SOUTIVEST REVIEW Volume XXIH = SANUANY, 1038 © Number 2 WATTEAN JOURNEY... by Alan Lomax 1. THe Camion ‘Mountains with a load of mangoes for Port-au-Prince 25)market, and she carries hee shoot-in-her hand like a dignts fied woman on business ‘You are setting ovt-on-ajoumey. in Haiti, and you agree with Monsieur Polinice. about she seriousness of journeying to the South, “To look at the Caribbean that rubs the shores of Yueatin and Colombia," you say. He responds solemnly, “Aux Cayes has strange gods; any- sshere there may be a drop of green poison from the nosttle-of a mort on your salt-fsh” Swent_ripples tke silk across your breast, and the palms of your hands itch from the heat. To improve your diction you haggle with the taxi driver, who charges # aickel for @ Biteer-m fide if you consent 10 sit six to a seat in his well-worn Ford. But you look forward to one pleasant certainty— the camion will be painted yellow and trimmed in searet. Te was. It was like a great, square-cut, tropical fowh- 8 fantastic bird with an olive green beak and « black oupee, and it was named Fleur d'Innovence. To the wide front seat were Faine, the driver, 2 slender mulatto of Taalian extraction; a fat French priest in tropical black a pimply young Cuban peddiing the goods of his New York drug house through Haiti and Santo Domingo; and sometimes myself. Bebind were six benches pited ‘with bales of empty coffee sacks and then two crammed with: Haitians ‘A word should be added about the camion. In Haiti the rich and the touriste travel in private cars or in taxis. = The peasants walk or beat their donkeys or occasionally, where the road permits, ride the Haitian bus, the camion.. | ‘The driver makes no bones about crowding eight, ten, oF even twelve peopte where there is barely room for six} but if anyone objects and becomes obnoxious, he and his Huggage may be left unceremoniously by the roadside. “The driver and his two or three porters will fall upon 4 (1281 2 helpless, sgualing female, pul her out of the camien, hurt her pares on the road, bully her fare out of hee tnd depart cursing the name of het mother. The driver Gan sete thee opsheay charger for onelve of fourtean hours over oats that thiead mangrove swampe and wt slong the edge of precipitow mounting an at he end ot nich a drive caetully, according tothe nature of the passenger, extract every nickel of the fare that i owing "ec porn are ean ic, When he cnion rowed, they ride al day long in the dus, swing from the tallboard, hanging. on the running’ Dourd ot sqating-on-the top. Ragged, barclotel, profane, un ferupulou, protesting that their camions‘afe found. to Aepart within the hour when they know tat they ca ponibly Teave before she nextday these young monkers, tho cary ail the burdens anf ave responsible fr al the property ofthe camion, seem to lead charmed live, And ‘hen the lordiy drivers depart io the evening, the porters Curl up on the narow sents of the camions, wrap thet heads in their straw mat and snore, withthe Brett pleasure, "When Faiae had crammed is camion full the great awkward bird ook fight, The san setched tat the ~ great palm and banana groves and cane fields, Te scorched the stony hills brown and made the litte dull-faced plants try to crawl back into their holes, Tt baked the white road until the blazing track coughed up huge clouds of ‘hoking dust, and focused on litte towns with such clarity and ruthlessness that you closed your eyes, trembling. It puffed great blasts of the perfume of coffee blossoms into your face, and followed the coffee blossoms with the stink, ‘of pigsties. It plunged into the deep shade of the coffce roves and flashed across the hills, smiling wickedly at he goats. Then it hurtled over the last hill and smote querythe Caribbean with a brassy raat, and the blue sca_re- = sounded like ten thousand cymbals. Thereafter, as i¢ fell vwesteard, it grew calmer-and_was satisfied with making = soft waves break into fierce smiles. Castles should have.- towered among the hills, and the narrow valleys along. the sea-edge should have shone with armies. But there ‘were only mud houses and poverty. ‘After night we lurched into Aux Cayes end sought the house of an old harridan who kept travelers. Under = the pink canopy of a gigantic mahogany bed the sun stl crackled in my veins and my fever soared. TL, Aux Caves ‘The old harridan was howling at the servants for her coffee, and it was yet pitch dark. T tried to sleep, but her shrill Voice penetrated and molded my dreams, And af ast I in my turn began to shout for coffee. Revoli ap- peared with a cup of the same jetblack liquid with which ‘Napoleon’s armies had warmed their hearts in Ttaly, Aus- tria, and Spain; and we cursed all the old women of the = world while T drank behind the pink mosquito bar and felt the coffee wash away the dust of yesterday’s ride ‘As T dressed behind the door, the old madame asked. after my health and then hurried on to matters that con- ‘cerned her more nearly, She assured me that she was a respectable woman, that she had once been married to-a ‘marine, and that he had gone away to Les Etats-Unis and = had left her enough money to brine up their children and keep three servants, Was I lonely? She could look around? No, she did not run a hotel. She took in only 123 fn occasional traveler who struck her fancy. Of course, her marine was coming back some day. He was now too busy making a fortune in my rich country to write to her. I agreed with her that Americans belong to 2 sadly uundemonstrative race, but assured her that they have hearts of gold and are particularly fond of eggs and orangeade in the moming. T breakfasted with a somber Revoli, When Revoli ‘went traveting, his skin and his nose and his heart woke and told him that he was in a strange place. They kept asking questions and receiving the most curious answers, For the first wo or three days in a strange town, he pre ferred to sit up all night and talk to anyone who would stay awake with him; and then after everyone had gone to bed, he would sit and smoke and watch the things of the night that came to visit him. ‘This morning he re ferred enigmatically to tall red men without heads, t ‘cars with wild blue fights and no drivers, He had never been to Aux Cayes before, but his night's watching with the spirits of the place had canvinced him that it was @ wicked city inhabited by legions of devils, Yet T found Aux Cayes lovely in the early morning. ye wide white coad—the approach to the city-—was anked by tows of coconut palms, The greenery, stil aleaming with dew, crowded in at their feet; and the is of leaves were punctuated with bougeinviliaes and trumpet vine. The merchants were leaning over their boits of goods and barrels of salt and gossiping, with the more elegant lawyers and doctors. Revoli and 1 ap- proached diffidently and inquired of them about the state and condition of music in their city. It is strange how this question fabbergasts the businessman. “Songs,” he says, “songs—what does one have 0 do with songs? They don’t come hy the pound or by the yard, Over the radio, 1229