Dear readers,
Whereever we travel in our lives, no matter for how long or short, we always leave our footprint and a small piece of ourselves. Tonight I write my final footprint and my last blog post, under the same star studded sky that greeted me on my arrival.
I would be lying if I said I had specifically fallen in love  ... Read More »

Dear readers,
Voodoo is a religious fusion between ancient West African religions and Catholicism. The slavemasters enforced their christian beliefs onto the slaves whilst the slaves hid their ancient religious practices underground or under catholic terminology. Over time, the two have become rather intertwined, unable to  ... Read More »

Dear readers,
I write in a sad and sombre mood. I start with a verse from the Bible and dedicate it to the people of Haiti.
'So I returned, and considered all the oppressions that are done under the sun: and behold the tears of those oppressed, and they had no comforter; and on the side of their oppressors there  ... Read More »

Dear readers,
Back to earthquake reality I am afraid. Up until now I have described only the beginning foundations of our spinal unit with our handful a spinal patients - essentially a specialist tertiary referral centre being built for a specific type of injury pattern. Although it is really exciting to be present at the  ... Read More »

The marines come to help!  ... Read More »

Dear readers,
Let me now slowly start to introduce the characters of this story. Firstly and most importantly, there is Carwyn and Reninka. Carwyn is one of the two actors who initially set up this project and Reninka is his wife. Carwyn and Reninka have been here permanently for the last year trying to  ... Read More »

Dear readers,
Tonight I will write two days worth of events. I could not write yesterday because electricity has been very intermittent here and I was unable to charge my phone. Although in all honesty, I was out like a Haitian light with no electricity myself and slept straight through my cockerel alarm clock. I shall  ... Read More »

Dear readers,
Tonight, on the eve of Valentines day, I really tried to look for heartwarming and uplifting stories from Haiti before beginning the tales of sadness and heartache later in these updates. However the only romance I have found for you is that tonight as I write this, above this disaster stricken country is the  ... Read More »

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The first 24 hours of the journey to Haiti  ... Read More »

The beginning of the journey to Haiti with the Haiti Hospotal Appeal, a British charity  ... Read More »

I’ve been dreading this day because there is no easy way to say goodbye. I have developed so much affection and respect for Haitians, who carry such dignity in the face of this crippling adversity.
By this time next week I’ll be working in the comfort of my office, worrying  ... Read More »

In any tragedy there are always miraculous moments. A couple of those moments occurred today.
The first was a privileged and lengthy discussion with the young man who works for us as a driver. We’ve been on the road for the last two days towards the north east part of the country, to assess the health needs of  ... Read More »

Things are slowly changing. In fact everyday when I walk into our office and our hospitals there are small noticeable changes and supplies are finally piling up in our storage, there is some order to the madness. MSF’s program is also evolving. I was speaking to a mental health expert who was explaining that this  ... Read More »

I had the scare of my life this morning. I had hoped I could sleep in an extra 10 minutes because I’ve been working on 5 hours a night for the last week and am hitting the bottom of the barrel.   No such luck. I suddenly felt my sleeping bag on the bedroom floor rocking back and forth. For about a second I  ... Read More »

The situation remains critical, few aid agencies in place, still hundreds of bodies stuck in buildings. I've only seen about 4 or 5 trucks and cranes trying to remove buildings to get people out, in the entire city!
The smell can be overwhelming in some areas, where corpses are rotting in the heat and near Internal  ... Read More »

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