{"id":3123,"date":"2010-09-14T16:36:00","date_gmt":"2010-09-14T21:36:00","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2010-09-14T16:38:21","modified_gmt":"2010-09-14T21:38:21","slug":"in-pap-attention-to-detail-is-de-rigeur","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/thickculture\/2010\/09\/14\/in-pap-attention-to-detail-is-de-rigeur\/","title":{"rendered":"In PAP, Attention to Detail is De Rigeur"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Yesterday I arrived at Toussaint L&#8217;Ouverture International Airport.&nbsp; I was arriving at a Caribbean country not to vacation, not to present and listen to papers at a conference, but to do work as a volunteer for an international NGO, Sun Mountain International.<\/p>\n<p>Despite my noble intentions, the immigration officials were not impressed.&nbsp; They didn&#8217;t want to know who Sun Mountain International (SMtn) was, that it was started by an alumnus of California Lutheran University, the university where I teach.&nbsp; They didn&#8217;t want to know that SMtn was working with the International Organization for Migration and US Agency for International Development.&nbsp; They didn&#8217;t even want to know that I had received a commendation for patience from una abuelita on the overnight flight from LAX to Miami for sitting among her three generation deep family &#8211; I got something out of being able to practice my Spanish.<\/p>\n<p>What the immigration officials in Port-au-Prince (PAP) wanted to know was the exact street address in the Christ Roi district where I was going to stay.&nbsp; My passport confiscated and protests ignored, I was sent packing until I could produce a more detailed address.&nbsp; After a few seconds, I returned to the immigration supervisor.&nbsp; Eventually, I wheeled around and suggested that the Hotel Villa Creole was my destination.&nbsp; Rejected again, I was told to get my taxi driver.&nbsp; Rolling two duffel bags across a dusty pavement, separated by a chain link fence from a horde of desperate and no doubt hungry kids yelling &#8220;Boss&#8221; at me, I found Lemoune, who was holding a sign with my first name and the words, &#8220;Hotel Villa Creole.&#8221;&nbsp; Salvation.&nbsp; We deposited the bags in his SUV and marched back to the immigration office to secure my passport.&nbsp; Sweaty and a bit angry, I returned to my appointed task.&nbsp; Onward, Lemoune.&nbsp; The devil&#8217;s in the details.<\/p>\n<div class=\"blogger-post-footer\"><img width='1' height='1' src='https:\/\/blogger.googleusercontent.com\/tracker\/1822199030431006452-8686743548789886864?l=threesuns-russrunner.blogspot.com' alt='' \/><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Yesterday I arrived at Toussaint L&#8217;Ouverture International Airport.&nbsp; I was arriving at a Caribbean country not to vacation, not to present and listen to papers at a conference, but to do work as a volunteer for an international NGO, Sun Mountain I&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":172,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3123","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/thickculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3123","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/thickculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/thickculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/thickculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/172"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/thickculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3123"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/thickculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3123\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3738,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/thickculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3123\/revisions\/3738"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/thickculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3123"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/thickculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3123"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/thickculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3123"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}