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Children Stories & Children Book from Haiti 8/19/2004 9:03:53 PM
This blog is concerning my experience growing up in Haiti as a toddler and adolescent. There was a strong emphasis between two major characters: "Ti Bouki" and "Ti Malis" or "Ti Malice." "Ti Bouki" is regarded throughout my childhood experience, story telling and riddles as someone who is slow, dumb, fat, short, ill-mannered and unintelligent. By contrast, "Ti Malis" is regarded, in Haitian society, as someone educated, well-mannered, smart, intelligent, sociable, and pleasant. The adjective, "Ti" means little. It denotes how naive or inexperience a character or person is. "Ti Bouki" & "Ti Malis" heading to school
Once upon a time, "Ti Bouki" and "Ti Malis" were heading to school. But "Ti Bouki" has never heard or been to a school before although he was already 12 years old. But, he has a brand new book bag filled with books and other school supplies. "Ti Malis," however has known the regiment and the routine of middle school expectations. Therefore, he had no problem adjusting to the academic regiment or academic expectations of middle school. He only had a binder, a pen and a pencil. Below is the academic interaction between "Ti Bouki" and "Ti Malis" on their first day of school:
"Good morning, Ti Bouki," said Ti Malis jokingly.
"Good morning, Ti Malis," replied Ti Bouki innocently.
"You understand your French homework?" asked Ti Malis.
"Non!" responded Ti Bouki with his shivery eyes.
"Give me your French book and I will show you how to do your homework!" exclaimed Malis.
"Oui!" replied Bouki innocently.
"Bien!" responded the skilled Malis.
"How about your geography homework, do you understand it?" asked Malis with a smirky smile.
"Non!" responded Bouki with his shivery eyes.
"Give me your geography book and I will show you how to do your geography homework!" exclaimed Malis.
"Oui!" replied Bouki not knowing what he is getting himself into.
"Bien!" replied the skilled and soft-spoken Malis.
"How about you science homework, do you understand it?" asked Malis with the same smirky smile.
"Non, not a all, nothing at all!" responded Malis in frustration and fear.
"Give me your science book and I will show you how to do your science homework!" demanded Malis.
"Oui!" softly but reluctantly replied Bouki realizing that his book back is getting less fat and a lot lighter.
"Tres bien!" replied Malis with a sign of excitement knowing that he is about to outsmart Bouki and takes all of his school supplies from him....
At the end of their interaction, Malis was able to take Bouki's books and his bookbag leaving him with nothing at all to go home with. However, Malis had all the books and school supplies necessary to complete all of his homework assignments. The fact that there is a deep rooted social class system in Haiti, Malis knows that he will not be allowed to be in Bouki's company but Bouki was totally unaware that he was being taken advantage of until he got home and faced some severe punishment for being slow, dumb, fat, and unintelligent. That sort of mindset plagues the Haitian society to a large extent because everyone thinks of himself or herself as being "Malis." Therefore, everyone is trying to outsmart the other in every segment of business dealings. Thus, makes effective power-sharing, equal access to public education, economic opportunities, infrastructures and integrity difficult commodities. Until a more positive mindset is surfaced in Haiti and a shift in the education of young children with regards to putting an emphasis on the art of Malis outsmarting Bouki, the multi-track conflicts in Haiti will escalate even more in every segment of the Haitian society.
More Blogs by Manes Pierre, D.M. • 7 Steps to putting your child first - Sunday, March 18, 2007 • Children Stories & Children Book from Haiti - Thursday, August 19, 2004
