Extreme poverty isn't foreign to Lise Budreo. The Bellerose grad has spent time in Africa volunteering to build homes for Habitat for Humanity and travelled through some of the poorest parts of China.
Yet nothing prepared her for the dismal conditions in earthquake-devastated Haiti.
Budreo booked a month off work from her job as an inpatient care nurse at the Holy Cross in Edmonton to volunteer at an orphanage-turned-medical clinic in Tabarre, 25 kilometres northeast of the quake's epicentre. Fourteen-hour days have been the norm since her arrival on March 9, yet she's still coming to grips with the scale of destruction.
"I've seen poverty before but it's nothing compared to anything we're remotely aware of or can relate to," says Budreo in an interview via a crackly online connection (cellphone service is still spotty at best). "The need is still huge."
Two months after the earthquake, Haiti is still a disaster. Buildings and homes lay in rubble, giving rise to large-scale tent cities, some as large as 20,000. Budreo says people are being handed tarps and told, "here is your new home." People refuse to sleep indoors because they're afraid.
"People are fighting for tarps and stuff."
The situation is so dire Haitians don't think about tomorrow or next week. Survival is the main concern. "Every day it's survival."
Makeshift clinic
Despite the chaos, Budreo did not think twice about travelling to Haiti. She's always had an interest in humanitarian relief efforts and says taking a posting with Heartline Ministries was a "no-brainer."
The Christian charity has operated in Haiti for more than 20 years and has set up a medical clinic in the Maranatha Orphanage. All but two of the orphanage's children have left Haiti through a humanitarian parole process to ensure they receive adequate care.
Budreo described the clinic as "makeshift." It has no running water (hand sanitizer is essential) but Heartline flew in supplies to treat about 50 patients at a time. The clinic's doctor and nurses have treated individuals with a range of injuries, from a child who was stepped on to a woman who was buried under a house for five days while eight months pregnant. The mother had a leg amputated below the knee but was able to deliver a healthy boy.
"To hear that kind of stuff is amazing."
Budreo was also moved by Emmanuel, a three-year-old whose face was almost ripped off when a brick landed on his head. The toddler, whose three siblings died in the quake, was treated by a plastic surgeon at a field hospital in Miami.
"He came back to us a couple of days ago and his face, he looks like another little boy," Budreo says.
Hard to put into words
Budreo has recorded her activities for friends and family through an online blog. It's also an opportunity to internalize the experience, which ends with her return on April 6.
In one entry she writes about an 18-month-old infant wrapped in a dirty blanket who had not eaten for 14 days and was suffering from diarrhea. The child's mother appeared apathetic.
"Poor little soul, crying looking at mom with a look in his eyes I have never seen before as if to say, 'I'm scared of you but I love you …' Possibly the worst look I have ever seen before in my life," she wrote.
The United Nations has estimated rebuilding Haiti will cost $11.5 billion over 10 years. Budreo hopes people do not lose sight of the problem once the news headlines subside. Rebuilding will not happen overnight — it will be a generational effort, she says.
"I really hope it changes. I really do."
Budreo's blog can be found at liseinhaiti.blogspot.com.
