Cathiana Vital and her family got a call the afternoon of Jan. 12. Two of her cousins who were visiting family in Haiti had gone missing after the magnitude 7 earthquake that struck the country that day. By Jan. 14, both bodies were found. She was shocked.

‘One of my cousins, I’m thinking, knowing his character, he’s probably outside helping somebody. My 10-year-old cousin, I didn’t know was there at the time,’ said Vital, a senior accounting and marketing major at Syracuse University. ‘I’m more shocked because you hear something happens and you’re like, ‘Oh, that might not affect us,’ but then to see how surreal it is that it is affecting us.’

The earthquake struck southern Haiti Jan. 12, destroying the capitol, Port-au-Prince, and claiming more than 200,000 lives. A 5.9 magnitude aftershock hit the country Wednesday morning, causing more panic in the capitol.

Vital said she is blown away by the effort to help the victims of the Haiti earthquake, both on the national scale and locally at SU. She, too, has stepped up to help. As president of the Haitian American Student Association (HASA) on campus, she said she is planning and promoting aid efforts on campus.

HASA is co-sponsoring a candlelight vigil in front of Hendricks Chapel Thursday at 7:30 p.m. to honor those who died and were affected by the tragedy in Haiti. The vigil will include prayers for the dead, poetry, a moment of silence and a fundraiser for the relief effort.

The vigil was planned to be a large-scale event so that the campus could support the victims of the earthquake, said Aaron Spencer, the president of Phi Beta Sigma fraternity, which is also co-sponsoring the event.

Even though he is not of Haitian descent, Spencer said he feels connected to the Haitian community through his Caribbean heritage and because he has Haitian friends who were affected by the earthquake. He said this is part of the reason he got involved in the vigil.

‘This is something that is really, really important for SU and the community,’ Spencer said.

Students across campus are coming together to show support for those affected by the tragedy. John Crandall, the president of Pride Union for LGBT students, created a Facebook group called ‘Orange Response: SU helping Haiti’ immediately after he heard about the tragedy to help disseminate information on the national relief effort to students and to help coordinate the various campus groups’ planned aid events.

Crandall said the Pride Union and his Facebook group challenged every student organization on campus to do at least one fundraiser to benefit Haiti. Through this, Crandall said he hopes to unite a diverse range of campus groups.

Crandall and his organization will be attending the vigil as a show of support for Haiti, he said.

‘We’re trying to ensure this stays in the public eye on campus and that students want to do this and are encouraged to leave their comfort zone and maybe help someone they wouldn’t normally help,’ Crandall said. ‘I personally will be donating money from (Pride Union’s) own private fundraised money.’

Faculty members are also getting involved in the campus effort to help Haiti and the vigil. Paula Johnson, a law professor, is helping to coordinate the long-term efforts of faculty and staff and will be attending the vigil to address the attendees.

While it is important for SU community to respond immediately with monetary donations, Johnson stressed that attention will eventually need to turn to long-term rebuilding of Haiti. She said she plans on creating a Web site compiling information for the university community to learn more about how to help Haiti. She also plans on taking advantage of faculty specialties needed to rebuild the country.

‘For instance, I’m in law. So one of the groups that I’m a part of, a list of lawyers and law professors, we are looking at what might be some of the eventual legal needs that people will have,’ Johnson said.

Students are looking at the short-term as well. HASA is in the process of organizing a medical supplies drive as well as a citywide pledge-a-thon, said Manoucheka Philantrope, the vice president of HASA.

Philantrope, a junior psychology major, also felt the sting of the Haiti devastation. Her family went unharmed in the quake, but she spent four days without any means of contacting them. The walls of her family’s house were cracked, forcing them to sleep on nearby soccer field for fear of it collapsing during an aftershock, she said.

‘It was very hard on me because I would try to call, and I wasn’t able to get through, and I couldn’t hear from anybody,’ Philantrope said. ‘I was looking at pictures of where my mother works and it was on the ground. I was going crazy.’

rhkheel@syr.edu

Published on January 20, 2010 at 12:00 pm