port-au-prince at 17.78c: a digital nomad's drainage crisis unfolding

never understood entropy until i tried working from this side of town. woke up yesterday to the ac unit cooling the apartment like it was a fridge. open a window and the humidity clings to your skin like a clingy houseguest. the forecast? 91% humidity today, which basically means my keyboard is now a terrarium for millipedes. port-au-prince, where the weather files insurance claims on your sanity.

*spent a few hours last night convincing a goat to photobomb my work laptop. goat won. neighbors think i’m sharing housing with a herd. actually, two neighbors did peer into my window to yell about the noise. one brought a pot of lavender and offered it like peace offerings. the irony: i hate lavender. she kept smugly saying "ah bon, ah bon" every time i sniffed the pot. local tip: learn to say "ah bon" and nod a lot. it’ll get you out of needing a real job.

work spot: the café on rue montagne. if you order here, know that the wifi cuts out every time the solar charge fails. review: “breakfast kept me alive after my bus got stuck behind a parade of donkey carts. .” - drunk tourist on tripadvisor. (never offered). some local warned me they’d close early during the heatwave. vanishing at 3pm sharp. i took it as a molecular vibration hint.

hard truth*: don’t Google "how to survive port-au-prince" before midnight. at that hour, the internet says everything’s closed. includes the pharmacies. including the hope. instead, follow the sound of shoes on cobblestones. that’s a new café opening, not diaspora hub 41.b.

needs more chaos? take the 9km highway toward cap-haïtien. locals swear if you honk your taxi horn, the mangos will reply. seen a guy last week trying to wrestle a dog into a taxi for extra fare. human after all.

photos: a drained swamp in broad daylight (yes, this is my workspace-drainage channel chic), a man painting near the port’s broken statues, and a dog snoozing in a pile of rum barrels. the city’s energy plan is solar-powered rum, apparently.

view:

map:if you click, you’ll see why satellite view looks like a child’s doodle of a boatyard.

You might also be interested in:

• https://votoris.com/post/nampo-bites-what-locals-actually-chew
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• https://votoris.com/post/san-juan-puerto-rico-a-diy-buskers-messy-afternoon
• https://votoris.com/post/dubai-sand-skyscrapers-and-seriously-confusing-laws-a-travel-diary
• https://votoris.com/post/remote-work-in-ar-ramd-is-it-a-digital-nomad-paradise-6