Interview: Jean-Robert Cadet recounts his life as a slave child in Haiti, the subject of his book "Restavec".(10:00-11:00 AM)(Broadcast transcript). Morning Edition. National Public Radio. Feb 18, 2000. pNA.

ALEX CHADWICK, host:

This is NPR's MORNING EDITION. I'm Alex Chadwick.

One of the things almost all of us know for sure--and which turns out to be untrue--is that slavery is over. A study last year says there are 27 million slaves worldwide. It's no surprise to Jean-Robert Cadet, who escaped a slave childhood in Haiti to become an American citizen, a teacher and now, at age 45, an author. His new book is the story of his own life--the son of a rich white Haitian and his black cook. When his mother died, the boy was sent to stay with one of his father's mistresses as slave labor, a practice so common in Haiti, Jean-Robert Cadet takes its name for the title of his book: "Restavec," from the French `to stay with.'

Mr. JEAN-ROBERT CADET (Author, "Restavec"): Today there are approximately 300,000--that's a UNICEF estimate--300,000 children, from five all the way up to 17, who are living this very existence that I describe in the book. I mean, it's still going on right now, as we speak.

CHADWICK: And how did you become a restavec?

Mr. CADET: My mother died when I was about four years old, and I was given as a gift to a woman who used to be my father's mistress, and she raised me as a restavec, which means that I was never part of the family. I slept under a kitchen table, I did every duty you can imagine, from washing her feet to hand-wash the cloth that she used to control her menstrual period. She would send me to her friends to do the same thing. If her friends needed someone to wash clothes, to do laundry, to go on errands, to clean the house, wash the cars, and these were my duties as a restavec.

CHADWICK: Restavec children are not allowed even to go to school, although you did manage to get schooling, and you did very, very well in school. Really, that's what saved you.

Mr. CADET: Yes. When I was about--I would say 12 or 13, we move into a new neighborhood, and there was a school across the street. It's called Ecole du Canada; the school was built by Canadian missionaries for poor children, and I was told that whenever I finished my chores, if I had nothing to do, that I could go across the street to go to school. But most of the time, I couldn't go to school. I probably went maybe once a week or twice a week, because when I thought I would be going to school, the friend of my master would come and say, `Well, I need Bobby today.' That was my name--`I need Bobby today to do my laundry,' or to clean the house or to clean the toilets, to do any type of work. So I rarely went to school in Haiti.

CHADWICK: Eventually, the family that you were living with, that you essentially belonged to, emigrates to New York.

Mr. CADET: Yes.

CHADWICK: You are left behind. You have to find others.

Mr. CADET: Yeah.

CHADWICK: It's a difficult time for you, but it actually leads to you meeting your father.

Mr. CADET: Well, when Florence--you know, I call her Florence in the book--when she left Haiti, she emigrated to New York, I was left, basically, to fend for myself, and I started to ask people where I could find this man named Philip--I call him Philip in the book--and Philip is my father. And the reason I learn about Philip was one day Florence said to me, `A white person is coming to visit today. When you see him, say "Good morning, sir," and disappear. If the neighbors ask you who he was, you tell them you don't know. He's your father, but don't tell people that.' And then she added, `That's what happens when men of good character have children with dogs.'

And these words just really stayed in my mind, and I thought, `Ah, I have a father.' That was the first time I learned that I actually had a father. And when she left to New York, and I started asking people, `Do you know this man called Philip?' Eventually I found him, I went to his house, and I stood across the street with a box that had my rags, my bedding, and I saw him coming out of the house to get into his car to go out, so I went into the yard and stood behind the car. He looked at me and said, `What are you doing here?' I mean, he knew who I was. And I told him, `Well, I don't have a place to live. May I live here with you?' And he said, `No, you can't live here with me.' So he took me to another family where he dropped me into restavec servitude again, and the family didn't want a restavec, and he said, `Well, what can I do? Well, I think I'll send you back to your former owners in the United States.' And then they agreed that they would accept me.

CHADWICK: You did go to high school, though. Fortunately it's...

Mr. CADET: I...

CHADWICK: ...it's the law in this country that minors have to go to school...

Mr. CADET: Yeah.

CHADWICK: ...and the family realizes this.

Mr. CADET: Yeah.

CHADWICK: You go to school and you get an education, but again, it must be very difficult. You don't speak English, you have no friends, you don't know anyone there, and you're in a completely strange society. I wonder if that may not have been the lowest moment of your whole story for you.

Mr. CADET: Well, actually it was one of the highest moment. I discovered--there were two teachers, a French teacher and a history teacher. The history teacher--I can't remember the French teacher's name--but there was this man called Mr. Max Rabinowitz, who took me to his office every day. This man actually restored my humanity. I sat at a table for the first time in my life, eating lunch with him. He made me read in the American history textbook.

CHADWICK: He was a history teacher.

Mr. CADET: He's the one I went to when the family I live with in New York threw me out in the streets. There I was, no English, and they told me, `Well, you're not welcome any more.' And one reason behind it was that they soon discovered the restavec system was not working very well in the United States, so I was climbing up the social ladder. So they didn't want that, so they asked me to leave. Mr. Rabinowitz sent me to the welfare office with a letter. The letter was written by the counselor, and I was on welfare while I was in high school. I received food stamps, and I found an apartment, actually a roommate. I used this money to pay for my rent and buy food, and after about a couple months, I decided to work in a gas station, 4 to midnight, while I continued going to school every day.

CHADWICK: I wonder how is it that you endured what you endured and have become what you are today.

Mr. CADET: Well, in Haiti, if a child is not recognized by the father--in other words, you don't have your father's name--then you are nobody. And then I thought if I get an education, become something, get a good job, that he would actually give me his name, and I wanted to have his name. So you might say that was my main motivation.

CHADWICK: Have you been back to meet the family that had owned you as a slave, Florence and her children?

Mr. CADET: Florence died about, I think, three years ago, two or three years ago, I'm not sure. While I was in college--I was at the University of South Florida--I was having nightmares. I was trying to cope with my past. In other words, my childhood was catching up with me. I was reliving my past, and I sought help. The psychiatrist--the counselor, one of the things that she told me to do--right after I graduated, she said, `I'd like for you to go to Florence, and I' d like for you to sit with her and tell her about all those things that she did to you.' And I did. This was in 1981.

I went to Florence's house. We sat together, and I told her, I said, `Do you remember, do you remember, do you remember,' over, and I kept reminding her, and finally she said, `Well, why don't you kill me and get it over with?' And at that moment, in my overnight bag, I had my college degree, and it was almost like I was pulling a gun from that overnight bag, and I removed the diploma, and I put it in front of her, and I said to her, `See? I am not a shoeshine boy,' because restavecs in Haiti become shoeshine boys--that's the profession she had chosen for me. Every day, she said, after I finished cleaning--shining the shoes, she would say, `You know, you did well. You'll never be anything but a shoeshine boy.' And that's what came to my mind, and I said to her, `See? I am not a shoeshine boy.' And I walked out, and I never saw her again.

CHADWICK: Jean-Robert Cadet. His new book is "Restavec: From Haitian Slave Child to Middle-Class American."