ARTICLE - GIFTS FROM CANADA

This afternoon we went over to Dottie's place to meet Jim and Kim Dewar and a couple of guys from Prince Edward Island, Canada! They organized a drive to send 4 containers to Haiti to help in the relief effort. We were blessed by being able to pick up a couple of truck loads this afternoon and a couple more tomorrow! We will distribute the aid that we received with local hospitals, organizations working with the handicapped and the refuge camps in the Delmas 31 area. To the people on P.E.I., your gifts will be well used! Thanks!



The following article is about their efforts:

HAITI EXPERIENCE LIFE-CHANGING: RUST
(CBC News)

Containers of food and medical supplies sent to Haiti by Prince Edward Islanders have finally made it through customs.

After three weeks of delays, the donations arrived in a small town 60 kilometers outside Port-au-Prince.

Matthew Rust of P.E.I.’s Master Packaging said being on the ground with the supplies is life-altering.

He said his life has changed after seeing desperation in the eyes of a starving Haitian woman. She was holding her baby as she stood in line with hundreds of others, waiting for a jar of peanut butter and some rice. This was to be her rations for a few days.

'It's very desperate right now. There's just nothing here.'—Master Packaging's Matthew Rust in Haiti

"You're perspective — those rose-coloured glasses you see everything through — is challenged in almost every way,” said Rust.

Rust has been living in a secure compound just outside Port-au-Prince for the past week.

He's representing PEI's Master Packaging. The company collected 80 tonnes of supplies donated by Islanders--enough to fill four shipping containers full of everything from food, medicine, wheelchairs, and stretchers, to bedding, clothes and toys.

A Christian mission group, Lifeline Ministries, is distributing the goods.

Medical supplies will go to eight nearby hospitals.

Everything else goes to churches and schools, some as far as 10 hours away.

"We're trying to get these goods out to people in the more mountainous regions that have trouble getting aid," he said.

Seventy-five percent of the population there is unemployed, said Rust. That kind of desperation means supplies have to be carefully monitored to avoid mobs.

Master Packaging has been collecting more supplies. It plans to send another shipment in the fall.

Rust's current trip will help the company know what is most needed, and where.

"I just felt it was in my heart to see this project through," he said. "Yes, it was a big life changing experience," he said.