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Courtesy of Team Jesus 2000 Inc.

West Union resident Bill Cameron, left, learned this week that his friend and Good Samaritan, Pierre France, had moved dozens of orphans to safety after Hurricane Ike swept through Haiti last weekend.

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Courtesy of Team Jesus 2000 Inc.

Two young girls at the orphanage in Mount Rouis in happier days before Haiti was deluged by four storms in the span of three weeks. A bridge linking Mount Rouis to Port-au-Prince was washed away. These girls' fate is uncertain.

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Courtesy of Team Jesus 2000 Inc.

Pastor Tony Prathaftakis, of Seneca's House of Judah Church located in the Utica community, stands with a local minister in Mount Rouis that he knows only as Pastor John. Following his first-ever mission trip, Prathaftakis said two words summed up what he saw in Haiti Ñ constant need.

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Courtesy of Team Jesus 2000 Inc.

Mount Rouis villagers burn logs and tree branches used to carbon cook meals. The mountain town remains isolated after Hurricane Ike washed away a bridge that links it to Port-au-Prince.

SENECA — Unlike the tens of thousands of Texans along the Galveston coastline who fled north in their vehicles in anticipation of Hurricane Ike’s arrival today, residents of the Caribbean had nowhere to run when the powerful storm struck last weekend.

Millions in Cuba, Dominican Republic, Haiti and the Turks have been in the crosshairs of a string of four cyclones that have caused untold death and destruction.

First, it was a brush with Tropical Storm Faye, followed by more fury from Hurricane Gustav and then Tropical Storm Hanna. What those systems did not demolish, Hurricane Ike finished off last week by leaving entire villages submerged by flash floods.

In Haiti, there were reports of tens of thousands of residents standing on rooftops to escape rising hurricane floodwaters.

For the past few weeks, two Oconee County men who returned from a mission trip to Haiti less than two months ago have waited anxiously to hear from the man who was their host during their mission trip to Haiti.

Thousands dead

Missionary Bill Cameron, a Michigan man who now calls West Union home after a 30-year stint in Florida, finally heard this week from his Haitian contact.

Cameron likes to describe his friend, Pierre France, as someone who is always positive and upbeat. Cameron said that vivacity was missing from France’s voice when he spoke by phone with him Sept. 8.

“It was the first time I ever heard him sound down,” Cameron said. “He got the kids out of the orphanage, and they are in clinics now. Pierre says there are thousands dead. Whole villages are gone.”

Cameron and his wife, Charlene, have been to many obscure villages in Brazil, Guatemala, Costa Rica and Haiti since Cameron dedicated his life to mission work in 1999.

The Camerons, who moved to Oconee in February 2007, attend the House of Judah Church in the Utica community of Seneca. Bill Cameron invited House of Judah pastor Tony Prathaftakis to accompany him to Haiti.

Prathaftakis, who is of Greek descent, considers himself to be what he calls “an urban missionary.” Before becoming pastor at House of Judah, Prathaftakis and his wife, Gloria, spread the Gospel through a puppet ministry to children and teens at rough neighborhoods.

Humbling experience

However, although his wife had been to a mission trip to Panama, Prathaftakis said he had never ventured out of the United States. He now humbly calls his one-week trip to Haiti with Cameron “life changing.” The pastor said he can no longer look at a plate of food without seeing the faces of so many hungry children he met in the impoverished island who would stare awaiting leftovers.

The pastor said that many things Americans take for granted are luxuries in Haiti. Cameron and Prathaftakis stayed at a home in Mount Rouis toilets flushed only half the time. They slept in beds, while many around them slept on dirt floors. They were given a plate of food. Others ate from the same plate.

Parents with sick children cannot afford medical treatment or medicines. Unlike in the United States, where the sick are treated and then given a bill, Prathaftakis said in Haiti one has to pay for services first.

Cameron and Prathaftakis walked into a situation where a child was dying because a parent could not afford the $200 in Haitian currency to buy antibiotics. Cameron and Prathaftakis said they covered the bill with less than $30 of their money.

“It’s mind boggling that you can save a life in Haiti for less than $30,” Prathaftakis said.

Before Haiti was besieged by tropical storms and hurricanes, Cameron and Prathaftakis had already planned a fund-raising event in Seneca to help Pierre France realize his dream of finishing the construction of a school and orphanage in Mount Rouis. Cameron, under the organization Team Jesus 2000, Inc. will hold a fund-raiser to benefit completion of the facilities.

Cameron said he hoped to get France to attend the event, which is called “Evening for Haiti Benefit Dinner.”

“He doesn’t want to spend money on the trip that could go to helping the children with everything that’s happened recently,” Cameron said.

However, he said a network of Christian friends want to pay for France’s trip. “We feel he is going to meet people here who are going to help him with the school and orphanage.”

Cost is $10 for adults and $5 for children. For more information on the fund-raising efforts, call (864) 718-0015 or (864) 916-0186.