We have yet to find a book club to join down here, so we are just out there on our own, fishing for great Hatian reading.
As of late, the camera has lost Troy's attention.
All waking hours not dedicated to work and family are now going to "Parol Granmoun" - a book of "Haitian popular wisdom."
This book is filled with ways to say nothing at all while saying something very important. Make sense?
For example:
#92- Makak sou pa domi devan pot key chen
Which (according to this book of great wisdom) means:
The drunk monkey doesn't sleep in front of the dogs door step.
You all surely know what that means, right?
In case you don't --- it means, "Even when a man is drunk, there are things that he won't do."
Jumping ahead past hundereds of sensible proverbs, (not) we come to:
#867- Pye bef pou pye bef, m'pito achete-l ka pratik
which clearly means:
When it's a matter of a beef's foot, I'd rather buy it at the house of my favorite shopkeeper.
and of course that means- "If I have to suffer about something, I'll suffer with my friend."
Troy is walking around here proud as a peacock with his new silly little phrases. It does not even matter if they make sense or apply to the situation at hand, just the fact that he knows some of these proverbs is gaining him popularity among our friends and employees. Who doesn't love to be popular?
Let me leave you with this-
Krapo fe kole, li mouri san deye/san bounda.
The frog gets angry; it dies without its behind.
(Of cooooourse!) ???????? Yeah, I get it.
-Tara
(Trying to understand Haitian Proverbs is like trying to understand Haiti.)
