PUERTO RICO
tracking numbers for packages that dozens of people have sent to Toa Baja, Puerto Rico, with supplies to help those in need rebuild their lives after Hurricane Maria devastated the island in September.
It’s been two months since the hurricane, but Paul is still adding tracking numbers to that list, ones that she’ll cross out when the packages arrive. She isn’t planning to stop any time soon.
Paul contacted her stepmother, Carmen Arroyo, in Puerto Rico as soon as she could get through after the hurricane — to ensure that her family there was safe, but also to ask a question that her friends had been asking her: “What can we do to help?”
The answer was to send supplies — not for Paul’s family in Puerto Rico, but for others affected more deeply. Arroyo rattled off a list of things they needed: flashlights, batteries, work gloves, grill lighters and more.
Paul and her brother, Samuel Camacho Jr., of Grandview Heights, got to work on Facebook, alerting their friends about what to send and where to send it — Paul and Camacho’s father’s post office box in Puerto Rico.
At first, there was nothing. Arroyo and her husband, Samuel Camacho Sr., wondered whether anything was coming. Paul reassured them that boxes were on the way.
One day, the postmaster had a box for them. A few days later, there were 30.
Word had spread, and now numerous boxes have been sent, resulting in many revisions to the list. With help from Arroyo’s children, Jecar and Gabriel Robles, they distribute the items to those in need in three neighboring communities.
The entire family was gathered in Blacklick this week, coming to the U.S. mainland for Thanksgiving.
Jecar and Gabriel said they found many heartwrenching situations while delivering boxes.
“We found people bedbound; we found people with nothing,” Jecar said. Others were starving and hadn’t eaten in days.
There were some places where no one had gone — the military and the government couldn’t get to them or hadn’t arrived yet. Those were the places the family desperately wanted to reach.
Gabriel recalled one man so thankful to have food that he opened a can of chicken on the spot and started eating. The siblings gave him two rations.
“A lot of people just get shocked,” Gabriel said of people’s reactions to the supplies. He was speaking Spanish with his stepbrother, Camacho Jr., translating.
“They start giving you hugs, saying, ‘You’re the only ones who have brought us what we truly need,’” Gabriel said.
Arroyo said her house was mostly spared, but many in Puerto Rico still don’t have water or electricity. The whole family has been delighted, and surprised, by the help from central Ohio.
“It started as five people, then it grew to 15, now it’s 55,” Camacho Jr. said of people he and Paul were communicating with through Facebook.
They created a Facebook group — “Huracane Relief From USA to Toa Baja” — and update the list of needs there constantly.
Since the movement started, hundreds of boxes have been sent. Donors include Columbus City Schools students and staff, Upper Arlington students, churches, individuals from Arizona and Colorado, a dentist in Miami, and others.
“It’s touching,” Paul said. “All the way from Ohio. It’s touching. People just never thought this was going to happen.”
Arroyo is touched by it as well, and Camacho Jr. said his stepmother has to have a box of tissues with her when she opens the boxes, as the letters Paul has encouraged senders to include make her emotional.
“Little ones are writing to Puerto Rico, saying, ‘We love you,’” Arroyo said. “There’s a saying in Puerto Rico, ‘We kicked the ant hill and all the ants came out.’ People are helping.”
To help, visit the Facebook group “Huracane Relief From USA to Toa Baja” for a list of needed items or send materials to Samuel Camacho and Carmen Arroyo, P.O. Box 1867, Sabana Seca, Puerto Rico 00952.