The other Notre-Dame was not rebuilt

Soon it will be a decade since the cathedral fell. Haiti’s archbishop at the time of the earthquake said that it might be 20 years or more before Haiti could put together the $30 million to $40 million necessary to rebuild the cathedral, and that he was eager for parishioners to be contributors, as they had been, to a degree, for the initial building of the church in the early days of the 20th century. But to the informed eye, Haitians in general are far more impoverished now than they were then, far more urban, far more dependent on a trickle of the faltering cash economy, so it’s hard to imagine them ponying up a percentage of their nonexistent income to rebuild the church.

Here’s one illustration of Haiti’s poverty: In Port-au-Prince, people eat spaghetti sandwiches, literally, white bread with white spaghetti in it. That’s starvation. These are not heaping, supersize American things on ciabatta with meatballs and gooey cheese and vegetables. They may, however, include ketchup. Haitians live in destitution that no one should experience. Income inequality is visible, public, and shocking. More shocking even than in Los Angeles, where I live, and where the homeless wander the streets and sleep under the freeway overpasses while … you know.