Aslaug's Axe Shed

… and swallowed Haiti.

I’m sure a lot of you are fed up with hearing about Haiti. Reading about Haiti. Watching images of distressed people and ruined homes from Haiti.

Corpses from Haiti.

I’m sure a lot of you have had quite enough of it already, but I ask you to please take the time to read this anyway.

I’m asking you to, because Haitians need people to not stop caring. Because they need help.

Haiti is a small country. It takes up less than half of the island of Hispaniola. It is also one of the poorest countries in the world, and it is, without any real competition, the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere.

They don’t have the means to help themselves. They need us … the comparatively wealthy people in the world around them … to help them out.

Imagine living in a place where you have no access to clean water. Then imagine a place where you have access to no water … at all. Imagine living in a place where you don’t have access to food either. Where you can’t get any clothes, even if you are wearing scraps of textile or nothing at all. Imagine all your friends have suddenly died. Everyone. Then imagine you turn around and you realize that the family you had standing behind you until a moment ago are also dead and gone. That if you’re lucky, one of them is still alive but maimed.

Then imagine there is no hospital where you can take your loved one for help.

Imagine there isn’t even a doctor you can contact.

Imagine there is no medicine … not even clean bandages to wrap up the horrendous wounds you see on everyone around you.

Imagine your house is gone. Then imagine you can’t even find the street your house used to be on, because EVERYTHING has been destroyed. Imagine the streets are covered in rubble … and corpses.

Imagine having gone four days without shelter of any kind. Imagine that when you lie down to go to sleep tonight, you have to do so amidst corpses, because no one has the strength or even the ability to remove them. Or imagine you go to sleep next to your last remaining family member, trying to tell him or her that everything will somehow work out and be alright.

Then imagine waking up to see that person dead next to you. Passed away while you slept.

Imagine walking through your home town, only to see people stacking corpse upon corpse in a crude barricade, desperate to show whoever is out there, watching that there is an area that needs help.

Imagine even something that grotesque becoming bland and irrellevant amidst the horrors you’re surrounded by on all sides.

Imagine how your insides scream for food after four days while you watch rescue workers struggling frantically to dig out someone who might still be alive, thinking to yourself “Why bother? Why dig them out to -this-?”

And once you have failed to truly imagine all that, you still haven’t even scratched the surface of what life in Haiti is like now.

If there is Hell on Earth, Haiti is it.

The United Nations has publically proclaimed this the worst natural disaster in modern times. Worse than Hurricane Katrina by MILES. Worse even than the Boxing day Tsunami … or the great Chinese Earthquake of a few years ago.

And here is why this is true.

Haiti does not have the capacity to rebuild itself. Every public institution needed to do so has been destroyed or severely damaged. And even if by a miracle, every government building had remained standing in Port-au-Prince … the people working there are dead or they have lost family and friends en masse.

Even if all those working for the Haitian government hadn’t been bereaved or killed … the issue of money still looms heavy.

Haiti is deeply, -deeply- impoverized. It is a country that has been plagued by one despot ruler after another. But they were on the right track before this happened. Finally they were moving in the right direction. It would have been a long, difficult process but it could have happened. Haiti could have prospered or at least outgrown the worst of its poverty.

Now that may not happen in our lifetimes.

You think I’m exaggerating?

China is still cleaning up the mess after the Earthquake. The Tsunami still impacts the everyday lives of those who lived in the affected areas. Haiti doesn’t have a hinterland to draw on to help clean up this mess. ALL of the country is affected by it.

I never … ever thought I would find myself in complete agreement with a news anchor on Fox News, on practically any topic. I just didn’t think it would happen. I think of Fox as either a joke or an insult, but not a new station. However, then I saw this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MjbBn11bSVA&

I urge you all to watch it. Every horrible second of it. And then I urge you all to reflect -deeply- on what that news anchor says at the end. Because he is right. He speaks to the bad conscience in all of us, and he does so without wrapping it up in finery or niceties.

And then, if you haven’t done so already, I urge you … all of you … to find it in yourselves, to donate something to the International Red Cross. To Doctors without Borders. Or to one of the other great aid-organizations, fighting a desperate battle to save lives and futures in Haiti.

I have done so, and I have so little to give of. I am not rich … I’m on unemployment benefits, but I still found the means to donate about 30 dollars to Doctors without Borders. I may give more next month, because this has affected me to an extent I can’t even begin to describe. But at least I have given -something-.

And here is the crucial, all-important detail for all those of you who say “But if I donate now, will my money matter?”

Yes. It will matter. It takes so little to save a life. And we have so much, in comparison to them. We can all find at least a little. And every penny counts. Even if the money won’t get to those in need for a month … or two … or even three months, it will get there. And this is not something that will go away when the cameras of the news-stations turn to the next hot story.

This will still be there, for those who have to live with it. It will be there in a month … or two … or three.

It’ll be there in a year, or two … or three.

Haiti won’t simply vanish, because the cameras suddenly decide that Paris Hilton’s choice of new dog is more interesting. Or that Sarah Palin’s latest gaffe is of greater importance. It won’t vanish when the cameras and the coverage are no longer there.

Please find it in yourselves to do the right thing … and help people in need.

Thank you for reading.