A few days before departing for a vacation in Curacao I checked the headlines and State Department warnings to see if there was anything going on that would cause me to cancel my trip. There was a report of a
terrorist act – a
car bombing. This worried me a little, but I’d been to Curacao before and knew I was staying in a fairly
isolated resort.
I’d been to the resort before, so getting re-acquainted with the staff was easy. It’s also very easy to make friends when traveling alone. On my second day I felt comfortable enough to ask a few of the locals about the recent terrorism outbreak. There was laughter, and they said it was not a terrorist act. We had diving to do, so I didn’t get to hear any more about it that day.
Two days later one of the staff introduced me to a man from a town. After some light talk about the weather and the island, the man started to tell me about a friend of his: a man from Haiti.
First, you should know that Haiti is a very, very bad place. The political corruption is rampant, and most of the politicians back up their desires with violence. The US Government, through military and CIA, have done what they can to worsen the situation in nearly every way possible. Human life is cheap in Haiti. For this reason, any Haitian who can leave, does. There aren’t many places they can go though. The AIDS rate in Haiti is very high. Most countries do not want a bunch of poor, diseased Haitians; including the United States. Several Haitians have made it to Curacao. However, because the Dutch government does not want them there, they must live there illegally. They cannot turn to the government for assistance of any kind.
So this Haitian man was working for a white Curacao man. He worked as a carpenter. He worked long hours in staggering heat. He worked with a crew of other illegal Haitians. The white man (and yes, there is quite a bit of prejudice in Curacao) paid these guys a little at first, but not as much as he had agreed to pay. Then he stopped paying the Haitians altogether. He knew there was nothing they could do about it. They could not turn to the government and report the white man.
So this guy who was talking to me, he rigged a bomb in the white man’s car. It connected the ignition and the gas tank. When the white man went to start his car, the resulting fire caused severe burns on his ass.
Terrorist acts are committed by people who have no other means of action. People who are disenfranchised, who are disempowered, who are ignored.
In a literal sense this man committed a terrorist act. But what do you call what the white man was doing to the Haitians?
I really liked this brave man who stood up for the Haitian workers. I was fortunate to be able to spend time with him through the remainder of my week in Curacao.