| Belize miraculously escaped most of the
malevolent wrath of Mitch. However, our southern neighbors were not as lucky.
Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador, and Nicaragua have been badly hurt by Hurricane Mitch
and its aftermath. People are trying to exist in horrible conditions, without food,
drinkable water or dry places to stay. The entire region has been economically and
psychologically set back for years. Placencia
guides and boat owners have been ferrying beans and rice to Honduras. But we don't
have the resources to help enough. Please consider donating to one of the
organizations described below. It could be the best present you ever give. I
also want to give a special thanks to Pearl Young who sent me this email message:
I saw your message posted on
"Chat bout Belize" Website. I have a homebased business doing "Personalized
Letters from Santa". I will donate $1.00 from each letter sold to the relief fund for
victims of Hurricane Mitch. Please let me know where to forward funds at the end of
December. I have no idea what the amount will be as this is my first year in business. I
wish I could do more.
Pearl Young, Keyboard Kreations
Also posted below are some email messages we've received concerning
conditions in other Central American countries.
Aid organizations can be contacted
as follows:
You can donate to the Honduran relief
effort directly through Honduras.com
(http://www.honduras.com). You can also make general relief donations through the
following organizations:
American Red Cross, International Response Fund,
P.O. Box 37243, Washington, D.C. 20013. Telephone: (800) HELP-NOW; Spanish: (800) 257-7575
Baptist World Aid, 6733 Curran St., McLean, Va.
22101-3804. Telephone: (703) 790-8980
Brother's Brother Foundation/Nicaragua, 1501
Reedsdale St., Suite 3005, Pittsburgh, Pa. 15233-2341. Telephone: (412) 321-3160
CARE, 151 Ellis St. NE; Atlanta, Ga. 30303-2426.
Telephone: (800) 422-7385
Catholic Relief Services, P.O. Box 17090,
Baltimore, Md. 21203-7090. Telephone: (800) 235-2772
Church World Service, 28606 Phillips St., P.O. Box
968; Elkhart, Ind. 46515. Telephone: (800) 297-1516, ext. 222
Doctors of the World, 375 W. Broadway, 4th Floor,
New York, N.Y. 10012
Map International, 2200 Glynco Parkway, P.O. Box
215000, Brunswick, Ga. 31521-5000. Telephone: (800) 225-8550
Mercy Corps International, 3030 SW First Ave.,
Portland, Ore. 97201. Telephone: (800) 292-3355, ext. 250
Oxfam America, Central America Relief Fund, 26
West St., Boston, Mass. 02111. Telephone: (800) 776-9326
Partners of the Americas, 1424 K St. NW, Suite
700, Washington, D.C. 20005. Telephone: (202) 628-3300
Salvation Army, World Service Office, 615 Slaters
Lane, Alexandria, Va. 22313. Telephone: (703) 684-5528
Save the Children, Hurricane Mitch Emergency
Appeal, P.O. Box 975-M, 54 Wilton Road, Westport, Conn. 06880. Telephone: (800) 243-5075
United Methodist Committee on Relief, 475
Riverside Drive, Room 330, New York, N.Y. 10115. Telephone: (212) 870-3816
World Relief, P.O. Box WRC, Dept. 3, Wheaton, Ill.
60189. Telephone: (800) 535-5433
World Vision, P.O. Box 9716, Federal Way, Wash.
98063-9716. Telephone: (888) 511-6565
Source: Associated Press
From: Lourie, Stewart & Shende
MDs, PC [SMTP:shende@traknet.com]
Sent: Saturday, February 13, 1999 2:18 PM
To: finca@villagebanking.org
Subject: Afro-Honduran Garifuna face crisis after
Mitch
Dear Friends of FINCA:
We, the Comite de Emergencia Garifuna, are a group
of local Afro-Hondurans based in Trujillo, Honduras, who have coalesced to try and survive
and rebuild after Hurricane Mitch. As you may know, the north coast of Honduras was
severely battered by Hurricane Mitch, suffering not only the flooding that affected the
rest of the country, but also the destruction caused by the high winds that hit hardest
along the coast and the rising ocean tides. The neglect faced by this isolated region, and
the marginalized ethnic group of the Black-Honduran Garifuna who populate the coastline
villages, is nothing new. Our community is accustomed to having to provide for itself, and
to battling for our rights in a context where we have little access to political or
economic power. Immediately after the hurricane, local community groups, formal and
informal, mobilized to assess the damage and serve those worst off, knowing little help
would come from outside.
Some of us in the Comite have long worked together
in various organizations, others are motivated for the first time to get involved in the
face of the overwhelming devastation of Mitch. The Black communities all along the coast
have been forgotten from the outset: the Atlantic coast had endured three days of the
hurricane, survived two more days with some people trapped on rooftops and in trees,
before emergency shipments began to arrive. With this gap in time during rising flood
waters, who knows how many lives might have been saved with more immediate action.
Since that time, international attention and
assistance has been focused on Honduras and Nicaragua, but the Afro-Caribbean Garifuna of
the north coast have not benefited from the aid pouring in. We direct your attention, for
instance, to the village of Santa Rosa de Aguan. Over 30 people of this village were
killed; over 80 houses were entirely demolished; dozens more are damaged so as to be
uninhabitable; bodies of people and cattle were not able to be buried immediately because
of the flooding, so dangers of cholera and other epidemics threaten and there is only one
nurse stationed there in an under-resourced health center; transportation is only possible
by truck, then tractor, then canoe; ODECO (Organizacion de Desarrollo Etnico Comunitario)
estimates that 30 acres that used to be neighborhoods, schools, crops and grazing is now
permanently underwater; two months after the hurricane, communication still consisted only
of short-wave radio; people were still taking refuge in public buildings, many more are
crowded in with relatives or friends.
Long term disaster also looms for smaller rural
villages where the people almost entirely depend upon the crops they raise and fishing for
survival. These are villages where, even before the hurricane, there was no electricity
nor phones, and access was only possible during the dry season. These are people who are
largely self-sufficient, have little or no outside cash income, and live from the land and
sea. Their beans, corn, bananas, plantains, coconuts and rice were destroyed by the 180
mph winds: their cassava (yucca) and yams were drowned by the flooding. Many people along
the coast lost fishing nets and canoes.
Without seeds and seedlings to replant, materials
to repair nets and without help when current stockpiles run out, they will literally face
starvation.
Even in less isolated areas, aid does not arrive.
The Congresswoman of Colon herself, Zoe Laboriel, has had to personally pay for
transportation in order to have donated supplies arrive in her coastal region. Of course,
small communities and community groups fare even worse. A pastor from a nearby village had
had to use monies from his poor congregation to get to San Pedro Sula. There, he picked up
donated items, and then had to pay for transport for them by truck, tractor and canoe to
get them to his village. He calculated that he paid more in transport than the items were
worth, but there was no other way to obtain them. . . .
As the Comite de Emergencia Garifuna, we initially
came together to share the little that we had with those who had nothing. Our work has
expanded, and we have tried to ensure equitable distribution of the aid that does come in.
For instance, only with our insistence was a local church effort, linked to U.S. church
networks, persuaded to include destroyed houses in the Black neighborhoods in their
re-building plans. Our programs for survival, recovery and growth in Garifuna communities
after Hurricane Mitch encompass both short term emergency measures, and long range plans
for sustainable re-development.
Immediately we intend to assist in the
reconstruction and repairs for people without resources who have lost their homes. We are
establishing programs to offer food to those who can't work, and to provide food in
exchange for work in cleaning the sewage systems for those who are able. We have begun to
mount a local agricultural project, to help us be more self- sufficient. In that vein, we
know we need to assist people in repairing nets and building canoes, to be able to fish
once again. And it is vital that we reach the isolated villages with seeds and seedlings,
to prevent terrible hunger in that previously self-sufficient region. Our long term vision
includes: a capacitation (training) center, so that our youth are equipped to be stronger
to confront future natural and human challenges; continuing the battle to maintain our
rights to our lands; supporting women in the face of domestic violence and limited job
opportunities and more.
Because our members had worked on educational and
cultural projects with allies for the U.K. and an AIDS project with allies from the U.S.,
we were able to call upon a network of friends to help. But the task is so daunting, we
have turned to new sources of assistance as well. The Nathan Cummings Foundation, the
Funding Exchange and the American Jewish World Services are among those who have decided
to support our efforts. We call upon you, too, to work with us. . We would be happy to
send you more details.
If you can respond before Feb. 20, please call
contact person Suzanne Shende at (315) 446-1484; fax (315) 470-7963, or e-mail: s_shende@yahoo.com. Ms. Shende returns to Honduras
Feb. 20, and after that date, please contact us by fax through Hondutel, titling it
prominently 'Comite de Emergencia Garifuna ' at 011 504 434 4200. Write to us at Apartado
Postal No. 67 / Trujillo, Colon / Honduras. Call Ms. Shende at 011 504 434 4438, or Prof.
Carolina David Gil at 011 504 434-4386.
Please see our Website at Sincerely,
Suzanne Shende, contact person for the Comite de
Emergencia Garifuna
[Suzanne Shende is a human rights lawyer from the
U.S. who has lived in Honduras for the past three years. She would be glad to provide her
CV]
Disaster Relief Manager
FINCA International, Inc.
1101 14th Street, NW, 11th Floor
Washington, DC 2005
Tel: (202)682-1510 Fax: (202)682-1535
Email: adavis@villagebanking.org
Email
Messages
This an e-mail received by Andrew
Harrington, Montreal. He posted it on DejaNews, and we are repeating it here.
The writer is Warren Post, the operator of Pizza Pizza in Santa Rosa de Copan, Honduras.
In the words of Mr. Harrington, please read this
and also please consider talking with the nearest Rotary Club. Anyone who's been to
Honduras, specifically the countryside and Mesquitia must understand that this hurricane
has really essentially killed the country. I post this as a reminder of how good we
have it in North America, and Europe.
Dear family, friends, and
friends of Honduras,
Many of you have written in the past days asking
how we are. Some of you were lucky to get a few terse lines out of me, but most of you
have had to wait until now to get a reply. Sorry about that; as you can probably imagine
things here have been most hectic. Even now I have to resort to a mass mailing to reply to
all of you.
First, the good news. We're fine. Hurricane Mitch,
which tried and almost succeeded in hitting every square mile of Honduras, inexplicably
veered off course at the last moment and missed us. All we received was a heavy rain. Now
we are virtually the only pocket of Honduras with those things most people take for
granted. Food to eat. Water to drink. Electricity. Crops ripening in the fields. Streets
and highways open. No one to bury. Honduras doesn't celebrate Thanksgiving, being an
American holiday, but as that date approaches we in Santa Rosa de Copán indeed have much
to be thankful for.
Now the bad news. And the bad news is that no one
really knows, nor will ever know, just how bad it is. The official statistics as of today
were nearly 7,000 dead and 1.4 million (almost one third of the nation's population)
homeless, but with entire coastal villages washed out to sea and mountain villages buried
whole under mud slides, who knows how many are gone?
Fortunately, aid has begun to come. Mexico, Spain,
Canada, England, Cuba, the U.S., and the Netherlands have all send food or rescue
missions, and aid has begun to flow into at least the more accessible parts of the
country. More is on its way, for which we are most thankful.
Yet the more remote areas of the country, perhaps
due to the difficulty of access, remain largely untouched by aid. The area known as the
Mosquitia -- the eastern wedge of Honduras -- has received little assistance to date,
despite its size (nearly one third of the nation's territory is there). The Mosquitia is
physically isolated from the rest of the nation by barrier ranges of mountains. No roads
penetrate the barrier and virtually no roads exist within the area. Transportation is by
boat or, rarely, bush plane, although the rivers are still so high and rough that most
river travel remains impossible. In addition, there have never been telephones or
electricity, and what little communication there was was via ham radio or the once monthly
mail boat.
Hurricane Mitch first roared onto Honduran soil in
the Mosquitia, and its largely flat topography presented nothing to slow it's
then-category 5 winds. Category 5 is the highest ranking possible for a hurricane:
meteorological texts refer to its force as "total destruction" and it is
generally assumed that few in its path will survive.
Yet the Miskitos survived. The year's rice crop
was washed away right at harvest time, few buildings remain -- the village school at
Yapuwas was last seen heading downstream past Krausirpi -- but somehow the people
survived. In my wife's native village of Wampusirpi, the survivors were joined in the
following days by a flood of 4,000 to 6,000 refugees from up and down the Patuca River,
swelling little Wampusirpi's population to ten or fifteen times its normal size and
quickly consuming what little food had not been ruined in the hurricane. The refugees have
come in search of airlift relief, as Wampusirpi has the only runway in the area.
The people of the Patuca need help. They need seed
to replant their crops and become self sufficient once again. They need the materials and
tools to rebuild their homes and schools. The most urgent problem, however, is food today.
These refugees have been without outside help and without food stores for over a week. The
single relief airlift they have received -- Saturday, 7 November, 3000 lb. of food sent by
a group of Germans -- works out to less than 12 ounces per person. Among those 4,000+
refugees going hungry tonight as I eat dinner here in front of my computer is my mother in
law, so I have a very personal stake in this effort.
Our Rotary Club here in untouched Santa Rosa de
Copán, together with the Rotary Clubs of North Sacramento, California, and Edmonton
Glenora, Alberta, are raising funds to airlift food and other needed materials to the
Patuca refugees. If you believe, as I do, that these people need our help, you may help by
sending your donation to any of the following accounts:
IN CANADA --Account name: Rotary Club Honduras
Relief Fund, Account number: 509890042110, Type of account: Canadian dollar checking,
Bank: The Bank of Nova Scotia, 11140 - 149st, Edmonton, Alberta T5M 1W4, Phone (403)
448-7910, Fax (403) 448-7529
IN THE UNITED STATES --Account name: Rotary Club
of North Sacramento - Honduras Relief Fund, Account number: 0100001221, Type of account:
U.S. dollar, Bank: Bank of Sacramento, 1750 Howe Avenue, Suite 100, Sacramento, CA 95825,
Phone (916) 648-2100. Short Name: BK SAC SAC, Routing number: 121142779
IN HONDURAS --Account name: Club Rotario Santa
Rosa Cuenta Especial Mosquitia, Account number: 39265-2, Type of account: Lempira savings,
Bank: Banco de Occidente, Santa Rosa de Copán, Phone (504) 662-0232, Fax (504) 662-0692
All three accounts are managed by their respective
Rotary Clubs in accordance with Rotary International's principles of funds management.
As a final request, I would like to ask that,
whether you are in a position to give or not, you please consider forwarding this message
on to your friends and urging them to help. That way, we ALL can help in our own way.
I hope this message finds you well and happy and
that you have a happy Thanksgiving.
Sincerely yours,
Warren and Orlanda, Hamlet, Cid, and Jaret [mailto:wpost@hondutel.hn]
From: Darren Haylock [darrens@prodigy.net]
Sent: Saturday, November 21, 1998 7:21 PM
Subject: Bz-Culture: Article of Mitch Aftermath
Honduras--Little Brian
Suazo's birthday will always remind his family of the moaning winds that destroyed their
house and swept away his crib when he was only hours old. He entered the world just as the
100-mph winds of Hurricane Mitch seized his home in Guanaja, the most eastern of the three
Bay Islands off the coast of Honduras. The winds continued for three terrifying days,
battering the once-lush island in a preview of what lay ahead for the rest of Central
America. Perhaps nowhere else are the abiding changes wrought by Mitch stamped more
clearly.
Gratitude that the storm killed
only eight inhabitants easily gives way to fear that it ripped away the future for the
remaining 8,000. Here, Mitch scattered the McLaughlins of Savannah Bight, a family
clustered in one seaside neighborhood before a house knocked off its stilts killed the
matriarch, Miss Florentina. Here, the Moore clan of Mangrove Bight spent three days
standing up in a flooded kindergarten as Mitch splintered their houses and washed away
their dream that even the children of poor fishermen could enter the computer age.
And here, Carolina Suazo, whose life before Mitch was one of hardship and uncertainty, now
grapples with raw survival as she seeks a way to support her newborn son and his sisters.
These three families tell the story of
Guanaja, home to the Caribbean's only pine forest, a speck of land whose inhabitants lived
by fishing the seas and who dreamed of new prosperity from tourists visiting its beautiful
mountains, coves and reefs. Now the trees are naked trunks. The boats are washed
away. The beauty is smeared and pounded into pulp. Damage to the coral reefs that draw
scuba divers here has not yet been determined.
Above sea level, however, the
tranquillity of an island with parrots and iguanas--and no automobiles--has been
shattered. "Are tourists going to want to come here to see debris? No fire ever
did what this did," said Walden Bush, who for 12 years has owned Island House dive
shop on Mangrove Bight, the island's most remote settlement. Still, with jokes and faith,
these proud great-grandchildren of pirates make light of their losses as they nail wooden
planks back onto the frames of broken homes and wash dishes wherever they can find water
that looks less dirty than the plates.
The islanders' favorite post-Mitch pun is
that this was not a hurricane at all. "This was a slow-cane; it wouldn't go,"
former Congressman Spurgeon Miller said of Mitch, which first struck Oct. 26 but then took
on a snail-like pace even after it was downgraded to a tropical storm, making the deluge
all the more destructive. As they bail water and wait in long lines for donated food, the
people of Guanaja are quick to express their gratitude that the deadliest Central American
storm in two centuries, which took 10,000 lives, killed relatively few of their neighbors.
"It's a miracle that there were eight dead here and 8,000 telling the story,"
Miller said. "People were crawling from one shelter to another in the midst of the
bad weather, and they lived. The Lord had a hand in this hurricane."
Residents Descended From Swashbucklers
A quarter of a century ago, ship's cook Alsonm McLaughlin retired from the sea and brought
his wife, Florentina, to Savannah Bight to make a new life. They built a little house on
stilts over the water, where stiff breezes would drive away mosquitoes and where the tides
would carry away waste like a sort of natural sewer system.
McLaughlin's mother lived next door, and
the home of brother Edney was close by. Their move was part of a long tradition of
migration: Like most families on Guanaja, the McLaughlins are descended from the Irish and
British swashbucklers who made their way here, often through the Cayman Islands or other
British colonies.
The pilgrimages continued even after
Guanaja and the other main Bay Islands--Roatan and Utila--were ceded to Honduras by
Britain in 1856. After that, Hondurans from the mainland also began to settle in Guanaja,
especially in Savannah Bight. Still, the old family names and the tradition of speaking
lilting Caribbean English at home continue, even though school is taught in Spanish.
Alsonm McLaughlin supported his growing
family by selling the day's catch in the village. Florentina helped by grating and
rendering coconut to make oil for sale. "Sometimes, we would have 3,000 coconuts to
grate," recalled son Armando, 27.
Four years ago, with their three children
grown, the McLaughlins had their bonus baby, Lila Adelina, named for her grandmothers.
"What a blessing!" said McLaughlin, 62. "I cry when I think how nice she
comforted me [when Florentina died in the storm]. . . . She said, 'Don't cry, Papi. I love
you. Mommy is with Jesus.' From a little baby." That was McLaughlin's only
moment of peace in three days of horror.
Running For Their Lives During Storm
Mitch struck on a Monday. Most of the McLaughlin clan holed up in Edney's
home--until the roof flew off. Early Tuesday, they ran for cover underneath a nearby
house built on high stilts, and when that structure began to sway they ran again.
Armando took Lila's hand, and his father clasped Florentina's. As Armando and Lila
ran, a plank hit McLaughlin on the head. He hesitated. In that instant, the house
crashed down. "I had her by the hand, ready to run for our lives, and she found
death," McLaughlin said, weeping. He remembers little about the next two days: There
was unrelenting hunger and thirst. The physical pain of a dislocated collarbone, twisted
ribs and cracked skull. And the emotional pain of losing his life partner. "It's a
bitter pill because I had a nice wife," McLaughlin said. "We lived a long time
together, and we lived nice."
On Thursday, Mitch finally moved on.
The 2,000 residents of Savannah Bight emerged to find 30 houses where 436 had
stood. And Miss Florentina's sons and brothers-in-law began the long task of retrieving
her bruised body. It was nightfall by the time they could put her in a simple
plywood coffin and bury her. Daughter Selena, 23, who had fled to a more protected
patch with her husband and 3-year-old daughter, Angie, arrived as the last shovel of dirt
was placed on her mother's grave. "My brothers were crying, and my father made
no sense," she recalled. Selena's last memory of Miss Florentina was from the
night before the storm, the gentle gesture of a grandmother sitting in a quiet, dark
house, fanning young Angie with cardboard so the mosquitoes wouldn't bite her.
In the days ahead, the McLaughlins, who
had built their lives around the family colony on Guanaja, broke apart. Bight for
the fishing banks off the coast of Nicaragua and Colombia, to try to earn money for
reconstruction. Armando stayed behind to clean up and rebuild. He cobbled
together a woodshed-size shelter from scrap wood and steel, his sweat mixing with tears.
"Sometimes, when I'm doing this, I stop for a little while to think about my
mother," he said. "She was a happy person and friendly. She would talk to
anybody."
Son Shadra, 22, took his ailing father to
a hospital in Tegucigalpa--a terrifying plane trip to a capital made chaotic by Mitch's
flooding. While Shadra struggled to find food and water to augment the hospital's
provisions, McLaughlin watched four patients die in the beds next to him. "All
the death and, oh, the stinking scent," he recalled.
Upon his release, McLaughlin and his son
rode buses and forded streams where bridges were washed out, and arrived in the coastal
city of La Ceiba two weeks after they left Guanaja. There, McLaughlin is
recuperating at the home of his mother, who has lived on the mainland since her husband
died 10 years ago.
McLaughlin now longs for the day he can
be reunited with daughter Lila. The 4-year-old has been taken in by Selena and her
husband, Joaquin Wahl. But now they too are wondering whether they will have to
leave Guanaja. A small guest house and diving business are the sole source of
the couple's income, but they see little hope of making money this Christmas season, or
for many seasons to come. "I don't want to be a rat deserting a sinking ship,
but tourism you can forget right now," said Wahl, a German and one of 100 foreigners
who live on Guanaja. "I never came down here to make a lot of money, but now my
family has gotten bigger."
To support the extended McLaughlin clan,
Wahl is thinking of going back to Germany for a while to earn money. That
complicates little Lila's future. Selena wants to take her with them, but McLaughlin
is reluctant to let his baby go so far away, even though he realizes that he cannot care
for her right now. Mitch may force a family breakup, but Wahl is determined that the
separation will not be permanent. "I may have to go to Germany, but I'll be
back for sure," he said. "This is my home. I don't feel at home in
Germany anymore. It's not just coconut trees and having a reef to dive from--it's
the people."
Woman Doesn't See Island as a Paradise
Cradling her newborn son, Brian, Carolina Suazo also is making plans to leave
Guanaja. Born and raised off the island on cays--10 acres that magically escape
mosquitoes and sand fleas, where half the island's population crowds together--she does
not see the paradise that drew foreigners such as Wahl here. Mitch is the drop that
overflowed her bucket of troubles. "Normally, life here is hard work,"
said the 22-year-old mother of three. "Now, my goal is to fix my papers so that I can
go someplace else to work."
Even before she gave birth during a
hurricane, Suazo's life was not going well. Ever since her father was killed on a
visit to the mainland eight years ago, survival has been difficult for Suazo, her five
sisters and their mother, Hipolita Castillo. Like most of the men who fish out on
the banks, Brian's father is rarely around, and Suazo is uncertain whether the couple is
separating or he is just working. She brushes away questions about him, as if to say
he does not count.
Before Brian was born, Suazo struggled to
support herself and her two other children, ages 3 and 6, with a job at the Marcusa
Fisheries, one of three plants on the island that thaw, clean, package and refreeze
lobster and shrimp brought in by the boats. She worked from 7:30 a.m. to 9 or 10
p.m., with breaks for lunch and dinner, and earned about $50 a week--barely enough to pay
her monthly rent of $48, a $15 electric bill, groceries and clothes for her growing
children.
As Mitch was pounding Savannah Bight,
Castillo, a midwife, was helping Suazo give birth to Brian. A few hours later, the
hurricane reached the cays. "The baby was born in the morning," Suazo said.
"If he had been born at night, maybe we wouldn't be here telling the tale."
The first night of the storm, they moved
from one corner of the house to another, as the wind blew bits off the roof. When the
fiercest gusts moved to the other side of the island, the family ran to the Roman Catholic
church, a concrete structure. All Suazo could save were the baby's clothes.
Suazo has remained in the church basement
ever since, with her children, mother, sister, cousin and nephew. Fifteen-year-old
cousin Wilson is the only family member working right now. He lifts racks of bread
into a hot oven and takes them out, eight hours a day. Castillo, who used to take in
laundry when she had a sure supply of water, keeps the family fed by standing in line
every midday until the Guanaja Ladies' Club distributes donations.
Just living day to day is hard, but
Castillo knows that she needs to look toward the future. "The church has not
said anything, but we need to worry about finding another place to live," she said.
"I need to find a little spot and build something." She attends
Mass every morning and does not seem concerned about Carolina's plans to find work off the
island, leaving the children in her care. She said simply, "I have faith in
God."
Keeping the Faith Despite Hardships
Across the island in Mangrove Bight, Guanaja's most remote settlement, the Moore clan
keeps faith another way. Gathered under a U.S. Agency for International Development
tarp on a Saturday morning, missionary Norton Perilla read Scriptures as 40 members of the
Seventh-day Adventist congregation followed along in Bibles they had wrapped in plastic to
save from Mitch.
The hurricane took their church, the high
school that international church volunteers had helped build and the 10 new computers that
had arrived last month to bring their children into the cyber-age. Of the 146 houses that
used to line the shores of Mangrove Bight, only 11 are habitable--and they now shelter 127
families. "Most of the houses were on the sea, and there's not one left standing on
saltwater," said Marcelo Webster Moore, first elder of the church.
Still, people here are receptive to
Perilla's message of valuing life over the material things that the hurricane destroyed.
"Everything we had is lost," said Eveline Moore, a 58-year-old grandmother,
quickly adding: "I thank the Lord that our lives were spared." That sentiment is
repeated all over Mangrove Bight, a poor village where nine of 10 families make their
living from fishing.
Significantly, only 19 families have left
this debris-strewn beach. Those who remain agree with Webster Moore. "I feel like I
couldn't stay someplace else," he said. "Everywhere you turn, we're family some
way or another." The Moore, Jackson, Ebanks and Powery families have lived on this
bay for nearly two centuries, intermarrying and building a tight, supportive community.
The same four last names are repeated
over and over, and to minimize confusion over identity, people here have adopted the
Spanish custom of using both their parents' last names. "This is a good place to
raise kids," said Cherry Powery Moore, Webster Moore's cousin. "Everybody knows
them. We really had a good little town here." Mangrove Bight had no telephone
service, but there was electricity at night and television four to five hours a day.
People here had learned over the years to
make light of hurricanes. "Fifi just took the roof off [in 1974]," Eveline Moore
said. "Greta came four years after [on the same date] to sing 'Happy Birthday' to
Fifi." Still, people here are finding it tough to laugh about Mitch just yet.
"For four days, I was wet, with no
food or water," recalled Powery Moore, who waited out the storm from Monday afternoon
until Thursday morning with 200 neighbors and relatives in the school's kindergarten.
"Those were the longest four days of my life. . . We couldn't sit: There were
always three to four inches of water on the floor. We just kept bailing. "The wind
sounded like some wild animal howling," she continued. "Everything was white.
You couldn't see."
Once the rain stopped and they could look
outside, it was almost worse. "Trees 100 years old were smashed up," said George
Webster Moore, Marcelo's brother. "That was a hill full of little animals and birds.
Now, not even a crow is left. It was so green in morning, with the smell of pine."
City Hall has issued an order that no
more houses are to be built over the water, where two-thirds of Mangrove Bight's homes had
been located. But, said Eveline Moore, "we have nowhere else to build. The land
belongs to other people." And after three weeks on land, she added, she is fed up
with the mosquitoes. "We are going to break out in malaria," she predicted.
Powery Moore, who has lived through four
episodes of malaria on this island, shares that fear. "If I had the money, I'd go
right back out [to the sea to build] again," she said. "There may not be another
hurricane for another 20 years."
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PLEASE, PLEASE
HELP!
10:44 a.m. CST, November 6, 1998
We are getting first-hand reports
from Honduras and conditions are horrible there - - almost no food or drinkable water.
Belize escaped the terrible
conditions facing Honduras, Nicaragua and Guatemala. But it is now our
responsibility to help our neighbors as much as we can.
Most of the fishing, snorkeling and
diving guides in Placencia are today transporting food, water and clothing by boat
to Honduras.
But we know what we can offer will
only satisfy a very small portion of the great needs of the people in these countries.
Therefore, on behalf of myself and
the other Placencia guides, we implore you to help in the disaster relief efforts in these
countries in any way you can.
We appreciate all the care and
concern you demonstrated when Belize was threatened by Hurricane Mitch. Please show
the Hondurans, Guatemalans and Nicaraguans the same care and concern.
You can donate to the Honduran relief
effort directly through Honduras.com (http://www.honduras.com). You can also make
general relief donations through the following organizations:
American Red Cross, International Response Fund,
P.O. Box 37243, Washington, D.C. 20013. Telephone: (800) HELP-NOW; Spanish: (800) 257-7575
Baptist World Aid, 6733 Curran St., McLean, Va.
22101-3804. Telephone: (703) 790-8980
Brother's Brother Foundation/Nicaragua, 1501
Reedsdale St., Suite 3005, Pittsburgh, Pa. 15233-2341. Telephone: (412) 321-3160
CARE, 151 Ellis St. NE; Atlanta, Ga. 30303-2426.
Telephone: (800) 422-7385
Catholic Relief Services, P.O. Box 17090,
Baltimore, Md. 21203-7090. Telephone: (800) 235-2772
Church World Service, 28606 Phillips St., P.O. Box
968; Elkhart, Ind. 46515. Telephone: (800) 297-1516, ext. 222
Doctors of the World, 375 W. Broadway, 4th Floor,
New York, N.Y. 10012
Map International, 2200 Glynco Parkway, P.O. Box
215000, Brunswick, Ga. 31521-5000. Telephone: (800) 225-8550
Mercy Corps International, 3030 SW First Ave.,
Portland, Ore. 97201. Telephone: (800) 292-3355, ext. 250
Oxfam America, Central America Relief Fund, 26
West St., Boston, Mass. 02111. Telephone: (800) 776-9326
Partners of the Americas, 1424 K St. NW, Suite
700, Washington, D.C. 20005. Telephone: (202) 628-3300
Salvation Army, World Service Office, 615 Slaters
Lane, Alexandria, Va. 22313. Telephone: (703) 684-5528
Save the Children, Hurricane Mitch Emergency
Appeal, P.O. Box 975-M, 54 Wilton Road, Westport, Conn. 06880. Telephone: (800) 243-5075
United Methodist Committee on Relief, 475
Riverside Drive, Room 330, New York, N.Y. 10115. Telephone: (212) 870-3816
World Relief, P.O. Box WRC, Dept. 3, Wheaton, Ill.
60189. Telephone: (800) 535-5433
World Vision, P.O. Box 9716, Federal Way, Wash.
98063-9716. Telephone: (888) 511-6565
Source: Associated Press
Thank you, Kevin
Report from Colleen Fleury, Green
Parrot Inn, Placencia Peninsula
This is what happened from our side .....
On Sunday morning two friends
stopped in to say they were getting back to Ambergris Caye as soon as possible because the
Hurricane was looking really bad. This was the first time we really, truly paid attention.
We started notifying our guests as they returned from Snorkeling and Monkey River
that Hurricane Mitch was threatening. By the time everyone finished a great meal that
evening (Tina's fresh bread, Baked Lobster Tail and all the Trimmings) we had made
arrangements to fly everybody out on the first flights the next morning. Our first concern
was the Guests, second concern to batten the hatches of Green Parrot, third to get the
Staff to their homes and finally to get ourselves evacuated if necessary.
The next morning our guests were at Placencia
International by 6:45 AM and our staff of 10 moved into action. We are so proud of them !!
As you know we have great people and they sure proved it that day - everything was
moved or packed into the lofts of all the Beach Houses - all tables, chairs, gift shop -
you name it. All refrigeration and laundry was raised up at least 4 feet. The office
equipment and stereo into the van along with all the food and clothes we would need for
one week. And this was accomplished by 11:00 AM. We had our own little hurricane
happening on the property everybody was moving so fast !
Everybody was fed, paid and on their way by Noon.
Ray and I sat on our deck and watched the weather ..... said a few prayers ! We had been
starving Jupiter and Stupiter for 24 hours - finally put some food into their smaller cage
and managed to trap them. We are ready to go if necessary.
Tuesday morning brought bad news. The Hurricane
was heading directly west towards Belize City. Time to move out. Ray gathered a work crew
from Seine Bight and they disconnected the Generator and put it in the back of the truck.
Cut Jupiter and Sputter's small cage out of the
larger aviary and packed them into the back of the truck with the Generator. One
last look at the Green Parrot - the rain was starting to fall pretty heavy by this time
and the road was deteriorating ( well, worse than usual!). We drove to Dangriga,
filled with gas and continued on up the Hummingbird Highway to Caves Branch which is just
south of Belmopan. Good friend, Ian Anderson was welcoming everybody.
By the time we reached Caves Branch at 2:00 PM the
word was even worse - hurricane winds sustained at 180 mph - Hurricane deemed Class 5 -
Catastrophic damage to property and life expected. Wow - that makes you sit down and take
a deep breath.
Ian and his Guides informed us of Plan B. Evacuate
Caves Branch and head to even higher ground. Ian says that he knows the best place - dry
cave up in the hills. Ray and I took a little walk to POW wow for a minute. We
agreed that we had continually tried to do the safest thing for our guests, our staff, our
resort and ourselves. Let's Go.
So - 20 ADULTS, 4 BABIES, 1 POODLE AND 1 MONKEY
head for the hills. We put Jupiter and Stupiter in the highest place possible with food
for 5 days. Move all the vehicles to higher ground and then set off for a 45 minute trek
with the Guides cutting trail through the jungle with their machetes. The old trail was so
muddy and slippery that everybody was falling. Talk about Indiana Jones and his Temple of
Doom ....
When we reached the mouth of the cave - the Guides
tell us that we have to harness up and rappel down into the cave. That took an extra
breath I must admit. It is getting dark, we are all muddy, soaking wet and tired right
down to the bone. Everybody was carrying maximum weight plus children and animals.
The Guides were fabulous - Barnaby was my personal
favorite - he seemed tireless. They got us into this huge cave - it was wonderfully dry !
AND the guides already had a full campsite kitchen set up already. Ian's girls had a full
meal of stewed chicken and rice & beans ready to be re-heated. Never tasted so good !
Within 2 hours we had the cave looking like home -
if you can picture this: Light blazing from sterno cans set all around us on the
rocks. Army cots have been set up - everybody has claimed a small area of the cave
for their own - a latrine has been dug - everybody is dry and warm. The radio was set up
near the entrance to the cave and every hour somebody climbs up to the mouth of the cave
to get a report. It is not looking good but we are safe.
The first report at 6:00 AM is still not good but
each hour takes the Hurricane further south. Ray and I are the most worried - Mitch is now
sitting directly east of Green Parrot and moving west. Ray hit an emotional low
after the 3:00 PM report as it looks like we can kiss everything good-bye. We keep telling
ourselves that we are safe and that is what counts. But you can't help but crash a little.
The group agrees that if we write the book: "
STOP THE CARNIVAL - PLEASE" we just might recoup our losses. Meanwhile the babies are
wonderful and Julius the Monkey entertains us by throwing Jeff's army cot down off a Mayan
Ceremonial Site into an abyss below. Guess the Gods did not want him sleeping there !
Then - the Hurricane starts moving south, a little
more, a little more and we start to feel a little bit hopeful ! Everybody agrees that if
all is the same on Thursday morning - then we will move out of the cave and back to Caves
Branch. Lack of showers, privacy and worry are starting to wear everybody down just a
little. We have resigned ourselves that the Green Parrot is history.
The Thursday morning report is great - we are
leaving. Winds are down to 120 mph. Since it has been raining for days and days - the exit
from the cave is a little slippery but teamwork got everybody down without incident.
All extra stuff is left in the cave - Ian will
hire a team of guides to pack everything out.
Every hour the winds are dropping .... 115 mph
.... 105 mph .... my god 80 mph .. and then 65 mph ... no longer a hurricane .... hitting
Honduras ... We truly feel for the people of Honduras.
Back at camp ... Hurricane Party .... Ray had
packed coolers of food .... Lobster is served to everybody ..... a few drinks and we all
fall onto comfortable beds after hot showers .... HEAVEN !!
Ray makes the decision to try the roads to get
back to Maya Beach the next morning. Now looting and the aftermath is the concern ....
nobody thinks he will make it back. But the call comes at 4:00 PM that he has made it.
60% of the peninsula road is underwater - there is
fairly high surf ....drives into Green Parrot ... no damage ..... everything is standing
....nobody seems to have been on the property .... HALLELUJAH !
Don't you just love a happy ending ?
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