Biloxi, Miss., Jan 23, 2010 / 05:58 am
An American volunteer in Haiti has stepped up to the challenge of helping the country cope with the aftermath of the massive earthquake that flattened the city of Port-au-Prince last week. Elissa Kergosien, of Bay St. Louis, Mississippi, returned to Haiti just before the earthquake hit and feels herself to be “in the center of God's will.”
Kergosien, a recent college graduate, was interviewed by the Diocese of Biloxi's Gulf Pine Catholic just days before the 7.0 earthquake hit Haiti.
She told the newspaper that her decision to spend a year at the Louverture Cleary School as a volunteer teacher wasn't a difficult one. Her parents had involved their family in missionary work for a long time, from countries in Eastern Europe to the Dominican Republic.
Though she had worked with the poor before, “It was still kind of shocking to see the poverty that exists in Haiti. It was shocking to see all the malnourished children in the neighborhood surrounding the school. They’re happy children, but they have bloated stomachs and it was shocking to know that it’s just a 90-minute plane ride from Miami and people are dying from malnutrition.”