A Wedding in Haiti (Shannon Ravenel Books (Paperback))
Julia Alvarez
Language: English
Pages: 208
ISBN: 1616202807
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
In a story that travels beyond borders and between families, acclaimed Dominican novelist and poet Julia Alvarez reflects on the joys and burdens of love―for her parents, for her husband, and for a young Haitian boy known as Piti. In this intimate true account of a promise kept, Alvarez takes us on a journey into experiences that challenge our way of thinking about history and how it can be reimagined when people from two countries―traditional enemies and strangers―become friends.
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of Altagracia The Best Gift of All: The Legend of La Vieja Belén Return to Sender How Tía Lola Learned to Teach How Tía Lola Saved the Summer How Tía Lola Ended Up Starting Over A Wedding in Haiti The Story of a Friendship JULIA ALVAREZ A Shannon Ravenel Book ALGONQUIN BOOKS OF CHAPEL HILL 2013 for los pitouses & all the Ludys Contents Author’s Note One Going to Piti’s Wedding in Haiti Circa 2001, the mountains of the Dominican Republic A coffee farm or a mistress? Early August
for us. Eseline throws open the back door before the pickup has stopped moving and jumps out to greet them. The sisters all hug each other, exclaiming and giggling, like a bunch of cheerleaders. My heart feels as if it has sprouted wings, beating at the doors of my rib cage, wanting to soar above this happy scene. I make the mistake of looking up, only to see thunderclouds moving across the sky toward us. I remember the deal I made last night and shudder. Once we start unloading the back of the
look at her. She, too, like Infancia, is missing most of her teeth. I’d love to ask her questions, find out her name, how it’s been for her this year with her eldest daughter gone. But our translator has more important matters at hand. We can hear his soft-spoken voice wafting down to us. Eseline’s father responds with an explosion of words, loud and emphatic. I recall his long peroration at the end of the wedding. He seems an excitable man with strong passions. Look how he went crazy over that
English, people know that he is talking about goudou goudou, the onomatopoeic name that Haitians have given the earthquake, imitating the sound of the ground shaking, the buildings crumbling. Junior must assume we’re missionaries or aid workers, because as he is leaving, he thanks us for coming to Haiti. I feel embarrassed to be getting credit for something we’re not doing. By the same token, it seems coldhearted and not totally accurate to say we didn’t come here to help. “We just came to
From time to time, these tensions have erupted in violence, most shamefully in 1937, when four to forty-thousand Haitians (the figures vary wildly) who were then living just this side of the Dominican border were massacred over the course of a few days. The massacre was the brainchild of Trujillo, who had the military use machetes to make it look like a grassroots uprising by farmers protecting their land from Haitian invaders. Since then, relations between the two countries have never again