Hometown: Montreal
Age: 64
Late Sunday night, Sherline Azemar and her sister Marie-Rosele Azemar got the call they were waiting for: their dad, Voltaire Leblanc, was calling from Miragoane, Haiti. He was alive.
"I am tremendously happy," said Marie in an interview Monday morning. "It was a huge relief, but I understand the pain of all the Haitians in Montreal. There are so many villages where people can't call cause they don't have comunications. They have to wait until some organization comes or when electiricity is restored. But families have to have faith and hope."
According to Marie-Rosele, the Red Cross found her father and arranged for the former Montreal taxi driver to call his family and let them know that he was okay.
"He has been sleeping ouside. The house is cracked so he cannot live in it," she said. "Officials have asked everyone to stay outside their homes for prevention."
Miragoane is just on the edge of the zone where the earthquake struck in Haiti, she said. Azemar said her father said there were only 30 deaths there so far, but the community has been devastated by the collapse of so many houses. "The ground is against them," she said, "so they can't do anything."
Leblanc warned his daughters that if there was a strong or torrential wind or heavy rain, most houses left standing in Miragoane would totally collapse. Residents there are in the same boat as those in Port au Prince -- no electricity, no shelter and no food, he told his daughters.
According to Azemar, her father will be making his way back to Montreal shortly. For that, she and her two other sisters and mother are very grateful.
To show her gratitude, the teacher at a Montreal 7th Day Adventist School has registered to go and help rebuild Haiti in the near future. In the meantime, her school is holding a fundraiser to help raise money for a relief agency.
"We have to keep hope. So many of the missing can't get to ther house for address books or phones for telephone numbers. Many of them don't have their numbers in their heads."
Like so many others, Azemar and her sisters and mother registered her father on a number of websites for missing Canadians, including those run by the Red Cross and Facebook.
When they finally talked to him late Sunday, Leblanc was quiet but made out like nothing much had happened, his daughter said.
"He's just that type of person. He was trying to not make a scene and pretend nothing happened in Haiti. He's the kind of person who likes to reassure and comfort people so we don't have to be afraid."
Leblanc, 64, had gone to Haiti in November to visit family and friends. His daughters had last heard from him at New Year's. When the quake struck, the family had repeatedly tried to reach Leblanc, but didn't get an answer. For daughter Sherline, the earthquake represents just another blow to Haiti. "I said, okay, that always happens to Haiti. They have too many bad things. We are always suffering."
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