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Called to quench a slum’s thirst
By JIM SPENCER, Star TribuneFebruary 25, 2010Photographer Richard Tsong-Taatarii, Star Tribune
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They ran for blocks whenthey saw the big truck withthe Minnesota license plateroll by. Little girls and oldwomen, little boys andyoung men, all chasing theshiny silver tanker downstreets of Cite Soleil, one ofthe world’s worst slums.Past fly-infested garbagepiles, by canals reeking ofraw sewage, they carriedbuckets, pans, pots, tubs —anything that could holdwhat has become gold inthe ruins of Haiti’scatastrophic earthquake:clean water.Behind the wheel of thesemi-cab pulling thetanker, a short, wiry Minneapolis man with abadly sunburned facegrinned. The dirty woolGreek seaman's capperched on his head didn'treally fit the tropicalsurroundings. But then,many things about KevinMcClellan don't fit.Like why he has spentmuch of the past decadedevising ways to deliverhundreds of thousands ofgallons of clean water to agang-ruled grid of streetswhere the United Nationsoften refuses to enterexcept in armed vehicles.
"Respect the line," Kevin McClellan barks in fractured Creoleas he tries to maintain order in a long line of peopledesperate for clean water from retired Minnesota truckswhich he brings to Cite Soleil six days a week.
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In Cite Soleil, children run at the sight of Kevin McClellan's water truck. There is norunning water there and and raw open sewage can carry disease especially during therainy season which comes in April and May.
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