00:00I don't see how, as a Venezuelan, I can not do something, however little it is as a drop in
00:10the ocean.
00:11On the 24th of June, Venezuela was hit with two back-to-back earthquakes, which killed over 3,000 people.
00:19Now, it's believed around 50,000 people are missing under the rubble.
00:27One Venezuelan-born Ashford resident still has family and friends in the country, including a great aunt who had to
00:34be rescued from the top floor of her building.
00:37Even though our heart is still in Venezuela, we carry a bit of this guilt, like we're not there.
00:42So we have the shock and the stress and the trauma and we can't, we're like, I mean, I know
00:49so many Venezuelans that are like, I just want to go there and dig with my hands.
00:52But the good news is that the several million of us that are out, we can be a support and
00:59a help by mobilising, by utilising network and resources that if we, perhaps if we had been there, we wouldn't,
01:06we would be in the same boat.
01:07So Tingy Somoza-Lopez has organised a donation hub for medical necessities in collaboration with Ashford Free Shop.
01:14Nappies, which is, you know, an easy, obvious one because there are so many children and babies that have been
01:20orphaned or displaced.
01:23We also are looking for personal hygiene, so things like menstrual pads.
01:29And for Carolina, it was only natural that the donation hub was held here.
01:33As the free shop culture is about community, kindness, love and compassion, when my friend Tingy called me and informed
01:41me about the earthquake, I was like, I need to do this.
01:45I'm going to help you. You can bring all the stock here.
01:49We're going to connect everybody to make sure people can bring the stock and we can show up for this
01:55nation that is suffering.
01:56The donations come in multiple times a day and are being brought in by both traders and locals alike.
02:02This is Tingy's car and as you can see, it's pretty full of the donations, but these are just the
02:08donations from this morning.
02:10They're expected to receive so many more throughout the day.
02:13Now, the donations started on Thursday and at the moment, everything is being held in Tingy's living room.
02:17Well, she'll have to go through and itemise everything, but she's expecting to send off the first shipment to Venezuela
02:23next week.
02:24And with a surge for missing people still underway in Venezuela, Tingy says it's never too late to donate.
02:31Naila Mohamed for KMTV in Ashford.
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