Fear, worry constant companions for Haitians abroad

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Fear and frustration kept company with the thousands of Haitians abroad who were unable to reach their family and friends in the earthquake-ravaged Caribbean country.

"My parents, my five children and my friends are all in Haiti. And there is nothing I can do," a teary-eyed Antoinette Lamande, 48, said on Wednesday, polishing the counter of an empty restaurant in Brooklyn's East Flatbush, which serves as home to some of New York City's more than 100,000 Haitians.

At a nearby barber shop, Georges Hamilton asked the dozen or so men gathered around the television if they had heard any news.

"This is utterly catastrophic," Hamilton said. "I have an aunt and two uncles near Port-au-Prince. And no news."

The television near him showed collapsed buildings and bloodied and dazed people wandering the streets of Port-au-Prince.

In one of Boston's poorer sections, Maurice Sylvester, 48, was behind the counter of a store on Blue Hill Avenue watching TV coverage of the magnitude 7.0 earthquake that toppled hillside shanties and the presidential palace.

"I have family there. I kept calling all night. I couldn't even sleep," Sylvester said. "My mother is there, and seven relatives are in the area where it happened. I can't reach anyone, and that hurts me."

Some 30,000 Haitians live in Illinois, most in the Chicago area, according to the Haitian Congress to Fortify Haiti, based in Evanston.

Aline Lauture of the Haitian Congress said members reported it was nearly impossible to reach relatives in Haiti.

"We had a meeting last night and called on the community to come together to brainstorm about what to do, about how to help with relief efforts," Lauture said in a phone interview.

"Ten people are willing to go and more will sign up," she said. "We want to work with another organization because we're not equipped ourselves."

Hugues Berrette, the vicar at Brooklyn's St Jerome's Church, led mourners in noon prayers, tried to provide some solace and planned to organize supplies and funds to be sent.

"We don't have much money but we'll do what we can, we have to give the example and sacrifice something," Berrette said.

(Additional reporting by Ros Krasny in Boston and Andrew Stern in Chicago, editing by Philip Barbara)