Puddles here, puddles there, there are puddles everywhere! When in Haiti, it’s important to know the system. Ya know, which puddles are harmless, and which should be avoided at all cost.
Classification of puddles are as follows:
- Light brown: typical rainwater mixed with dirt. All the roads in Port de Paix are dirt, so these are pretty common. – little to no smell
- Milky white: “just did laundry” water. –smell is ok, worse if it’s been stewing for a while.
- Blue/Green: bacteria has entered this cesspool. It lives here, is stoked to be here, and stays this way for a while cause most people try to avoid it. –funk smell
- Teal: literally a gleaming teal color. Not sure about this one, as we only can across once, but it was startling. –didn’t get close enough to smell.
- Black: this is where the term muck came from. Looks like death, smells like death. You would drop dead if your big toe touched it. –smell reaches you before you see it, letting you know it’s close by
This is only from ten days of analysis, so I’m sure I’ll be adding some new categories later on.
Jessica Stone 