Haiti Before the Quake

Laura Freschi writes a short introduction to Anne Hasting's narrated slide show about Haiti (Aid Watch, "Haiti’s recent troubled past," January 15, 2010).  Freschi provides a link to the slide show that I encourage readers to view.  I agree with Freschi's description as "eerily prescient."  It is enough to make you weep.

This is Anne Hasting, director of Fonkoze, alternative bank of the poor, in fall of 2008, speaking to reporter Ruxandra Guidi about the damage from the latest hurricanes to hit Haiti. That year, four hurricanes and tropical storms hit Haiti in quick succession, causing mudslides and floods that wiped out the coastal town of Gonaives, killing some 800 people and displacing millions.

Take a moment to watch the narrated slide show, produced by journalist Ruxandra Guidi with photographs by Roberto Guerra and a haunting soundtrack by Luis Guerra.

In these next few days, we turn from our initial horror at Haiti’s new catastrophe to the dizzying, widening view of a human disaster that will take years to recover from. This eerily prescient video is now an artifact of Haiti’s immediate past, when Port-au-Prince, with its houses and markets, slums and palaces, churches and hospitals, was still standing.

Thanks go to reader Luke Seidl for the tip.

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