Proudly Passionate at 50
Carolle’s present for my 50th birthday was to take me to see Queen perform. Freddy Mercury is gone and instead they have a young replacement, Adam Lambert. It was great fun to hear the song that I’ve known since high…
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Getting Lucky in Bangladesh
Here in Bangladesh you have been very lucky. It has been two hundred years since your last major earthquake. But for how long will your luck last? With its proximity to an active fault, very weak soils, dense population, and…
Lying wasn’t Greg Mortenson’s biggest sin
On Tuesday, Greg Mortenson reappeared after the scandal surrounding his books and charity to apologize for lying. “I stand by the stories. The stories happened, but … not in the sequence or the timing,” Mortenson told Brokaw. If his only fault was…
The Haiti Earthquake Damage Assessment Program
In the immediate aftermath of the earthquake, it seemed as if the city of Port-au-Prince had been completely destroyed. There was talk of relocating the capital or of bulldozing large swaths to make way for new construction. As the rubble…
The Our Border Program
From 2003 through 2010, I directed a program for the Pan American Development Foundation (PADF) to improve cross-border cooperation and trade in the Haitian-Dominican borderlands. It was a facinating experience as we worked on issues ranging from cross-border perceptions to…
Still Looking for a Good Book on the Haiti Earthquake
I seek out books on the Haiti earthquake in the hopes of finding one that captures what I experienced and perhaps helps me to understand it better. Instead, all of the books seem to describe a different event. Like…
Le Grande Rue Languishes while Petionville booms
Le Grande Rue–the historic buisness center of Port-au-Prince For the first time in quite a long time, I ventured into the traditional heart of Port-au-Prince. It was a sad sight. Most of the buildings along the main street (Boulevard Jean-Jacques…