The Earthquake, Haiti

I'll try to post a link to photos on here somewhere.

I've been reading the Livesays' blog and various updates on the catastrophic earthquake that hit Port-au-Prince yesterday. It's a little weirder for us than for most Americans, reading this stuff, because we've actually been there. I read that there are rumors that the Hotel Montana collapsed, and I remember eating dinner there. And so forth.

It's all unbelievably horrible--but I'm glad to see the reports and photos of people from various other countries rushing to provide aid. It almost makes me feel like Haiti is a thinking entity, somehow, like Haiti finally said, "Okay, you folks in other countries have ignored us long enough--the poverty, the suffering. Even the hurricanes didn't get much attention. Just what does it take, folks? How about THIS--is THIS bad enough for you? Will you finally send help now?"

I mean, the news reports state that electricity is out in PAP, as if it's part of the earthquake situation--yeah, electricity goes out all the time there. That's actually normal. If you live there, you put up with regular, periodic loss of power. And they report that the hospitals can't handle all the injured people--that's normal too. If you don't have the money to pay for your treatment up front in a Haitian hospital, you don't get treatment. You die on the street. It was that way PRE-earthquake.

There's just so much to fix there. They can't just fix the earthquake damage and make it all fine, because the damage goes deeper. I'm picturing good Samaritans from other countries coming in to give medical treatment to an earthquake victim, a little girl perhaps, and saying, "Okay, this one, we've cleaned her up and treated her injuries. But, hmm, she also seems to be very malnourished. And I don't think these sores on her hands are part of her earthquake injuries--it looks like scabies to me. And, um, I think she has intestinal parasites, and there are some old infected scabs on her head, and that cough--has she had a TB test? And, and, and . . . "

It's all sad and tragic and horrible and I'm so sorry. But at the same time, I'm glad Haiti finally got their attention.