Today we attempted the Greenhill clinic. The truck was to leave Lenakel around 8am, so we watched through the rain for about an hour for the truck this morning. Then Cassidy, Courage and I went to shore with all our medical supplies and started to walk to the village south of here where the inhabitants came, welcomed us to their beach, and told us their entire village blew down. We made their village before the truck came (the truck never came due to the rain). We saw the overhangs and caves they were living in with their few recovered material possessions. They had a single brick house, which only had 2 x 3 foot tall walls standing left. Everything else was gone. The family started in the house, then ran to another thatch shelter until it fell, ultimately ran to caves in the hills to hide with the pigs. The caves they live in now were below the wave surge line.
They have rebuilt a single house that stores their food aid and a generator he had that survived. Half of that floor was dry with woven mats on it. The other half was muddy. The roof did not leak and it was pouring rain, so that was nice, but the bamboo siding let in light, so I imagine if there's wind with the rain it comes in the sides too. They have found a few of their pans, only have the shirts that were on their backs, but somehow they have mosquito netting which it sounds like they have from before. They are living under overhanging rocks. There were some palm leaves enclosing a shelter with woven mat flooring, 3 mosquito nets up, a single woven basket and a one pint plastic bottle of water. When we originally walked up to the "village" we saw the women with the children under an overhang with a pan of cooked yams they were sharing. They spoke no English, so sent us over to the men.
There was another rock structure with a roof and metal siding walls, but the roof was flat with palm leaves (no slope), so it leaked despite the fact that it also had a tarp on it. There were 2 mosquito nets up and there was one foam mat that was soaked. There was a girl in there that had stepped on a bottle a year and a half ago. I think she did not get care right away, so it got infected and became osteo. She had surgeries in Port Vila and her lateral 3 metatarsals were missing, then there was a somewhat crude skin graft/flap of her lateral foot to cover the wound. It was healed and not infected, but bumpy and didn't look like it would tolerate much pressure across the wound. She had a wheelchair beside the "house", which was just laughable. I guess if they give it to you, you keep it. But it's hard enough to get around on this terrain with two feet stable; there is NO place that a wheelchair could go around here. A 4x4 truck could not even pick us up on the road. I looked at the wound, and then wrapped it back up. We had some donated ACE supports for elbows onboard, so I brought one and we made a nice covering for her foot rather than the torn up sheet she had. She was pretty excited. When they heard I was a doctor, they asked if we could leave some medical supplies because it's so hard to get medical care here. They have to walk to the airport where they can catch a truck to Lenakel, but then it's a long wait too. We gave them a basic first aid kit - antibiotic cream, Band-Aids, gauze, antibacterial soap, toothbrushes and toothpaste (theirs blew away), and Tylenol. My goal is to see if we can get her up using crutches or something, maybe with a platform shoe? I don't know, but she's 20-30 years old and is going to get pressure sores and pneumonia if she sits in a wet house and does not/cannot move. I noticed a girl at the village we went to yesterday had some crutches. We may go to tomorrow (but it's pouring rain and we went straight up a muddy hillside to get there yesterday) and I will see if I can get them?? Otherwise, maybe we can build some.
It is a little hard to understand why they have one house after 6 weeks. It takes maybe 3-7 days to build a local house as we've been told. Working hard of course, but it's possible. A charity came through, gave them some corrugated steel and built a 12x12 structure with a roof, but no walls. They are collecting water from the roof, but only 3 streams of it into a 3 gallon bucket, they have no gutter on it. Courage gave them a 4-inch plastic tube they can cut down the side, attach to the roof, and then collect much more water. They used to walk to a river to get water, but their plastic bottles are all gone. We brought them some old, empty jugs we've been keeping as we use up food items, but if they can collect water onsite, they won't have to walk it all over the place. They had wood, fallen corrugated steel, a little new steel, and surrounding leaves they use for roofing all laying where the houses used to be.
They indicated the main reason they have not built is that they didn't have nails. Courage asked where his hammer was and he said, that's another reason, they have no hammer (but they can use their machete to pound nails in if needed). He also asked for an axe. We don't have an axe, but gave him a large machete that made him happy, a hammer, and nails. He said when he was staged; he could get family from the hills to come help him build. Courage lent them a metal file to sharpen their tools, and we hope they are ready to rebuild their village.
They said they went to town and got some hooks, but didn't have fishing line. They normally fish when they can for food, but also have some farming on the hillside. We gave them some more fishing supplies and we have seen them out fishing, so we know it is getting good use.
Finally, I have clothes on the boat that the children have outgrown. All of them were wearing pretty well worn out clothing. Some clothes were drying on the rocks (but it was raining, so not going to happen this week probably) and they were so thin, faded, with holes. I'm sure they've worn these for a long time. I gathered together a couple of bags of clothes, mostly for the children, a few for the men and women, and brought that in. They were quite happy, I'm curious to see if they are wearing them when we come back. There were also a bunch of sleepers since they are basically sleeping outside in the rain and elements each night. There were only 3 children here now, but another family went to the hills to visit family when a truck came through the other day. There are normally 4 families and 8 kids here, so we left extra.
They asked us for an American flag, so maybe tomorrow we'll bring them one. They were very appreciative and while we went to gather the things, they sent some girls up to the farm who came back with a wonderful yam. They were sure they had enough food and that it was OK. It was 10-15 pounds and plenty for all 3 boats to split it. We cooked it up like a potato for dinner tonight and it was quite nice.
Again, not the day we'd planned at all, but a very interesting day overall. We have learned a lot, we have resupplied them with "stuff", and hopefully solved some of their problems. Our biggest benefit I think would be outfitting this girl to walk, maybe with a homemade platform shoe and crutches. We did not address it with her, as it was more of an afterthought.
I don't want to put her at risk for falling though and getting more hurt, but I think her life is basically over if she can't move.
. . When discussing with her, she is not able to be mobile. We knew the wheelchair was useless. I also did not ask her where she was during the hurricane? Did family just carry her as they ran from place to place?? I bet that's a fascinating story.
Shannon
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