Dear Friends,

It’s been three weeks since the catastrophic earthquake of Jan. 12th struck Port-au-Prince.   Thanks to all of you, thousands of earthquake survivors are receiving desperately needed food and water.

Today, another truck full of rice, beans, canned food, and bottled water, paid for with your donations, arrived at the St. Clare’s rectory.  I spoke with Lavarice Gaudin, our program coordinator, this afternoon as the food program was in full swing serving hot meals to about 4,000 people.  Lavarice said the lines are getting longer every day.  He’s deeply concerned that things will get much worse before they get better as malnourishment and disease set in and the rainy season approaches.  Everybody is still living outside.

He asked me to pass on again his gratitude to all of you for your compassion and for sharing your resources so generously at this critical time.

I talked to Bill Quigley, a friend of the foundation, on the phone yesterday.  He just returned from Port-au-Prince and described what he saw this way:

“It is much worse than the images on television.  There are so many people who need help and so few people who have anything.  The airport and main hospital have lots of troops, supplies, and well-organized places, but the rest of the city is empty of aid.  If there are well functioning areas, they are not apparent. What you see is Haitian people trying to make it on their own, but there’s not enough to go around.”

Bill visited the St. Clare’s rectory a number of times.  “There’s no doubt the food program is saving lives.  It’s an oasis of people who work together, understand each other… it’s an island of hope.  There are not enough islands over there.  Children a few miles away who can’t walk to the food program look severely malnourished, listless.  Don’t underestimate how important that meal is.  It meant a lot before, but now, it’s needed more than ever.”

Thank you, our donors, for keeping the meals flowing through your gifts and through your participation in our Tell A Friend campaign.  Every gift, every recommendation, ever fundraiser, every prayer makes a difference.

Piti piti na rive!  Little by little we will arrive.

With love and hope,

Margaret Trost