Our Haiti team visited one of the interim camps being set up for displaced Haitians. Corail Cesselesse, opened two weeks ago, rests on a wide gravel flat 1.5 hours north of Port-au-Prince. Services are scarce and the cost of commuting to Port-au-Prince is sizable. At 30 Haitian dollars per round trip ticket, other options need to be found for setting up work, education and community activities closer to camp. Corail is currently home to 6000 Haitians and is growing by 500-1000 residents each day.

The standard unit of money in Haiti is the gourde (G). There are 5 gourdes to the Haitian dollar, and about 40 gourdes to the American dollar. So bus tickets cost around $3.75 US round trip–not a large sum unless you consider Haitian minimum wage is $40 Haitian (or $5 US) per day.