The new normal

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti-All around the growing piles of dangerous rubble and the squalor of rotting trash in the streets of their capital city, Haitians are living the new normal: In the shadow of a collapsed house, a woman gives a young man a haircut. On the outskirts of a park-turned-tent-city for thousands of displaced people near downtown, a little boy flies a kite made from string and a piece of trash. And near another squalid camp, reeking of trash and human waste, and filled with thousands of homeless people in the city's central plaza-the Champs de Mars-a man sells basic supplies: small cans of deodorant and cooking oil.

But some sights of normal life are hard to process: Near a broken water main, a little girl scoops filthy water and takes big sips from her small hands. On a side street near the collapsed Presidential Palace, the body of a dead man lies face-up in the street, while a skinny man with a wheelbarrow filled with sticks steers around the bloodied corpse.

As life and death continue their morbid mingling in Haiti, relief groups forge ahead to serve thousands, and try to find thousands more waiting for help in a country where coordinating response to a disaster of this magnitude turns into a earth-moving feat itself.

Many of the thousands needing help are in Cité Soleil, the largest slum in Port-au-Prince, just north of downtown. Conditions here were miserable before the earthquake, but on a hot afternoon walking the streets, they seem unbearable: A dry riverbed is packed and overflowing with stinking trash. Pitiful shacks leveled by the earthquake lie on the sides of streets. Since the whole area is treeless, children squeeze into small patches of shade cast by tiny tents.

When workers from Samaritan's Purse approach a sprawling tent city formed after the earthquake, a small crowd presses around, perhaps curious but certainly needy. Jean Claude, an elder at Eglise Chretienne Des Cities, a local church with some 1,600 attendees, says many come to the broken gate of the church each day seeking help. He says they need food, water, and clothes. The church has little to give, and tells them to wait for help.

Each day at locations around the city, non-profit groups ranging from the massive World Health Organization to the smaller, Washington, D.C.-based Food for the Hungry meet to coordinate the best way to offer that help. They exchange information-where they've been, what they plan, and what needs are most acute. They try to avoid duplicating efforts or researching information already discovered.

But that process may change in coming days: At a meeting Friday morning at a UN station in Port-au-Prince, a Haitian government official interrupted the proceedings, demanding that groups notify them of their plans for relief efforts. It's not clear if relief groups will comply-or how serious the demand was-but the incident raises concerns: Will a government notorious for its corruption pollute a process designed to help its own people?

Whatever the government response, Jean Claude, the elder at the church in Cité Soleil, says his church is determined to offer the people of his community whatever material help it can as its able. In the meantime, he says they will continue to offer spiritual help that is sure: "We will knock, and we know the Lord will open the door."

Related coverage:

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