(October 2016) I have just returned from a visit I was able to make after Hurricane Matthew. Many have lost their homes, crops, livestock and so many homes were flooded. ‘Children of the Dirt’ a sticker I see on so many four wheel trucks here in USA took on a totally different meaning when I stood with a young mother of four children, baby in arms in her home which was no bigger than 2×4 meters literally in a muddy swamp.
Her home has no walls to speak of except stretched shredded tarpaulin, a corrugated sheet of metal on the floor and various items hung where ever she can from the shack frame made up of stripped tree branches.
I have not felt so hopeless and overwhelmed with despair in a long time and I don’t even live there. I don’t know how she does it and it says so much of the Haitian people – their resilience, strength and joy is divine.
She smiled and was excited as we demonstrated and left with her a plastic bucket with a lid and small filter system so that she can catch rainwater which when run through the filter will be cleaned and the children will be able to drink clean water and not get sick or at the very worst die of Cholera. It is a small thing that we can do which makes a huge difference.
www.gofundme.com/foodandwater
