Congratulations to all the Haven volunteers who helped to built 63 houses, a community centre and a playground last week in searing temperatures just so the lives of some of the world's most poorest people could be a little better.

Gonaives, about 160 km miles north of Haiti's capital Port-au-Prince, has been riddled with poverty for years. Families live in the tiniest makeshift shacks or tattered tents after many had their homes destroyed by two devastating hurricanes in 2004 and 2008. Children ignore the horrible stench to play in their bare feet in sickening filth where Irish people would dump their household waste. Men work whatever menial job they can get, usually in fishing, for little more than $3 a day.

It's some of these unfortunate people who will have their lives greatly improved by the first housing project in the area for 25 years, one that will continue later this year and into next year.

The surrounding wasteland might look as barren as it gets but at least poverty-stricken Haitians will have four walls to keep them dry when the rainy season comes, a community centre in which to meet and discuss their futures and a playground that the kids might never have seen before but will be something joyful that will give them childhoods to remember.

It's these lives that the Irish volunteers last week helped to change for the better and will continue to do for many years to come.

But it's a pity they couldn't see the destruction caused by January's quake in Port-au-Prince, many of whom having signed up to fly to Haiti after seeing the images on television of the world's worst natural disasters in decades. Gonaives might have as much poverty in parts, if not more, than the capital, but at least there are some positive moves being made, no matter how small they may be. But PAP will take decades to repair, if it ever does.

Imagine the sickening feeling of helplessness as you rise every morning and stare at the rubble that was once your home, as so many do. Added to that the infinite pain of losing someone you loved in the terror that engulfed the city on January 12. Houses can be rebuilt but broken hearts take a lot longer to mend. These are the nightmarish feelings of loss and suffering that 1.3 million Haitians wake to every day.

Three days after leaving the land many locals consider to be God-forsaken because of the practice of voodoo in some parts, and there is much to reflect on. For one, when the rain comes what will become of so many of the camps that are merely built on hillsides and what kind of future the children of this potentially beautiful country have in store for them? The truth may lie in the fact that much more hardship lies in wait for Haiti before the damage of recent months and years can even begin to be repaired.

The work of Haven and their volunteers in their two Build-It weeks so far might be making a small difference to the lives of some. But far greater intervention, perhaps a divine one, will be needed for the people of this small country, only the size of the Munster, to be ultimately able to enjoy some kind of normal life.

Haiti - three months on.

No one in the world deserves to suffer the fate that bestruck Port-au-Prince at 4.53pm on January 12 of this year. But if there was a country so ill-equipped to cope with such a natural disaster it's Haiti. The week I've spent here has been an unforgettable experience, but perhaps for all the wrong reasons.

I arrived last Sunday night and got on a bus straight up to Gonaives, about 160 kilometres north of the capital. It seems like such a short distance but an hour or two outside the capital and the roads just disappear. Most of the distance is negotiated across stones and rocks in the bumpiest drive imagineable. And Gonaives is no picnic either. Rubble line each street, take over the pavement, block the entrance to businesses but this is a city which wasn't touched by the quake that decimated the capital. This is just the way things are up here in a place that has not seen a new house built in 25 years.

Leslie Buckley and Haven has vowed to change all that.


Nearly 300 Irish volunteers are here working flat out in temperatures above 40 degrees for the week to complete 60 houses for the impoverished locals by Sunday. And most Irish people will never have seen poverty like this.

Two powerful hurricanes in 2004 and 2008 destroyed Gonaives, killing thousands and forcing so many to live in makeshift tents and shacks in some of the most squalid conditions on earth. The stench and filth that children in a small area called Rabota play in is impossible to even describe. It's these living conditions that forced vice chairman of Digicel Leslie Buckley to bring his Haven charity to Gonaives for a second Built-It week after the success of his first in Ouanaminthe last October. Having traveled back down to PAP on that bus again on Monday, we flew up to Ouanaminthe on Tuesday morning because we were told the journey by road could take between five and six hours, and this is a country no bigger than Munster. Six months after that Build-It week and there is a whole new community living in the houses built by Haven. Women hang out their washing, men cultivate their gardens and the immaculately turned out children attend school believing for the first time that there is something out there for them other than abject poverty.

Then it was that quick flight back to PAP to experience what I was looking forward to most this week. Buildings lie in ruins all over the city which lost 230,000 of its residents and now has an additional 1.3 million who are homeless. The Presidential Palace once stood out like a beacon of hope for these people in an identical way that the White House does on Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington. But it has literally crumbled now, it's two domes have collapsed and the front looks like a has bomb has torn the heart out of this incredibly important Haitian building. The nearby Departments of Justice, Finance and Sanitation have all also been reduced to rubble.

Denis O'Brien modern Digicel building stands out amongst the ruins, having been built earthquake-proof and this careful approach to his operations in the Caribbean saved the 600 lives which were inside at that moment on January 12,
But there's one thing that stands out more than anything in PAP and that's the scores of makshifts camps that have sprung up all over the city. At the last count there was 950 in total, including a few which Haven accidentally stumbled across only three weeks - nearly 15,000 people who went three months with no water and no sanitation. Many of the people living in tents and huts thrown together with wood from the trees and tarpaulins handed out by the charities even stare blankly across at the rubble that was once their homes, praying for divine intervention that one day they will be able to rebuild and start their lives again.

But it's the resourcefulness of these people which underlines how remarkable they are. Amidst the chaos that is now their lives they are creating something which is truly amazing - a community once again. Many wasted no time in getting on with their lives. Small businesses, such as shops and restaurants, are now open in the camps. Places of worship are in operation and the most enterprising of locals have even built community centres where the people can all congregate. Every site has their own committee which controls and manages the camp. Usually young men are on the boards, no more than 18 years of age, because their parents believe the future of PAP is these young people and they can get things done quicker. Since Haven and other NGOs moved in they are now supplying them with latrines and showers to make them feel even remotely civilised. All the children are very well dressed and queue patiently to wash their hands despite the madness they are now being brought up in.

The Haitians are truly an amazing race of people and it's this strength of spirit which will ensure their survival, even if their city might never quite return to the bustling cosmopolitan, if still extremely poor, urban centre it once was. The city is now littered with 4x4s because it is the greatest means of negotiating the rubble that now lies everywhere. Haven have been quick to ensure the safety of their workers on the ground in PAP and each member of staff must travel with an armed Haitian bodyguard at all times. Not that the locals in PAP are that much to be feared, it is merely a precaution should the desperation of the situation become too much for the millions of quake victims. Added to that there is now a few hundred criminals lose on the city streets after the jail collapsed, many of them having set up base in an area called Cite du Soleil which has become a real gangster's paradise.

The sad thing is PAP could be such a beautiful city if it had money. Scenic green hills surround the hustle and bustle below and a beautiful coastline lies a small distance to the west. But these people can't escape - there is too much to do right now and will be for decades to come, possibly longer. Catholicism is the main religion in Haiti but many people also practice a form of voodoo. They believe that there country is cursed and judging from the poverty, deadly hurricanes and now a massive earthquake it is easy to see why. They also believe that a second even larger earthquake is imminent. There is nothing they would deserve less and the prayers of the world are needed to prevent that from happening.

Back up here in Gonaives and the spirit among the workers is excellent. They will have created something very special by Sunday and Leslie has vowed to double the number of volunteers he brings over next year after making a promise to President Rene Preval in the days following the quake that he will construct 10,000 new houses over the next four years and such is the drive of the man that you just know he's going to do it. Haiti needs men like him if they are to have any kind of future.