The strength and resilience of the Haitian people has been awe-inspiring in the aftermath of the earthquake that struck on 12 January, according to Oxfam America’s president Ray Offenheiser who visited Port-au-Prince recently.
I arrived in Port-au-Prince on the one-month anniversary of the earthquake that rocked Haiti to its core. The airport was hectic, full of UN officials, aid workers and military personnel frantically working to move goods and people, struggling to coordinate and manage their own stress in the face of the monumental task in front of them.
Block after block of collapsed buildings
As we left the airport, the sheer scale of the tragedy became apparent: I saw block after block of collapsed buildings and 500,000 people living in ramshackle shelters. Some had tents. Some had the familiar blue sheeting. Others had nothing more than bed sheets. Disposable cups, plastic bags and every other kind of trash formed piles all around as over-taxed sanitation workers tried to cope with the overwhelming problem of human refuse.
Much of this story has already been told, but I was privileged enough to witness a new beginning. An entire nation bravely confronting and accepting its grief.
Around town, small churches overflowed with men in suits and ties, women in white dresses and their best hats and preachers exhorting their faithful to sing, chant, grieve and embrace.
Hauntingly beautiful
At the Oxfam office, I met with colleagues who told me about the many dimensions of the humanitarian response taking place. All the while, a small religious choir two doors down sang and sang and sang. Their harmonies set the tone for my entire afternoon and evening, never stopping for more than a few seconds. Young voices led the call and a small organ provided just a trace of a melody.
It was hauntingly beautiful and seemed to provide the necessary inspiration for our Oxfam team. Not only had they lost two colleagues but many of them had lost family and friends as well. Still, they did not stop to mourn. They carried on as they have ever since the first minute the quake hit.
At the parish of Our Lady of Perpetual Help the next morning, Father Fredric told me that he was preparing to open the front door of his church for a 5.00pm service when the quake struck. While he was able to flee in time, another colleague froze in her tracks and did not make it to the door. Like many heroes in Port-au-Prince, Father Frederic immediately took over an empty lot across from the church and turned it into a gathering place for parishioners to find solace in the company of their neighbours. In short order, they had organised a community group of 125 families, arranging shelter, water and hygiene services. Families posted their names and new addresses on their makeshift shelters and began to cope with their new reality.
At another small empty lot up the street, another 300 parishioners gathered around a woman who led them in prayer, reflection and singing. Men, women and children swayed to the music with both hands over their heads. As I surveyed the crowd, I was drawn to the sight of a solitary man, probably in his seventies, who stood alone away from the group, hands over his head, swaying in his own private space. What was his loss, I wondered. A wife of many years? Children? Grandchildren?
Around the city, I witnessed community-wide efforts to come together and share the burden. But how can a nation that was struggling even before the quake begin to recover from such a devastating collective trauma? Is it possible for a whole country to go through the grieving process as one?
The healing has begun
A Haitian psychologist told me about her efforts to initiate some trauma counselling with students at what was once the university and is now a pile of rubble. She told me that many students, labourers and friends she has worked with share the same experience of falling asleep thinking they are in a nightmare, hoping that when they wake up, things are back to what they were. She confessed that this is happening to her as well. She and her husband were still sleeping in the garden in front of their house. Yet deep down, each of them knows it will not end. It must be endured.
She believes that the experience of processing this trauma will be different for each person, given where they are in their lives and what resources they have. But all of them will count on hope to keep them going.
On the last day of mourning, people took their grief to the streets in a defiant show of renewal. Everywhere you turned, there were processions of hundreds of people marching, singing and waving leafy green branches. Men in suits, women in their finest, children in fluffy dresses of all colours. Renaissance on the streets of Port-au-Prince. The work goes on but the healing has begun.