By Liz Satow, Programme Officer, World Vision Global Rapid Response Team
People always ask me, “What is it like to be a humanitarian aid worker on the ground?”
It’s difficult to know where to begin. Sometimes I think of an endless stream of airports, or the challenge of balancing the requirements of process and procedure with meeting the urgent needs of the emergency. I think of the times I’ve tried to finish a proposal when there was no electricity and my computer battery was dying, or – worst of all – running out of toilet paper.
Other times, when I’m asked that question, distinct images with specific smells, sounds and feelings begin to cross my mind—a flooded river in Mozambique; a food distribution that goes wrong, hundreds of people charging across an open space towards sacks of maize from the United States government; the sound of a bullet going past a vehicle window in Gaza and the face of a man who threatens to pull the pin on a grenade because he is desperate and can’t help his family.
I also think of shivering on top of a snowy mountain in Pakistan, waiting for helicopters of the World Food Programme food to arrive; the faces of two child soldiers in the Democratic Republic of Congo; a displaced person offering me a piece of roasted maize and a little girl carrying a 10 litre jerry can on her head as she walks slowly, carefully up a hill.
While I was in Pakistan after the earthquake, a small team of us based in the Northwest Frontier Province visited villages to gather information. In the last village, I was standing near some rubble talking with the team when a veiled head peeked out around the corner. A woman beckoned me over and invited me into her dark, cold house. There was nothing but some quilts and blankets piled in the corner of the house.
She asked me what we were doing, so I opened my notebook and began to explain our assessment to her. I didn’t get very far because she cut me off in mid-stream, saying, “My six-year-old daughter died here” as she pointed to the ground where we were standing. She began sobbing and clung on to me so hard my ribs hurt. She cried, “My daughter, my daughter” over and over again. I did nothing but stood there, weeping and hugging this woman who was grieving for her child.
As a humanitarian aid worker, I am constantly reminded that despite our differences in circumstance and privilege, we are all in the end, simply human.
