Page 10 - 37-Fall 2013

Colin Legerton
Supporting young students through Happy Campus is an
investment in Haiti’s future. Photo: Bornain Chiu

onald arrived at nine in the morning to to be read. The messages varied in language—
pick us up. It was my first full day in Port- French, Creole, English—and also in spirit, from
Dau-Prince, and I was about to experience “HUMILITY” and “RESPECT” to “DON’T TRUST NO
my first ride on a tap-tap, Haiti’s ubiquitous ONE.” Many referenced Bible verses. Though
mode of transportation. A complete novice to their messages may have been there for years,
Haiti, I was traveling with a group of seasoned whenever I saw something like “PROVERBS 27:1”
veterans. Bornain was on his third trip, Kathy (Do not boast about tomorrow, for you do not
her sixth. Patrick led the team on visit number know what a day may bring) or “PSALMS 117:18”
eight. All told, we were officially part of Tzu Chi’s (The Lord chastising hath chastised me: but he
twenty-fourth post-earthquake relief team. In hath not delivered me over to death), I always
just two-and-a-half years since the earthquake, thought about the earthquake.
twenty-three volunteer teams had been to
Haiti. Others had visited in 2009 after a series of
hurricanes, and more are certain to follow.

Before I climbed into the tap-tap, I noticed
the single word pasted on the windshield:
“BLESSING.” I would soon learn that it is a tap-
tap tradition to adorn the windshield with a
message, often a spiritual one, and in this regard
Donald’s was no different. The crowded streets
of Port-au-Prince brimmed with all manner of
tap-tap—from beautifully adorned buses that
seated dozens of passengers within vibrant
mosaics spanning all the colors of the rainbow
to unadorned pickups like Donald’s with Garishly decorated tap-taps fill the streets
covered benches welded into their beds—so of Port-au-Prince. Photo: Colin Legerton
there was a never-ending variety of messages

1 0 Tzu CHi uSA FALL 2013