Haiti Earthquake Relief Project

Name: Surjit Singh
Age: 38
Occupation: Chef
Hometown: Surrey, BC

Why I felt compelled to go on this mission:
While assisting with the fundraisers at the various radio stations, I came to realize how generously donors opened their hearts and pockets. The image of Sikhs in the media has changed since, and now that the opportunity to help them directly, in person. I would to take advantage. If some have given money, others are giving time. I, and the many other “sevadars” there are ambassadors of Sikhs, and have a great responsibility. I pray to God that fulfill this duty.

Name: Jasvir Singh Chattha
Age: 37
Occupation: Painting Business Owner
Hometown: Surrey, BC

Why I felt compelled to go on this mission:
I am going to Haiti because the people of Haiti are in need of aid, relief, and love; the guru blessed each of us with the opportunity to go to these people and give of ourselves. I am honored to be of service and to fulfill my responsibility to my fellow people. The Haitian earthquake was a tragedy of untold proportions and it is the obligation of every Sikh to do what they can to help alleviate the suffering of our brothers and sisters no matter where they reside.

Jericho Camp Update:
Today Doctors from United Sikhs, brought Ice Cold Soft Drinks for all the Langaar Sevadaars in honour of their dedication and service.

This may not seem like a big deal, but this is our first cold soda since we got here. It just makes you realize once again, that we have so much at home and there are so many things that we take for granted and don’t think twice about and even wasting. Everyone has thrown away a can of pop that they could not finish or if it goes flat – I know the group here will think twice before wasting any food or drink in the future.

Take Care,
Team Jericho

Yesterday, the United Sikhs Medical Team arrived in Port-Au-Prince. The team includes 3 doctors, 1 physical therapist and 1 occupational therapist. One of the doctors is a specialist in rehab and physical medicine and so he and the physical therapist and occupational therapist have set up a rehab camp at the nearby makeshift hospital. Even though they’ve just arrived, it looks like they’ve been doing a lot of good work already! There are a lot of horrific injuries at the hospital that require rehabilitation therapists and doctors and it looks as if the Medical Team is filling this previously unfilled void effectively.

Even though our Medical Team, as doctors, have been around pain and suffering so many times before, they have encountered injuries that have left them puzzled and fully appreciative of the unique extent of the destruction caused by the earthquake last month.

Two of our Team Members left this morning and we were sad to see them go. On the bright side, we’re looking forward to the arrival of Team Kitsilano from Vancouver in 2 days and other volunteers from California!

Take Care,
Team Jericho

Haiti Relief Team, Team Kitsilano, is leaving tomorrow at 4pm. Please join us at Guru Nanak Gurdwara at 4pm, Feb 4th for a special Ardaas (Prayer Service) before they leave.

Yesterday was tough, although it started promisingly. It was our first day without the volunteers (sevadaars) from Toronto and our team handled the cooking and the packaging of the food like seasoned veterans. However, the distribution of the food was challenging to say the least.

The usual setup is that we go to one location that has been scouted in advance and all of the meals are distributed there. The scouting team has a number of considerations in mind when deciding whether or not to approve a site for the distribution of meals. Chief among them is security. When determining security, many factors are important: whether the site is a closed environment (e.g. a church or an orphanage), number of people expected and the reputation of the area.

Yesterday was different. We did scout one area for distribution and it went well although only a quarter of our meals were ultimately distributed there. Word of our arrival was not adequately communicated to the people in that area. We scrambled to find a second location which also went well although we still had around half of our meals left at that point! At this point, our Haitian Police escort abandoned us even though we told them that we still had half our meals left to distribute. We pleaded with them and also with the United Nations Military Police but no one was willing to escort us. Although we were uneasy about pressing ahead without our security escort, we had no choice; the meals had to be distributed.

Finding people who are hungry in Port-au-Prince is not difficult. One of our Haitian volunteers took us out to the streets to hand out the rest of the meals. We stopped at one location and after we distributed a few meals, things got unruly. Things started out well with children lined up at the beginning of the line although that superficial order quickly fell apart. One crazed man went right up to our truck and began throwing the meals at some of our volunteers and also onto the ground. Without a security escort, we had no choice but to quickly leave that site as things were quickly becoming dangerous. We later found out that he was upset because we were delivering hot meals rather than raw goods that he and his associates could steal and then sell for a profit.
 
 

 
 
We still had a few hundred meals left at this point and one of the Haitians in our team guided us to the fourth and final site for the day. Right away we should have known that going to one of the major shantytowns in Port-au-Prince was not a good idea, especially without a security escort. I guess all of us were just tired and we wanted to go back to the camp and so we were not at our sharpest. Right away we were bombarded with hundreds of desperately poor Haitians who were literally fighting with each other for the meals. We felt sick at what was going on but we were helpless in our attempts to instil order. We saw old men steal meals from children, a woman steal a meal from a pregnant woman and many other shocking sights. Eventually, we distributed all of the meals and departed back to the camp without any serious problems.
 
 

 
 
We learnt a lot of lessons from yesterday. Mostly, we will strive to be better when it comes to scouting locations for the distribution of meals. We will never again head out to sites that pose any potential for danger. Lastly, we found out the crucial need for having a security escort in a country such as Haiti where law and order is not a given, especially at a time such as now.

We are not deterred from our mission here. We are not letting one bad experience ruin our mood and we are certain that today’s distribution will go well! We are heading to a UNICEF camp and have had satisfactory assurances about the security situation there.

Take Care,
Team Jericho

Effectively chronicling the human tragedies that have taken place in Haiti since the earthquake struck is a nearly impossible task.  How is one orphan’s story any more or less distressing or significant than the thousands of others?  And yet it is still necessary to do what we can to highlight specific heart-rending and also heart-warming events in an effort to provide greater context for those of us who have not witnessed the devastation firsthand.  It is crucial that we do not fall into the trap of looking at Haiti’s anguish through the prism of statistics and data.  The suffering is real and it touches millions.  It is no less real than the suffering we see elsewhere and it does not demand any less of us as Sikhs.

Haiti’s plight was enormous even before the earthquake battered its people.  Poverty was extreme; good governance was absent; effective planning was lacking and its people lacked access to basic services that we usually take for granted.  The earthquake has magnified all of those problems and the results have been catastrophic.  The price of food has skyrocketed and the distribution of food has also been seriously disrupted.  The destabilization in the food situation combined with the destabilization in the income of millions of Haitians has resulted in our mission here.  Many of us have been doing what we can to listen to and console the earthquake’s victims and yet we do not lose sight of the fact that our current mission is primarily about feeding those who are hungry and providing water to those who are desperate to quench their thirst.

Our team members here have all borne witness to events that they will remember for their rest of their lives.  Some of these events have shaken us deeply while other events have left us with faith that the resiliency of the Haitian people will see them through this dark period.

A short glimpse into Haiti’s agony was encountered right at the border between the Dominican Republic and Haiti.  A young boy, no more than 6 or 7 years old ran up to our van and before long we were skipping stones across the lake with him and trying to understand how he was personally affected by the earthquake.  He told us that his entire family had been killed and that he was alone and helpless.  We fed him and also provided him with a pillow and a blanket.  We did our best to flag down a UNICEF bus but it went by too fast and unfortunately we had to head on to Port-Au-Prince in the hopes that someone else would help this boy.  The frustration at how little we could do in that situation still frustrates us today.

Charles is a little boy who is 8 years old and he comes to our camp regularly.  He is let in by the United Nations Military Police who do not usually allow children into the area that we are located.  The Military Police let him in because they know that we are here to take care of him and to feed him.  Today we bathed him and brushed his teeth as well which he was really eager for.  After his bath, he even requested that we tie a dastar (turban) on him which he happily showcased to everyone he could find!  He also regularly participates in singing the keertan that is playing in the camp which we all find really inspirational.  He is getting very close to and comfortable with us and all of us will be sad to let him go when we leave from here.

Yesterday we took a tour around downtown Port-Au-Prince and witnessed some of the worst affected areas from the earthquake.  As we approached the Presidential Palace we saw a sight that spoke so tellingly to the state of Haiti’s government. The metaphor of a destructed crumbling palace coupled with the sight of Haiti’s people standing in the forefront against a gate that protected their once gleaming White House was enough to make one stop in awe. We spoke with some of these people to find out what they were feeling and how they were coping. We found one gentleman leaning against the gate who spoke English very well and when we asked how they were feeling he said, “It is like something is broken inside us that is still not right…”. Many around him had lost family members and loved ones, though his family had been spared. They were extremely appreciative of the global community’s aid and assistance during this traumatic time. We dug a little deeper and asked for their thoughts and feelings about their government. There is a pervasive mood of dismay and abandonment amongst the people of Haiti; they feel that the government does nothing to help the people but instead only help themselves. We asked the gentleman who was translating to convey a message that we as Sikhs and Canadians were here to help in any way we could and that we would also go back home and encourage our government to continue their aid to Haiti.

Down the road from us there is a makeshift hospital that we visit every day.  When visiting it yesterday to drop off lunch for the hospital’s children, we witnessed the birth of a baby boy right in front of our eyes.  The joy of the people at the birth of the child was stirring.  Our team members were moved to be able to hold the baby in our arms.  One of our team members did a short ardaas (prayer) that this newborn grow up and become a leader in growing Haiti and helping the people of his country.

There are many other stories and we hope to keep you all posted!

-Team Jericho

Haiti Relief Team 2 – has been codenamed Team Kitsilano. Yes you guessed it – teams are named after Vancouver beaches. Why? – Well why not!

More details, profiles coming soon.

We’ll be calling the Guru Nanak Gurdwara at 12pm on Jan 31st to give a live update to the Sangat. The Gurdwara will put this on speaker phone and we can share our experience in the last few days with the Sangat and provide some tips for the next volunteer teams

Take care,
Team Jericho

Today was our first full day in Port-au-Prince. We began our day at 5am and after getting ready, we started to prepare the daily meal for 1,600. We also became aware that the team here prepares a separate meal for the children at the local hospital, many of whom are orphans.

We dropped off the meal at the hospital at noon and witnessed many amazing sights and had the honour to meet a number of courageous doctors who were doing all they could do to alleviate the suffering around them.

Our daily routine also includes scouting locations for the distribution of the meals. Today, we received a tip of a slum that was located one hour outside of the international relief efforts and was therefore neglected by the other relief organizations.

We went to distribute the meal at 2pm and found the local Haitians to be very organized. Children received their meals first and were followed by older children and then adults.

The experience of distributing the food was extremely moving for all of us. We will provide an update with videos and pictures as soon as possible.

Beginning tomorrow we will take full seva of the langar as the group of volunteers/sevadars from Toronto are heading home. The days will become even busier but we will try our best to keep the sangat updated.

Take care,
Team Jericho

Announcing Haiti Toy and School Material Drive

Even before the earthquake on January the 12th, Haiti was one of the world’s poorest countries and has been swamped with orphans. It was estimated before the earthquake, that over 380,000 children were living in orphanages or group homes, as reported by the United Nations Children’s Fund.

Many of the Haitian children lost their parents in previous disasters, including four tropical storms or hurricanes that killed about 800 people in 2008, deadly storms in 2005 and 2004, and massive floods almost every other year since 2000. Others have been abandoned amid the Caribbean nation’s long-running political strife, which has led thousands to seek asylum in many other countries.

Guru Nanak Sikh Gurdwara will be collecting donated toys and school material such as colouring books, pencils and pads, in hope that these donations will provide comfort to the children of Haiti and help them get through the terrible ordeal they’ve been going through.

“While we recognize the impact the earthquake has had on the people of Haiti, we’re doing everything we can with sending financial donations and relief teams. We’re also now concerned about the numerous children who have lost entire families and are now orphans” Ranjit Singh Sambhi, Member of Guru Nanak Gurdwara

Drop of toys and school material to the Guru Nanak Gurdwara. We’ll be sending as many as we can with the next group of relief workers and then ship the rest  through other organizations. Get involved today!

Stage 1 – Vancouver to Seattle – Complete
Stage 2 – Seattle to New York – Complete
Stage 3 – New York to Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic – Complete
Stage 4 – Santo Domingo to Haiti Border – Complete
Stage 5 – Haiti Border to Base Camp – Complete

01/29/2010 – update 6
3.19pm PST – United Sikhs camp setup in Haiti is amazing. Things are going great and Team Jericho group is learning our way around the camp and kitchen. We’ve now started to make dinner for the old group and will be cooking the thousands of daily meals starting tomorrow. Sikh volunteer group from Toronto are doing amazing volunteer service.
Take care,
Team Jericho

01/29/2010 – update 5
1.24pm PST – Arrived at Port-au-Prince; at the United Sikhs relief mission. Wow the impact of the Earthquake is… we’re all just lost for words. This is a real eye opener. More detailed updates later.
Take care,
Team Jericho

01/29/2010 – update 4
4.47am PST – We’re near the Haitian border now; waiting to get supplies for our trip across. Drive from Santo Domingo took longer than expected (understatement). We spent the night in a hostel owned by Fransisco, our eyes and ears (and speaker) on the ground here. Anxious to get to Port-au-Prince.
Take care,
Team Jericho

01/28/2010 – update 3
5.51pm PST – Just arrived at the hostel, by the Haitian Border. All team members are doing great and in high spirits. Will be resting up here for the night and crossing the border into Haiti in the morning to reach our final destination, the United Sikhs base camp.
Take care,
Team Jericho

01/28/2010 – update 2
9.34am PST – Just arrived in Santa Domingo. Getting off the plane and meeting with the United Sikhs crew here to drive us to base camp.
Take care,
Team Jericho

01/28/2010 – update 1
Our first post! We’ve just arrived at JFK-NYC, waiting for our flight that will take us to Santo Domingo (and then a 7-10 hour drive to Port au Prince, Haiti). Everyone is in pretty high spirits, anxious, but excited to get on the ground and get to work.
We would like to thank our airline, JetBlue, who was incredibly helpful; they accepted all of our luggage and relief supplies, even suitcases weighing up to 97 lbs!

Okay, we will keep you posted on further developments.
Take care,
Team Jericho

Name: Sukhpreet Singh Heir
Age: 25
Occupation: Border Services Officer (Canada Border Services Agency)
From: Surrey, BC

Why I felt compelled to go on this mission:
I felt it was my duty as a Sikh of today’s generation to put into practice the great teachings of our Gurus of selfless service to all of humanity. I see the people of Haiti as our brothers and sisters and by helping them we are serving humanity in the way that Ten Gurus intended, in the true spirit of Sikhism.

Name: Sukhminder Singh
Age: 26
Occupation: Law Graduate
Hometown: Surrey, BC

Why I felt compelled to go on this mission:
I’m going to Haiti because sewa needs to be done; it is not good enough to help ourselves, we must also help those in other countries. I hope by helping the Haitian we will promote the common destiny of all humanity.

Name: Japnaam Singh
Age: 23
Occupation: Articled Student
Hometown: Vancouver, BC

Why I felt compelled to go on this mission:
I’m going to Haiti because all of us are god’s children – regardless of caste, race, nationality or social status. The Haitian earthquake was a tragedy of untold proportions and it is the obligation of every Sikh to do what they can to help alleviate the suffering of our brothers and sisters no matter where they reside.