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Joseph’s Castle in the Sky
BY MARGARET AUGUSTE
A
s the plane descended, Joseph could not tear
his eyes away from the palm trees rapidly getting closer. He pressed his nose against the
window to get a better view.
Joseph, who was adopted, was traveling to Haiti,
the country of his birth.
He had wanted to visit Haiti ever since his fourthgrade teacher gave his class an assignment: Share an
important landmark from your culture of origin. Joseph
could still hear his classmates excitedly shouting, “I
choose the Eiffel Tower!” and “I choose the Taj Mahal!”
The assignment had put Joseph’s stomach in knots.
He didn’t have any ideas about what his landmark should
be. He wasn’t even sure he wanted to remind his classmates that he was adopted. It made him feel different. He
still remembered embarrassing questions like, “Why is
your dad white?” and “Do you miss your real parents?”
But now he was here, and Joseph and his father
boarded a bus called a “tap-tap,” meaning “quick
quick” in Haitian Creole. They laughed as they were
greeted by a bleating goat and squawking chickens
that passengers were either holding in their laps, like
babies, or carrying in crates.
“I am Louis. Where are you going?” asked the driver
with a wide grin, shouting above the noise.
“To see the Citadelle!” Joseph’s father shouted back.
“Ah, the Citadelle
Laferrière,” Louis said happily. “The unknown eighth
Questions for Readers
Wonder of the World.”
RIGHT THERE (IN THE TEXT)
“Why is it called
Why was the Citadelle built?
‘unknown’?” Joseph
THINK AND SEARCH (IN THE TEXT)
asked curiously.
Why is it sometimes hard for
Louis explained that
non-Haitian people to see
Haiti
has experienced
beauty and promise in Haiti?
many bad times—includAUTHOR AND ME (IN MY HEAD)
ing a recent earthWhat does Joseph think about
quake—and that it is
during his trek back down
often hard for people
the mountain?
to see the beauty and
ON MY OWN (IN MY HEAD)
promise that exists on
What does it mean for people to
the island and within the
“fight for their independence”?
Haitian people.
ILLUSTRATION BY FRANTZ ZEPHIRIN
“To the Haitian people,” Louis said, “the Citadelle is a
symbol of the sacrifice that we were willing to make for
our freedom, showing our strength and our resilience.”
Suddenly in the distance, they saw it. Joseph gasped
with delight. “There it is!”
They stood at the foot of the mountain, with its
steps winding high up into the sky, where the Citadelle
loomed majestically above them. Its diamond-shaped
front extended so far, it looked like a pirate ship that
was somehow part of the surrounding mountains.
“It’s incredible,” said Joseph’s father. Joseph
agreed. He had thought these kinds of magnificent
buildings existed only in cities, surrounded by noise
and people, with only other tall buildings for company.
The Citadelle, by contrast, stood alone in the middle
of a forest of palm trees and wild flowers, surrounded
by quiet, with the silence broken only by the sounds of
birds chirping and the distant crashing of waves.
Louis explained that Haiti was a French colony
and that the colonists had forced many thousands of
enslaved people to come to the island from Africa and
labor in the plantations. However, in 1791, the enslaved
Haitians began the fight for their independence, defeating the French in 1804 after many heroic battles. Under
King Henri Christophe, formerly enslaved Haitians
built the Citadelle into the side of Haiti’s tallest mountain to defend their home against future attacks and to
serve as a symbol of liberty, completing it in 1820.
Inside the Citadelle, Joseph looked up and realized
there was no ceiling but, instead, a series of crisscrossed
stone walkways that looked like lace. Looking through
them at the sun above was like looking through a kaleidoscope and seeing many colors and shapes.
As they made the long trek back down the mountain, Joseph thought about the thousands of Haitians
walking along that same path so long ago. They may
have been scared, but they had succeeded against all
odds to build the mightiest fortress in the Caribbean.
Joseph no longer felt afraid, but tall and strong,
like the Citadelle. For the first time, Joseph felt glad
to be different and special. He could not wait to tell
his classmates the incredible tale of his landmark,
the unknown wonder.
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