Dear Family and Friends,



Today is a beautiful day, sunny and bright with a little breeze. But things will soon change. Hurricane Dean is category 4 on the verge of being category 5 (so we hear), and is headed over Jamaica Sunday afternoon . As we brace for the hurricane, a flurry of activity is going on around us. Trips to the store for water, toilet paper, food, and other necessities is in full force.  We are blessed to be surrounded by classmates and professors who are experts in emergency management. These are seasoned professionals who have seen this type of hurricane before, and are making sure that when Dean hits we will all be as safe as possible.  Our buildings were made to survive this type of weather, hard solid concrete, steel slatted windows.



Overall, we are well-supplied and preparing to be hunkered down in secure/non-flood-prone structures on the University of the West Indies campus and will stick it out.  We’re taking the situation very seriously, but we hope for the best and optimistically expect to be delayed just a few days returning home.  The US Embassy in Jamaica has been alerted to our presence, and we have prepared an phone train to ensure that all our emergency contacts are informed as soon as possible. Our fieldwork went well, but we shudder imagining what will happen to some of the local communities we visited throughout the week.  The current task is to maintain calm & order within our group, and to get us to Monday.



We may not be online again until we are back in the USA (end of the week?), and we will send another note then.  Until then, wish us luck and we will see you soon, mon. 



In-Country Emergency Numbers

Cat Lem: 876 541 3597

Stephanie Brodine: 876 447 8401

Henroy Scarlet: 876 894 0636

Madhav Bhatta: 876 447 8228

Catherine Lem

Program Coordinator