him during the night when he woke up, so he’s pretty sure they’re bed bugs.

Mel’s says they bit us on the hand because we were eating beef jerky using those fingers.

I switch beds for the rest of the trip.

At night I’ve been walking past these bars in our dorm that form part of the wall at one section.

I wonder if they’re to keep the wolves out.. or to keep us in. I’m not sure, but I feel pretty safe. See the holes at the top near the roof? That’s so the breeze can blow through the house and take the heat out.. and it also lets all the mosquitoes in.. wait no, the bars and open windows do that too. All the houses are built like this, I guess there’s no keeping the bugs out.

At night I can hear donkeys braying in the distance. Walking past this gate is eerie though. At night, it’s just me, then the bars, then pitch black. I’ve seen the eyes of a cat or something reflecting back at me around our dorm at night. There’s no way these bars are going to keep a small animal out, but I’m not too worried.

We are never without our flashlights in the very dark night here.

This is Sixto, the Parish dog. He rides with us in the car when we go places. He’s a pretty laid back dog.

Cell phones came to Banica in 2008. That’s pretty impressive for this part of the world. The word “claro” has become something of a running joke among our documentary team. It’s the name of a cell phone company, but it also means “clear” or “clearly” as we might say. When I say something Mel will say very loudly “claro!” in the most hilarious voice. Sometimes we drop it into conversation slyly. We’re having a good time with it because none of us speak Spanish, so this one word we are holding onto as proof of our progress, and then we spot this:

Johnny Celular? Yes!! We love it. Claro.

We make it to the river that forms the border between Haiti and the Dominican Republic. Sherwin says we should film throwing something between two countries. What a great idea. I relocate a small rock to Haiti from the DR.

It doesn’t look like much, but the river is flowing quite quickly in parts, and can be a bit deep in places. I’m not sure I’d want to go swimming in it.. especially because I don’t know what’s going on up river.

We travel to another part of the river where the Haitians cross into the Dominican Republic (especially on market day). You can ride a small boat across the river if you don’t want to get your feet wet. The boats are hollowed out tree-trunks. One tree–one boat.

Mel and Shana pay a few pesos to ride into Haiti. The boat has an old license plate from a Haitian Taxi nailed to the back of it.

They were only across the river a few minutes, but when they returned they said there was a noticeable difference. Shana must have taken a thousand pictures of people on this trip, but she said that “no one over there smiled”. She wasn’t kidding–when I saw the pics later, no one was smiling, not even the children.

I don’t know the suffering in Haiti, but between my small experience and hearing the stories of the Medical Missionaries, I believe it’s bad.

Once a month the volunteers show a movie for a local town. People come from all over. There are hundreds of kids. One month it’s a regular movie (wholesome), the next month it’s related to the faith–like on the life of a saint or something.

This has to be one of the coolest things I’ve ever had the privilege to witness. Here we are in the middle of nowhere, in this little town, in a dirt field, in the pitch black, setting up a movie screen–a tarp on the side of a van. This has got to be the best thing around!

The movie screen looks a bit wrinkled, so I re-adjust it and set the rock on it to keep it straight. Isaac and John (two of the volunteers) are setting up the DVD player–tonight’s movie is Ice Age.

We head to a local “mercado” (market hut) to buy some snacks before the movie begins. Mel and Sherwin buy chocolate. Even here they have Coca-Cola.. so strange. Mel remarks how those Coke commercials are true. You know, the ones where you see people from all over the world and different cultures drinking Coke? It’s really like that!! People all over the world in the most remote places that don’t even have clean water DO have clean Coca-Cola. It makes so much sense now!

Fr. O’Hare introduces the movie. I’ve seen this film back in the States. Never in my life would I have believed I’d be here in the middle of the island of Hispaniola, in a dirt field surrounded by a hundred kids, unable to communicate with anyone, watching the same film. I can’t get over it.

There’s such a contrast between the living conditions we’re surrounded by, and the fact we’ve just set up a drive-through movie.

Unreal!! Can you imagine what this is like for these people? It must be fantastic.

After spending some time at the movie, we head back to the church to get some dinner and rest. Tomorrow we’re headed into the highlands to meet Fr. Murphy.

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Today we check on a project, visit the market and eat lunch with the Bishop.

Mamoncito is a small town that sits on top of a hill. To get up to it, is a bit of a hike.

It’d cost you a couple hundred dollars to buy a few acres of land here, but you’d get a million dollar view along with it:

Don’t expect any running water or plumbing though.

That’s actually what we’re here to fix. Fr O’Hare is checking on a latrine project. The church (instead of the government) builds lots of things here including schools, hospitals, roads, and yes, even latrines. When Fr. O’Hare asks the people where they use the bathroom, they point to the trees and say “over there”. That isn’t good for sanitary conditions, so the church will work with them to help improve the situation.

Here’s a panorama of the view from Mamoncito [full res]:

A market is a grocery store. Unlike here in the US where the grocery store is open every day (often 24 hours a day), in other countries the “grocery store” is open on “market day”. In Banica, that’s one day a week.

Haitians cross the border to sell their goods alongside Dominicans in the market. The hillsides are dry and dusty, and this is the first time I’ve seen some food with real color. There are red onions and even peppers. We’ve been eating mostly chicken and rice for seven days now which I’ve enjoyed, but I’m not sure what is going on with all of this food with color!

Mel buys a machete. I’m not sure how he’s going to get it through customs. Then we spy something that I’m beginning to think is universal to every culture on earth; no, not Coca-Cola, but fried chicken!

The woman cooking it is pregnant.

Next, we’re off to interview Bishop Grullón for the documentary. On the way to the offices of the Diocese of San Juan de la Maguana, we learn that Bishop Grullón was responsible for building some of the local roads. The economy here (like everywhere else in the world) depends largely on the ability to transport goods to market. Without roads, this can become almost impossible. Bishop Grullón had the road built to connect two of the major towns. A trip that used to take 4 hours by automobile now takes about 40 minutes. In the US, we think of infrastructure as being a function of the government. Here, the church provides what the government does not. We spot some beautiful scenery along our way.

Pulling into the parking lot of the Diocese of San Juan de la Maguana, you wouldn’t recognize it. It is largely unmarked, with only a dirt parking lot. The building looks like something out of the ravages of a war-torn country, but this is the hub of everything good here:

In addition to serving the spiritual needs of the people, the Diocese has offices for Human Justice, Agriculture, Social Programs, etc. It reminded me of a small-scale government.. one that was only benevolent though. I couldn’t believe the sheer capacity and number of avenues the church was pursuing to help people. Programs from teaching respect for women (a problem there), to programs teaching the importance of and how to grow vegetables (malnutrition is another problem). The church is concerned with the entire well-being of society, building homes, roads, schools and aqueducts. Its enough to leave one overwhelmed to understand it all. It’s hard for me to take in all at once. (I learn later that the Diocese also provides for medical care).

We interview Bishop Grullón for the documentary. He is hilarious, but I don’t know this until we get back and translate the videos from Spanish. After the interview, the Bishop invites us to his home for lunch.

When we arrive at Bishop Grullón’s home, he gives us a tour of his garden. There are fruit trees and lots of shade. We take some pictures. Sherwin and I spot cherries in the garden. Through a translator, the Bishop invites us to try them.

At lunch, Sherwin, one of two Protestant brethren on our team is given the seat at the head of the table. Bishop Grullón insists. I found this particularly humbling that Bishop refused to sit at the head of the table. Bishop Grullón serves us a lunch of salad (with avocados–now I’m really excited), rice, and what Sherwin described as “one of the best lasagna’s he’s ever had in his life”.

By serve us lunch, I mean the Bishop literally served us.. taking our plates and putting the food on them for us.

Sherwin has some great questions for Bishop Grullón, asking him whether the politicians have ever tried to bribe him. “No”, Bishop laughs.

Bishop Grullón is the first native Dominican Bishop. That’s the mark of the success of a mission. One day it will be independent of Arlington’s assistance. Missions like San Diego, Los Angeles, and San Francisco come to mind. God bless the missionaries who work so hard to plant the seeds for a stable society.

After lunch we head back to Banica where the volunteers are acting out the Stations of the Cross with the children.

This devotion re-enacts Christ’s sentence and crucifixion in 14 different steps (or “stations”). Every Catholic church in the developed world (and some non-Catholic ones) will have the Stations of the Cross. You will see it often around the walls of the church. It is a very popular devotion, especially before Good Friday.

When you walk the Stations, you meditate on Christ’s life in each scene.

If you get to see it acted out, it’s even more meaningful–especially for people who can not read.
We head back to the dorm for the night.

Tomorrow we’re headed to the river that forms the border with Haiti.

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