Tears for HaitiBy STACY MOORE Tuesday, February 9 2010
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An ITNAC volunteer attends to an injured Haitian boy....
THEY DIDN’T know what to expect when they made the snap decision to go to Haiti following last month’s 7.0 magnitude earthquake which caused widespread death and destruction in that impoverished nation. With little time to prepare, members of the local missionary group Is There not A Cause (ITNAC) travelled to the devastated Caribbean country to offer assistance to the homeless, hungry and injured
More than 40 volunteers, including nurses, doctors, firemen, police officers, cooks and other professionals were quickly mobilised for the relief mission. The group also shipped large containers of food and relief supplies on January 20 following the departure of the volunteer team.
Almost close to tears as he recounted the experience, Derek Richards, 32, of La Romaine, a member of the ITNAC team, admitted that he had been deeply affected by the experience.
Richards, who had made mission visits to Haiti before the earthquake said just getting there was a challenge, since a trip which usually took eight hours took a stressful12 hours.
He said they travelled to Santo Domingo, then made the journey to the Haitian border. When they got there, he said, they encountered “Haitians by the thousands . . . children and adults just holding on to the gates . . . just waiting for the gates to open to run across to the borders of Santo Domingo”.
He told Newsday: “You know you see these things on television, you never believe that one day you would be there to experience it for yourself. I still keep asking myself if I was really there it was so frightening.
“We carried one huge container which could have fed so much people but in Haiti it was like a drip in the bucket and it was not enough, but fed a small portion.”
Recounting their journey by bus on their relief mission in Haiti, Richards said: “We began sharing out stuff at Port-au-Prince and then went to St Mark and other places. And people kept crowding around us in the numbers until the bus we were travelling in was completely surrounded by hundreds of people rubbing their stomachs for food.”
“Although we kept saying ‘Fini, fini’, which means finished in their language, they kept coming and just looking at us pointing to their mouth and stomachs. They were not violent but were more like they were anxious to see what we had to offer to them.”
Richards said when their relief supplies ran out, members of the group felt helpless.
“It was so painful. The entire bus full of people just started crying. We wanted to help these people so badly but all the food had finished and we felt helpless among them I wish there was something we could have done.”
He said even the food the group had brought for themselves was distributed to the Haitians. “There were days we just survived on a cup of soup and shared out and cooked the food we had and just distributed to them. They needed it more than we did.”
The group also made frequent stops to assist injured persons. According to Richards, there were many people, including babies, with wounds and sores about their bodies lying on the side of the road.”
“The doctors and nurses aboard using the kits and medical items, cleaned the wounds and treated these persons and then transported them to an area which was transformed into a medical centre.” The ITNAC team spent seven days in Haiti, sleeping in buses and an abandoned school, among other things. The Haitians, according to Richards, were taking shelter in empty parks and on the streets as there was nowhere else to go. “They tied two sticks to a bed sheet and families would make that their homes there,” he said. “In another area people were lying on mattresses along the roadway. It was the worst I have ever seen.”
He said it was heart rending to drive through Port-au-Prince and see people digging through the mountains of boulders that once were buildings and homes.
“Is like they still had hope of finding their loved ones alive and everyday they kept digging through the rubble.”
An ITNAC team will be returning to Haiti on Friday on another seven-day relief mission. They will be taking along a large shipment of clothing and food items. The organisation is appealing for donations of canned foods, clothes and cash. Items can be dropped off at 99.5FM in South Trinidad and ISAAC98.1FM in Port-of-Spain.
Financial donations can be made at Republic Bank account 51000944802 and First Citizens Bank account 1660410. Persons needing further information on the ITNAC mission can contact Richards at 765-0181.
