by Rick Perera.

I love watching the humming machine of the Haiti relief effort in action.  CARE has more than doubled our local staff since the Jan. 12 earthquake, and the well-oiled supply chain is cranking along.  Our huge new warehouse buzzes with workers loading and unloading, trucks rolling in and out.  It’s a sight to see.

Pierre Bayard, inhabitant of “CARE Village” in Port-au-Prince, is fed up with being fed (photo: CARE/Perera)

Yesterday I visited our largest-yet distribution of non-food items – a massive and well-run operation.  At the seaside district of Village Gaston, overflowing with makeshift shelters, nine trucks arrived at 4:30 a.m.

(more…)

by Rick Perera.

We’re watching from Haiti with shock and sadness as the news comes from Chile: another merciless earthquake, more powerful than ever. So soon after the devastation here in and around Port-au-Prince. (Was that only a few weeks ago? It feels like an eternity.)

Haitians understand all too well what the people of Chile are enduring. The desperate search for missing loved ones … sleepless nights in the street outside unstable houses … lack of communication to the outside world … the fear of what the future holds. The terror does not subside easily. (more…)

by Rick Perera.

Its name, Hôpital La Paix, means Peace — but this massively overflowing hospital is anything but peaceful. The largest medical facility still standing in devastated Port au Prince, La Paix is beyond overflowing with critically injured people.

The parking lot in front of the two-story concrete building is packed with the wounded, lying on mattresses or bedframes (no one gets both), on blankets, on the sparse grass, even on the bare sidewalk, under a brutally hot sun. A handful have someone leaning over them, offering at least some comfort, maybe holding up an IV drip bag. But many lie alone. Virtually everyone in this beleaguered city lost someone – some have lost their whole families.

(more…)

by Rick Perera.

If charity begins at home, CARE is in the right place.  Just outside our Haiti headquarters, many hundreds, perhaps thousands – no one has counted them – of newly homeless people are camped out in the main square of Pétionville, a near suburb of Port au Prince.

Thousands of People camp out in public squares in Port-au-Prince (Photo: CARE/Evelyn)

They wait patiently in the hot sun, but their desperation grows by the hour.  At night, groups of people can be heard clapping and chanting.  Some have hung banners, painted on bedsheets, with messages like “We need help!” in English and Creole. (more…)

by Rick Perera.

We’re crossing the border at Jimení, between the Dominican Republic and Haiti. Things are moving fairly quickly at least on the Dominican Republic side. We’re seeing supplies crossing the border including search and explore teams with dogs, many large tanker trucks with water, backhoes and other construction equipment, mobile kitchens from the Dominican Republic, and many journalists. (more…)

CARE’s Rick Perera is on his way to Haiti.

A group of CARE staff and journalists — 12 of us in all, landed in the city of Puerto Plata in the northern coast of the Dominican Republic early this afternoon. We were welcomed as tourists by a steel drum band, scantily clad dancers and free cocktails. It was a surreal experience.

Rick Perera is CARE’s Emergency Media Coordinator (Photo: CARE)

Shortly, we all boarded a bus, which is taking us on the first leg of our eight hour journey over land to reach the Haitian capital of Port-au-Prince. By all accounts, the scene will change dramatically once we cross the border. The lush green hills and gentle rain we see through our windows will give way to the harsh, deforested landscape of Haiti. (more…)