KIMOSABEE HURT

One of our running around errands in the last couple of weeks resulted in poor old Kimosabee getting hit by a bus. Nobody was seriously hurt. Johnny and I both got bumps on our heads and had a sore head and neck for a few days but now everyone is alright. We were in the process of bringing Marie's sister Chrismanie to the Medecin Sans Frontieres Maternite Hospital on Delmas 33. She had been bleeding and in labor all night and at 5 in the morning Marie came and asked if we could drive to Cite Soleil and pick her up. I saw a bus in the rear view mirror and decided at the last minute to delay making the left hand turn to the hospital gate. The next moment there was this big bang and I wondered what hit us.

We went and brought Chrismanie inside the hospital and then talked with the bus driver. He had also side swiped a car driving in the opposite direction. His excuse was that he had no brakes. The front end of his bus was severely damaged from an accident the prior evening. We asked him for his id and he had none. He was wearing a Moulin d'Haiti shirt. We flagged a police vehicle down and they told us that we would not find anyone at circulation to deal with the accident on a Sunday morning (don't have accidents in Haiti on a weekend :) ). The policeman told us to go out to the Moulin Haiti flour mill out in Titanyen and try to talk with someone there and we followed the bus driver.

When we got to the flour mill the director was summoned and it took a bit for him to arrive. The company has a mechanic and I told him that the bus has no brakes. The driver of the bus then said that the brakes were working fine. He was just planning to pass us and there was not enough room. The director summoned the justice of the peace to do a report and the justice of the peace from Cabaret came along with some Haitian Police and UN Police. We both made a report. The story of the first accident that the bus driver was involved in was very interesting. He said that on Saturday evening he was driving the bus on main Delmas and turned by Delmas 41. 3 guys on a motorcycle stopped the bus at gunpoint, boarded the bus, bound his hands and put a bag over his head. They then kidnapped him. Around 1:00am they released him by the bus and the bus was severely smashed at the front. The windshield had been shattered and there were 2 large rocks on the passenger seat. Because he was so shaken up he drank of bottle of Bacara rum and then started driving. That is when he smashed into us. What is frustrating is that the police and the UN did nothing. We are now trying to go through insurance to fix the truck. The Haitian people at the house tell me good luck, it will take 3 years :) Pray that the insurance comes through or that funds are raised to fix the truck. We rely on Kimosabee a lot.