Blan! Blan!

I often close my eyes right when someone's taking my picture. Here, I was drinking a sprite, partly because I really wanted to consume something with calories. Even though I've been told there's no guarantee soda bottled in Haiti won't make you sick due to impure water.

Generally when a white foreigner first travels to Haiti, it's not easy for him or her to understand exactly why many Haitians call out, "blan, blan!". Usually it's children who call out this way, but adults sometimes do it too. At least one person described the sound and strength behind the word "blan" as being like gunfire. Still, I knew there was no harm in it and didn't mind that folks acknowleged my existence.

I've spent most of my life interacting with white people and then, for a good two and a half weeks in Haiti, never saw a white person other than myself. Nothing struck me as odd about this (people are people, right?) until I saw, not one, but four white people walking in the road in rural Haiti. I was on a motorcycle headed to Dabon, so it wouldn't have been that easy to get off and talk to them. But I felt a really powerful curiosity - why are they here?

What are they doing? What languages do they speak? I wanted to say something just to acknowlege that I saw them, too. Really, I just wanted to call out "blan, blan!" Figured it might sound funny but on the other hand, it might sound really rude. Didn't say anything.

Somebody told me they were probably missionaries.