Alan Thomlinson is in Haiti to help with proposal writing as CARE tries to raise around $100 million for a five year response strategy. © CARE
Alan Thomlinson is in Haiti to help with proposal writing as CARE tries to raise around $100 million for a five year response strategy.
A week has now passed since I came to Haiti, my daily battle with the mosquitoes continues, some days I win and some days I lose, but mostly I just lose.
I have been working with colleagues here to put together a number of proposals to give people the initial resources to start rebuilding, including shelter kits (which include wood planks, rope, nails, plastic sheeting) and then training on improved building techniques.
My first few days here were spent sleeping on a mattress on the floor but I have now moved to one of the staff houses. One of my colleagues I am sharing the house with commented that he had heard that British cooking wasn’t up to much, I just told him he could cook his own super noodles with ketchup next time.
I saw a shocking thing on the way to work today, Port au Prince is surrounded by steep mountain sides, many of which are covered with densely packed houses of all shapes and sizes. I could see that in the earthquake a number of these mountainsides had simply given way taking everything, including the houses with them.
The rains have started to become a little more regular with showers almost every other day now. Part of CARE’s initial Shelter response has been to help people strengthen their temporary shelters to cope with the changing weather, whilst also helping them build back better for the future.
In Port au Prince, Leogane and Carrefour where CARE are working one of the major challenges is actually finding land to re-house people. Most of it is still covered in rubble after the earthquake as heavy clearing machinery is not available.
We are able to order in a variety of food to the CARE office here, but it doesn’t seem to matter what I ask for as chicken and rice is the only thing that ever turns up. I wonder what will happen when I actually order chicken and rice?
