When Haiti was devastated by an earthquake on January 12, a flood of international media showed up to cover the shock and sadness of a terrible human disaster. But eventually, Haiti will no doubt fade from the headlines and the media will trickle out as the Haitian people continue rebuilding their lives. In the weeks and months ahead, it will be vital to keep up coverage of the massive, long-term recovery effort.Freelance reporter Grant Fuller will help fill the journalism void as he travels to Haiti and produces radio features, audio slideshows, and print articles that tell the stories of the Haitian people trying to move forward.
From Tuning In, the Donate column of WSJ magazine's May issue, sights and sounds recorded on the streets of post-earthquake Port-au-Prince by CLP contributor Grant Fuller.
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Categories: Haiti, Watch, Listen, Poverty and Development
Children in developing countries don't often get to enjoy the privilege of playing with store-bought toys. But for most of them, it doesn't matter. They'll just put together their own makeshift toys to keep themselves occupied. From Port-au-Prince, Grant Fuller brings us a portrait of Haitian kids in an earthquake displacement camp, making do with what they've got.
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Categories: Haiti, Listen, Poverty and Development
What would it take to make the Haitian people laugh in the midst of the disaster? Grant Fuller brings us a story from Port-au-Prince about a street vendor who brings joy to people, one cup of shaved ice at a time.
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Categories: Haiti, Watch, Listen, Poverty and Development
Check out this audio slideshow on NYTimes.com. CLP contributor Grant Fuller recorded all the audio and conducted the interviews. Photographs are by Lynsey Addario. The slideshow accompanies this print article by Simon Romero.
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Categories: Haiti, Watch, Listen, Poverty and Development
In Haiti, it's common to see vendors walking down the street with phones in their hands. That's how they advertise what they're selling: not the phones themselves, but phone calls. Since the January earthquake, though, business hasn't been easy. Reporter Grant Fuller visited a displacement camp in Port-au-Prince, and met one of these phone-call sellers.
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Categories: Haiti, Listen, Poverty and Development
Haiti's only film school, the Ciné Institute, is based in Jacmel, a city hit hard by the earthquake. In the past two months, the young students at the Ciné Institute have given up making fiction and began making documentaries covering the earthquake's aftermath. They've even received international recognition for their work. Grant Fuller visited the school and brings us this story.
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Categories: Haiti, Listen, Poverty and Development
For the girls of Haiti's Under-17 national squad, it's more than just a game. Every member of the 20-girl team was left homeless after the 7.0-magnitude earthquake ravaged their country on Jan. 12. In March, the team competed in the U-17 women's CONCACAF championship in Costa Rica, giving their fellow Haitians back home a small sign of hope and recovery in the wake of death and destruction.
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Categories: Haiti, Costa Rica, Watch, Poverty and Development
The government of Haiti has begun a massive cleanup effort, removing the thousands of piles of rubble left by from the January earthquake. A large dump site has been set up on the outskirts of town, and trucks full of debris arrive throughout the day. Reporter Grant Fuller tells the story of a man in Haiti who salvages metal from this rubble.
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Categories: Haiti, Listen, Poverty and Development
It was a sight I expected to see. Bodies, corpses, cadavers, whatever you wanna call them. From the horrific shots of dump trucks carting them off to the gruesome stories told by friends who came before me, I knew I’d see something unpleasant. But it took me almost three weeks in Haiti, until my next-to-last day here, to see one single dead person.
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Categories: Haiti, Blogs, Poverty and Development
I’m living in a dining room. Hotel Karibe was one of the finest hotels in Port-au-Prince. Now, its cracked-up main building is clearly unsafe for guests. But the rest of the hotel facilities (dining hall, conference center, restaurant) are in good shape. And so, for lack of a better option, they’ve emptied out the dining tables and set up 18 double beds around the perimeter of this spacious room. Welcome to the new Hotel Karibe, where privacy suddenly takes a backseat to safety.
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Categories: Haiti, Blogs, Poverty and Development
This 3-for-1 combo blog post is a good indication of how busy I’ve become. I only have two full days left in Haiti, so I’ve been trying to make the most of my time. At the risk of sounding like a whiny privileged foreigner, I’ll say that I’m tired. All the driving around, all the collapsed buildings, all the sad stories, all the nonstop work has started to take its toll. But then again, I obviously have nothing to complain about. So I’ll just shut up now, you’re welcome.
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Categories: Haiti, Watch, Poverty and Development
Hurry up and wait. That’s been the theme of my time in Haiti. Today was full of frustration as my best efforts were thwarted at nearly every turn. Even if you start at the crack-a-dawn, you can easily spend an entire day and get very little done.
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Categories: Haiti, Blogs, Poverty and Development
After two weeks in Port-au-Prince, I finally got a chance to see more of Haiti. I’d heard stories about places like Leogane and Jacmel. That they were completely flattened and had received an incredibly slow trickle of aid since the earthquake. I braced for the worst.
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Categories: Haiti, Blogs, Poverty and Development
You’ll have to excuse the excessive use of kid photos. Ever since the first couple days when I wrote that there were no children around, I’ve been surrounded by them.
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Categories: Haiti, Blogs, Poverty and Development
Before I came to Haiti, I had no idea what to expect. The image you get from the outside is of a completely destroyed wasteland where the most basic needs are nowhere to be found. No food and water, no electricity, no medical supplies, no nothing. Then, of course, you get here and realize the image in your head was a bit exaggerated. Yes, it’s a disaster zone and yes, people are struggling. But that suitcase full of bottled water, beans, and camping gear that I (perhaps naively) lugged over here hasn’t been the necessity I thought it might be.
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Categories: Haiti, Blogs, Poverty and Development
I hesitate to even mention this because it’s a story we’ve all heard a thousand times in the past month: the tragic tale of another disaster victim. And yet that doesn’t make their stories any less heartbreaking, any less powerful. So here goes.
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Categories: Haiti, Watch, Blogs, Poverty and Development
The period of mourning is over. And in my opinion, the country is better off than it was last week. I told a Haitian friend I thought it was the happiest three days of mourning I’d ever seen. She informed me that the word “mourning” wasn’t exactly the best translation. It was more like a time to hope, a time to remember.
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Categories: Haiti, Blogs, Poverty and Development
My first radio dispatch from Haiti hit the airwaves today on World Vision Report. Senegal offers to resettle Haitians in the land of their African ancestors. An intriguing thought, but many in Port-au-Prince aren’t ready to abandon ship just yet. Listen above. There’s also a slideshow, and an audio postcard of a church forced into the street.
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Categories: Haiti, Listen, Blogs, Labor and Immigration, Poverty and Development
Today began three days of mourning in Haiti. Exactly one month ago, just before 5 p.m., “the event” struck this land. Finally, Haitians are taking time to honor their dead and reflect on their new reality.
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Categories: Haiti, Watch, Blogs, Poverty and Development
Traffic was a nightmare. Since most of my day was spent in the car, I'll give you a taste of what I saw.
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Categories: Haiti, Watch, Poverty and Development
This was a day for decisions. After spending all day on the UN base because of a story deadline, I decided I’m ready to get out. It’s been nearly a week, and I’m sick of this lifestyle. I go from the tent to the cafeteria to the Internet spot to the bathroom to the bank, and back again. Everything is so sterile, white-washed, without character. Sure, there are plenty of perks: free wireless, free lodging, plenty of food and water.
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Categories: Haiti, Watch, Poverty and Development
It was a pretty uneventful day. It started off in the bank line on base. Since I’m trying to keep a low profile around here, I had no idea there was a bank.
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Categories: Haiti, Blogs, Poverty and Development
Surprise, surprise. I saw more destruction today. A woman I interviewed gave me a driving tour of her neighborhood. The school she grew up in, gone. The church her mother forced her to attend, gone. Her friend’s home, gone.
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Categories: Haiti, Blogs, Poverty and Development
I called my interpreter this morning, wondering why she was running late. "I’m just waiting for the driver," she said. "I should still make it on time." That’s when I realized I’d been operating an hour ahead of Haiti for the past two days. Sigh. Definition of a boneheaded mistake. But seriously, who’d have thunk that two countries sharing the same island would be in different time zones?
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Categories: Haiti, Blogs, Poverty and Development
I take back what I said yesterday about the destruction not being so bad. Or rather, I’ll take this opportunity to revise it. Downtown Port-au-Prince is a disaster, no ifs, ands or buts about it.
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Categories: Haiti, Blogs, Poverty and Development
I got a late start this morning, thanks to a slight wardrobe malfunction (forgot to bring underwear).
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Categories: Haiti, Blogs, Poverty and Development
When Haiti was devastated by an earthquake Jan. 12, a flood of international media showed up to cover the shock and sadness of a terrible human disaster. But eventually, Haiti will no doubt fade from the headlines and the media will trickle out as the Haitian people continue rebuilding their lives. In the weeks and months ahead, it will be vital to keep up coverage of the massive, long-term recovery effort. Freelance reporter Grant Fuller will help fill the journalism void as he travels to Haiti and produces radio features, audio slideshows and print articles that tell the stories of the Haitian people trying to move forward.
[more]
Categories: Haiti, CLP Updates, Poverty and Development
Pakistan gets plenty of press for bomb attacks and international terrorist threats. After two months traveling the country last year, CLP journalists found that the ongoing crisis here has its roots in a corrupt and collapsing education system that is feeding poverty, discontent and violence.
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