Suddenly this blog has come alive some ... A friend emailed me yesterday asking if it was Haiti where I was originally assigned (before Azerbaijan). It was indeed somewhere in the Caribbean but I was too high of a risk to keel over and die according to the PC med team so they looked at lower risk countries...after South America rejected me for fear of my no large intestine, Azerbaijan said yes... that is after they confirmed that I'd be OK with unsanitary bathrooms?!--where is the risk there?! Anyone? That still baffles me.
Anyway, the PC hasn't assigned anyone to Haiti since '05 (I think) so I would have not been there regardless. However, neighboring Dominican does have volunteers and I have heard they are all fine.
And to answer another question that came in, being known to respond to disasters (Sumatra tsunami, WA's disastrous flood and Katrina), no, I don't intend to go to Haiti any time soon. I need a vacation! Besides, it's a mess over there right now. Best for the pros to get things aligned first. It would be months before I'd consider starting a program.
But here is a story of a former PCV who was working in Haiti during the earth quake in a different capacity. Interesting.
BTW, keep the donations coming! Thanks! http://www.mercycorps.org/fundraising/shaz
Haiti earthquake survivor back home in Pleasant Hill
By Doug Jastrow
Contra Costa Times
Posted: 01/16/2010 04:46:04 PM PST
Updated: 01/16/2010 05:39:46 PM PST
PLEASANT HILL — Having lived most of his life in the Bay Area, Kaveh Azimi has experienced earthquakes before. But what the 25-year-old saw and felt on the streets of Port-au-Prince, Haiti, on Tuesday was something completely different.
"A building had just fallen down in front of us, and another behind us, and people were running out of little alleyways, just chalk-white, bleeding," Azimi said Saturday from his parents' home in Pleasant Hill. "Everyone just stopped what they were doing, put their hands up in the air and yelled, 'God, save me. Jesus, save me.'"
The damage from the devastating, magnitude 7.0 earthquake centered just outside of Haiti's capital city this week has yet to be fully measured. Some estimate the death toll will exceed 100,000. Azimi was one of the lucky ones — he was uninjured from the massive quake and its series of aftershocks, and he was able to board a flight out of the country Friday.
Now that he is home, Azimi is eager to return to the Caribbean nation.
"It's tough. It's like you're leaving a country at its darkest hour when it needs the most help," Azimi said. "I plan on going back."
Azimi has been trying for years to help Haiti, an impoverished nation that he has called home for more than a year. A former Peace Corps volunteer who worked with Haitians near the Dominican Republic border, Azimi now works with Fonkoze, a company that supplies microloans to Haitians.
When the earthquake struck Tuesday, Azimi was leaving his job in Port-au-Prince to buy groceries before going home for the day. He was approaching the entrance to the supermarket when the store's concrete awning simply collapsed. It was only then that Azimi felt the earth beneath him start to move.
"While it was happening, everyone was just bracing," Azimi said. "This was by far the most violent earthquake I've ever felt."
Azimi remembers being immediately engulfed by a cloud of dust as several buildings crashed to the ground in front of him. His first thought was to get back to his apartment, about a 20-minute walk. Before he could move more than a few feet, he noticed a woman buried up to her chest in concrete rubble.
"It looked like she was alive but she was just in such a state of shock," Azimi said. "I was looking into her eyes and she looked like she saw me."
Azimi immediately began removing what he could from atop the woman's body. As soon as others walking by saw what was happening, they came over to help. The final piece of concrete took five people to lift, while two others pulled the woman's body free.
Azimi said he tried to revive the woman, but she never spoke or moved.
"I put my hand on her chest and she was breathing and I tried to wake her but she wasn't responding," Azimi said.
Another body was soon found nearby, an older woman that Azimi first thought was a child. Azimi and the other passers-by freed her from the heavy debris but once she was uncovered, it was clear she was dead.
"At that moment it dawned on me what kind of situation the country was in, because I knew this was going to be the same situation repeated many times over," Azimi said.
Azimi made his way to the office building where his roommate worked. The two traveled on foot to a friend's house they knew had a wide courtyard and would be relatively safe from falling debris. Everyone he saw on the streets distanced themselves from the damaged structures that still stood but could fall, he said.
Azimi spent the first night outside in his friend's courtyard. His mother's frantic call from the United States finally came through.
Lisa Radcliffe had been dialing her son's cell phone number constantly since she first heard news of the earthquake. After more than five hours, the signal went through and her son picked up.
"I was beyond relieved," Radcliffe said. "Then I started screaming at him: 'Get to the airport, get to the airport, get to the airport!'"
The next day, Azimi and about 30 others were picked up by members of the United States Embassy and driven to its headquarters about an hour away. He stayed there for the next two days, watching CNN news reports and trying to contact friends who live in Haiti.
On Friday, he was flown from the airport in Port-au-Prince to a U.S. military base in the Dominican Republic. He then boarded a flight to Miami and arrived at San Francisco International Airport on Friday night.
Despite the harrowing experience, Azimi already has plans to return to Haiti.
"They don't like this," Azimi said, referring to his parents, "but I feel bad I'm home."
Azimi has a plane ticket for Jan. 24. He wants to help rebuild the country.
"I'm hoping that the airport is open by the 24th," he said. "I'm going back."
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