We received our food box the next day and have been able to supplement our MRE with coffee, tuna and a few other non-perishables! Very grateful. Our car also arrived on the ferry. I use the term 'car' lightly - it's more like a truck; a Dodge Ram utility. While I'm grateful for having the wheels, driving in the left hand seat AND on the left hand side of the road is taking some time to get used to.
We have had intermittent power the last few days, and we've been blessed by the disaster tech team from the US who have donated to us a wifi hotspot for our accommodation. It's dependent on the phone towers working, though... which is proving to be another thing altogether.
Most importantly our work has been going on. We've organised distribution of 10 pallets of water and 8 pallets of bleach so far. This will enable people who are actually able to repair their homes to start the work of mould remediation and clean up.
We connected with a baptist pastor who has had 6 families from his church return to the island. They are staying in tents outside his church and he was so grateful that we had water for them, as well as the potential to get them some cooking stoves.
Back in Australia, the Salvation Army refers to transformation 'one life at a time'. We saw that very much on the weekend. When we were going through the warehouse I found a wheelchair; Doug, a colleague, had met someone in a borrowed (and broken) one, so we set this new one aside for him.
When we put it in the corridor at our headquarters ready to be delivered it disappeared. Those of you down under will know that we are still skeptical about whether or not the Thrift Shop manager sold it... even though she denies this.
So we went back to the warehouse where we found another. On Sunday evening, Doug took it to the address of the intended recipient, a double amputee, only to find that he wasn't home.
A man came running over to Doug and said, "God has told me to send you to the church down the road". Doug... being skeptical again.... almost turned around but thought "why not". He drove down to the church where the pastor's wife flagged him down. She asked Doug why he was in the neighbourhood and he told her the story. As it happens, the pastor of the church was on his way to pick up the amputee and bring him home... while the church was praying for both his recovery and the supply of a new wheelchair.
You can only imagine their surprise when Doug pulled one out of the back of the ute!
Finally, another nice note. We were sitting in our first coordination meeting the other day. I always like to sit at the back and observe and listen at first. The emergency administrator for the island saw me there and (in a slightly embarrassing move) pointed out that The Salvation Army were in the room and asked me to come up to the front working table. The shield does open doors!
If this link works (!) it's some photos from our work here that are on the IHQ Relief & Development twitter feed at the moment:
Brad from @salvos Australia has now taken on the responsibility of the relief distributions on #Abaco island, #Bahamas. He is also making sure that relief & recovery plans and activities there are coordinated with the government & other stakeholders. @TSACARTHQ @saworldservice pic.twitter.com/MnfZQ7oCr9— IHQ-ReliefDev (@TSA_Projects) October 24, 2019
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