Sunday, May 31, 2009
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
Update!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Today we received this message from our Headmaster. Read it to find out the full story. Or Summarized version from Ryan Oliver- NO SCHOOL for 7 DAYS!!!!!!!!! =)
Dear Staff,
This morning I received a communication and visit from the Ministry of Health advising me that Carol Morgan School should close for 7 days. There is still no indication that virus A (H1N1) has appeared at the Carol Morgan School. But because there were numerous students who had influenza like symptoms and 26 samples are being sent on to the CDC (Center for Disease Control in Atlanta) for further diagnosis we have been told that we must shut down.
We can return to the campus on Wednesday. It could possibly be earlier when we hear about the results of the H1N1 tests sent to the CDC. All staff are required to stay in Santo Domingo during this closure time. No staff except the Principal team may be on campus during the closure days except the maintenance staff who will be in charge of the disinfecting process.
Teachers are expected to be in their homes during school days ( from 8 am till 2 pm ) and at their computers as we will be using Wiki pages to impart lessons to students and communicate with students and parents. Principals will also be communicating with you about their expectations of you during those days. ONLY in this way are we able to count the days as school days and not have to extend the school year.
We will have a required full staff meeting in the old library today at 2:30 pm to go over further details and respond to questions.
Teachers please read to your students the following message before this period is over:
As a result of the spreading of influenza A we have been asked by the Ministry of Health to be closed for at least the remainder of this week. There is no one in the school that has been identified with the more complicated Flu A H1N1. These are precautionary measures. We will keep you informed through the school WIKI pages as to whether there will be more days than that or not. You are required to use the school wiki pages to get assignments from your teachers. In the meantime we ask that you bring all of your books home today so that you can do any homework you get from your teachers during the time school is closed. By following these guidelines you are helping the school keep its calendar days and not have to extend the school year beyond June 12. The Principals will be on campus from 8 to 2 this Thursday and Friday for those students who are not here and need to come in to pick up their books.
Thank you,Mr. Delman
Headmaster
Olivier's verdict :::::: 7 paid days off in the Caribeean. =)
Dear Staff,
This morning I received a communication and visit from the Ministry of Health advising me that Carol Morgan School should close for 7 days. There is still no indication that virus A (H1N1) has appeared at the Carol Morgan School. But because there were numerous students who had influenza like symptoms and 26 samples are being sent on to the CDC (Center for Disease Control in Atlanta) for further diagnosis we have been told that we must shut down.
We can return to the campus on Wednesday. It could possibly be earlier when we hear about the results of the H1N1 tests sent to the CDC. All staff are required to stay in Santo Domingo during this closure time. No staff except the Principal team may be on campus during the closure days except the maintenance staff who will be in charge of the disinfecting process.
Teachers are expected to be in their homes during school days ( from 8 am till 2 pm ) and at their computers as we will be using Wiki pages to impart lessons to students and communicate with students and parents. Principals will also be communicating with you about their expectations of you during those days. ONLY in this way are we able to count the days as school days and not have to extend the school year.
We will have a required full staff meeting in the old library today at 2:30 pm to go over further details and respond to questions.
Teachers please read to your students the following message before this period is over:
As a result of the spreading of influenza A we have been asked by the Ministry of Health to be closed for at least the remainder of this week. There is no one in the school that has been identified with the more complicated Flu A H1N1. These are precautionary measures. We will keep you informed through the school WIKI pages as to whether there will be more days than that or not. You are required to use the school wiki pages to get assignments from your teachers. In the meantime we ask that you bring all of your books home today so that you can do any homework you get from your teachers during the time school is closed. By following these guidelines you are helping the school keep its calendar days and not have to extend the school year beyond June 12. The Principals will be on campus from 8 to 2 this Thursday and Friday for those students who are not here and need to come in to pick up their books.
Thank you,Mr. Delman
Headmaster
Olivier's verdict :::::: 7 paid days off in the Caribeean. =)
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
Possible H1N1 Swine Flu outbreak.
Yesterday we received word that two embassy students tested positive for Influenza A. Both students attend Carol Morgan, one a 1st grader and one a 12th grader. Influenza A is a common strain of the flu but it is also the strain the Swine flue is found in. We do not know for sure if it is Swine Flu or not, but mass hysteria has began. The only way to know for sure is by sending blood samples to the CDC (Center for Disease Control) in Atlanta, GA. This process will take 3 days to know for sure.
The next thing we know the news is saying we are the first reported case in the Dominican Republic and that school is canceled. Both of these statements are not true. Multiple news broadcasts reported this information and because of that we only have a third of the school present today. Many students have come to school and then left quickly, some even wearing masks. The pictures I have seen of people wearing masks have come true. It is crazy to see how fast false information spreads. Who knows, maybe I get an early vacation if things progress more.
Just to clarify. I am at work and school is not canceled. I am feeling fine and their no verified cases have been found on our campus.
Olivier Out
The next thing we know the news is saying we are the first reported case in the Dominican Republic and that school is canceled. Both of these statements are not true. Multiple news broadcasts reported this information and because of that we only have a third of the school present today. Many students have come to school and then left quickly, some even wearing masks. The pictures I have seen of people wearing masks have come true. It is crazy to see how fast false information spreads. Who knows, maybe I get an early vacation if things progress more.
Just to clarify. I am at work and school is not canceled. I am feeling fine and their no verified cases have been found on our campus.
Olivier Out
Monday, May 18, 2009
More Haiti Pics!
Cape Haitian
Me on top of the bus we rode on.
Two kids who went a few miles to get water for the family.
The Citedal again. Very impressive
Ever wonder where Chocolate comes from?
Thats it......
Me on top of the bus we rode on.
Two kids who went a few miles to get water for the family.
The Citedal again. Very impressive
Ever wonder where Chocolate comes from?
Thats it......
Thursday, May 7, 2009
I finally found the words.
I had to respond to a job question while looking for jobs this summer. One question asked about my most memorable outdoor experience. Here is what I wrote. I ended up writing about Haiti. So here you go. Long and not really as detailed as I would like.
That is an extremely hard question. The first two thoughts that came to my head are: Rafting the Grand Canyon and flipping a raft two times within 15 minutes on the Illinois River in the middle of nowhere. Both of those have been unbelievable experiences that I will never forget.
To answer the question, one experience stands out more than any other. It did not take place in the Pacific Northwest but it is my most memorable outdoor experience. I took a trip to Haiti three weeks ago. Despite multiple warnings from the U.S. Embassy in Haiti three friends and I decided to make it happen. Perhaps this trip is most memorable to me because it is fresh on my mind and because it was life changing. Sometimes I feel like living in the Dominican Republic is living in a “third world country.” Haiti made the Dominican Republic look like the cleanest most sophisticated country in the world. Little did I know what an extreme case could look like.
The best way I can try and describe Haiti to a Pacific Northwest audience would be to compare it to Tijuana, except on a much larger scale and much worse. Forget plumbing, fast food, supermarkets, clean water, bathrooms, and more.
Porto-Prince, the capital is very tough to swallow. There is poverty everywhere and it is in your face constantly. Two of our members had volunteered for the peace corp. previously in their lives and both spent time in Kenya and Uganda. They said that if they were placed in Haiti without knowing where they were they would guess Africa.
In most struggling countries they still have an area where you can go to get a pizza or a Big Mac, not Haiti. The food was one of the hardest things for me to get use to. It is real hard to order any type of meat when you are driving down the street seeing pigs, goats, dogs, chickens all rummaging through piles of garbage and human waste. I did manage to eat a lot of rice and beans and prepackaged cookies.
Porto-Prince was now behind us and things started to shape up. We first caught a ride in a Tap-Tap (public transportation in the back of a truck) three hours south to the coast town of Jacmel. Jacmel is supposed to be a tourist town but I did not see any tourism at all. In fact everywhere we went in the entire country the children would yell “Blanc.” This means white in Creole in case you did not catch onto that. While in Jacmel we hiked into this beautiful set of waterfalls called Basin Blue. The water was bright blue and the waterfalls made for great rock climbing and cliff jumping.
When returning to town one of our crew said,” I have to get out of Haiti.” He enjoyed it but it was a little too much for him at this point in his life. The only way to leave the country realistically was to go back to Porto-Prince, the place we all dreaded. We did not feel safe leaving him on his own until he was on the bus headed back to Santo Domingo.
We got up at 4:00 a.m. to make sure he was able to catch the one bus for the day leaving from Porto-Prince. We made it just in time and then faced our own decisions. We knew we wanted to see more of Haiti and had to get out of the dreadful city. Immediately we went to the local bus stop. Our goal was to take one bus the entire 9 hours to the north coast town of Cape Haitian. The school bus was full of sixty or more Haitians, half of which were standing. This gave us three decisions. We could wait for another bus in the blazing sun for many hours with sewage everywhere, push our way onto the crowded bus, or ride on top. Riding on top won after careful debate. Okay, not really. We had to move on and that was that. It turned out to be one of the most memorable experiences of my life. We experienced the entire country side riding 9 hours on top of a school bus in the beating sun. We did have a few people join us on top and a lot of luggage. We drove through extreme dessert, lush crops, irrigated fields and large mountains with rivers. The bus did stop a couple times for a bathroom break which was an unusual occurrence in itself. When the bus stopped people got out to go to the bathroom immediately. Men and woman, boys and girls all together on the side of the road with no trees or rocks to hide behind. We just let it all go with no worries.
Eventually we made it to the north coast and spent two days in a hotel with no running water. We had to take bucket baths and use the bucket for the bathroom. During our time on the north coast we visited the Citadel and Sansouci. The Citadel is an enormous fortress from the 1700’s with 12 feet thick walls. It was built to fend off the French while Haiti fought for there independence. No battles were ever fought here. The Citadel was pristine in a country with so little. It had old preserved cannons with engravings from the 1700’s. It looked like a castle in the middle of Scotland. Sansouci was very impressive in itself although an earthquake had done its damage. Sansouci was the oldest palace of the country. At one time in the world it was regarded as one of the nicest palaces in the world. In fact, Haiti was at one time the richest country in the world according to them.
In closing, there are no words to describe my most memorable trip to Haiti. Pictures probably do the best job of telling the story. Perhaps a quote from a Haitian friend may help, " I can not believe you did some of the stuff you did." It is a simple quote that has little meaning behind it unless you know the environment within Haiti. We experienced poverty first hand but more importantly we experienced the Haitian people. If I was to give advice on this country I would definitely recommend it. I think every person should experience something like this in there lifetime to really appreciate what we have. I experienced beautiful waterfalls, mountains, culture, language, and most of all people. We never felt at risk and loved our time with the Haitian people. I would only suggest avoiding Porto Prince and be prepared for an eye opener.
To answer the question, one experience stands out more than any other. It did not take place in the Pacific Northwest but it is my most memorable outdoor experience. I took a trip to Haiti three weeks ago. Despite multiple warnings from the U.S. Embassy in Haiti three friends and I decided to make it happen. Perhaps this trip is most memorable to me because it is fresh on my mind and because it was life changing. Sometimes I feel like living in the Dominican Republic is living in a “third world country.” Haiti made the Dominican Republic look like the cleanest most sophisticated country in the world. Little did I know what an extreme case could look like.
The best way I can try and describe Haiti to a Pacific Northwest audience would be to compare it to Tijuana, except on a much larger scale and much worse. Forget plumbing, fast food, supermarkets, clean water, bathrooms, and more.
Porto-Prince, the capital is very tough to swallow. There is poverty everywhere and it is in your face constantly. Two of our members had volunteered for the peace corp. previously in their lives and both spent time in Kenya and Uganda. They said that if they were placed in Haiti without knowing where they were they would guess Africa.
In most struggling countries they still have an area where you can go to get a pizza or a Big Mac, not Haiti. The food was one of the hardest things for me to get use to. It is real hard to order any type of meat when you are driving down the street seeing pigs, goats, dogs, chickens all rummaging through piles of garbage and human waste. I did manage to eat a lot of rice and beans and prepackaged cookies.
Porto-Prince was now behind us and things started to shape up. We first caught a ride in a Tap-Tap (public transportation in the back of a truck) three hours south to the coast town of Jacmel. Jacmel is supposed to be a tourist town but I did not see any tourism at all. In fact everywhere we went in the entire country the children would yell “Blanc.” This means white in Creole in case you did not catch onto that. While in Jacmel we hiked into this beautiful set of waterfalls called Basin Blue. The water was bright blue and the waterfalls made for great rock climbing and cliff jumping.
When returning to town one of our crew said,” I have to get out of Haiti.” He enjoyed it but it was a little too much for him at this point in his life. The only way to leave the country realistically was to go back to Porto-Prince, the place we all dreaded. We did not feel safe leaving him on his own until he was on the bus headed back to Santo Domingo.
We got up at 4:00 a.m. to make sure he was able to catch the one bus for the day leaving from Porto-Prince. We made it just in time and then faced our own decisions. We knew we wanted to see more of Haiti and had to get out of the dreadful city. Immediately we went to the local bus stop. Our goal was to take one bus the entire 9 hours to the north coast town of Cape Haitian. The school bus was full of sixty or more Haitians, half of which were standing. This gave us three decisions. We could wait for another bus in the blazing sun for many hours with sewage everywhere, push our way onto the crowded bus, or ride on top. Riding on top won after careful debate. Okay, not really. We had to move on and that was that. It turned out to be one of the most memorable experiences of my life. We experienced the entire country side riding 9 hours on top of a school bus in the beating sun. We did have a few people join us on top and a lot of luggage. We drove through extreme dessert, lush crops, irrigated fields and large mountains with rivers. The bus did stop a couple times for a bathroom break which was an unusual occurrence in itself. When the bus stopped people got out to go to the bathroom immediately. Men and woman, boys and girls all together on the side of the road with no trees or rocks to hide behind. We just let it all go with no worries.
Eventually we made it to the north coast and spent two days in a hotel with no running water. We had to take bucket baths and use the bucket for the bathroom. During our time on the north coast we visited the Citadel and Sansouci. The Citadel is an enormous fortress from the 1700’s with 12 feet thick walls. It was built to fend off the French while Haiti fought for there independence. No battles were ever fought here. The Citadel was pristine in a country with so little. It had old preserved cannons with engravings from the 1700’s. It looked like a castle in the middle of Scotland. Sansouci was very impressive in itself although an earthquake had done its damage. Sansouci was the oldest palace of the country. At one time in the world it was regarded as one of the nicest palaces in the world. In fact, Haiti was at one time the richest country in the world according to them.
In closing, there are no words to describe my most memorable trip to Haiti. Pictures probably do the best job of telling the story. Perhaps a quote from a Haitian friend may help, " I can not believe you did some of the stuff you did." It is a simple quote that has little meaning behind it unless you know the environment within Haiti. We experienced poverty first hand but more importantly we experienced the Haitian people. If I was to give advice on this country I would definitely recommend it. I think every person should experience something like this in there lifetime to really appreciate what we have. I experienced beautiful waterfalls, mountains, culture, language, and most of all people. We never felt at risk and loved our time with the Haitian people. I would only suggest avoiding Porto Prince and be prepared for an eye opener.
Wednesday, May 6, 2009
Still no words for Haiti
More Pics though! =)
The Citadel. A huge fortress from the 1700's that is still completely in tact. Walls are 12 ft thick. Cannons still in place with engravings from the 1700's. It was built to fight off the French when earning there independence. It reminded me of something you would see in Scotland.
A couple pigs lounging in the trash. The river was 15 ft. to the right. Trash everywhere. It made it really hard to eat meat the rest of the trip. Everywhere you looked pigs, goats, dogs rummaging through the piles of trash.
This is looking up a dry river bed in the middle of Porto Prince. A guy was carving up some kind of animal. It almost looked like a dog. I am not sure.
Me!
After hiking to the Citadel we got caught in a rain storm. It was almost dark and raining. We dicided to take the calculated risk and ride on top of this 15 passenger van. We had two choices. Stay and wait for a ride in the middle of no where in the pitch black, or take this great opportunity to get a free bath on top of a van. It seemed very easy compared to our 9 hour bus ride in which we rode on top the entire way.
The Citadel. A huge fortress from the 1700's that is still completely in tact. Walls are 12 ft thick. Cannons still in place with engravings from the 1700's. It was built to fight off the French when earning there independence. It reminded me of something you would see in Scotland.
A couple pigs lounging in the trash. The river was 15 ft. to the right. Trash everywhere. It made it really hard to eat meat the rest of the trip. Everywhere you looked pigs, goats, dogs rummaging through the piles of trash.
This is looking up a dry river bed in the middle of Porto Prince. A guy was carving up some kind of animal. It almost looked like a dog. I am not sure.
Me!
After hiking to the Citadel we got caught in a rain storm. It was almost dark and raining. We dicided to take the calculated risk and ride on top of this 15 passenger van. We had two choices. Stay and wait for a ride in the middle of no where in the pitch black, or take this great opportunity to get a free bath on top of a van. It seemed very easy compared to our 9 hour bus ride in which we rode on top the entire way.Olivier Out
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