Earthquake - Day Four

At one point in the night, amidst the cacophony, there was an aftershock so strong, I went running to the top of the stairs and listened for the others, surely scrambling out of their beds, or at least talking in low tones about whether or not they should do the same. But no, everyone seemed to be fast asleep. Beyond all fear of waking my friends from their much needed sleep, I asked Linda and Lisa frantically if they "felt that." They sleepily replied "no." I crawled back onto the bed. But the peace you feel at night when you lay down to sleep didn't come. A few hours (minutes?) later I heard the Haitian family outside stirring, and I thought it must be about to dawn. In the distance I heard singing and chanting, too. I crept downstairs in the dark and listened. Soft talking, but no light in the sky was appearing (day dawns quickly near the equator, I'm learning). Again, stumbling up the stairs, I find my way back to the bed. Poor Julia, if she had any chance of sleeping, I was keeping her awake. I must be the most fidgety sleeper ever...she didn't move all night.

Finally the sky lightened. Even without sleep, daylight brings relief for some reason. It's like a new chance at a normal day with a normal ending of sleep. We all slowly worked our way to the kitchen, checked our email, and started on our new day. We enjoyed a lovely breakfast provided by our gracious hosts of Steve's homemade raisin bread, jam and an amazing mango.

The day proved to be filled with reading, writing, chatting with Mr. Factoids, walking to Quisqueya, and lots of emailing and facebooking. At one point, one of Odanie's cousins arrived, a doctor who lived a few hours away and wanted to come into PAP to offer help. He didn't really know where to go to treat the wounded and had no supplies. Ruth ran to her medicine chest and brought an armful of bandaids, ointment, peroxide, iodine, bandages, medicines of every kind. We emptied our bags of anything remotely medical in nature. Again, our stuff seemed to multiply and we were able to give him a good sized box. We snapped a photo, then he went out.

We kept communicating through the day with the guys back home in hopes of getting on a flight that night with Missionary Flights International. We were completely at the mercy of others to make our plans for us. We had no ability or power to arrange anything. We went through our suitcases and only kept the bare essentials in one carry-on. Goodbye t-shirts, skirts, and dresses. Goodbye The Book Thief, that I was supposed to read for book club. Goodbye nice beach bag from Stock Building Supply's trip to Costa Rica. Goodbye journal, with your written pages removed.

In the midst of Steve's duties as QCS director-turned-hospital administrator, and comforting his family, he managed to keep us in his plans. He was our only mode of transport to the airport later in the day, and yet we didn't even know which end was up on the plans. Linda's husband Wayne would call and say, "you need to get to the Embassy." Then 30 minutes later, a frantic email from my husband would come in, "have Linda read her email IMMEDIATELY!" Change - "go to the airport. Be prepared to spend the night." Then, "No, stay where you are until I call." It went on like that most of the day.

Eventually, it was firmed up that we would be flying out with MFI, on a private plane that Rick Hendrick Motorsports had donated. When exactly that plane was going to be available to fly out with us on it was way up in the air. Later in the day, after watching poor Ruth struggle with difficult decisions about what to do with her family, Lisa and I offered our seats to the Hersey children. We decided that we were the least "needed" at home, as our kids were all drivers and fairly self-sufficient. She would wait and talk to Steve.

Around 4, we got the "Go." We needed to be at the airport at 5 for a six o'clock departure. We loaded Steve's SUV and headed the back way to the airport. Ruth and the children would come back to the States soon, but not on this flight.

I probably took more photos on that ride to the airport than I had all week. Each time I raised my camera, I felt so conspicuous. I have always wondered how journalists can invade the pain of others. I know it is necessary, and I've watched my own photo-journalist daughter grapple with the same questions. But as an amateur, I didn't even feel like I should, or that I had an excuse. Yet I continued to snap away, trying to hide the camera from view whenever I wasn't shooting. My photos are not all that great for this reason, but I felt I needed to document what we were seeing, so that I could effectively communicate our ordeal, and the plight of the people there to potential donors. I knew our story would carry influence and weight in the fundraising effort.

I captured images of white mustaches - toothpaste spread under the nose to block the smell of death that was rising throughout the city. UN soldiers and police officers with rifles. Masks for the dust. Rubble. Lots of rubble. Heavy equipment beginning the clean up effort. Tent cities. Patient queues for water. Men bathing the dust off in a dirty puddle.

As we approached the airport, lines of folks wishing to exit the country waited outside the guarded doors. I rushed up and asked for the MFI flight, and I asked specifically about the Rick Hendrick's flight. They didn't know what I was talking about. Wayne thought we might need to go into the main terminal and wait, but those in charge (who was really in charge?) wouldn't let us pass. It was decided to go the the Missionary Aviation Fellowship hangar, where MFI usually departed from. When we arrived at the gate, miraculously someone was leaving and we just drove through the otherwise locked entrance. We saw the pilots and went to speak with them. They were amazed that we were able to get through.

They told us that the plane did not receive clearance to land that night but in the morning we had to be there at 9 am. The pilots were the Hersey's close friends, so arrangements were made to actually follow them into the airport's secure grounds so that we could leave. Security was super-loose, pretty non-existent actually.

When we got back to the Hersey's home, we decided to leave our bags inside and take a walk. I think we were all feeling like we were intruding on the Hersey's private life, in the midst of some of the most difficult decisions they were making; to separate their family so Steve could do his job without worrying about them. Again, we would have to impose on them for a place to sleep for the night, requiring the children to give up their beds to strangers once again. Dark was falling, but we strolled the quiet streets and snapped a few more photos.

When we got back to their home, the doctor was back, looking weary. We played with the little boys in Odanie's family, and I held the Down's baby and laughed as he bursted out in a hearty chuckle every time I said, "boo!" Moments of peace and sheer joy.

Time to go in and check our emails again. Sure enough, Wayne had written as soon as we'd left for the airport, that he got the word Stateside, the flight wasn't departing FL. But the pilots had assured us that it would be leaving in the morning, and we needed to be there ready to go. Ruth and the children were also going. They had decided. We notified the men back home that we would be on our way in the morning.

Back to bed...I dreaded climbing in, losing hope that I would ever sleep again. Somehow I had been functioning all week without it. As if on cue by a cruel maestro, the dogs, the mosquitoes, the doves, the roosters all warmed up their voices one by one. Misery. But I managed to get two or three hours.