Haiti is the first black republic that gained its independence in 1804. I was honored to be raised where they celebrated and signed the act of independence. The city's name is Gonaives. It is a coastal town in the caribean. It is a small city with a small population compared to the capital. Everybody knows each other and the city is surrounded by mountains in order to protect it from huge natural disasters.
I remember as a kid, my parents were really strict about my education. School was my passion. I used to be creative by inventing my own toys. With empty plastic bottles of juice, I would cut them off in a way to be the body of the car and then with the top of the bottles, they would serve as wheels. During the weekends, after I was done with my homework, I would be in the yard playing with other kids. Playing with those cars and marbles was my entertainment as a kid. Officially and traditionally, the President would come to the city the first day of the year from the capital to celebrate our Independence Day. My parents used to take me to this place called "Place d'Armes" to watch the ceremony. They used to buy me ice creams and I went running around with other kids with little flags in our hand shouting our national slogan "L'Union Fait la Force" and singing our national Hymn.As a teenager, me and my friends usually wandered the street, rode bicycles and played soccer and basketball without any fear a car would hit us. I used to go to parties and come back late at night. I had this philosophy which was the balance of school and party. During the week days, I went hard on my school work and during the weekends I had to go out and get all the stress out in order to be fresh for next week. It was not a habit but I did it for fun.
Compared to other cities mine was safe. I was not scared of anything because I knew almost everybody in the area. Even though, the city is small, we have everything we need to in order to complete our daily life such universities, supermarkets, restaurants and clubs. My city is known for its best qualities of food. We have something called "LALO". We make it with greens and meats. We eat it with white rice and we add white or brown beans on top of it. That is so delicious.
My city used to organize carnival activities and I usually took part in them with my friends. Drinking, dancing and flirting were our only ways to express our happiness and to enjoy those festivities. I wore my masks and my best outfit to go out and have a good time. In 2004 and 2008, we had a big hurricane that completely destroyed our city. This disaster cost many people their lives; so many people drowned and so many families lost their relatives. That decreased the beauty of our city. Afterward, we started to do our best to keep our heads up until then. My city is still attractive in its own style with beautiful people living in it and I love it that way. 