by Rick Perera, CARE Emergency Media Officer in Haiti

February 1, 2010

We're all starting to feel a little safer, and more relaxed – though that's a relative term, of course. We've noticed that there have not been aftershocks in a week or so. The mass distribution of rice that got underway yesterday has gone smoothly so far – a huge relief since many survivors have had nothing to eat since the quake. Of course it will take a long time to reach everyone in need, but the system is working well so far.

Just now structural engineers declared our three staff apartments, even those on the fourth floor, safe for occupancy, so we will have more room to spread out for the night. Some will remain on mattresses on the floor, of course, but I don' mind for a few more days – a slumber party is just one more bonding experience with these people who have become closer than family during the past two weeks.

Sophie Perez, our amazingly dedicated country director, has gone on a much-deserved week's leave, to take her children to stay with family in France. They all need a break from a stressful environment.

With some flights resuming from Port-au-Prince, it's getting easier for staff to get in and out, without arduous trips by land or nail-biting waits for unpredictable aid flights. Many of the first wave of emergency staff are starting to be replaced with new models. Team Leader David Gazashvili (unmistakable in his dirty CARE T-shirt, Frankenstein boots, and surgical mask) left last week to resume charge of the emergency unit at HQ. Our IT hero Astor Chirinos, who took us from text-message-only to full-scale satellite Web access in a few days, has returned home to his wife (in Atlanta and in contractions). He seemed sad to leave, and unfazed by the new-father role (it's a sequel).

My own "relief," the indefatigable Melanie Brooks, CARE International's media and communications coordinator, who is scheduled to depart Geneva tomorrow, overlapping for a couple of days so I can hand off media operations here. It will be awfully nice to see her! She's planning to stay on for two or three weeks after I leave, and then we’ll decide how to proceed.

The media onslaught has slowed somewhat but is still pretty ferocious. Last night, I appeared on the "Tagesschau," the premiere evening news of Germany, to the surprise of many friends (I used to live in Berlin), and was the subject of a story in the Berkshire Eagle, my hometown newspaper. I'd like to thank my high school French teacher, Mrs. Krause, as well as my agent, my producer, my family, my cats, best boy, gaffer, key grip… (cue get-off-the-stage music).

I finally managed to copy all my journalist contacts scrawled in notebooks over the past two weeks into an Excel spreadsheet: 136 (and counting). There were days during the first week when I actually did 15 interviews in a single day. Seems like years ago.

It ain't over yet, of course. Tomorrow, my photographer colleague Evelyn Hockstein and I will leave at 8:00 a.m. for an excursion to the city of Gros-Marne, in northwest Haiti, to see where displaced people who have fled Port-au-Prince are camping, and how CARE plans to help them and their host communities. We've invited journalists to come along but, being creatures of deadline, they have yet to confirm.

On Wednesday, from "the field," I'll speak to David Lewis, an old CNN friend and current star of WMLB radio in Atlanta. On Thursday, the hills are alive with the sound of an interview with Radio Bavaria. And on Friday… well, no doubt we'll find that out soon enough.

Rick smiles for the camera. Photo: 2010 Evelyn Hockstein/CARE

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