Haiti Quotes - Page 4

• America's relationship with Haiti has always been very complicated. I often say to people, "Before we came to America, America came to us in the form of the American occupation from 1915 to 1934."

  Edwidge Danticat

  America, People, Occupation

  "A Voice in Haiti’s Chorus". Interview with Elizabeth Gettelman, www.motherjones.com. 2010.

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• Haiti is extremely stratified socially with a number of large families controlling most of the economy, and import-export.

  Michele Montas

  Numbers, Economy, Large Family

  Source: www.indiewire.com

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• Haiti, like any place, has its security problems; it has a great challenge in terms of establishing a kind of globally acceptable rule of law.

  Sean Penn

  Law, Challenges, Kind

  Source: www.pbs.org

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• As a foreign worker in Haiti, speaking for myself, speaking for the workers, our organization is about 95 percent Haitian, but even foreign workers driving through, we have had very minimal security issues.

  Sean Penn

  Organization, Issues, Driving

  Source: www.pbs.org

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• That has always been a strength of Haiti: Beyond crisis, it has beautiful art; it has beautiful music. But people have not heard about those as much as they heard about the coups and so forth. I always hope that the people who read me will want to learn more about Haiti.

  Edwidge Danticat

  Beautiful, Art, People

  "A Voice in Haiti’s Chorus". Interview with Elizabeth Gettelman, www.motherjones.com. 2010.

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• At the time Latin America was composed only of colonies. We were up against the biggest army of the colonial world, the Napoleonic army. Haiti was ostracized for almost a century. Surviving in that international context is in itself a feat.

  Michele Montas

  Latin, Army, America

  Source: www.indiewire.com

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• Haiti is closer to anarchy than it is to anything else.

  Michele Montas

  Anarchy

  Source: www.indiewire.com

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• I would want to make Radio Haiti as independent as possible, which means it can't be strictly commercial.

  Michele Montas

  Independent, Mean, Want

  Source: www.indiewire.com

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• Haiti is the best cure against melancholy; it is also the most creative place for me to be. My productivity has increased enormously since I moved to Haiti. That's where I write my stories, develop my ideas and write nonstop, so it's a productive time, not a sleepy time.

  Jørgen Leth

  Writing, Ideas, Creative

  Source: www.indiewire.com

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• Language is such a powerful thing. After the earthquake, I went to Haiti and people were talking about how [they] described this feeling of going through an earthquake. People really didn't have the vocabulary - before we had hurricanes. I'd talk with people and they'd say, "We have to name it; it has to have a name."

  Edwidge Danticat

  Powerful, Vocabulary, Talking

  "A Voice in Haiti’s Chorus". Interview with Elizabeth Gettelman, www.motherjones.com. June 2010.

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• Every time I go to Haiti after a season of busy work in Europe, I feel like I'm submerging into a certain state of mind, which is very productive.

  Jørgen Leth

  Europe, Mind, Busy

  Source: www.indiewire.com

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• I've been dealing with pressure all life long. Coming from a very poor family in Haiti, moving to Paris, a new place, a new culture, a new language. I used that pressure to adapt, to do better than everyone else, and I moved around quite a bit as well.

  Jimmy Jean-Louis

  Moving, Paris, Long

  Source: blogs.indiewire.com

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• I worked on human rights projects in Haiti, Cameroon, and East Asia, and the bigger ones tended to do with agriculture. My role was to make sure that there was equity that remained at the base of those projects, with the workers. I had a couple of different lives.

  Sanjay Rawal

  Couple, Rights, Agriculture

  Source: www.motherjones.com

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• Haiti was a French colony, but in 1804, the slaves rose up and defeated the French and formed the Republic. For the last 200 years, Haiti has had a very unfortunate history.

  Thabo Mbeki

  Years, Rose, Republic

  "Tregernomics Interview with President Thabo Mbeki". Interview with Adam Treger, www.mbeki.org. October 31, 2016.

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• The US intervened in the Philippines to uplift and christianize the backward people, killing a couple of hundred thousand of them and destroying the place. The same thing happened in Haiti, the same thing happened with other countries.

  Noam Chomsky

  Uplifting, Country, Couple

  Seminar at Bard College, New York, February 02, 2000.

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• When people think about this religion, they'll say "voodoo" this and "voodoo" that in the way the Hollywood movies show it: the sticking of pins in dolls. It's very different than Vodou - which is a religion that comes to Haiti from our ancestors in Africa. I want to differentiate it from the stereotypical, sensationalized view that we see of the religion.

  Edwidge Danticat

  Thinking, Views, People

  Interview with David Barsamian, progressive.org. October 1, 2003.

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• There is a reason why Nelson Mandela went to Cuba to praise Castro and thank the Cuban people almost as soon as he got out of jail. That's a third world reaction and they understand it. Cuba played an enormous role in the liberation of Africa and the overthrow of Apartheid, sending doctors and teachers to the poorest places in the world, to Haiti, to Pakistan after the earthquake, almost everywhere. The internationalism is just astonishing. I don't think there has been anything like it in history.

  Noam Chomsky

  Teacher, Thinking, Doctors

  Source: pennpoliticalreview.org

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• Vodou is one of the religions practiced in Haiti, a rich religion for the people.

  Edwidge Danticat

  People, Rich

  Interview with David Barsamian, progressive.org. October 1, 2003.

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• Whether the people in Haiti, the young kids in Chicago that [are] going through violence, or whether you're in Atlanta or L.A. or Europe - it's not even color barriers for me - I go to where I know there's a lot of turmoil and pain.

  Common

  Pain, Kids, Atlanta

  "A Chat with Common Interview: Adimu Colon". Common Interview, www.marandapleasantmedia.com.

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• I would love to work with the artisans and take it to another dimension, the same way I did in Haiti.

  Donna Karan

  Way, Dimensions, Artisans

  "Donna Karan on Meditation, Fashion - and Love". Interview with Mayu Saini, wwd.com. March 28, 2016.

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• It seemed from the media that we were being told that all Haitians had AIDS. At the time, I had just come from Haiti. I was twelve years old, and the building I was living in had primarily Haitians. A lot of people got fired from their jobs. At school, sometimes in gym class, we'd be separated because teachers were worried about what would happen if we bled. So there was really this intense discrimination.

  Edwidge Danticat

  Teacher, Jobs, School

  Interview with David Barsamian, progressive.org. October 1, 2003.

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• The Attorney General made another astonishing claim, that there were Pakistani terrorists possibly coming on these boats from Haiti. No one has ever seen a Pakistani coming on a boat from Haiti yet.

  Edwidge Danticat

  Boat, Claims, Made

  Interview with David Barsamian, progressive.org. October 1, 2003.

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• After the Dance was my first attempt at nonfiction. I'd never really participated in carnival, and I really wanted to go. It sounded like a wonderfully fun thing to do. And I wanted to write something happy about Haiti, something celebratory. And going to carnival gave me a chance to do that, because it is one of the instances in Haiti when people shed their class separation and come together.

  Edwidge Danticat

  Fun, Writing, Class

  Interview David Barsamian, progressive.org. October 1, 2003.

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• Haiti is unique - the first successful slave revolt in history, the first black republic etc., and then when you get into the culture, the voodoo, and that wonderful synchretization of Christian and African belief and symbology, it's like nothing the world has ever seen.

  Ben Fountain

  Christian, Successful, Unique

  Source: www.raintaxi.com

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• I kept going back while I was writing the novel - which never sold, may it rest in peace - and by the time it was finished I had too many connections to Haiti to walk away.

  Ben Fountain

  Rest In Peace, Writing, Connections

  Source: www.raintaxi.com

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