Student experiences the hell in Haiti

I was sitting on my bed with my camera reviewing photos. All of a sudden, the room began to shake. I had been in Haiti for exactly a week, staying with Jeanette and Christopher Felix, founders of the Children in Need Haitian Project. This is the organization I was working with in Haiti and it is located in the mountains about an hour away from Port-au-Prince.

At first, I thought something huge had fallen or something, but then the entire house began to shake. I watched the bookshelf outside my door sway from side to side.

Flashbacks of movie scenes rushed through my mind as I watched the lights swing and the globe fall onto the floor. I could no longer tell which way was level anymore. At that moment, my brain was not thinking, “Ah, I need to get out of the house!” Instead, I just began to pray and declare God’s peace over the earth.

When it had calmed down, one of the students on the team I was working with rushed to see if I was okay. Everyone else had run outside and was in shock. No one could believe what had just happened.

We began to talk about how crazy the timing was. It happened just before 5 p.m. If it happened later, people might have been sleeping in their homes. If it were the day before, our team was hiking on extremely steep hills. Haiti had not had an earthquake in 40 years and that one had not been nearly as severe. And we happened to be there.

The entire experience was extremely disorienting. You really take for granted that the earth is always there and that it is always still. We know that the earth will not be here forever, but we don’t really think about it. It made me realize that there is nothing in this world that we can really depend upon.

Thankfully, the house itself was not damaged. People thought that Christopher was wasting his money when he built it with extra iron and cement, but there are no cracks in the building. The only things we lost were glasses that had fallen and a cement wall that had not set yet.

A house nearby had not been as lucky. The three-story cement house had collapsed to the ground floor. Fortunately, everyone had not come home yet when it collapsed.

There were still small aftershocks every now and then and everyone was outside their houses, afraid to go back in. Radio announcements advised everyone to stay outdoors until 10 p.m.

The following day, our team walked down to La Boule, where there is a sand quarry where a lot of damage was done. Along the way, there were several people walking higher up on the mountains away from the city to find shelter or family there. Jeanette is a nurse and had some supplies, so we were able to help clean and bandage their wounds and give antibiotics or painkillers to those who needed them.

The Felixes had started a school in a small community of L’Espinasse in the mountains. I was supposed to take class photos and individual photos
for the students, who probably never had pictures taken of themselves.

I was with a team of four students from Vassar College. We had sanded down and repainted the interior of the school, creating a bright yellow environment for learning. We also did a basic physical and dental check-up and height and weight measurements with the students. The Felixes had been helping another school in La Plaine and we were able to go down and see how they lived in that community.

We had opportunities to go down to Petionville, a heavily hit area on the outskirts of Port-au-Prince. We were able to help bandage more wounds. We also bought charcoal and large bags of rice and beans and were able to feed over 250 people in Petionville.

It was the largest earthquake in Haitian history and it hit the small country on Jan. 12 leaving thousands dead, hurt and homeless. Many slept outside, afraid to go back inside their unstable homes and communications, including cell phone towers, were down.

I was very curious to see how the government would respond to this. The President’s Palace had collapsed. All that President René Préval had to say was that he didn’t know where he would sleep that night, although he has several residential houses around the country.

The control tower at the main airport in Port-Au-Prince was hit and commercial flights were cancelled for several days. Already without electricity and with very limited supplies of gas to run generators, people could not reach family members through the internet, etc. The population was left in shock and with little hope for the future.

According to the CIA’s “The World Factbook,” Haiti is the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere with 80 percent of the population living under the poverty line and 54 percent in abject poverty. Haitians are used to natural disasters like hurricanes, but no one had expected an earthquake. The entire population was caught off-guard.

There was nothing set up in Haiti to help with anything. All of the help came from the outside. There are very few hospitals, doctors and limited resources. Hospitals were full, generators were down, everyone was hurt and had no place to go.

Water is a limited resource in Haiti, especially clean water. Those who could afford it buy bottled water to drink. Those who can, go to water sources, a few water pumps, find open pipes or cistern water if they are lucky.

Hot water is a whole other issue. In order to get hot water, you have to heat it. In order to heat it, you have to use electricity to run a water heater or burn charcoal to heat up the water. After the earthquake, there was no electricity and charcoal was twice as expensive as it was before.

Many children had ear infections, skin legions and other illnesses from even bathing in unclean water. Most people do not see the importance of brushing their teeth and most of the older Haitians do not have any.

What you are seeing on the news is still happening and simple things like a cut can turn into a life-or-death situation. It is true that relief supplies and teams are literally sitting on the tarmac at the airport, waiting to get to the people.