Régine Chassagne of Arcade Fire has written a passionate editorial for The Observer, sharing her personal association with Haiti and issuing a plea for relief in the ravaged island.
The multi-instrumentalist has familial roots in the country, which she documented on the song "Haiti" from Arcade Fire's 2004 Funeral album. Chassagne and her husband, Arcade Fire co-leader Win Butler, took to the band's website asking for donations to the organization Partners in Health for the relief effort.
"Since Haiti shook and crumbled, I feel as if something has collapsed over my head, too," she writes. "Miles away, somehow, I'm trapped in this nightmare. My heart is crushed. I've been thinking about nothing else."
She continues: "I am mourning people I know. People I don't know. People who are still trapped under rubble and won't be rescued in time. I can't help it. Such emotion came over me. My breath stopped. My heart sank and went straight into panic mode. I knew right away that the whole city is in no way built to resist this kind of assault and that this meant that thousands were under rubble. I saw it straight away. I ran downstairs and turned on the television. It was true. Tears came rushing right to my eyes and I let out a cry, as if I had just heard that everybody I love had died. The reality, unfortunately, is much worse."
In her editorial, Chassagne attempts to put the crisis into a broader historical perspective. She writes, "Haitians know that they have been wronged many, many times. What we are seeing on the news right now is more than a natural disaster. This earthquake has torn away the veil and revealed the crushing poverty that has been allowed by the west's centuries of disregard. That we must respond with a substantial emergency effort is beyond argument, but in the aftermath, Haiti must be rebuilt."
Read Chassagne's entire statement at the Guardian. I highly recommend it.
