CARACAS, June 29 (Xinhua) -- Around noon on Sunday, Caracas resident Robert hoisted a heavy beige tent onto his shoulder and squeezed onto a crowded bus for a 12-km ride to a downtown residential neighborhood. Waiting at the other end was his close friend Weider and his family, who would soon make the tent their temporary shelter.
Two powerful earthquakes measuring above magnitude 7 struck Venezuela on Wednesday evening. By Sunday, the death toll had risen to 1,450, with 774 buildings collapsed or damaged, Venezuelan National Assembly President Jorge Rodriguez said.
Weider's home remained standing, but was no longer safe to live in. Upon learning of the disaster, a Colombian friend of Robert and Weider immediately sent a tent by international courier. Delivered on Sunday, it was the very tent Robert carried across Caracas to help shelter Weider and his family.
"My home is still livable. Weider needs my help more," Robert said. "It may not be much, but every bit of support matters."
After helping pitch the tent, Robert sat quietly across the street, watching Weider's family eat the arepas and sip the coffee he had brought. With relief supplies still scarce, much of the aid reaching earthquake survivors in Venezuela has come from ordinary people helping one another.
Along Bolivar Avenue in downtown Caracas, sidewalks were dotted with tents of different colors. Large SUVs were parked along the road, with people whose homes had escaped the worst of the damage unloading clothes, food and medicine for neighbors whose losses were far greater.
Weider recalled that he had been lying at home, resting before his night shift, when the quake struck. Within seconds, the entire building began shaking violently. Then came a deafening roar from outside as stone decorations broke away from a nearby landmark building, plunging from high above onto the street below.
"I was scared, but my son lived upstairs," Weider said. "When I saw the walls starting to collapse, as a father, what I did was run upward, against the crowd of people fleeing, to look for my child."
For the next three days, the family slept on the street, shivering through cold nights punctuated by repeated aftershocks. It was not until Sunday, when Robert arrived with the tent and helped set it up, that Weider finally had a place to shield his family from wind and rain.
The situation in a nearby residential community was no better. Survivors were living outside the building.
Angeli, a member of the community council, said that the building looked largely intact from the outside.
"But once you go inside, you find rubble everywhere. Walls have fallen, stairs are broken. It has become an empty shell that no one can live in," she said.
Inside the building, cracks ran across the walls. Residents had swept fallen debris into piles outside their doors, while broken water pipes were still leaking. Part of the facade had fallen away, leaving the stairwell exposed to the open air. Despite the danger, neighbors moved in and out in small groups, retrieving food from their refrigerators.
"Kind people in Caracas have brought cooked food and tents, but we still need diapers, liquid milk, ready-to-drink formula, tarps, mattresses, blankets, sheets and pillows," Angeli said, counting the items on her fingers.
Asked what hopes she still had for the community's future, Angeli looked toward a nearby damaged building. Her voice softened but remained firm.
"We survivors have been given a second life," she said. "In the future, there should not be so much selfishness. We must become more noble and learn to love and help others generously."
In her eyes, the disaster shattered walls, but also changed the way neighbors relate to one another. In the days since the earthquake, helping hands have become a common sight amid the rubble. Enditem
京公网安备 11010802027341号