There’s no other way to put it: when Dina Simon launched her firm MyHaitiTravels Global, LLC in 2013, she stepped out on faith. Simon had an impressive and long-running career as a civil servant, but always wanted to start her own travel and tours business with Haiti as a destination. But the country was still experiencing disaster vertigo from an earthquake three years before. Could her concept work? From the success that Simon has enjoyed in her first year of business, the answer to that question is a loud and firm, “Yes”. Two trips and counting with Haitians and non-Haitians discovering and rediscovering the country, MyHaitiTravels has become more than a business venture for Simon. It’s been an outlet to show others—as well as herself—a Haiti beyond Port-au-Prince, a Haiti more beautiful than a Google Image search could ever fathom.

MyHaitiTravels is a year old. What have you learned regarding Haiti through this venture?

Haiti is complex and I’m still trying to better understand her. Yet, there’s nowhere else I’d rather be.

What are some the hardest-hitting lessons you’ve learned regarding entrepreneurship and owning a travel and tourism business your first year of business?

Don’t rely on anyone for your success. Take a lot of risks. Last year when we planned our first annual tour we had no idea how it would turn out. We did not meet our goal, but we knew we had a good formula so we made some tweaks. We learned how to better position our message and how to engage our potential clients across all platforms.

What are your thoughts on the current state of Haiti’s tourism industry?

Haiti’s tourism industry has tremendous potential. We’re starting to hear and see more positive things about Haiti and we have a government that is highly engaged in making tourism a success. My company is doing a tremendous job in showcasing Haiti as well as securing key partnerships to enable more people to see Ayiti through our eyes. Haiti is rebuilding its tourism industry by investing in infrastructure, training, and ensuring that tourism is sustainable. I’m very excited about that. There are also a lot of individuals working on behalf of Haiti to make sure that the tourism industry becomes successful for the people of Haiti.

I think a lot of people reading your story will become really inspired. Here is this professional woman, who left Haiti when she was about nine, and who returns to create a travel tour firm built around it.

Well, I feel it’s simply my duty as a Haitian person educated in the United States to no longer be a bystander but to actually be proactive in finding a way to do something to advance Haiti and benefit Haitians, specifically the youth. During our last tour this past January, we had a “Real Talk” forum at a school with some 9th grade students on our volunteer Project Day. We were supposed to tell them about our careers and answer any questions that they had. One young lady stood up and asked “How do you keep going. How do you maintain hope?” Her question shook us, because no child should have to ask that. Hope shouldn’t be a concern at fourteen years old. So, when I think about what I’m doing, it’s not worthy of praise. Those kids sitting in the classrooms trying to learn despite their circumstances is an inspiration. The machann waking up at 5 a.m to set up her stand to sell her merchandise so she can send her kids to school is an inspiration.

Dina Simon flanked by tourists on her ImpactWeek tour in front of a hotel in Petionville.

If you were to give readers advice about establishing their own business, what would you tell them?

Make sure you are passionate about your venture. You are your biggest cheerleader. Have a good team and people who believe in you and what you are doing. Be prepared to financially invest in your business. Find a successful entrepreneur whose experience and knowledge can help you avoid mistakes; maybe that person can be your mentor. Prepare for disappointments, but never let it deter you.

Now, I know you have a Management certificate from Cornell, and a Bachelor’s and Masters degree. Out of all the things you learned in college, which have proven to be the most helpful in terms of taking you to the next level, business-wise?

I think what college prepares all of us for is the ability to discern information, being able to meet deadlines, and the ability to analyze and to be a thinker. College taught me how to function in a group. It also gave me the opportunity to interact and work together with different people which is beneficial in the business world. While I don’t think there’s anything specific in relation to my course work, I do believe that those fundamental skills have helped me on the business level.

Out of all the sites and places on the My Haiti Travels itinerary, which drew the most oohs and ahhs from your tourist-clients?

I think it’s different for everyone. I had one client who was amazed that the school we volunteered at had a wheelchair ramp. Another could not believe we were at a restaurant smoking hookah. I think others are always amazed at Arcadins Coast and the mountains behind mountains everywhere you turn.

Where do you hope to take your venture?

That’s a good question. We just finished a hugely successful 2nd Annual ImpactWeek tour during the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday weekend. With that behind us, we’re launching our first annual Memorial Day Weekend tour called Jacmel Getaway on May 22 – May 26. We’re also constantly visiting and reviewing establishments in Haiti for our “mango reviews” to help people choose where to go when visiting Haiti. We’re also building our Travel Stories Blog. We remain committed to showing the authenticity of Haiti, supporting local businesses and giving back directly to the Haitian youth.

Thank you for chatting with me again. Always a pleasure

Visit the Impact Week Haiti Website | Jacmel Getaway | MyHaitiTravels | MyHaitiTravels on Twitter

A pleasure indeed.

Budding documentary filmmaker Dave Fils-Aime has always had a little activist growing in him. A graduate of Yale University, Fils-Aime grew up in Martissant, Haiti and attended Saint Jean l’Evangeliste, an all-boy Catholic school. He says he and his family moved to the United States before the start of high school. “Although I was happy to finally be able to visit America,” Fils-Aime recalls, “my parents’ decision to stay in the country did not go well with me. I was saddened by the idea of having to forfeit the opportunity of attending my dream school with some of my closest friends.”

With time, the teen accepted his destiny and excelled in school and graduated as one of the top students in his high school in South Florida. Fils-Aime received a Miami Herald Silver Knight Award winner for his outstanding academic excellence and community service. His entrance into Yale provided him a platform as a budding community leader. He I served as the president of Yale’s Klib Kreyol (Haitian Cultural Organization). During a one-year leave of absence from Yale, Fils-Aime interned for Organizing for America, the successor organization of Obama for America during President Obama’s first term. He also served as a community organizer for the city of Miramar in Florida, which led to his being chosen to drive the White House Press Corps in a presidential motorcade during a visit by President Barack Obama to Miami.

Fils-Aime’s awareness about Haitian causes grew when he worked on community leader Marleine Bastien’s congressional campaign as a Volunteer Coordinator. He also wrote his senior thesis on Haiti during the early 2010s.

After turning down the opportunity to work on President Obama’s reelection campaign, Fils-Aime acccepted an offer from the United Nations Development Programme in Haiti, where he worked as a donor relations and resource mobilization consultant. While in Haiti, Fils-Aime launched a youth-driven program Basketball to Uplift the Youth (Baskètbòl pou Ankadre Lajenès).

Somehow, filmmaking emerged in this equation. Fils-Aime founded DaliReel Productions, his film company, and his fixation on the South of Haiti provided the inspiration for his first Haiti-focused production entitled, well, South of Haiti. The documentary was touted “The Best Tourism Video You’ll See All Year” by travel website Skift. It was Staff Pick by the video sharing site Vimeo and was also singled out by Canada.com as one of its “Monday Inspiration” Videos.

Dave Fils-Aime looking very pensive on a documentary set.

DaliReel Productions is your very own production company. What drew you to film and documentary filmmaking.

Well, one of my main roles as the Director of Operations of the Yale Men’s Basketball was to film the team’s games and to coordinate film exchange with other teams. I was also responsible for putting together a highlight video of the team’s best plays of the season to be played at the end of year banquet. Through this experience, I became extremely interested in filming and editing, and in ultimately using it as a medium to educate people about Haiti.

This documentary about Haiti is your very first production?

Actually, when I led the Yale International Relations Association election observation trip to Haiti, I took the initiative to film the entire experience and to use the footage to put together a documentary film titled Ayiti Leve: The Political Reconstruction of Haiti. That was my very first production. Although we have had private screenings of the film, we have not yet made it available to the public. Over the past year, I’ve been working on an updated version with my collaborator James Murphy, and we hope to make it available to the public in the coming months.

What drew you to the southern part of Haiti, and what ultimately made you feel that this documentary needed to be a reality?

It was actually through a retreat organized by some co-workers in collaboration with the tour guide company J’adore le Sud that I was able to discover the south of Haiti. It was my first time visiting the area and I was simply amazed by the region’s beauty, the breathtaking beaches, the magnificent caves, the wonderful waterfalls, and the fascinating historical sites that have stood the test of time. I felt that I had an obligation to share this experience with the world, to show a Haiti that most don’t even know exist. But I knew that I couldn’t do it on my own if I wanted the end product to be a topnotch piece. A year earlier, I had met filmmaker Alex Horner in Haiti through my good friend Jimmy Toussaint’s Haiti volunteer program. When Alex showed me some of his work, I was particularly impressed by his strong technical skills and great vision. He suggested the possibility of joining forces in the future to produce short films/documentaries on Haiti, and I expressed my strong interest in forging such a partnership. So, as soon as I returned to Port-au-Prince from the trip down south, I contacted Alex about doing a project on the region and he was immediately on board. Alex recruited Nick Mihalevich, a sound technician, to join us on the project, and a few months later they both flew down to Haiti from Minnesota to capture images and sounds over a period of 10 days.

Filmmaking can be tough territory. What are some of the things you’ve learned that you feel are must-know information for those who want to get into filmmaking.

Filmmaking is most definitely a tough territory. The most important lesson I’ve learned and that I would like to share with people interested in entering the field is that if you’re not willing to give it your all, do not even think about pursuing a project. Because even when you pour all your effort into a project, there is no guarantee that it will pan out. If I had not been fully intent on seeing the South of Haiti project become a reality, it would have remained simply a beautiful proposal on paper. I sent the project proposal for sponsorship to government ministries and a wide range of private enterprises, but we did not receive any positive feedback. Unfazed by the lack of interest in the project, Alex, Nick and I pooled our own funds together to finance the project. The lesson learned is: if you and your team are not passionate enough about a project to make sacrifices for it, the project will not become a reality.

Visit Dave Fils-Aime’s YouTube Channel| Like Dave Fils-Aime’s Haiti Basketball Organization Page on Facebook!

Robinson Vil isn’t a newbie when it comes to filmmaking. Creating stories for the big screen has always brought purpose to the life of this producer, director, and filmmaker behind several shorts and urban films.

His newest production Rasin Mwen is set, and was filmed in Haiti. It’s storyline takes viewers into Haiti’s slums. A young man (David Charlier) gets on the wrong side of a mafia-like pimp, resulting into all sorts of quandaries.

​ Kreyolicious: What was it like filming in Haiti?

Filming anywhere is overwhelming and it was no different in Haiti. The art of film-making can be arduous, especially when it’s done under budget. There were many obstacles we had to overcome as a team to see the project through. Some of the challenging factors were: the heat, traffic and the noise level. I’ve been making movies for over a decade now and I have learned so much; I was prepared. I was determined to do the film no matter what; nothing was going to get in my way.

Above: Filmmaker Robinson Vil.

​ Kreyolicious: Did you do make preliminary trips there to see how things were before you started shooting?

I lived in Haiti for sixteen years, before moving to the United States in 1992—so I knew what to expect. There were no hidden surprises. But, prior to shooting my film Rasin Mwen, I was hired to co-produce and star as the lead in a short film there in 2011. During that production—a one-week shoot—I had to pretty much do the same thing I did on my film. Though, we shot Rasin Mwen for five weeks.

Kreyolicious: Why was it so important for you to bring Rasin Mwen to the big screen?

One of my goals with Rasin Mwen was to bring about a new type of film-making to Haiti that was compatible to other countries. I wanted to do a story with young Haitian actors, that was relatable and relevant. A story that would not only intrigue, but resonate with its people. Screenwriter Wade Ballance and I did just that with the screenplay for Rasin Mwen. I also felt that the presence of good quality Haiti films was lacking. I wanted and determined to change that. I have three other Haiti films that are ready to go—upon securing funding.

Above: A scene from Rasin Mwen, a film by Robinson Vil.

Kreyolicious: Were there any things that surprised you about filming a project in Haiti?

How great and accessible the raw talents were. The majority of my cast was new and had never done any type of films before—let alone a full length feature film. We developed such a great bond instantly, many thanks to our casting director Frantz Louis-Charles, who helped me cast ninety percent of the talents in the film.

Kreyolicious: As someone who is living in the USA, what advice would you give to filmmakers about shooting in Haiti?

Don’t do it—unless you have all your ducks in a row. Be ready to work harder than everyone else on your team. Know your script, the story inside out. Be able to think quickly on your feet. Find quality and good people who believe in you, your project and themselves.

Kreyolicious: Are there some things you wished you had done differently?

Not really. If there is one thing I can think of, it would be the funding aspect of the film. I would look harder at securing funding and not go into production until it was fully acquired. My team of actors and crew-members were excellent, I wouldn’t change that. They all worked so hard, I’m indebted to them.

Kreyolicious: So Rasin Mwen has wrapped up. What should we expect from you next?

With the success of Rasin Mwen and new relationships with sponsors and investors, you can expect bigger and better quality films from Villain Pictures. As I previously mentioned, I have 3 more films in development that are ready to go into production. Rasin Mwen 2 is one of them.