Posted on 01/14/2010 8:16:34 PM PST by kristinn
Some of the dead in this shattered city line the roads, carefully placed garments shrouding their faces. Others are carried into the hills for quick burials. Hundreds are arrayed in a macabre tangle of limbs outside a morgue, just feet from the grievously wounded.
The living and the dead here share the same space -- the sidewalks, the public plazas, the hospitals. The living are frightened of being inside in case another earthquake hits; the dead are everywhere.
On the doorstep of a pharmacy, six bodies were lined up shoulder to shoulder. On the body of one woman, covered in a sheet, rested a small bundle, the tiny leg of an infant sticking out of the wrap.
''It's beyond description. The disaster, the damage, is just so overwhelming,'' said Karel Zelenka, a Catholic Relief Services representative in Haiti. ''Everyone has a scarf or something, because the smell is unbearable. ... You literally have bodies all over the place."
SNIP
Late Thursday afternoon, the sunset mingled with the concrete dust from the crumbled buildings, tinging the city in a golden mist.
On a patch of dirt on a busy street corner a woman took her last breath. She was 26. Her family said she had been injured in the quake and suffered for two days.
Her family and about two dozen passers-by crowded around. They said a prayer and gently wiped the corners of her mouth before closing her eyes and covering her with a blanket.
Her father sat at the woman's feet. Like the rest of those in the crowd, he didn't cry. He sat, visibly drained, seemingly distant. When a journalist asked his daughter's name, he just shook his head.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Per WFTV thousands of Haitians will be brought to Florida ASAP. The locals just got the word and are not sure how they can integrate them into the social services. I just heard it on the 11:00 news and there is no link.
...
Voodoo, a mix of African religions and Roman Catholicism, is central to Haitian life and is widely observed in some form. The religion often has been wrongly associated with black magic or sorcery, leaving a lingering stereotype against its followers.
But suggestions that survivors are stacking corpses outside Port-au-Prince hospitals because they are waiting for a Voodoo ceremony is inaccurate, said Patrick Bellegarde-Smith, an expert on Haitian Voodoo, also spelled Vodou, in the department of Africology at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.
‘’None of what the Brazilian authorities say makes any sense,’’ Bellegarde-Smith said in a Thursday e-mail. ‘’They are absolutely wrong! Most Haitians, though they believe in Vodou, are devoted Catholics or Protestants.’’
...
More Democrat voters.
More Democrat voters.
When Katrina hit we relocated folks to other parts of the country. Haiti doesn’t quite have that option.
The ambassador was on Greta tonight. If I understood it correctly, the Hatians are holding up the U.S. from taking over and delivering to the people the aid that is waiting.
He said they don’t want to give up their sovereignty. They are apparently bickering about what the U.S. can and cannot do!
(But Obama has no trouble giving up America’s sovereignty!)
Yeah, and Rev. Wright and Obama are Christians too, right? Right?
I saw Steve Harrigan reporting on Fox today about the mother who lost 4 children who sits and screams every so often on a blanket on the ground. Harrigan said she is all alone and his voice was breaking. I am sure all the rescue people and reporters are having a rough time seeing all of this on the ground.
my kids have been annoying me today. At least they are alive to annoy me. I think I will go snuggle with them as they go to sleep.
Wisest thing I've read all day!
(My granddaughters got extra-long goodnight hugs tonight...)
one of the talking heads said today the gubment of Haiti is trying to excise a 'landing tax' on the relief planes. I haven't heard any confirmation but it seems to fit.
Haiti’s government is one of the most corrupt governments in the world. I knew they would be an obstacle. Haiti’s problems aren’t due to Voodoo or Satanic pacts, they’re due to their government. They need to be removed before any progress can be made.
Control? Sovereignty? In the midst of this chaos and suffering they want control? It’s clear to the rest of the world the only control they;ve exerted has been in taking aid $ meant for people for decades and enriching themselves.
They don’t want yet another crisis to go to waste.
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