Living Water Community

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Living Water Refreshes Grenada


By Laura Ann Phillips - LWC Member
 

    Miss Gertrude may sleep a little easier now. At 75, the widow faced Hurricane Ivan with only her scrawny ginger kitten for company. Now, she faces a future as part of a wider community that cares.

    We went to see her after one of the members of Living Water Community's (LWC) Trinidad construction team - in Grenada to help with construction work who, after work the previous day, had gone 'exploring' the neighbourhood.  He'd been attracted by the incredible sight of a little wooden house on stilts with only two walls standing. Miss Gertrude had allowed him to come up to see the rest of her house. She'd sat on the bed, he said, and, immediately, streams of water issued out from the corners like a squeezed dish sponge. That was where she slept night after night, rainy or starry.

    When we found her, she was washing a few pieces of clothing in the inky depths of a bucket, in the under room formed by the wooden posts that held up her house. She had got the water from a neighbour a few doors down, after another neighbour stopped allowing her to use his garden tap. There's still water in the mains, but not everyone was fortunate enough to remain connected.

    To get to Miss Gertrude's hillside home, just ten minutes away from
Grenville's commercial area, we first had to scramble through a spaghetti of electric cables - thanking God that the island's electricity supply was not yet up - and over a fallen lamp post, nearly a foot in circumference, which stretched out across the access to her yard, the bottom of the hill. Once over, one landed on the first of almost 15 stones and roots that jutted out from the steep incline, which formed steps up the 'path' to her home.

    Miss Gertrude polite enough, considering that Ivan had left only her
bed, a few battered pairs of shoes, a picture of the Sacred Heart - still hanging on a wall that now stood at a 35 degree angle - a vase of silk flowers and a few dresses. She tried bravely to recount what had happened the night that Ivan struck, but finally ended in tears, the reality of no food, running water, resources or support finally taking their toll.

    But, she was able to smile later that day, when more of the construction team came to assess the damage to her house, and promised assistance in rebuilding. And, a few days later, as she stood beside a truck  that was being loaded with galvanise and lumber for the project, her excitement was almost palpable.

    "I like how all you move," she smiled. "All you move real good with
mih."

    Through the kindness of many agencies and individuals, LWC has been able to send almost half a million TT dollars in aid to Grenada, and  teams of volunteers to help with distributing food and clothing, and rebuilding spirits and structures in an island in which everything that could go wrong, already has.


TOP TO BOTTOM
    More than 20 years after the coup, Grenada continues to nurture a strong communist element. Against such a background, Hurricane Ivan was seen by many as 'the great leveller'. Within the first hours of its onslaught, as villagers and squatters were fleeing their twisted, crumbling shacks, the island's Governor General and the First Family were running for cover, according to media reports, and the official residence of the Prime Minister was destroyed. Vicar General of the Roman Catholic Church, Monsignor Cyril La Montagne, whose own residence was severely damaged, observed that the looting of homes and businesses that began while Ivanšs winds still howled,
may have been spurred by hopes of attaining that long-elusive 'equality'.

    "We have had four years of communism, and the people who were children then are adults now," said the Monsignor. "After that time, things became very unequal; there was a wide gap between the 'haves' and 'have nots'.

    "Many people are saying that Ivan has levelled everything: I have not, so I'm looting and stealing'. And stealing with a kind of anger," he mused.

    Speaking about the widespread looting of supermarkets and warehouses, an angry Upper Lucas Street resident, just down the hill from the official Governor General's residence, said, "I'm very ashamed of my people. If they had left everything there would have been enough to feed everyone for one month!"

    The early looting was part of the reason that CARICOM troops and others from various territories were sent in early. By Wednesday, a combined camp had been established less than a mile east of the Point Salines Airport in the island's west coast, and various troops assigned areas of responsibility. Their peacekeeping efforts combined with a state-enforced curfew have, so far, quelled further civil misbehaviour.


AID DISTRIBUTION

    The week after Hurricane Ivan pounded Grenada, the Living Water
Community sent its first team to the island to take emergency food, water clothing and construction materials, and to assess the damage. In those first days when the island was slowly shaking itself, it was tough going for the team to get around the island and the people who were only just realising the extent of the destruction.

    "People have to understand that Grenada is on hold in the sense that everything is hard to do," said Rose Jackman, Co-Founder of the Community and head of the initial Trinidad mission to Grenada. "It takes time to do everything. And everything costs money!"

    Many groups, organisations and governments have come to Grenada's aid; International Red Cross trucks distributing food in various villages is a common sight. However, one of the internal weaknesses of the national distribution framework is that, as yet, there has been no government initiative to co-ordinate the distribution efforts of the various organizations currently at work in Grenada. Because each group works so independently, there is no way of knowing exactly who's doing what, and where.

    The Catholic Church, however, has tried to put some order in its aid distribution efforts. In the second week of her mission, Jackman attended a diocesan meeting in the second week after the hurricanešs passing, to hammer out a plan.

    "Each parish has been given a contact person," she reported afterward, "and allotted stuff to be distributed. They each have sheets of accountability for what's given out. So, if you're given ten thousand items and you give out four thousand, you say who's been given. You need to be accountable, especially for big items."

    The main storage area for aid sent through the Church is the residence of Bishop of Grenada, Vincent Darius, in St George, in the island's south western corner. The Mount St Ervan Retreat Centre in Grenville on the island's west coast is the second area to which aid is sent for storage and distribution. 

    Jackman and her team went to Grenada a few short days after the
hurricane passed. When LWC's first team had newly arrived, said Jackman, people were still traumatised by Ivan's battering. "People were still in shock, still in denial," she recalled. "They needed someone to say it's okay and that there is hope. We are given that (hope) by Cross International and religious communities; also Food for the Poor and CARITAS are coming to help, so is an Irish congregation. Many, many people are coming to help."

    And many have.


MOUNT ST ERVAN - A NEW COMMUNITY

    By the weekend after Ivan bulldozed through, the first LWC team from Trinidad was sent to help with aid distribution and reconstruction. They stayed first in a private residence in St George's, then briefly at the Bishop's residence before settling at Mount St Ervan Retreat House in Grenville in the east - a 50 minute drive through the Gran Etang, the mountain range that stretches lazily, treacherously through the belly of the island.

    The retreat house is run by the Eternal Light Community, a
Trinidad-based Catholic charismatic community. Three of their missionaries live there: Gwen Alexander, Menita Neverson, and Grenada-born Christopher Munro. They'd spent the hurricane huddled together in a small larder with their dog.

    A large part of the roof of the retreat house was damaged, and many of the trees in its six-acre expanse were blown over, including several of its royal palms, lying stretched out at angles to each other across the front lawn. They add to the other debris left by the front chapel that was destroyed and bits of wood, galvanise, concrete and branches.

    Because of the retreat centre's role in providing aid to the surrounding area, the Living Water team began repairs to it immediately.  Once the building is secured, the team intends to work on reconstructing homes in the village and wider area, focussing on helping those lacking the resources and skill  to help themselves.

    After the initial LWC team, others joined and succeeded them, including members of LWC's Barbados community. The Eternal Light Community in Trinidad has also sent volunteers.

    Only the main building was blessed with a 24-hour water supply; the retreatant's part of the building did not. In the absence of electricity, LWC-sourced generators powered the roofers' tools and refrigerators, though not the freezers. The part of the building housing the retreatants' rooms was supplied with electricity from dusk to 9 pm.

    The mission evolved day by day, as situations changed, and events happened. Transport was planned and found for those going to and from the airport, deliveries to those unable to walk up the hill for their food parcels were organised - all outings timed to fall within the dusk to dawn curfew, since moved to 9 pm to 5 am.

    Apart from work done on the roof, days were spent washing and drying linens made mouldy from the damp left since Ivan. Bonfires were lit on the grounds and fed with combustible debris and the kitchen kept  busy with preparing three meals for more than 20 volunteers and, at times, villagers.

Donated clothing was re-sorted and packed. Food parcels made up of basic food items and toiletries were prepared and packed - 175 per week on average. Some food items could be readily included
in these parcels others - such as flour, salt, dried peas and bean, powdered milk and oil - needed to be bagged or bottled out. And, if it rained, all action stopped to cope with the fallout.

    Day by day, anxious eyes gazed skyward - as do most eyes in Grenada now - looking for that suspicious bit of cloud that could portend another day of catching and bailing and sweeping out torrents of water that flowed through the roofless rooms. Rain also spelt bad news for the roofers, who then suspended their work, not just until the rain stops, but until the roof dries sufficiently to walk about safely on it.

    Frantic females would brave the first showers, scrambling their precious load from the clothes lines lest their morning spent labouring over buckets and basins, rubbing and scrubbing, be in vain.

    In the beginning, the early teams were a varied lot. A chef, a painter, a plumber, two roofers, a soldier, combined with missionaries, a tourist, housewives, teachers and administrative minds. Whomever the Lord sent, were used and, as it turned out, well-suited to whatever needed to be done.



CONCLUSION

    The day before Rose Jackman left Grenada, almost three weeks after Ivan's onslaught, she noted, "People are picking up. They're beginning to think there's hope, like the trees that are now sending out leaves. They're now beginning to look at long-term development."

    Signs of that have already begun.

    Already, teams from the Trinidad and Tobago Electricity Commission (T&TEC) have been spotted servicing downed poles and lines in various areas.  The Grenada Cablevision Limited have begun repairs and re-installation, giving themselves a head start when electricity is restored. Communications may be improved as both Cable and Wireless and Digicel offer enticing packages for aspiring or existing mobile phone users. Grenadians have accepted their offers, flocking their offices from the beginning to the close of the business day. Bulldozers have been actively clearing roads blocked by boulders, fallen trees, and unlikely impediments such as boats
and houses.

    Sunday 03rd October was declared 'National Clean Up Day' and truck owners were encouraged to make their vehicles available in their districts, and people asked to collect debris that couldn't be recycled and burn them or place them at the side of the roads for collection. The response was quite positive in downtown St Georgešs and in villages along the Gran Etang, through to the island's east.

     Many people yet remain traumatised by Ivan's battering, and so, the Catholic Church in Grenada will establish counselling centres, with the assistance of the Trinidad and Tobago Psychological Association.

    Bit by bit, the island is doing what it can to rebuild or restore what
was lost. Bit by bit, the people are coming to terms with what must be done, while facing an uncertain future. One thing is certain, Grenada cannot do it alone.

    The day we met Gertrude, two of the ladies in our team took her
blackened laundry back to the retreat house and washed it all by hand, returning it to her the following day. That was one very small act, but that may be how Grenada will be re-built in the end - one small act of kindness at a time.

(October 2004)
 

 


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