The Destramy family were already poor before the earthquake struct. Now they have no home, no food and just water from the stream.

We found them living in the ruins of their collapsed home....the curtain still blowing in a front room now wide open to the street.

"We didn't foresee this event so we had no food supplies at home," says the father, Sony, 43, from Mariani district in Port au Prince, an area badly hit by the quake.

Once a street vendor selling plastic bags, Sony became too ill to work. His wife Monique, 48, used to sell drinking glasses but they all got smashed in the earthquake.

"I was ill and lying on my bed in front of the house when the earthquake happened. My head just spun - I didn't know what was happening.

"My children were inside as the house started to collapse around us. It was all so quick. They got out but everything's been destroyed.”

The family is living on the street - like all the others in the area - under sheets strung between broken down buildings.

Their neighbours are sharing rice and spaghetti with them.

"It's difficult to find food and it's expensive. We have no money to buy anything," says Monique.

Their two children - Michou, 10, (girl) and Wendy, 12, (boy) are both sponsored by ActionAid Italy.

They attend the local school - run by partners COZPAM for the poorest children in the area - but this building has been destroyed as well.

450 children are sponsored in the Mariani district of Port au Prince and another 550 in Phillipeau - which is less badly affected.

People are still being located while many have left for the countryside to stay with relatives.

"We just want our children to go to school and find somewhere safe to sleep," says Monique.

Image note:
Michou (10) and Wendy (12) Destramy live in the Mariani district of Port-au-Prince and are twoof the Haitian kids sponsored by ActionAid Italy that survived the earthquake. ©Charles Eckert/ActionAid

 

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