It was in Florida, in Homestead to be precise (a little community south of Miami), that I met a group of migrant Haitian workers. For one afternoon they allowed me to photograph them at their work picking beans. I was prohibited from coming back to see them during the following days (read ‘‘The Story of the Reports from the USA’’). I nevertheless made a brief trip, as I had promised, at the beginning of July to meet them in Georgia. They were here, as before, to bring in the bean harvest for the local farmers. For them, the year is divided in two, six months in the bean fields in Florida, six months in the bean fields of Georgia (July 4, Independence Day, included).
During the course of successive waves of immigration from Haiti over a period of thirty years, the Haitian community is well represented in Florida. Cities like North Miami and the Little River District have become bastions of the Haitian community of south Florida. (On June 3, 2009, North Miami elected a mayor of Haitian origin).
The Haitian community in the United States is fighting for a temporary special status (TPS) that would be issued to the thousands of undocumented Haitians currently living in the United States, a kind of residence and work permit that has been renewed for more than fifteen years to nationals of certain Central American countries like El Salvador, victims of natural disasters.
(Excerpt from Read the Story
It was in Florida, in Homestead to be precise (a little community south of Miami), that I met a group of migrant Haitian workers. For one afternoon they allowed me to photograph them at their work picking beans. I was prohibited from coming back to see them during the following days (read ‘‘The Story of the Reports from the USA’’). I nevertheless made a brief trip, as I had promised, at the beginning of July to meet them in Georgia. They were here, as before, to bring in the bean harvest for the local farmers. For them, the year is divided in two, six months in the bean fields in Florida, six months in the bean fields of Georgia (July 4, Independence Day, included).
During the course of successive waves of immigration from Haiti over a period of thirty years, the Haitian community is well represented in Florida. Cities like North Miami and the Little River District have become bastions of the Haitian community of south Florida. (On June 3, 2009, North Miami elected a mayor of Haitian origin).
The Haitian community in the United States is fighting for a temporary special status (TPS) that would be issued to the thousands of undocumented Haitians currently living in the United States, a kind of residence and work permit that has been renewed for more than fifteen years to nationals of certain Central American countries like El Salvador, victims of natural disasters.