Emily Reports

About a week ago, my friend and fellow journalist Eleanor Miller (follow her @eleanoram) met someone in an organization that was taking volunteers down to Haiti. I heard she was looking for more people to come along - free flight included - and I immediately began kicking myself.

Over the summer, my passport was stolen. Well, technically it wasn't stolen at all, but picked up by a friend of mine from the scene of the break-in and stowed in a safe place. I didn't get the memo because I was in the backcountry, so I called and cancelled it. And of course, a passport can't be un-reported as stolen.

Anyway, I figured I had all the time in the world to get a new one. I wasn't planning on being abroad until the summer, and I'm not used to free trips to overseas disaster areas falling from the sky. Again: kicking myself.

But the more I read about the situation on the ground in Haiti, the better I feel about not going. I don't have any medical training, so I might be in the way. I wouldn't be able to bring enough water to support myself for a week, so I'd inevitably use precious resources. Transportation in and out of Port-au-Prince, accommodations at night, food - I get the feeling overburdened Haiti would spend me time supporting me than the other way around.

If the place wasn't already crawling with journalists, sure, it would be worth it. But the coverage is at saturation point. The world is already watching.

In any case, I was already thinking about going down there sometime in March if I can swing it financially. It's going to take months, years, decades for Haiti to rebuild. If I can report on the situation a couple of months down the road after it's faded from the headlines, and remind people that there's still a lot of work to be done - well, that's something.