Date published: Mon, 2010-07-12 02
When January's earthquake ripped through Haiti, 1.5 million people lost their homes. Most, around 900,000, stayed in the capital, Port-au-Prince, and are still living in camps on every available piece of land.
But 600,000 fled the city. Some in the immediate days after the earthquake, others after a few weeks when life on the streets or in the camps became unbearable. Today, six months later, many of these people remain scattered throughout the country.
A remarkable feature of this emergency has been the willingness of Haitians to help each other. Most of the 600,000 are staying with host families. Many of the host families are related to the survivors they are hosting, but amazing, many are not. The sacrifices and goodwill involved for families with meagre means to take in strangers in need are immense.
Alexandre Victoir left Port-au-Prince three weeks after the earthquake when life became too hard. Her sister and niece were killed by their collapsing house and, with no money or food, she slept amongst the rubble with her five children, living off whatever food her neighbours could spare.
"One of my neighbours said to me, come to Fonds Parisien because there someone can give you somewhere to sleep," she told us. Her husband had a distant cousin in the district, about two hours out of the city. The cousin, a man mired in poverty himself, welcomed them with open arms.
When Trócaire visited, Alexandre was sitting with her daughter under the shade of a tree in his garden. "There is not enough space, not enough food, anything we need," she said. "We have to sleep very close together at night." Trócaire is working in the area, providing food to displaced people in the area and the families who host them and schooling for the children.
Sr Nuria Merono Otoi is a sprightly 73 year-old Spaniard working with Trócaire's partner organisation who lives in the community without running water or electricity. Straight after the earthquake she gathered a small team and they drove to Port-au-Prince to administer basic first aid. "All we had were some bandages and our good willingness to help," she said.
She told us the story of Ricardo, an eight year old boy who was taken to them after being found wandering alone on the streets of Port-au-Prince. "All Ricardo could tell us was he was outside playing when the earthquake struck and when he went home his whole family were dead," she said.
"We tried and tried to help him remember his address, or a phone number, or where his relatives lived. But he couldn't." "He lived with us for three months and one day he remembered part of a phone number. Bit by bit over a few more weeks we helped him every day to remember more. When we had almost enough numbers we started guessing the others."
"One morning, we were working through combinations. A woman answered a number and we explained who we were. The woman on the phone was the wife of Ricardo's brother. We put them on the phone together and Ricardo went berserk. His brother was alive. They came immediately to Fonds Parisien and took him home that day."
Fonds Parisien is an extremely poor area and the overspill of people from Port-au-Prince hasn't helped. Trócaire is working with groups in the area to set up a training programme for young people to learn a trade with which they can contribute to the reconstruction of Haiti and to their own lives.
The earthquake killed many skilled people, such as carpenters, bricklayers and electricians and the gap in expertise is huge. Training young people in the rural areas to help them make a career for themselves might also help some of them stay out of the city, where overcrowding is a huge issue and the quality of life is poor.
For some, like Alexandre Victoir, the city will never tempt them back. "I cannot go back," she said. "My sister and her baby are still under the rubble. I will always hate Port-au-Prince now.