I am ActionAid Haiti’s Communications Coordinator, therefore I am always in the field and I love taking pictures.
Since I joined ActionAid in 2007 I have unfortunately documented a lot of emergencies, some bigger than others.
With Haiti’s particular political and environmental context, emergencies are coming and going: from food riots to floods and schools collapsing, to earthquakes,cholera and political unrest. Despite the fact that I have lived in Haiti my whole life, after the earthquake I always think that the worst is yet to come.
In the past five years, besides the earthquake of 2010, I believe that the year 2008 was the hardest for Haitians in general. With the food riots in April,four hurricanes in September and the school collapsing in November, no one would have imagined that we would have been hit by a 7.0 earthquake two years later.
As much as the earthquake affected me personally, the school collapsing has remained as one of my most traumatic experiences. It was the first time I had ever seen dead children. It took me a long time to shake those images from my mind. I have learned that living in a country like Haiti makes you grow faster and forces you to be more responsible.
Being part of ActionAid Haiti’s team has made me want to work harder to support the most vulnerable people to fight for their inalienable rights. And my colleagues have given me great support to do so.
