Miracles and misfortune continue to coexist in Haiti. An aftershock registering 6.1 on the Richter scale shook the rubble yesterday. But survivors are still being rescued — despite having been buried alive for seven days. A trapped man used his iPhone to learn how to treat his wounds; a woman was dug out of the wreckage singing and smiling; a baby girl, who had spent half her 15-day life imprisoned and alone, was also saved. There is always hope, we console ourselves. That hope must not be allowed to fade.
It is hope that drives on the rescue workers. It is hope that unites nations in donating to the charitable effort. It is hope that inspires newspapers and their readers to take such a deep interest in the rescue effort in Haiti.
But hope should not only console in the short term. It must endure. For now, hope has a human face — the woman singing, or the baby saved. But soon hope will become more faceless and abstract. Hope will reside in workaday issues like rebuilding schools and funding hospitals. Matters of life and death will no longer be decided by rescue workers, but by politicians making long-term decisions rather than enriching themselves. Hope will drift into the grinding business of everyday life, far removed from the miracles and wonder of today. The lasting rescue of Haiti will rely on the unflashy virtues of solid infrastructure and public service.
It is there — in retaining hopefulness during the everyday grind — that the real challenge lies. Rebuilding a better Haiti will be gruelling. It must draw on the spirit of hopefulness that has continued to unearth miracles in the rubble, long after rational voices had turned to despair.