Pakistan Update #5

Note from one relief worker to her family

We spent yesterday and today at a "refugee camp" (it isn't an official one; the people just got dumped there by the highway.) The needs are so overwhelming, the pain is so great—basically every family lost husbands, children or wives, or have members separated from the rest of the family. Mostly it's women and children here, because the men stayed behind to try to save their animals.

It all feels so helpless, but I guess if we can make a difference in a few people's lives, it is something. We started focusing on one group of 110 people, which grew overnight because another truck with 35 people arrived! The new group hadn't eaten for three days; they were rescued by helicopter last night. We are taking cooked food out to the whole group (145-plus) tonight and then taking them cooking sets and dry rations tomorrow. We'll also try to provide chappals (flip-flops) for them tomorrow, as most are barefoot and the ground there is covered with sharp rocks. They also need clothes. Their clothes are torn; some of the men don't even have shirts, and some ladies don't have dupattas (traditional scarves)—you know how much they've lost if they don't have dupattas! They need tents too, but it will take time for us to find some. The kids are covered in terrible sores. I saw one baby whose foot was turning green. We'll take some antibiotics (oral and cream) out tomorrow and try to do our best, but we need a doctor to do a proper medical camp.

We went to another camp near "our" people (the ones we've "adopted") and tried to assess needs there, but it was just chaos. Ladies were grabbing my arms and pulling at my clothes. But that side of the road is actually getting attention from some of the political parties and religious groups, so we aren't going to try to do too much there. There is too much chaos there to even begin to be effective. We do want to try to do a medical camp there if we can get a doctor to help us. Anyway, please pray for strength and wisdom, and for the resources we need to try to meet a tiny fraction of the needs.