VOA标准英语2010年-Haiti’s Food Needs Still Urgent 10 W

Steve Baragona | Port-au-Prince 22 March 2010

Haitian officials say less food aid and more jobs are needed to get the economy running again.

Some major organizations are scaling back donation efforts beginning April 1st.

But many Haitians are still in urgent need of food.

Suzette Etienne spent eight days in the hospital after the earthquake buried her in her house in Port-au-Prince.

“After two and a half months, I am just starting to walk,” she says.

To escape the ruined city, her brother carried her onto a bus to Gonaives.  Arriving without friends or family in the city, she searched for food and shelter.

She found Fleuris Edlene, head of a small local charity.

After the earthquake, Edlene says, “I went on a local radio station and said I had a four-room place that was available for anyone who needed help.”

 

About a 150 people came - so many that some are sleeping on the roof.

For the first few weeks, she fed them all out of her own pocket, along

with donations from local people.   But now, the community has exhausted¹ all the generosity² it can afford, and the food is running out.

“An organization donated 25 bags of rice and 25 bottles of water, but they are gone,” she says. “It does not take long to use up these supplies.”

She says soon she may have to send her guests to live in an empty field nearby, because she cannot bear to look them in the eye when they go hungry.

Haitian authorities say they want donors³ to focus on creating jobs, because giving away food is disrupting⁴ the local economy.

But more than two months after the earthquake, many Haitians appear to still need urgent help finding food.  Simply meeting their needs - without further damaging the economy - will not be easy.

 

1 exhausted   

adj.极其疲惫的，精疲力尽的

参考例句：

• It was a long haul home and we arrived exhausted.搬运回家的这段路程特别长，到家时我们已筋疲力尽。
• Jenny was exhausted by the hustle of city life.珍妮被城市生活的忙乱弄得筋疲力尽。

2 generosity   

n.大度，慷慨，慷慨的行为

参考例句：

• We should match their generosity with our own.我们应该像他们一样慷慨大方。
• We adore them for their generosity.我们钦佩他们的慷慨。

3 donors   

n.捐赠者( donor的名词复数 )；献血者；捐血者；器官捐献者

参考例句：

• Please email us to be removed from our active list of blood donors. 假如你想把自己的名字从献血联系人名单中删去，请给我们发电子邮件。
• About half this amount comes from individual donors and bequests. 这笔钱大约有一半来自个人捐赠及遗赠。 来自《简明英汉词典》

4 disrupting   

使混乱，扰乱( disrupt的现在分词 )

参考例句：

• Demonstrators succeeded in disrupting the meeting. 示威者成功地扰乱了会议。
• Wage claims had led to one strike after another, disrupting every section of the community. 由工资问题引起的罢工浪潮此起彼伏，扰乱了社会秩序。