When Hurricane Melissa made landfall in Jamaica last October, Gordon Higgins watched from Japan, waiting for news of family and friends back home. Months later, he is channeling that anxiety into action.
¡°I wanted to do something in support of Jamaicans back home,¡± says Higgins, 41, who has lived in Japan for 17 years. ¡°It was all really sad because this unprecedented storm got little to no news time in Japan.¡±
Melissa was the fiercest storm to hit the region in modern history, striking Jamaica with winds exceeding 295 kilometers per hour. It affected 1.25 million people, left 45 dead, forced more than 1,000 into shelters and put up to 360,000 in need of food assistance. Reconstruction continues, but recovery has been slow.
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