WorldBed Visits Haiti: Trip Updates on Bed Drop & Camp Visits!

I posted something last week about a Haiti initiative from WorldBed.org. You can find the post here.
Here’s some updates from WorldBed Project Executive Director Patrick Johnson
DAY 1

Today we arrived in Port-au-Prince and were met by Thony Querette from World Hope International.
He drove us around Port Au Prince and showed us the ruins..he is our guide for the week.

Here is the Presidential Palace (similiar to our White House). Across the street is a tent city. Tent cities are peppered throughout the city.
Thony told us that people are starting to go about life as normal. Selling wares on the street, setting up markets, cooking, driving, living.
The streets are cleaned-up (bodies are removed and debris cleared). There is rubble everywhere and buildings in ruins. Thony said something that struck the group: “downtown looks like a movie set.” It is surreal and looks as if it is not real.
Haitians are already starting to rebuild. We saw a few areas that were being leveled and prepared for a tent city to be built. Some tent cities are in better shape than others…meaning that some are made with tarp and higher quality materials while others are strewn with tattered sheets and remnant fabrics.
Tomorrow we will have a full day and a chance to interact with the people personally…stay-tuned.

DAY 2

Cite De Soleil

We had a really productive day! In the morning we visited a tent community in Cite de Soleil (one of the most poverty-stricken cities) and were greeted by smiling children. We gave them candies and took lots of pictures (they loved the camera.)

Cite De Soleil Children
We also visited a woman outside the tent community who made a make-shift home alongside the road. In her tent, she housed up to 10 people.

Tent Home Roadside
She was very proud of her home and invited us to take a look. We were all touched and gave her a WorldBed. She was very gracious and was excited to model her new bed and said she would share it and love it.

Tent Home Interior with a WorldBed
In the afternoon we drove to Leogane and visited a hospital. The head doctor said he sees about 40 patients a day. Many who were at the hospital had TB or HIV.

Leogane Debris
While in Leogane , we met a school teacher, Frances who lost her house to the earthquake. She, like many Haitians, thought that it was a biblical event and that the world was ending. After 2 days of helping her family and neighbors in the aftermath, she set up a makeshift hospital and home and now tends to her community. World Hope was there building a more permanent hospital. We gave her a WorldBed to use to help the injured..

Leogane “tent ” house
We ended the day in Conceive, a town on the coast. We had dinner with a group from Convoy of Hope who works with Mission of Hope. Convoy of Hope is a distribution mechanism that connects grassroots charitable fundraising with grassroots charitable distribution. We are looking in to working with them for future deliveries.

Will keep you updated on the journey and mission of WordBed.org’s group on the ground in Haiti. More photos and hopefully images soon. Not all came through.
Stevie Wilson, LA-Story.com

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