|
|||||||||||||||
|
|
|||||||||||||||
|
|
The first wave of Haitian orphans landed in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania on Tuesday. If all goes well, the second wave will include the adopted daughter of Azle residents Richard and Lorraine Larrew.
After a catastrophic earthquake tore through Haiti last week, leaving as many as 200,000 dead, a quarter-million injured and more than a million people homeless, the Larrew family waited anxiously for information about 16-year-old Naphtaline (Natalie) Noel.
Richard, Lorraine and their daughter Mandee have been in the process of adopting Natalie since 2007 when they first met her at an orphanage in Haiti. “She seemed to have picked us,” Lorraine said. “She asked if we would adopt her.” Over the past four years the Larrews and Natalie have been writing letters and calling back and forth every week. Last year the Larrews even spent a month with their daughter at the orphanage.
The quake’s epicenter was 16 miles west of Haiti’s capital, Port-au-Prince, which is within walking distance of Natalie’s orphanage. It was an agonizing 24 hours before Chris, the orphanage director, was able to get word to the Larrews that everyone was safe. She told them the orphanage’s building had been destroyed and they had been forced to move into the streets. The United States Embassy was in complete chaos. There was little food and fresh water, and looting was starting to be a big problem as people grew more desperate. From their homes in the U.S., the Larrews and hundreds of other parents began calling news agencies, emailing congressmen and senators, desperately trying to get help in securing food, fresh water and transportation to bring their children to safety. Four days passed before Natalie was able to borrow a cell phone and send a text. It read, “Mommy, I’m afraid. I love you and I miss my family. God took care of us.” “She’s a very resourceful little girl,” Lorraine said. But gangs and the lack of fresh water and food usually trump a young girl’s resourcefulness. So the Larrews began stepping up their efforts. Haiti, the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere, had no computerized system for tracking adoptions, and what they did have was destroyed in the quake. So the Larrews began scanning everything they could find that would prove the adoption progress – passports documenting multiple visits to Haiti, report cards proving they were sending Natalie to school, immigration forms, background checks and even family pictures. The United States has loosened its policy on visa requirements for 900 Haitian orphans like Natalie, who were in the process of being adopted by Americans before the quake. Natalie’s adoption was set to finalize in less than two years. But the Larrews were hoping that since the quake, the adoption will happen much sooner. Those hopes took a blow on Tuesday, when the Larrews received a call from U.S. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchinson’s office to say they were unable to help. “So it’s left up to us to do our own thing,” Lorraine said. The Larrews started networking with parent support groups across the United States via Facebook and other chat lines. By Wednesday Lorraine was told “some of the fathers had rallied a cargo carrier.” The carrier left for Haiti Tuesday morning carrying thousands of pounds of supplies. “I asked them to get a message to Natalie and I was told that I could tell her myself when I see her,” Lorraine said. “I have no idea how they did it – but I firmly believe that within a week Natalie will be coming home.” That possibility remains the subject of much hope and prayer in Azle, Texas – and for at least one young girl in Haiti, too. |
|
