Impact Stories

“My children haven’t gone to bed hungry this past month. I can’t explain how much that means to me.”

For Alice Harant Gobanian, a 65-year-old widow in Lebanon, food vouchers make it possible for her family to eat nutritious food.

One of Alice’s daughters and seven grandchildren live with her in a small three-room apartment in Nabaa, a neighbourhood in Beirut.

When the huge explosion rocked the port of Beirut in August 2020, Fatima immediately had a flashback to the war in Syria.

“Everything is gone! You have to come to Beirut immediately. A disaster has happened!"

That's the message Christine Codsi received about the impact of the devastating port explosion on her business.

Like many in Lebanon, Darwich is a manual worker, looking for jobs every day. This means his income is unpredictable – if there’s no work, there’s no money.

“If I don’t gain money, my family won’t have anything to eat nor even drink,” he says of how he supports a family of eight.

“My children, especially the younger ones, were crying more often and wouldn’t leave me alone,” says Amal. The doctors told her husband -- a port worker -- to rest and stay off work for at least six weeks.

Water, too much of it, uninvited and out of control, flooded her house. Madina, her husband and her children spent the next ten days sleeping under a plastic sheet.

The words of our colleagues are being echoed across the country as hundreds of thousands of Indo-Canadians bear the burden of waiting for news from friends and family in India.

Loubna and her family first arrived in Lebanon as refugees, and together they rented a small apartment in Bekaa. Loubna got a job as a caretaker in a clothing store, which allowed her to provide for her two daughters on her own, since her husband is no longer in the picture.

The only thing worse than having to flee your own home because of flooding, is having to do it two nights in a row.

Dina and her family live in Syria. Ten years into the relentless conflict in that country, more than 11 million people are in need of humanitarian assistance.

At 26 years old, she was a proud business owner of a beauty salon. But after the explosion, her shop was destroyed – the windows shattered, the walls crumbled and her equipment was broken.