If I hadn’t asked the question in 2003, probably in 2015 François Hollande wouldn’t have admitted to the debt...That was a step. It’s not finished. - Jean-Bertrand Aristide

The exceptional resilience demonstrated by the Haitian people during and after the deadly earthquake reflects the intelligence and determination of parents, especially mothers, to keep their children alive and to give them a better future, and the eagerness of youth to learn – all this despite economic challenges, social barriers, political crisis, and psychological trauma. Even though their basic needs have increased exponentially, their readiness to learn is manifest. This natural thirst for education is the foundation for a successful learning process: what is freely learned is best learned. Of course, learning is strengthened and solidified when it occurs in a safe, secure and normal environment. Hence our responsibility to promote social cohesion, democratic growth, sustainable development, self-determination; in short, the goals set forth for this new millennium. All of which represent steps towards a return to a better environment.

What will 2004 look like to them? I see for them a country with 85% literacy, rather than 85% illiteracy. Cooperatives flourish in villages and in the informal sectors of the cities. Water is flowing through the fields of the countryside-where food enough for all of Haiti's people is growing. Creole pigs are seen more and more in the countryside, the descendents of those few that the peasants hid away and saved from extermination. Seedlings are beginning to take root on the mountainsides. The seedlings have a chance at survival because the people are no longer in misery, but are already on the road to poverty with dignity. There are primary schools and health clinics in every municipality of Haiti. The schoolbooks are not just half-price-they are free, in accordance with Article 32.1 of our constitution which promises a free education to every Haitian child. The children and young people are actively engaged in the changes sweeping their country. Radyo Timoun can be heard throughout the country, and people begin to feel it is normal for children to have a voice in national issues. The bayakou and the bouretye still labor, but the weight of social exclusion has been lifted. The restaveks are eating at the table with everyone else. This is our challenge for the new century; this is the challenge of 2004. We assume it. We are living it right now.

Through this letter we would like to open a window for you, a window through which you may see something that touches your own life.